House of Commons
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Mr Speaker
I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that Her Majesty has signified her Royal Assent to the following Acts:
Fisheries Act 2020
Social Security (Up-rating of Benefits) Act 2020.
Oral Answers to Questions
(4 years ago)
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Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Education (Gavin Williamson)
To support schools to open fully from the autumn, we published guidance in July and updated it as necessary. Schools have access to an advice service and supply of test kits. By assessing risk and maximising the use of Public Health England-endorsed control measures, schools reduce risk for pupils and staff.
Bambos Charalambous
Schools are facing huge budget pressures as costs escalate for increased supply cover as teachers self-isolate and from unfunded covid-19 cleaning costs. More than a quarter of all state schools are using reserve budgets to ensure that pupils have devices and access to the internet to study while isolating at home. What assurances can the Secretary of State give that schools will get the funding they need to cover these unforeseen costs?
Gavin Williamson
I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that important point. We know how important it is. We already outlined a package for the summer term, and tens of millions of pounds have been distributed to schools. We have kept this matter under review and will update the House closely in the near future.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
Can the Secretary of State say how many pupils have been sent home from school for covid-related reasons since the start of this term, and of those, how many have been sent home on more than one occasion?
Gavin Williamson
The hon. Lady raises an important point about the number of pupils being sent home. We keep a close monitor of those children who are sent home and we are working with the sector, so we can provide her with that detail and will send it on to her.
Kate Green
I am disappointed that the Secretary of State does not know those figures. Parents, pupils and teachers have told me of students having been sent home three, four, even five times; some have missed up to one third of their time in school. I am sure the Secretary of State agrees that that will have a disastrous impact on their learning. As we have heard, promised help with laptops and additional costs has not always arrived. School leaders and staff are stressed and exhausted. I support him in wanting pupils to be safely in school, but please will he tell our dedicated and desperate teachers, heads and support staff what he is going to do to support them and keep children learning?
Gavin Williamson
At every stage, we on the Government side of the House have championed the importance of schools and getting children back into schools. We have done everything we can to support schools to welcome children back. We have done everything we can in terms of the over half a million laptops that are going to be distributed, and are being distributed, to schools to support remote learning. We recognise the fact that children have lost out as a result of this covid pandemic. That is why the Government pledged £1 billion-worth of support to schools to help them catch up that lost learning.
Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con)
The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)
The Department published updated guidance in September 2020 on the admission of summer-born children. The guidance will help ensure that decisions are taken in the best interests of the child concerned. It remains our intention to legislate to change the school admissions code when an opportunity is available.
Stephen Hammond
I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. I agree with him that legislating would ensure that all summer-born children get the opportunity and the life outcome they deserve. Will he agree to meet me and perhaps a member of the Treasury so that we can ensure that that legislation comes through in this Parliament?
Nick Gibb
May I first pay tribute to my hon. Friend for highlighting the important issue of summer-born children? Of course, I would be delighted to meet him to discuss the legislation that we need to put through to ensure that his and others’ very strong opinions about fairness for summer-born children are implemented.
Stuart Anderson (Wolverhampton South West) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Vicky Ford)
We have made an unprecedented investment in childcare of £3.6 billion this year. Childcare settings have been prioritised for reopening, childcare bubbles have reduced pressure on working parents, and from next Easter, disadvantaged children will be able to take part in our holiday activities and food programmes all across the country.[Official Report, 24 November 2020, Vol. 684, c. 5MC.]
Stuart Anderson
The Minister will know of my enthusiasm for campaigning for another outstanding secondary school in Wolverhampton. Will she work with me to see that that comes to fruition and that we get another outstanding secondary school in Wolverhampton?
Vicky Ford
My hon. Friend shares our passion for making sure that we improve education in Wolverhampton and all across the country. He has been championing that non-stop, lobbying my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. The free schools programme has created thousands of high-quality school places. Three secondary applications have been received from my hon. Friend’s constituency, and we hope to make a decision later this year.
Mrs Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Education (Gavin Williamson)
We are clear that schools have a duty to provide remote education for state-funded children who are unable to attend school due to coronavirus. I gave a direction that placed a legal duty to provide remote education in those circumstances. That has been in effect since 22 October 2020.
Mrs Murray [V]
I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. Many teachers are also having to self-isolate. For those who are healthy, are we ensuring that they are able to assist with online learning?
Gavin Williamson
We very much are, and we are encouraging schools with teachers who are not in a position to be in the classroom, to ensure and support online learning straight into children’s homes. It is absolutely vital we do so. As we see more and more testing becoming available, we can release staff so they can be back in the classroom supporting the amazing work that is already going on there.
Mr Speaker
Let us head to the Secretary of State for Education, Robert Halfon—not the Secretary of State, the Chair of the Select Committee on Education. [Laughter.] The next promotion!
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con) [V]
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. We have a good Secretary of State already.
Last week, The Sunday Times reported that a record 600,000 children were absent from class due to covid-related reasons. We know that around the country sending pupils home has, sadly, become more commonplace. It is right that exams in some form or another take place next year, but will my right hon. Friend set out the measures he is taking to ensure there is an absolute level playing field for those left behind during the coronavirus outbreak, as well as those who are sent home to self-isolate, so they have as fair a chance as possible in their exams as every other pupil?
Gavin Williamson
What all the evidence points to is that exams are the best and fairest way to ensure that children, especially children from the most disadvantaged backgrounds and children from black and ethnic minority backgrounds, get the best possible grades. What is so important is that we deliver fairness for all youngsters right across the board. We have already announced a package of measures to push back the date when exams will take place, so people can catch up on lost learning. We have also announced a £1 billion package to support schools to deliver extra assistance for those youngsters. We will announce further measures to ensure absolute fairness in our exam system, so that young people have the best opportunity to prove themselves when they have the opportunity to take their exams.
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Education (Gavin Williamson)
The national funding formula distributes funding based on school and pupil characteristics. Despite budget pressures due to covid, we have increased funding for the lowest-funded schools to ensure every school has the resources it needs to deliver an outstanding education, with at least £5,150 per pupil next year for all secondary schools and £4,000 per pupil for primary schools.
Sir Edward Leigh
The headmaster of Caistor Grammar School has contacted me. This school produces, for kids from all sorts of backgrounds, some of the best results in the east midlands, but its buildings are in a shocking state. He has been refused a condition improvement grant, despite the fact that he has temporary and mobile classrooms that are classed by the Secretary of State’s Department as grade A. Will the Secretary of State assure me that, in his national funding formula negotiations, there is no discrimination against grammar schools? I often find that, while the education is wonderful, the buildings are peeling.
Gavin Williamson
I can absolutely assure my right hon. Friend that there will be no discrimination shown against grammar schools. I encourage him to be in contact with the school as the next round of condition improvement funding is due in January next year. I very much encourage that school, as well as other schools in his constituency, to apply. That gives me the opportunity to highlight the fact that we are spending more on the condition and improvement of our schools, with an extra half a billion pounds allocated to support schools and their rebuilding.[Official Report, 24 November 2020, Vol. 684, c. 6MC.]
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)
We are making over half a million laptops and tablets available for disadvantaged students across the country by the end of the year. Since September, over 100,000 devices have been delivered to schools, building on over 220,000 delivered in the summer term. Where children lack access to the internet at home, we have also delivered over 50,000 routers.
Maria Eagle
Knowsley is one of the most deprived boroughs in the country and has had its allocation of laptops cut from 1,065 to 282 since the Government’s 80% cut in allocations. Fifty-six of the 61 schools in Knowsley have at least one bubble self-isolating and one primary school in Halewood in my constituency which currently has 60 children self-isolating has been allocated six laptops. Half the children in that school have no access to technology at home, so how exactly are headteachers meant to comply with the Government’s regulations that schools must provide immediate access to high-quality, remote learning for pupils who are self-isolating?
Nick Gibb
Any school where pupils are self-isolating, and which has disadvantaged students who do not have access to a computer, is able to contact the Department to acquire extra computers beyond those allocated. I am told that it takes 48 working hours to have those laptops delivered to the school. In the context of significant global demand for laptops and tablets, we have updated the process of allocating those devices to schools to align more accurately with the number of students typically self-isolating. This will help to ensure that those who are self-isolating and need a laptop or a tablet are able to receive one.
Zarah Sultana
Teachers in Coventry South have stressed to me the importance of pupils having access to computers at home, but many children from working-class communities do not have that. One school in my constituency, Ernesford Grange Community Academy, found that 12% of students—101 pupils—struggle to access a device at home. The Government introduced a new duty on schools to provide online learning, but the next day they slashed the allocation of laptops. Ernesford Grange saw its allocation fall from 111 to just 22, so will the Minister today guarantee that every school in Coventry has the laptops that their students need?
Nick Gibb
The allocation is to schools that are not necessarily sending children home to self-isolate—that is to all schools, whether or not their pupils are self-isolating. We need to make sure that there is a computer—a laptop—for every disadvantaged pupil who does not have one who is self-isolating, and because we made that decision, we are able to ensure that every pupil in those circumstances will receive a computer. All they have to do is phone the Department for Education, and they will have the computer, if they fulfil the eligibility, within 48 hours of putting in that call.
Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
Simon Baynes (Clwyd South) (Con)
Gordon Henderson (Sittingbourne and Sheppey) (Con)
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)
We are working with Ofqual and engaging widely with the education sector to identify risks to examinations at a national, local and individual level and to consider the measures needed to address any potential disruption. That could be a student unable to sit examinations or schools affected by a local outbreak. More details will be published shortly.
Lucy Powell [V]
GCSEs and A-levels are two-year courses. Most students have missed six months of in-school teaching for these courses. Ofsted has concluded that that has impacted on the disadvantaged the most, and significantly, in the three months since school has started, some students have missed even more, with high pupil and staff absences reflecting the high infection rates. That is particularly the case for the disadvantaged, those in the north and BME communities. How can any form of traditional exams be done on a level playing field, particularly for poorer kids in the north? Will the Minister be happy that the huge attainment gap that follows will be his personal legacy?
Nick Gibb
Our No. 1 priority is to make sure that we help young people catch up on their lost education. That is why we have allocated £1 billion to schools—the catch-up premium—to help students catch up and, of that, £350 million is allocated to disadvantaged pupils. We have delayed this summer’s exams—GCSEs and A-levels—by three weeks to free up teaching time. Ofqual consulted in the summer on changes to assessment on issues such as science practicals, field trips, spoken language and optionality in history and English literature, again to help reduce pressure on teaching times. We will shortly announce other measures to help to ensure that exams are fair, including the approach to grading to ensure that the 2021 cohort is treated fairly compared with previous years’ cohorts of students.
Ruth Cadbury
Secondary heads in my constituency told me last month that it was already too late to plan properly for even the delayed GCSEs and A-levels next summer, and they are still waiting. If the Republic of Ireland Government could give students and teachers a clear roadmap for summer 2021 back in August, and a plan B that went along with it if the situation changed, why can this Government not do the same and give students in years 11, 12 and 13 a fighting chance?
Nick Gibb
As I said to the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell), everything we are doing is about ensuring that every student has a fighting chance to do well in the exam. There is a broad consensus that exams are the fairest way to judge a student’s assessment. We want to ensure that that fairness is spread right across the country, regardless of the experience any individual will have had as a result of the virus. That is why we are delaying the exams, why there have been changes to the assessment and why we are still working with Ofqual and the exam boards on further mitigations and contingencies to ensure that every student is treated fairly. We will have more to say about those issues shortly.
Munira Wilson
Young people across this country, including Sophie, an A-level student in my constituency, are extremely anxious about this year’s exams after last year’s fiasco, and due to the precious face-to-face teaching time lost in the first lockdown and to the self-isolations and teacher absences currently. Why will the Minister not, please, listen to Sophie and follow the lead of the Liberal Democrat Education Minister in Wales by providing clarity and certainty now, by cancelling exams and moving to a robust teacher-led assessment? As Sophie said to me: “We are not lazy. We need your help.” Will the Minister listen to her and help her?
Nick Gibb
We listen to all opinions on this issue, but there is a broad consensus, including among unions and school leaders, that holding exams is the best option for next summer. That is the fairest and best way of judging students’ performance. But as I said earlier, we know that all students due to sit exams next year have experienced disruption to their education due to the pandemic, and that is why we are working closely with the school sector to ensure that clear contingency plans are in place for students who are ill or have to self-isolate. We are engaging widely on contingency plans and other measures to ensure that exams are fair this year.
Simon Baynes
Can the Minister say how the arguments put forward by the Welsh Government to cancel GCSE and A-level exams are informing his own decision-making process at UK Government level?
Nick Gibb
Yes, I can. We of course look at the decisions taken by the devolved Administrations on such matters, but the broad consensus remains that exams are the fairest and best way of assessing student attainment and of ensuring that young people have the qualifications that they need for the next stage of their education. The £1 billion catch-up fund, £195 million on laptops and computers, the delay of three weeks in the exam timetable and the changes to assessment already announced by Ofqual are all designed to ensure that the experience of students next summer is as stress-free and as fair as possible.
Gordon Henderson
I have received a number of letters from the heads of primary schools in Sittingbourne and Sheppey concerned about the potential further loss of learning time if pupils have to sit standard assessment and other tests. What reassurances will my right hon. Friend offer to my hard-working and valuable teachers that those tests are essential to the future development of children as they are being prepared for future individual and group study later in life?
Nick Gibb
My hon. Friend is right, as he so often is. The exams, and the preparation for revision, tests and exams at primary and secondary are the best way of ensuring that knowledge is retained, so it can be built on in the next stage of a young person’s education and training. That is why we are determined to do all we can to help young people catch up on the lost teaching time that they may have suffered while schools were closed to most pupils.
Michael Fabricant [V]
Despite the excellent news regarding vaccines this morning—Britain has the largest vaccine portfolio in the world—and despite the millions being put into getting schools on to a level playing field for all students regarding virtual teaching, it is estimated that right now some 80% of schools are disadvantaged when it comes to training their students who are isolating at home. Can the Schools Minister please tell me what discussions he is having with the examining boards? Will he ensure that they take all this into account when they are allocating grades next year?
Nick Gibb
My hon. Friend will know that 99% of schools are open and that overall attendance is 83% in secondary schools. We are working with the exam boards and with Ofqual on the issue of grading, and we will have more to say on that shortly, but we are also working with the exam boards and Ofqual to ensure that the experience students have next summer is as fair as possible, given all that they have experienced over the last year.
Tony Lloyd [V]
I was recently in touch with schools across my constituency and, other than the money to meet the costs of covid, a common theme was the disproportionate amount of days lost by teaching staff and pupils in towns such as Rochdale and in Greater Manchester across the piece. The Minister says that he will make exams fair, but how can he do that when young people in Greater Manchester have lost more teaching hours than those in other parts of the country? Also, how can it be fair when young people who are at the end of the fourth term of their A-level syllabus still do not know what the regime will be as they approach their exams next summer?
Nick Gibb
We have been very clear that exams are the fairest and best way of assessing student attainment, but we are also conscious of the fact that a large number of pupils have suffered a different experience from other pupils up and down the country. We want to ensure that the exams are as fair as possible while also being valid qualifications. That is the work we have been doing with Ofqual and the exam boards for several weeks, and we have announced a delay of three weeks to holding those exams to try to free up as much teaching time as possible.
Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)
We all agree that exams would be the fairest and best way to assess pupils this year, and given the absolute chaos at the heart of last year’s exams, it would have been reasonable to expect Ministers to have a plan in place by now, yet the Minister’s answers this afternoon have been woefully inadequate, at a time when school leaders, teachers, parents and pupils are crying out for certainty. Given the obvious challenges to ensuring that exams go ahead in a way that is fair to all pupils, and the fact that any delay makes the job harder, when will Ministers present a plan, which teachers and pupils can see, for exams to go ahead in a fair way?
Nick Gibb
The hon. Gentleman is a serious Member of this House—I was delighted when he was appointed shadow Schools Minister; I congratulate him on that appointment and welcome him to the Front Bench—so I know that he knows that these issues are complex. They need to be thought through and they need to be consulted on, and that is what we are doing with pace, rigour and energy, but I recognise that, in opposition, there is always a temptation to reach for the slogan rather than the solution.
Sir Roger Gale (North Thanet) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Education (Gavin Williamson)
The latest published data shows that, as of 12 November, 0.2% of pupils in state-funded schools were absent due to a confirmed covid case, and between 5.8% and 6.7% were self-isolating due to contact either in or outside school. Statistics are published weekly, and the data for the week of 23 November will be published on 1 December.
Sir Roger Gale [V]
First, will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating Herne Church of England Junior School on achieving an extraordinarily high placing in The Sunday Times listings? There are schools in North Thanet with whole classes isolating, including year 1 and year 2 children. Those are the children scheduled to undergo phonic screening, and others are facing SATs. Further to the question put to the Minister of State by my hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Gordon Henderson), will the Secretary of State look carefully and again consider the possibility of allowing teacher assessments to take the place of SATs, for this year only?
Gavin Williamson
I join my right hon. Friend in congratulating Herne Church of England Junior School on its exceptional ranking, which is obviously down to the commitment and dedication of the teaching and support staff, as well, of course, as the pupils and parents, who do so much to support the school. He raises an important point about SATs and assessment. This is a useful internal tool for schools, enabling teachers to have a good grasp and clear understanding of where those children are, especially after so much disruption this year. We will be working closely with the sector to ensure that anything we do in this field is very much to support them and the children, and to support the learning and understanding of what support those children need going forward and not add extra pressures to them.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
The Minister for Universities (Michelle Donelan)
Throughout the development of the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill proposals and preceding White Paper, the UK Government have engaged constructively with many businesses, professional organisations and other groups, including the General Teaching Council for Scotland.
Alan Brown
During the debate on that Bill in the other place last week, Lord Callanan assured peers that
“the devolved Administrations will retain the right to legislate in devolved policy areas.”
—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 November 2020; Vol. 807, c. 1520.]
However, during the previous Education questions the Secretary of State would not give a clear answer on whether the Bill could impact the Scottish Government’s ability to set university fees in Scotland. So can the Minister now confirm that her Government’s internal market Bill will not undermine the Scottish Government’s provision of free university tuition?
Michelle Donelan
I can indeed confirm that it will not interfere with the Scottish Government’s ability to charge no fees for university students.
Patrick Grady
Well, that is a very unequivocal answer, so we look forward to that not coming back to bite them at any point in the future. I am glad the Minister is engaging with the GTCS, because in the other place the Minister has had to table an amendment to specifically include school teaching in the list of exempted professions. School teaching could be interpreted narrowly as solely relating to the education of children, but of course GTCS-registered teachers teach in many different educational settings, so will this Minister clarify whether the amendment is intended to include any institution in which teaching is delivered?
Michelle Donelan
We have listened to the concerns about the Bill’s provision covering the mutual recognition of professional qualifications and have decided to exclude the teaching profession, so on Thursday 19 November the Government tabled an amendment to do just that.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP) [V]
That is an encouraging answer from the Minister, so I thank her for that response. She says that the Government have engaged with the GTCS, but last month the GTCS wrote to the Secretary of State on this very matter and has yet to receive a response. Is that normal Government practice when dealing with professional organisations? When should the GTCS expect to hear from the Secretary of State?
Michelle Donelan
As the hon. Lady will know, officials from the Department for Education and the Scotland Office have met the GTCS to discuss these concerns and have passed them to those who are leading on the implementation of the UK internal market proposals. As a result, an amendment to exempt teachers from the recognition clauses of the Bill has been tabled.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
Mark Fletcher (Bolsover) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)
There are still too many parts of the UK that have been left behind, and this Government are committed to bridging the gap in every region and levelling up opportunity in every corner of our country. That is why we are investing £2.5 billion in the national skills fund to turbo-charge our economic recovery and introducing a lifetime skills guarantee, so that no one is left behind, no matter their age or stage of learning.
Andrew Jones
I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. As she is planning the budgets and assessing the regional challenges, will she take into consideration the different levels of pandemic across the country? The highest levels of infection lead to the highest levels of people having to isolate, including teachers, so there are increased budgetary costs from having to backfill teaching staff. King James’s School in Knaresborough, a secondary school in my constituency, briefed me that this is running at £7,000 a week, so schools are facing a significant challenge.
Gillian Keegan
Of course, we are here to support schools and colleges, and we know that they are facing challenges. On top of their existing budgets, we have provided up to £75,000 additional funding to schools to cover unavoidable costs that could not be met from their existing budgets, which includes additional cleaning, support for free school meals and increased premises costs associated with keeping schools open for the holidays. There will be a further opportunity later in the year for schools to claim for eligible costs that fell between March and July that they did not claim for during that first window and, as the Secretary of State mentioned earlier, support for schools is kept under review.
Mark Fletcher
I would very much like to see higher educational attainment across the Bolsover constituency. Does my hon. Friend agree that a vital way in which we can make that happen is local post-16 provision and perhaps a sixth form in Bolsover itself?
Gillian Keegan
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This Government are committed to bringing excellent post-16 provision to every corner of the country. I was really glad to learn that West Nottinghamshire College, which serves many of his constituents, ranks among the top colleges in the UK for student satisfaction. He will be aware that local authorities have responsibilities regarding young people’s participation in education and training, and I have asked my colleagues in the Education and Skills Funding Agency to look closely at post-16 provision in the Bolsover area to identify whether further action is required.
Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
I am sure the Minister will agree with me that children cannot learn if they are subject to exploitation and neglect, but that is precisely what is happening in children’s homes across the country. Last year, more than 37,000 cases were reported of looked-after children going missing from children’s homes. That is a 150% increase from 2015 and experts attribute this to rising criminal and sexual exploitation. The Government promised a review into children’s care nearly a year ago. What on earth is delaying this?
Gillian Keegan
Local authorities have a statutory duty to protect all children from wherever they go missing. Children who go missing from home can face the same risks as a child going missing from local authority care. The Department for Education’s statutory guidance on children who run away or go missing from home or care settings sets out clear steps that local authorities and their partners should take to prevent all children from going missing and to protect them if they do go missing. Responsibilities to missing children remain unchanged during the pandemic. We expect local authorities to feel empowered to use their judgment to find suitable ways to safeguard children from the risks of going missing.
Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Vicky Ford)
Rolling out the excellent holiday activity and food programme for children across the country will mean that even more children will benefit from free healthy meals and enriching holiday activities. We have already written to all the local authorities with guidance. We will work closely with them, including sharing best practice from our pilot programmes, and we are appointing a national organisation from spring next year to support the local delivery.
Tom Hunt
Ipswich was lucky enough to be one of those pilots and, this summer, it actually had the holiday activity and food programme in operation. It was great to go there to meet not only the children who benefited from it, but the different organisations and the young adults from Ipswich who were able to play a part in delivering that service. Can the Minister outline what plans are in place, looking ahead to the Easter and summer holidays, to make sure that this continues to happen and that the community is completely aware of how it can get involved in this fantastic project?
Vicky Ford
It was a huge pleasure to visit the Government’s holiday activity and food programme with my hon. Friend in Ipswich this summer. We saw at first hand how local partnerships helped to deliver these excellent schemes, so we want to encourage schools, childcare providers, food suppliers, voluntary organisations, sports experts, and arts experts all to come together in partnership. Interested parties should contact their local authorities and together we will all make sure that next year’s holidays are full of food and fun.
Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)
The Minister for Universities (Michelle Donelan)
The Government keep the funding arrangements for the education of all pre-registration undergraduate and postgraduate NHS health professions under close review to ensure that students are appropriately supported. Most NHS professional student placements are funded by the education and training tariff, and the allocation of funding is reviewed and published annually.
Lilian Greenwood
Nursing and midwifery students are required to undertake 2,300 hours of clinical placement to qualify. Maintenance grants were reintroduced in England in September, but those student nurses and midwives who just graduated or who are about to, and who stepped up in the first wave of the pandemic despite the personal risks, have huge debts because the Government abolished their bursaries in 2016. What will the Minister do to acknowledge their tremendous contribution and ensure that they do not begin their careers in caring feeling undervalued, taken advantage of and carrying this massive financial burden?
Michelle Donelan
I echo the hon. Member’s sentiment about the true value that nursing students and graduates have given this country during one of the hardest times that we have faced. The Government are extremely grateful for all those students who opted into a paid clinical placement in the NHS during this extremely difficult time, and we have ensured that all those students were fairly rewarded for their hard work. Nursing, midwifery and allied healthcare students who volunteered were paid and received the appropriate pensions remuneration.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)
The Government are transforming the provision of skills. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and I regularly meet a diverse spectrum of stakeholders from around the further education sector to hear their views. On Unionlearn specifically, I met the TUC general secretary, Frances O’Grady, on 12 October to discuss this matter and our expanding commitment to skills through the national skills fund. The Secretary of State for Education met Frances O’Grady on 9 November for the very same reason.
Mr Speaker
Let us head up to Wansbeck with Ian Lavery. [Inaudible.] I think he has been cut off in his prime. I therefore call shadow Minister Toby Perkins.
Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
The recent Westminster Hall debate on Unionlearn was as illuminating for what was not said as for what was. There was no attempt by the Government to pretend that there had been a serious consultation with employers or educators before ceasing funding, nor was there a single Conservative Back-Bench MP willing to turn up to that debate to speak in favour of this cut. Does the Minister realise that no one will believe that the Government are serious about levelling up while they are cutting access to level 2 skills for the lowest paid workers?
Gillian Keegan
This Government are committed to substantial investment in further education, with priority given to qualifications aligned with our economic need, but, as I said during that debate, we need to focus taxpayers’ money on those who need it. With only 11% of users unemployed, Unionlearn simply is not the solution.[Official Report, 30 November 2020, Vol. 685, c. 2MC.] That is why, from April 2021, we will be fully funding the first level 3 qualification for adults who do not currently have a level 3 qualification. As I said during the debate, many of the basic provisions to which Unionlearn signposts learners are available right across the country, and have been available and introduced since Unionlearn was in existence.
Ian Lavery [V]
This Government have a real strange way of levelling up, and education is no different. Since its creation in 1998 by the Labour Government, the Unionlearn fund has enjoyed cross-party support and the backing of dozens of businesses. It is a flagship policy that costs the Government £12 million and returns £1.4 billion to the economy. It currently supports 200,000 individuals per annum to access learning; it is absolutely huge. Minister, put your cards on the table—this is an out and out attack against the trade union movement and its members. What is it about this hugely successful programme, which helps low-paid working people, that so antagonises the modern Conservative party?
Gillian Keegan
I am the first to recognise that, thanks to the funding provided by the Government, Unionlearn has done good work in directing and supporting people to take advantage of education and training opportunities in the workplace, but with millions in this country still lacking basic skills that they need to progress, we need a solution at scale that can reach everyone, not just those able to access the Unionlearn network. We have therefore created the £2.5 billion national skills fund and the £500 million skills recovery package to transform lives up and down the country, and to build our country back better; and we are making that available to everybody across the country.
Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Vicky Ford)
This Government are completely committed to free school meals, and no Government have ever been more generous with entitlements, extending eligibility to all infants and disadvantaged children in further education. But throughout the pandemic we also extended eligibility to groups with no recourse to public funds, and we continue to work across Government on longer-term eligibility for these families. Meanwhile, the extension of eligibility for free school meals remains.
Neil Coyle [V]
It is Government policy that has forced overstretched schools, charities and councils like Southwark to pick up the pieces and pay the price of the hostile environment that has left over 100,000 with no recourse to support, according to the Children’s Society. The Minister says that there are cross-Government talks. What representations has she made to the Home Office to end this scandal and save schools from this huge, inappropriate burden when they are already struggling with covid?
Vicky Ford
I remind the hon. Member that our new £170 million covid winter grant scheme will directly target the hardest-to-help families and individuals, and also provide food for children in need of it over the holidays. Some families with no recourse to public funds do receive support from the Home Office as is provided for under the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999, and section 17 of the Children Act 1989 requires local authorities to safeguard and promote the welfare of children within their area if they are in need, regardless of their immigration status.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Education (Gavin Williamson)
Last week I announced the Department’s intention to explore a post-qualification admissions system for higher education where students would receive and accept offers after they have received their A-level or equivalent grades. As set out in our manifesto, we are committed to levelling up our education system so that everyone with the ability to benefit from higher education can do so, regardless of their background. This is a fairer system that we are moving towards, especially for those youngsters from the most disadvantaged backgrounds. The Government will consult universities, colleges, schools, students, and, of course, devolved Administrations to understand how a PQA system can best be delivered in the interests of all students.
Andrew Gwynne [V]
We all want to see things returning to normal, but I note from the two local education authorities in my constituency that so many staff and pupils are off at any one time because of covid transmission and self-isolation. Given that this is likely to be the situation going into the new year, does the Secretary of State really expect routine Ofsted inspections to begin in January, and if so, how is that going to work for schools affected by covid?
Gavin Williamson
The hon. Member highlights an important issue about the fact that so many people right across the teaching profession and support staff are putting in so much effort to ensure that all our children get the benefit of a world-class education. We all know—especially Government Members, and many Opposition Members—the importance of keeping schools open and welcoming children into the classroom. We will continue to work with Ofsted so that our approach ensures that we have high standards and that the safeguarding measures that are properly in place remain in place, but always having proper regard for the good functioning of all schools and making sure that we do not get in the way or create barriers or obstacles to schools properly functioning.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
My hon. Friend raises such a vitally important point, because students right across the United Kingdom see it as one higher education system and are choosing the best universities for themselves, with many English students studying in Scotland and vice versa, and many Northern Irish and Welsh students studying in all the other four nations. It is absolutely important that we have a consistent approach. We have been working very closely with the DAs. This does show the strength of our higher education system as a Union system and how all universities working together in the United Kingdom strengthens all universities in all four nations.
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab) [V]
University students have been an afterthought in the Government’s thinking throughout the covid crisis, whether that is the A-level fiasco, the huge spike in cases after return in September, financial hardship, mental health or digital access. All have been palmed off to universities with only slow, token Government support, and now time is again running out. Will the Secretary of State take this opportunity to get ahead of events and publish clear, crisp and quick guidance for universities, so that they can plan for a safe and smooth student return in the new year?
The Minister for Universities (Michelle Donelan)
Following the end of term break, our top priority is January, and we will be ensuring that the welfare of students, staff and communities in higher education providers is at the forefront. We will look to utilise mass testing to make the return of higher education as safe as possible, and we will indeed produce further and comprehensive guidance.
Gareth Davies (Grantham and Stamford) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
Both Stamford College and Grantham College are great examples of brilliant further education provision, and I want to see more and more further education colleges coming to the fore, making sure that the skills revolution that this side of the House is absolutely committed to delivering is delivered, because far too often our attention and focus has been on higher education. We know that our further education colleges can be a real driver of productivity, skills, jobs and opportunity in local areas, including in Grantham and Stamford.
Mr Speaker
It might help the Secretary of State if I say that I am actually over here, which is where he should address his remarks.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP) [V]
With the end of the transition period fast approaching, the Home Secretary’s toxic immigration environment gives our universities little comfort, so how is the Secretary of State countering the Home Secretary’s damaging rhetoric? What discussions has he had with the Home Secretary and the higher education sector about the importance of our international staff and students?
Gavin Williamson
I thank my colleagues in the Home Office, who have worked so closely with Universities UK and universities right across all four nations to make sure that visa applications have gone smoothly. Despite the concerns and worries that many people voiced earlier this year that international students would not turn up, actually international students have been turning up, and I pay tribute to the cross-Government work that has been going on. What a powerful brand the United Kingdom has around the world, demonstrating that universities not just in England, but also in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, benefit from being part of the Union.
Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
I thank my hon. Friend, who has done so much to highlight the concerns and issues—not just of the University of Keele, but also of students whom he represents—and flag them up to the Department. We have worked very closely with the university sector, and it would be right for me to pay tribute to the Minister for Universities, my hon. Friend the Member for Chippenham (Michelle Donelan), who has done so much to ensure that all students will be able to return home for Christmas in an orderly and safe manner.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP) [V]
Michelle Donelan
Our universities are world leading when it comes to research, and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy recently published a road map. This is a priority for the Government. As the hon. Member will know, Horizon is being actively negotiated with the EU, and that Department has publicly said that it is preparing an alternative, should we not be successful in those negotiations.
Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
Even before he was elected to this House, my hon. Friend was campaigning to ensure that the people of Radcliffe and their children have a high school for their town. I know how passionately he feels about that; he has had a petition highlighting the issue and numerous meetings with me. We are still in the final phases of allocating round 14 of free schools, but his passionate campaigning has been noted, and I am sure we will all work to ensure that his constituents get the best educational attainment possible.
Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab)
The Minister for School Standards (Nick Gibb)
The hon. Gentleman will know that everything we have been doing since 2010 is about closing that attainment gap, and we have closed it by 13% in primary school and by 9% in secondary school. We know that the impact of the covid pandemic has been devastating across all sections of society, but particularly for disadvantaged pupils. That is why we have implemented a £1 billion catch-up fund. We are determined that no young person will suffer in the long term as a consequence of interruption to their education caused by the pandemic.
Imran Ahmad Khan (Wakefield) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
We all recognise the important role of the creative industries in driving the economy and the importance of having the right skills and training for young people who want to go into that industry. I would be more than happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss the challenges he faces in his constituency and how we can best assist.
Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)
Gavin Williamson
We are investing in skills right across the country through the lifetime skills guarantee, which gives a sense of opportunity to so many people who have never had it before. We want to invest the £12 million in our colleges up and down the country, to ensure that they have a real impact in our local communities. Unionlearn was costing £4 million in admin alone. That money is better spent on delivering skills for not only young people but people of all ages.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
I can absolutely assure my hon. Friend that under-16s should not be using that app. I would like to thank schools and the leadership of schools, which have done so much in working with Test and Trace to ensure that the number of youngsters who need to self-isolate as a result of a case has been reduced significantly over the past few weeks, making sure that as many as possible children are attending school. I will take up the point my hon. Friend has made and look at guidance on how best we can give people the right and proper steer.
Kate Osborne (Jarrow) (Lab)
Nick Gibb
This was the Government Equalities Office scheme to support a number of anti-LGBT bullying schemes. I have seen these schemes in action myself, and they are very good indeed. We will be looking at what more the DFE can do after the spending review to ensure that our anti-bullying programmes are LGBT-inclusive.
Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
As a Yorkshireman myself, I would agree that many exemplars come out of Yorkshire. The EdTech demonstrators the Department has been rolling out are a brilliant example, and I think that what Malton School has been doing really shows how we can best use technology to support pupils, including pupils from the most disadvantaged backgrounds.
Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)
Gavin Williamson
The hon. Gentleman raises an important point about vaccines. We are working very closely across Government to ensure that those people who have the greatest clinical need get the vaccine. He highlights a really important issue, and he would not be surprised to hear that, as Secretary of State for Education, I always see education as the absolute priority, but I would be very happy to work with the devolved Administrations to make sure that we have as combined and co-ordinated an approach as possible, which is really the greatest strength of our Union.
Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)
Gavin Williamson
I have some good news: on 14 January —after Christmas—there is going to be an opportunity for such schools to apply for the next round of condition improvement funding. There is more money in this pot than ever before due to the fact that we are spending more money on the improvement of our schools. Of course, I would always be very happy to sit down with my hon. Friend and discuss her educational priorities, including for the schools in her constituency.[Official Report, 24 November 2020, Vol. 684, c. 6MC.]
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
Gavin Williamson
We know how important it is to give children the opportunity to be in school, and that is why the Government prioritise school opening. We had more than 1.6 million children back in school before the summer holidays. We opened the door to all our schools right across the country to welcome children back, and it is great to see that 99% of schools are open. We continue to take the safety and security of not just pupils but staff incredibly seriously. That is why, at every stage of the way, we will do everything to ensure schools remain a safe environment. As the chief medical officers for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and the Children’s Commissioner for England said, children are best in school. That is why—
Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)
Thank you for squeezing me in, Mr Speaker.
It was absolutely right for the Government to keep schools open through the tiered system and lockdown, despite the pressure on my right hon. Friend from some of the unions and various others. One of the things that many teachers in my area have complained about is the patchiness of some of the advice its application: whole school groups—sometimes whole year groups—are going down because of the fear of infection. Would my right hon. Friend or the Schools Minister be prepared to deal with the guidance again and possibly participate in an online roundtable with my teachers, who are very keen to speak to them?
Gavin Williamson
I absolutely assure my right hon. Friend that the Schools Minister would love to do that with his teachers, and is enthusiastically penning in the date. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) is right that there have been some inconsistencies. That is why we set up the national helpline to ensure there is consistency of advice, and are working with schools groups and schools trusts to support them to ensure there is a common approach. We know that getting children into schools, where they have the benefit of education and learning, will give them the best opportunities, and that is why it continues to remain our focus.
Edward Timpson (Eddisbury) (Con)
Last month, during National Adoption Week, it was announced that more than 600 children are still waiting to be placed with their forever families. I know that my right hon. Friend has since launched a national recruitment campaign, but could he say what progress is being made, despite the challenges of covid, and what plans he has to ensure that those children are placed with their forever families as quickly as possible?
Gavin Williamson
My hon. Friend and I share a common passion about the importance of adoption. We want to drive up the rate of adoption right across the country. There have been delays in Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service, which have meant that a number of adoptions have been held up. I am meeting my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Justice to see what more we can do to speed up that process and give children the opportunity to be with a family forever. There is nothing more generous that people can do than open up not just their homes but their hearts to ensure that those young people have the opportunities that we all want them to have.
Mr Speaker
In order to allow the safe exit of hon. Members participating in this item of business and the safe arrival of those participating in the next, I am suspending the House for a few minutes.
Covid-19: Winter Plan
(4 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Speaker
Before I call the Prime Minister, I point out that British Sign Language interpretation of the statement is available to watch on parliamentlive.tv.
Some of the screens in the Chamber are not working, so we will see how we go. We will take it a bit easy if need be.
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement on the Government’s covid winter plan.
For the first time since this wretched virus took hold, we can see a route out of the pandemic. The breakthroughs in treatment, testing and vaccines mean that the scientific cavalry is now in sight, and we know in our hearts that next year we will succeed. By the spring, these advances should reduce the need for the restrictions we have endured in 2020 and make the whole concept of a covid lockdown redundant.
When that moment comes, it will have been made possible by the sacrifices of millions across the UK. I am acutely conscious that no other peacetime Prime Minister has asked so much of the British people, and just as our country has risen to every previous trial, so it has responded this time, and I am deeply grateful.
But the hard truth is that we are not there yet. First, we must get through winter without the virus spreading out of control and squandering our hard-won gains, at exactly the time when the burden on our NHS is always greatest. Our winter plan is designed to carry us safely to spring.
In recent weeks, families and businesses in England have, once again, steadfastly observed nationwide restrictions, and they have managed to slow the growth of new cases and ease the worst pressures on our NHS. I can therefore confirm that national restrictions in England will end on 2 December, and they will not be renewed. From next Wednesday people will be able to leave their home for any purpose and meet others in outdoor public spaces, subject to the rule of six; collective worship, weddings and outdoor sports can resume; and shops, personal care, gyms and the wider leisure sector can reopen.
But without sensible precautions, we would risk the virus escalating into a winter or new year surge. The incidence of the disease is, alas, still widespread in many areas, so we will not replace national measures with a free for all, the status quo ante covid. We are going to go back instead to a regional, tiered approach, applying the toughest measures where covid is most prevalent. While the previous local tiers cut the R number, they were not quite enough to reduce it below 1, so the scientific advice, I am afraid, is that, as we come out, our tiers need to be made tougher.
In particular, in tier 1 people should work from home wherever possible. In tier 2, alcohol may only be served in hospitality settings as part of a substantial meal. In tier 3, indoor entertainment, hotels and other accommodation will have to close, along with all forms of hospitality, except for delivery and takeaways. I am very sorry, obviously, for the unavoidable hardship that this will cause for business owners who have already endured so much disruption this year.
Unlike the previous arrangements, tiers will now be a uniform set of rules—that is to say, we will not have negotiations on additional measures with each region. We have learned from experience that there are some things we can do differently. We are, therefore, going to change the 10 pm closing time for hospitality so that it is last orders at 10, with closing at 11. In tiers 1 or 2, spectator sports and business events will be free to resume inside and outside—with capacity limits and social distancing—providing more consistency with indoor performances in theatres and concert halls. We will also strengthen the enforcement ability of local authorities, including specially trained officers and new powers to close down premises that pose a risk to public health.
Later this week—on Thursday, I hope—we will announce which areas will fall into which tier, based on analysis of cases in all age groups, especially the over-60s; the rate by which cases are rising or falling; the percentage of those tested in a local population who have covid; and the current and projected pressures on the NHS. I am sorry to say that we expect that more regions will fall—at least temporarily—into higher levels than before, but by using these tougher tiers and using rapid turnaround tests on an ever greater scale to drive R below 1 and keep it there, it should be possible for areas to move down the tiering scale to lower levels of restrictions.
By maintaining the pressure on the virus, we can also enable people to see more of their family and friends over Christmas. I cannot say that Christmas will be normal this year, but in a period of adversity, time spent with loved ones is even more precious for people of all faiths and none. We all want some kind of Christmas—we need it and we certainly feel we deserve it—but what we do not want is to throw caution to the winds and allow the virus to flare up once again, forcing us all back into lockdown in January.
So, to allow families to come together, while minimising the risk, we are working with the devolved Administrations on a special, time-limited Christmas dispensation, embracing the whole of the United Kingdom and reflecting the ties of kinship across our islands. The virus will obviously not grant us a Christmas truce—it does not know that it is Christmas—and families will need to make a careful judgment about the risk of visiting elderly relatives. We will be publishing guidance for those who are clinically extremely vulnerable on how to manage the risks in each tier, as well as over Christmas. As we work to suppress the virus with these local tiers, two scientific breakthroughs will ultimately make these restrictions obsolete. As soon as a vaccine is approved, we will dispense it as quickly as possible. But given that that cannot be done immediately, we will simultaneously use rapid-turnaround testing—lateral flow testing—that gives results within 30 minutes, to identify those without symptoms so they can isolate and avoid transmission. We are beginning to deploy these tests in our NHS and in care homes in England, so people will once again be able to hug and hold hands with loved ones instead of waving at them through a window. By the end of the year, this will allow every care home resident to have two visitors, who can be tested twice a week.
Care workers looking after people in their own homes will be offered weekly tests from today. From next month, weekly tests will also be available to staff in prisons and food manufacturing, and those delivering and administering covid vaccines. We are also, as the House knows, using testing to help schools and universities to stay open. Testing will enable students to know they can go home safely for Christmas, and back from home to university.
There is another way of using these rapid tests, and that is to follow the example of Liverpool, where in the last two and a half weeks over 200,000 people have taken part in community testing, contributing to a substantial fall in infections. Together with NHS Test and Trace and our fantastic armed forces, we will now launch a major community testing programme, offering all local authorities in tier 3 areas in England a six-week surge of testing. The system is untried and there are many unknowns, but if it works, we should be able to offer those who test negative the prospect of fewer restrictions—for example, meeting up in certain places with others who have also tested negative. Those towns and regions that engage in community testing will have a much greater chance of easing the tiering rules they currently endure.
We will also use daily testing to ease another restriction that has impinged on many lives. We will seek to end automatic isolation for close contacts of those who are found positive. Beginning in Liverpool later this week, contacts who are tested every day for a week will need to isolate only if they themselves test positive. If successful, this approach will be extended across the health system next month, and to the whole of England from January. Of course, we are working with the devolved Administrations to ensure that Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland also benefit, as they should and will, from these advances in rapid testing.
Clearly, the most hopeful advance of all is how vaccines are now edging ever closer to liberating us from the virus, demonstrating emphatically that this is not a pandemic without end. We can take great heart from today’s news, which has the makings of a wonderful British scientific achievement. The vaccine developed with astonishing speed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca is now one of three capable of delivering a period of immunity. We do not yet know when any will be ready and licensed, but we have ordered 100 million doses of the Oxford vaccine and over 350 million in total—more than enough for everyone in the UK, the Crown dependencies and the overseas territories. The NHS is preparing a nationwide immunisation programme, ready next month, the like of which we have never witnessed.
Mr Speaker, 2020 has been, in many ways, a tragic year when so many have lost loved ones and faced financial ruin, and this will still be a hard winter. Christmas cannot be normal and there is a long road to spring, but we have turned a corner and the escape route is in sight. We must hold out against the virus until testing and vaccines come to our rescue and reduce the need for restrictions. Everyone can help speed up the arrival of that moment by continuing to follow the rules, getting tested and self-isolating when instructed, remembering “hands, face, space”, and pulling together for one final push to the spring, when we have every reason to hope and believe that the achievements of our scientists will finally lift the shadow of this virus.
I commend this statement to the House.
Mr Speaker
The Prime Minister—it was a big statement—ran three minutes over, so the Opposition will have an extra two minutes and the SNP will have an extra minute.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
I thank the Prime Minister for advance sight of his statement and for his telephone call earlier today, when he set out a summary of the proposal.
Let me start with the good news: the tremendous progress on vaccines. Last week, the shadow Chancellor and I went to the Oxford vaccine group at Oxford University. It was inspiring. It was remarkable to see the work that they are doing. Our thanks, and I think those of the whole nation, go to all those who have taken part in the vaccine trials and research. We wish them Godspeed. I also want to make an open offer to the Prime Minister: Labour will provide any support we can in the national effort to deliver the vaccine safely across the country. That is an open offer.
I welcome the fact that the Prime Minister is seeking a four-nation approach on the arrangements over the Christmas period. We will obviously await details on that, and the evidence that supports the steps being taken, but the four-nation approach is the right approach.
Now for the more difficult bit. The vaccine is the light at the end of the tunnel; the question today is how we get there and protect lives and livelihoods along the way. The Prime Minister proposes a return to the three-tier system. That is risky, because the previous three-tier system did not work. Tier 1 areas drifted to tier 2, almost all tier 2 areas ended up in tier 3 and those in tier 3 could not see a way out, and we ended up in national lockdown. That was the sad reality of the tiered system before. Nobody wants a repeat of that.
I accept that the new tiers are different from the old tiers, but many of the questions are the same. They are not trick questions. I acknowledge that none of this is easy, but if the Prime Minister is going to carry Parliament and the country on this, they need answering.
First, on the tier system—the Prime Minister touched on this—which local areas will be in each tier? This is the red-hot question. This is the question everybody is going to be asking over their kitchen table tonight. I had a roundtable with business leaders this morning, and it was the first question they asked me. The Prime Minister says it will be decided later this week, possibly Thursday. I cannot emphasise enough how important it is that these decisions are taken very quickly and very clearly so that everybody can plan. That is obviously particularly important for the millions who were in restrictions before the national lockdown, because the message to them today seems to be, “You will almost certainly be back where you were before the national lockdown, probably in even stricter restrictions.” People need to know that so that they can plan for that. I really emphasise how important that is for the Prime Minister.
Secondly—the Prime Minister said he wanted uniform rules—will the tiers simply be imposed region by region, come what may, from 3 December, or will there be an element of local consultation and negotiation? I understand the uniform rules, but simply to impose them runs the risk of not getting buy-in from local leaders and local communities, which is incredibly important to people complying with the rules.
Thirdly, how long does the Prime Minister anticipate each local area will remain in each tier? For those that are going to come out of lockdown and almost certainly go back to more restrictions than they left, that is going to be a very pressing question.
Fourthly, will there be a new economic package to accompany these new tiers? There is huge concern among many businesses about their viability in tier 3, particularly a strengthened tier 3, so what new support can they expect? May I touch again on those who are self-employed who are outside the self-employed scheme—the so-called excluded? They will be hearing a message about the next three months in relation to schemes that they are not currently in, and that needs urgently to be addressed.
I turn to the public health impact of this approach, because one of the major reasons that we ended up in a national lockdown was that, in the words of the Government’s scientific advisers—the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies—test, trace and isolate was only having
“a marginal impact on transmission”.
It is one of the reasons that they suggested a national lockdown.
I know that the Prime Minister will talk about increased testing, mass testing. That is welcome but it is only part of the story, because the other two parts—trace and isolate—are not fit for purpose. SAGE advised, and continues to advise, that for trace and isolate to be effective, the percentage of contacts traced needs to be about 80%. It is currently nowhere near that level. It has never been near that level, and the figures are not getting any better. The latest figures actually show that every week, about 120,000 close contacts—that is, people who should be self-isolating—are not being traced by the system. The likelihood of getting the virus under control when 120,000 people who should be self-isolating are moving around their communities is very low.
Only a fraction of people able to self-isolate are doing so when asked to. We said to the Prime Minister that this needed to be fixed in the period of the national lockdown, and it has not been. It was barely mentioned in the Prime Minister’s statement today, and many people will be forgiven for thinking that the Prime Minister has given up on trace and isolate and is about to abandon that scheme altogether to reach out for a different scheme—mass testing. It is very important that we understand that if we are going into a tiered system, abandoning trace and isolate, or not getting trace and isolate where it should be, we are running a major risk.
This is not about knocking those on the frontline or knocking those working on track and trace; it is about being grown up about risk. If we are reintroducing a three-tier system without having fixed trace and isolate, that is a major risk and we all need to acknowledge it, because it raises the million-dollar question: how confident is the Prime Minister that the approach he is proposing today will keep the R rate below 1? If it does not, the infections will go up. They will go back out of control and we could well be back in a national lockdown. That is the million-dollar question.
Labour has backed the Prime Minister on all the big decisions that the Government have had to take to protect public health, including the two national lockdowns. We have done so because we want there to be a national consensus on such difficult issues and because we will always put public health first. Ideally, I would like to be in a position to do so again, but there are huge gaps in this plan, huge uncertainties and huge risks. We will await the detail. We want the Prime Minister to get this right. He has got a week to do so. Will he start by answering these straightforward questions?
The Prime Minister
I would like to thank the right hon. and learned Gentleman for his qualified welcome of these measures. He says that they are risky. It is not quite clear where he is supporting them or not. I think they are the right thing for the country. I think they are the right way of getting the virus down. If he wants to go back into another or keep a national lockdown on, I do not think that is the right way forward for this country. We want to get the economy moving as far as we possibly can and keep schools open, while supressing the virus.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman asks when we will make the announcement about who goes into which tier. As I said to him earlier on, and as I said in my statement just now, that will be announced on Thursday. The reason for the delay is quite simply that we need to see the data as it comes in. Of course, we will work with local authority leaders about which tiers they need to apply. We will discuss it with them, but in the end, we have to take some decisions and get on and do it. I think that we saw from the last experience that it was those local authorities—Liverpool springs to mind—that went early and were very collaborative that were most successful in getting the incidence down.
Some of the things that we will look at in deciding which tier is appropriate are case detection rates in all groups, case detection rates in the over-60s, the rate at which cases are rising or falling, the positivity rate overall and the pressures on the NHS in the region. Those are the things that we will be looking at as we make our judgment. Clearly, in some ways, the tiers have been changed—I mentioned the point about curfews, and there are extra possibilities for indoor and outdoor sports and events, as I said in my statement—and it is right that the balance of the impact of those should continue to be tough.
Once again, the right hon. and learned Gentleman criticises NHS Test and Trace. People should bear in mind that that operation has helped indisputably in identifying the areas that have the greatest prevalence of disease; it is not just to drive down the disease in those areas that it has been of immense value. We now have testing capacity of over 500,000 a day. NHS Test and Trace has done more than in any other country in Europe. What is so exciting about the new lateral flow testing is that, when we come to isolate, there is the prospect of using lateral flow tests, as I said, to check whether people are actually infected or infectious, thereby obviating the need for the 14-day quarantine.
Science is really beginning to ride to our rescue. It is in that context, with the combination of the tiering system, lateral flow tests and the gradual roll-out in the weeks and months ahead of the vaccine, that we are able to come out of the lockdown next Wednesday and to make the progress that we have described. I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for such support as he felt able to offer at this stage. I am aware that his support is one of those things that is, “Now you see it, now you don’t,” but never mind, I will take it while it seems to be there, at least temporarily, and I look forward to further conversations with him in the next week.
Damian Green (Ashford) (Con)
After the tremendous news about testing and the encouraging developments on vaccines, may I welcome the news that the blanket national lockdown is ending? In the spirit of a wise constituent who told me that if the Government imposes stupid rules, we will all stop obeying the sensible rules as well, may I ask my right hon. Friend that the new tiers be imposed at a local level—districts, rather than counties or regions? Restrictions that people feel are unfair to their particular community will simply not be respected or obeyed, and that itself will have a damaging effect on our long-term health.
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend and for the wisdom of his constituent, but I respectfully disagree. The people of this country have been obeying the rules to an astonishing degree. It is thanks to the heroic effort of the people of this country in following the guidance and the recent measures that we have the R down in the way that we have and that we have got the incidence down in some of those areas where the disease was really taking off—if we look at the graphs, we see that in the north-west in particular. It is now starting to track down across the country. I have every confidence in the wisdom of the British people to follow sensible guidance and rules. On my right hon. Friend’s point about local versus regional, alas, the disease is no respecter of borough boundaries. We have to have some regions in which to constitute the tiers that are sensible and large enough.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP) [V]
I thank the Prime Minister for advance sight of his statement and for his telephone call earlier today.
This morning, people right across these islands woke up to the more encouraging news on the development of vaccines to fight this deadly virus. It is right that we pay tribute to the remarkable efforts of thousands of scientists across the world who worked at unprecedented speed to produce those vaccines. All those scientists offer us hope that there is a way out of this pandemic, based on the primacy of safety for our society. Far too often in the recent past, expertise and science have been questioned or demeaned by right-wing politicians. Let us now ensure that those same politicians never forget that it is the commitment and dedication to science that is now coming to our society’s rescue.
While we all welcome that hope on the horizon, there remain far too many of our citizens who have not received a single penny of support since the beginning of the pandemic. Three million freelancers, sole traders and the recently self-employed all remain excluded from any of the economic support established by this Tory Government. Those include people across our community —painters, bricklayers, musicians, artists, entrepreneurs and plumbers—and because of the choices made by this Tory Government, they are now facing Christmas with no help and no support. I and my party have been raising that issue since March, eight months ago. The excluded are not asking for any special treatment; they are looking for some of the same fairness that others have seen. Others have received support, and those who are excluded should also be getting it.
The Chancellor’s spending review this Wednesday will take place exactly one month before Christmas day. Will the Prime Minister guarantee today that a package of financial support will finally be put in place for the 3 million people who have been excluded from any economic support? Will there be some pre-Christmas cheer for the 3 million who have so far been excluded from help?
The Prime Minister
I do not know who the right hon. Gentleman means in his attack on those who do not encourage investment in science. He certainly cannot mean this Government, because we put forward the biggest ever programme of investment in research and development and in a creating an advanced research projects facility that we hope will rival that of the United States. We are investing in pure science and applied science at a scale undreamed of by any previous Government—I think it arrives at about £22 billion a year at the end of the spending review period. I really do not know who the right hon. Gentleman is talking about, but whichever right-wing foes he has in view, they cannot be this Government.
On the point about supporting the self-employed, this has been very difficult, and we are doing whatever we can to help the self-employed and the excluded. So far £13.5 billion—I think more now—has gone to support the self-employed. Those particularly in the artistic and cultural sectors are beneficiaries of the £1.57 billion investment in the arts and culture. There are many things that apply generally, such as the cut in VAT, bounce back loans of all kinds and grants that are available to everybody, but the best thing for everybody in all sectors is just to get the economy moving again, get the virus down and move forward. That is the objective of this winter plan.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
I thank the Prime Minister for agreeing to meet me and my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker) on behalf of 70 colleagues who wrote to him at the weekend, and we look forward to discussing that matter in more detail later. Many hon. Members will hold their judgment on this plan until we know which areas go into which tiers, and I think that areas that go into tier 3 will struggle to spot much of a difference from the lockdown. For each of these restrictions that have such an impact on people and businesses, will the Prime Minister set out the impact that he is expecting it to have on dealing with covid, as well as the non-covid health impact, and—importantly—the impact on people’s livelihoods, so that we know that each measure will save more lives than it costs?
The Prime Minister
Indeed; I would be delighted to meet my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr Baker), who have written an excellent letter to me. I hope that he agrees that many of the points in that letter were answered in my statement: about sport, the curfew, non-essential retail, gyms, personal—[Inaudible.]
Mr Speaker
Order. Have you pressed the button, Prime Minister? I think we are going to have to stop for a moment so that we can check the sound, as we lost your answer. Have you pressed the mute button by mistake? It is not our end, Prime Minister; it could well be yours. I wonder whether Mr Hancock would like to take over with the answer. Is one of you going to do it or not? It is no use looking at each other. We are going to suspend the House for three minutes.
Mr Speaker
Order. Before we get too carried away, until we get the Prime Minister back we will continue with the questions. Is it all right with the Health Secretary to pick up the answer that we lost halfway through?
The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)
Thank you, Mr Speaker. In addition to what the Prime Minister said before we lost the audio, although the tier 3 restrictions that have been set out are less stringent than the national lockdown, it is necessary to get the R down under the tiered system in order to avoid a further national lockdown if the cases still go up. As we have set out, we have seen the case rates come down in some areas of the country, and now, thankfully, we are seeing the case rates come down nationally.
The final point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper) was about other health and economic impacts. Of course we recognise the economic impacts. On the other health impacts, I simply reiterate what I have said many times before, which is that the health impacts of not locking down on health conditions other than coronavirus and of the spread of the coronavirus going too broad are also bad. The best way to protect the health of the nation both from coronavirus and from all other conditions is to keep the virus under control.
Ed Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)
I think this makes the case for investing in broadband.
May I ask the Secretary of State a very serious question? From the lack of tests and PPE to the claims about a protective ring around care homes while people died in horrifying numbers, the Government’s abject failure to protect care home residents and care staff has been one of the biggest tragedies of this pandemic. Will the Secretary of State today guarantee that no care home in England will be required or pressurised to admit anyone from an NHS hospital who has tested positive for covid?
Matt Hancock
Over the summer, we put in place a new regime for ensuring that people who test positive but need to go to a care home can get the support they need in a way that protects them and also protects other residents. That means nobody leaves hospital without a test and that those with a positive test who need to leave hospital must be isolated in a CQC-approved isolation facility. We, of course, need to support people who have tested positive and hospital is often not the best place for them, but we need to do that in a way that protects all other residents as well. At the same time, I am delighted that we are able to announce the expansion of the availability of testing for care homes, domiciliary care workers and care home visiting, which I know is hugely welcomed.
Jack Brereton (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Con)
We have seen huge efforts across Stoke-on-Trent to get covid rates down. The city council has done an excellent job of rolling out testing and rates are now falling locally. Will my right hon. Friend do everything possible to ensure support continues to be given to local health and council services, so we do not exit lockdown at the highest tier?
Matt Hancock
I pay tribute to everybody in Stoke: the council, the Royal Stoke University Hospital, the wider NHS and our three colleagues in this House who represent Stoke, including my hon. Friend, who have worked so hard together to get high-quality public health messaging out. We can see the cases coming down in Stoke. As the Prime Minister set out, on Thursday we will announce decisions, taking into account the very latest data on which areas fall into which tiers.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
While millions will welcome the fact that they will now be able to shop, worship, and associate with friends and family over Christmas, does the Secretary of State not realise how alarming this statement is today? Rather than being grateful for an announcement that allows us to exercise some basic freedoms, should we not be alarmed that to do the things that people would normally expect in a democracy now rests in the hands of a Minister and the state? Does he accept that today’s statement will still deny people the right to earn a living, will drive millions into poverty, and will still instil fear? That should indicate that this policy is the wrong track.
Matt Hancock
The first duty of any Government is to keep the citizens of the country we serve safe. That is the reason we take the actions we do.
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
I hope the Secretary of State will not think me too eccentric if I say that on a winter’s morning I like to start my day by swimming the Serpentine and then going to mass. Of course, he abolished both of those things in the past four weeks. More important, he abolished them for hundreds of thousands of people. My question to him is this: under any tier or future lockdown, can we never return to the abolition of healthy outdoor sports or going to religious services? There has never been a shred of evidence that they cause any problem. By the way, this is the first time in 800 years that people have been prevented from going to church in this country, since it was put under an interdict by a medieval pope. We want reassurance on that. As well as having that conversation, could he give us some more reassurance about Christmas carols? We do not want it to be just a holy night; we do not want it to be a silent night either.
Matt Hancock
I very much hope that we will not have another national lockdown at all. One of the reasons that we have toughened up tier 3 is to ensure that, if areas are in tier 3, we can get the virus coming down as opposed to just flattening at a high rate, as we were seeing earlier. In that way, I hope that we can prevent the whole country from ever having to see the sorts of restrictions that we have had to introduce in order to keep people safe.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
It has to be said that news of the three vaccinations brings us a much-needed dose of hope as we face the winter months. Wales is especially vulnerable to covid-19 because of our older population and our higher levels of deprivation. Will the Secretary of State ensure that Wales receives a sufficient allocation of vaccines based on need and not per head of population?
Matt Hancock
It is absolutely vital that we vaccinate fairly across this country—across the whole of the UK— according to clinical need. That is the agreement that we have reached among the four nations. It is the principle that I am determined to follow, given that, obviously, the UK vaccination programme will cover the whole United Kingdom. On that basis, we have agreed a fair allocation of vaccine so that vaccination can occur at the same speed in all parts of the country according to clinical need.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) [V]
Given the big sacrifices that York residents have made to get the virus down locally, does the Secretary of State accept how unfair it will feel if the city is kept in high tier restrictions even when our covid rate is considerably lower than it was when we entered tier 2 and one of the lowest in our regions? Does he agree that the new restrictions policy has to give people hope that self-discipline and resilience will be rewarded?
Matt Hancock
Yes, those values are important and should be rewarded. I hope that, in the areas of the country where the case rate has really come down a long way and is coming down fast, we will see the fruits of that effort. Having said that, it is absolutely critical that areas that need to go into tier 3 do so in order to get the case rate down and to protect the population. We will take these judgments based on public health advice over the forthcoming days. The reason that we have not set those details out today is that the more data we have the better. We want to give businesses time to plan to be able to reopen, but, at the same time, we do want to take into account the very latest data. In York, as in some other parts of the country, the number of cases is coming down, and I welcome that, but I want to see a few more days’ data before we can take those final decisions.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) [V]
If these tougher tiers are to deliver sustained reductions in transmission then test, trace, isolate has to work better. Will the Secretary of State learn the lessons from countries where compliance with self-isolation is much higher, pay people more where necessary, offer hotel accommodation if needed, and fix the app so that people told to self-isolate via the app can now qualify for support? Will the Government stop repeating that they have given £13 billion to the self-employed when 3 million of them have been unfairly deemed to be ineligible? It is not good enough to say that it is too difficult or that we should wait until the economy is moving again. I say to the Minister: no ifs, no buts, no excuses, when will he give those people some hope?
Matt Hancock
The whole country knows that we are going through very difficult times, but I hope that the news, especially on vaccines, that we have seen over the past fortnight offers some hope about the way out. The hon. Lady mentions the test and trace system, as did the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer). I am very glad to say that not only is the testing regime and the opportunities that we have to roll out testing expanding very rapidly—I pay tribute to the team for that—but the contact tracing is improving. I am really pleased about that and pay tribute to all those who have been working to make that happen.
Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con) [V]
Quite rightly, we are keeping young people in full-time education at this time. The outdoor education sector provides an amazing parallel education for children, and there are many centres in Cumbria and across the UK. These centres are ready for covid-secure programmes where pupils who are in bubbles at school can be safely accommodated. Will my right hon. Friend work across Government to look at reopening these centres as soon as possible for residential visits, so that whole cohorts of young children do not miss out on this vital and life-affirming educational opportunity?
Matt Hancock
My hon. Friend makes a powerful case for a sector that is obviously prevalent in his beautiful constituency, and I look forward to working with him to see what progress we can make.
Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance) [V]
I welcome the progress that has been made on a co-ordinated approach across the four countries of the UK around the Christmas season. Given the particular context of Northern Ireland and, indeed, all the links across the Irish sea, can the Secretary of State ensure that this planning also includes the Irish Government? Can I also suggest that, in doing that, the most immediate priority should be given to clarity on travel arrangements, but some care also needs to be taken in relation to the precise guidance on household mixing?
Matt Hancock
Yes, I will absolutely take the hon. Gentleman’s points on board in the conversations that Ministers are having across the devolved nations of the United Kingdom, including his point about the enormous number of ties, including family ties, between the UK and Republic of Ireland. As he knows, the common travel area is there between the UK and the Republic, so travel to the Republic from the UK side has never been restricted. That is a point of principle and policy, and I know that it is important for the people of Northern Ireland.
Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)
It is welcome news that Ipswich Hospital found out on 11 November that it would be receiving £5.2 million for a new molecular laboratory. This will allow the hospital to ramp up rapid testing to almost 3,000 a day by the end of March. We have also heard reports that Suffolk’s first site for delivering vaccinations will be ready in two weeks’ time, with the NHS proposing the Gainsborough sports centre in Ipswich. Testing and vaccinations are two crucial ways to beat the virus, so does my right hon. Friend agree that having Ipswich at the forefront of both these key issues will be a real boost to Ipswich residents?
Matt Hancock
We have put millions of pounds into Ipswich Hospital, and I know that my hon. Friend supports Ipswich Hospital very strongly indeed. I am glad that across Suffolk and across the whole of the country we are now putting in place the vaccination hubs that will be there and ready, should the regulator sign off a new vaccine. I do not want to intrude on the rigorous independence of the medical regulator—the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, which will make the decision on the safety of these vaccines—but should it be approved, the NHS will be ready to begin the roll-out and I set the NHS the challenge of ensuring that it can roll out at the speed at which these vaccines can be manufactured and produced.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
Will the Secretary of State impart my question to the Prime Minister? Can I beg him at this late stage to change his mind? This is a national emergency, and his policy announced today will end up with critical and perhaps tragic results for my constituents and for our country. I represent Huddersfield, in Kirklees, which is a classic average typical town in Britain, and we have worked better and harder than anyone else to get the rates down under the tier system, but we have not been successful. Under the national plan, however, we have started to get there. We only have to keep ourselves under restrictions for a few more weeks, and then we will have the antidote. Please change your mind, Minister. Change your mind, Prime Minister. We must stop deaths occurring that could be avoided.
Matt Hancock
The tiered system that has been set out by the Prime Minister today is calibrated very carefully, learning all the lessons from the lockdowns that have been in place and from the previous tiered system, as well as from evidence from around the world and, indeed, from the devolved nations. It has to be calibrated to be able to bring infections down, but to do so in a way that also protects the other things that matter in life as much as possible. It is necessary that tier 3, in particular, is tougher than before, not least because of the experience of Huddersfield, Kirklees and other places that were in tier 3 for quite a long time, but saw a flattening rather than a reduction in their rates. That is why we have brought in a tougher tier 3. It nevertheless allows for the reopening of religious settings and non-essential retail, which are so important to many.
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con)
Millions of people will be delighted to hear that grassroots sports will return from 3 December. Will the Secretary of State confirm that that will be the case in all three tiers? With regard to the tiers, will consideration be given to variances across big counties and regions? For example, the conditions in the Thames estuary can seem very different and distant from those on the south Kent coast.
Matt Hancock
I am delighted that outdoor sports are able to reopen. Like the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, I have had significant representations from people who want to exercise, which of course is good for their health, so I am glad that we have been able to do that.
When it comes to the geography of the application of the tiers, of course we have to look at the areas in which people live and travel. Where it is clear that there is a genuine difference that is not represented by administrative boundaries, we will look at it and make a decision on that basis, as we did previously. For instance, with the previous tiers, we even split a borough in two in one example. Nevertheless, we do have to look at where people live and travel to get these decisions right.
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)
Thousands of jobs have been lost and will be lost in the pub and hospitality sector. At the beginning of the crisis, the Prime Minister said that Government action would follow the science. At a recent meeting, the national health director was clear that there was no science behind the 10 o’clock—soon to be 11 o’clock—curfew and said that it was a policy decision. If there is no science behind this decision, what are the reasons for it?
Matt Hancock
We have put in place an enormous amount of support for the hospitality sector and we understand the challenges posed by the measures that were brought in. The reason behind the restrictions on hospitality is that in order to protect people’s ability to go to work and, in particular, to protect education, it is important, sadly, to reduce the social contact on which the virus thrives. It is upsetting and frustrating, but it is true. It is clear from the evidence that later in the evening and late at night, social distancing declines, and we know that when social distancing declines, transmission increases.
Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)
May I ask the Prime Minister, through the medium of my right hon. Friend, what progress has been made to achieve integration between the lockdown measures and testing at the country’s airports? Should we not follow the example of countries that have been successful at boosting business travel, helping the airline industry, helping inward and outward tourism, and getting airport workers back to full-time employment? What encouragement can he give to those at Bristol international airport in my constituency?
Matt Hancock
This is a really important issue. It is another example of how the increased testing capacity we have built can help improve lives. I have worked with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport, the airline industry and the airports, including the important regional airports, to try to get a better regime in place. My right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox) will not have to wait very long to get an answer.
Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP) [V]
The uplift to universal credit was welcome, but people on legacy benefits, the sick and the disabled have also faced additional costs and hardships because of the pandemic, many of which were incurred to follow Government advice on shielding or protecting themselves. How does the right hon. Gentleman justify not applying the same uplift to those people, and can this injustice be rectified going forward?
Matt Hancock
Many people in those circumstances are also in receipt of universal credit. We have put in an increase of £1,000 for those in receipt of universal credit, which is a very significant and generous increase, alongside the furlough arrangements. That is a very substantial package of financial support, and the International Monetary Fund has described it as one of the most generous in the world.
Sir Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale West) (Con)
May I return to the question asked by my right hon. Friend the Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper)? The Secretary of State said that he recognises the damage done by these restrictions. Will he go further and publish the Government’s assessment of what the impact is in both economic and health terms? Will he ensure that on Thursday, when it becomes clear which regions are going into which tiers, the Government publish the exact criteria that will be used to make that judgment?
Matt Hancock
Yes, we will publish the statistics that we look at to make the judgments that my hon. Friend refers to. It is not possible to put a specific number on it, though, because there are a number of criteria. We would not want to put an area into lockdown—a higher tier, more accurately—because it triggered numerical criteria if there was a specific reason. For instance, there has been a very significant outbreak at a barracks in the past month, which meant that it looked like that area had a huge spike, but it was entirely—literally—confined to barracks. Therefore, an element of judgment is important in making these decisions, but we will publish the data on which they are taken. My hon. Friend asked about the economic impact assessment, and I will raise that point with my right hon. Friend the Chancellor.
Mr Speaker
We are still hoping to reconnect with the Prime Minister at some point, but in the meantime we will continue with Jonathan Edwards.
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (Ind)
Diolch, Mr Speaker. The news of the successful development of three vaccines is to be warmly welcomed because it offers light at the end of the tunnel. However, the Secretary of State will recognise that distribution will be a huge logistical challenge. What guarantee can he give that the Welsh Government will receive any additional resources they require to meet the task at hand?
Matt Hancock
The vaccines programme is a UK programme, and of course the costs of the roll-out incur Barnett consequentials and will therefore be available across the whole of the UK. We are working closely with the NHS in Wales to make sure that happens as smoothly as possible, but it will be the most almighty huge logistical effort for everyone involved.
Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)
As my right hon. Friend knows, I do not support lockdowns, tiered or otherwise, but I welcome the move to get these vaccines. That is very good news. As I understand it, the Government’s main weapon is test and trace. May I suggest that test and quick result is equally important? When will the Government be able to tell the House when the whole country can be tested and get a quick result, so that when it is negative we can all get on with our lives?
Matt Hancock
I hope that the system for people to test daily if they have been in close contact with somebody who has tested positive, as the Prime Minister has, instead of having to isolate, will be in place in January. As the Prime Minister set out, we are piloting it from this week, and then we will roll it out over December. I hope it will be available nationwide from January.
Kate Osborne (Jarrow) (Lab)
I direct my question to the Prime Minister or even the Chancellor, but I ask it to the Secretary of State. With the infection rates still high across the north-east, it is looking likely that the region will come out of this national lockdown in a worse position than it was in going in. When the tier restrictions were last implemented, local leaders had to fight the Government for a fair amount of funding for our region. Can the Secretary of State assure us that this time the north will not be left behind again? In line with their levelling up agenda, will the Government ensure that all businesses and people receive the correct level of the financial support that they desperately need?
Matt Hancock
I am glad to see that the number of cases in the north-east is falling. That is good news and testament to people right across the north-east. Yes, there will be financial support to the councils that are in higher-tier areas, alongside the huge amount of financial support to individuals through furlough and the increase in universal credit, and to businesses.
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
Physical and mental wellbeing go hand in hand, and both are under attack from this virus. I welcome my right hon. Friend’s comments on outdoor sport, but at this time of year, it is the fitness studios, Pilates studios and dance studios that are crucial to keep people active. What reassurance can he give the House that, even in areas that are in a higher tier, every effort will be made to ensure that people can keep active, recognising the enormous efforts that the industry has made to put in covid-secure measures?
Matt Hancock
I can give my right hon. Friend exactly that assurance, not least because gyms will be able to reopen in all tiers, and I recognise the enormous efforts that most gyms have made to ensure that they are covid-secure.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
I talked to Hounslow’s director of public health this morning. She welcomes the opportunity to have rapid lateral flow testing under her local jurisdiction, and we both welcome the fact that the Government have finally recognised that local health and public health professionals are essential to the successful tackling of infections such as covid. However, councils and health trusts cannot roll out rapid testing for vulnerable groups, employ, train and enforce in the way described by the Prime Minister and roll out the vaccination programme without significant additional resources. The Army has been helping with the rapid testing in Liverpool, but will the Government adequately resource local authorities and local health trusts to deliver what is needed?
Matt Hancock
The hon. Lady is right to praise local public health officials. Local directors of public health have done an amazing amount of work throughout this crisis, and we work incredibly closely with them right across the country. It is very important that further funding will come forward for those areas in higher restrictions, not least because of the amount of work that we all need to do together.
Karl MᶜCartney (Lincoln) (Con) [V]
As the Prime Minister said, 2020 has been a difficult year, and unfortunately, freelancers and directors of limited companies in Lincoln and across the UK have had a particularly hard year, with many of them receiving next to no financial support from the Government yet. While today’s announcements are welcome and we are moving in a positive direction, many will still have to wait several months before small businesses can return to some form of normality. Will my right hon. Friend urge his close friend the Chancellor to provide grant funding for those individuals and businesses? Local authorities can and will step in to provide this funding on a case-by-case basis, and to finance that, we can seek the repayment of taxpayer funding from the supermarkets, which have clearly misused taxpayer support that they do not need. Will he back the Blue Collar Conservative campaign and right this wrong?
Matt Hancock
I would be happy to look at that myself and to take it up with my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, who will be at the Dispatch Box on Wednesday.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab) [V]
The Government have committed to level up the country, and in particular the north of England. Given the risk that covid will level us down, what assurances can the Secretary of State give that in Wednesday’s spending review, the Chancellor will reform the Green Book, replace the local growth fund with the shared prosperity fund and deliver the investment needed to tackle regional inequalities?
Matt Hancock
The Treasury has already updated its Green Book, which is a significant step, and I know that the Chancellor has been discussing this further. The levelling-up agenda is even more critical after the pandemic than it was before. It is the agenda on which all Government Members were elected with enormous enthusiasm about a year ago, and we look forward to putting it in place with renewed vigour once this pandemic is over.
Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)
I heard the Secretary of State say some welcome things about sport. Given the importance of maintaining fitness to the ability to deal with this illness, can he confirm whether people will be able to go to indoor swimming pools and play golf?
Matt Hancock
Yes, golf is back. Outdoor sport will be available under all the tiers, and we will publish all the details for each tier imminently.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
I welcome the plans in place to test students, enabling them to travel home for Christmas, and I commend the work of the University of St Andrews, in my constituency, which has stepped in to facilitate that, but a gap remains in terms of the new year. We need to ensure that where students must return to university they can do so safely, as well as give reassurance to the communities in which they are situated. I understand from the covid winter plan that guidance will follow suit, but will the Secretary of State, on behalf of the Government, advise me as to what engagement is being had with devolved nations about the return and testing of students in January, including discussions on default online teaching?
Matt Hancock
Yes, this is a really important subject to get right. The use of testing will make it easier for students safely to go home and then safely to return to university. I have discussed that with my colleagues from across the four nations, not least because so many students go to university in different parts of the UK. I hope we have a good regime in place for the return of students, just as we have a good regime in place for students to be able safely to go home, using the new lateral flow tests that we now have available thanks to the huge investment and the work we did over the summer.
Kate Griffiths (Burton) (Con) [V]
So many businesses and jobs in my constituency are based in pubs and the brewing industry, which are not set up to provide food and without further support will struggle to make it through December. May I ask the Prime Minister, through my right hon. Friend, to ensure that any support provided to wet pubs also includes the wider brewing industry, which will also be seeing a significant decrease in trade?
Matt Hancock
Yes, of course. Everybody knows that Burton is inescapably linked to high-quality beer; anyone who has been to Burton knows that fact. My heart goes out to the hospitality industry, which has been hit so hard. Of course schemes are available nationally, including the furlough and the support for businesses. There has been more support for the hospitality, leisure and accommodation businesses, and there will be cash grants for businesses that are closed under the new tiering system, to try to support people through what are, inevitably, very difficult times.
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)
Although I am pleased that the Prime Minister and Secretary of State have listened to representations from me and other colleagues about the importance of reopening gyms, golf and collective worship, I am disappointed that we heard nothing from the Prime Minister about helping small business people and small businesses in my constituency who have received little or no help whatsoever; they have been financially excluded, and the Government should look again at that. Following a freedom of information request, through my local clinical commissioning group, I compared the GP referrals from September this year with those from September 2019 and found that there has been a huge drop in the number of people referred, for example, for cardio, gastric, trauma and orthopaedics. Although we have heard from the Government that they will put extra financial resources into the NHS, how will the Secretary of State provide the extra doctors, nurses and specialists to get the waiting lists down and to meet the surge in referrals?
Matt Hancock
I am glad to say that we are hiring large numbers of people into the NHS—over 13,000 more nurses over the last year, for instance. I am grateful to the Chancellor for putting an extra £3 billion into the NHS next year to deal with some of the backlogs that were inevitably caused by the virus. In answer to the first part of the hon. Gentleman’s question, let me say that there will be grants of up to £3,000 per month for businesses forced to close by restrictions in England and also backdated grants of up to £2,100 per month for businesses in tier 2 and tier 3 areas that have suffered from reduced demand—this is on top of the national schemes. I reassure him that we are doing everything we can to support businesses in these difficult times.
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)
Aylesbury was in tier 1 prior to the second lockdown and my constituents accepted the jump to national restrictions on the basis of protecting the national health service. Will my right hon. Friend reassure them that from 3 December any restrictions will be based on truly local needs, backed up with truly local evidence, so that they can see for themselves why the action is needed?
Matt Hancock
Yes, that is right. We publish unprecedented amounts of data, on which these judgments have to be made. I commit to my hon. Friend that we will look at the precise data—in Aylesbury, across Buckinghamshire and, of course, nationwide—as we make these difficult judgments.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP) [V]
We do not often enough thank those public sector workers who have gone the extra mile during covid, particularly those processing furlough payments in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, those processing universal credit payments in the Department of Work and Pensions, and, as the Secretary of State will be aware, those who work in the national health service, for their heroic efforts. Will he thank those public sector workers for everything they are doing, and will he explain to them why this Government believe they should be subjected to a three-year pay freeze and whether he thinks that is appropriate?
Matt Hancock
I pay tribute to all those who have been working on the coronavirus response and, more broadly, all those who have been working together across the public and private sectors to make it happen. There are clear, significant economic consequences to the actions that we have had to take, and we as a country will have to get through those in the same way as we have pulled together to get through this coronavirus crisis so far. We are not there yet, but we are making significant progress.
Greg Clark (Tunbridge Wells) (Con)
The scientists, their teams and all the volunteers deserve our thanks for getting the breakthrough with the vaccine, as do the Secretary of State and the Government for funding that research and for acting in anticipation by buying 100 million doses of the vaccine. In that spirit, and given that we have made this commitment, will he over the next couple of days ask the Chancellor to advance some of the money that the Prime Minister referred to—the record-breaking increase in science funding—and put it in the hands of other clinical trials that are funded by charitable funds but whose fundraising income has dropped, so that there is no interruption to life-saving research for cancer and other sources?
Matt Hancock
My right hon. Friend tempts me to give an answer ahead of its time. Like him, I look forward to hearing what the Chancellor of the Exchequer will have to say on Wednesday.
Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab) [V]
When the Prime Minister announced the end of the first lockdown in late June, the Office for National Statistics weekly survey estimated that about 25,000 people had covid, but after the Government ignored their own scientists’ call for immediate action in September, cases skyrocketed. The latest ONS data estimates that there are now more than 600,000 people with the virus. Cases will soar again if the Government keep repeating the same old errors, including the failed tier system, which is what they are doing, driven by the pressure of their own right-wing Back-Bench MPs, not by public health needs. Today’s measures risk a third wave. Will the Government take responsibility for the thousands of deaths and all the pain of the bereavements that that would cause?
Matt Hancock
I suppose the good news that I can break to the hon. Gentleman is that by studying the impact of the different restrictions that we have had to introduce, we have been able to bring in a set within tier 3 that are calibrated to ensure that we can get the rates down. There is also mass testing, which has been so effective in Liverpool, where the rates have come down by over two thirds. That is a remarkable effort by everybody in Liverpool, and I put my tribute to Joe Anderson on the record once more. So we can do this, especially if we all act and pull together.
Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)
London is the engine of this country’s economy, and my central London constituency is suffering hard. As of Friday, London had a substantially lower case rate than the English average, coming in at 75 points lower, and my constituency was 125 points lower. Will my right hon. Friend assure me that London will come out at the lowest tier possible, given the health circumstances?
Matt Hancock
I can assure my hon. Friend that London will come out at the tier that is necessary and appropriate based on the public health evidence. What matters, as my hon. Friend says, is the case rate and the case rate among the over-60s, as well as the direction of travel in both of those, and then, of course, the percentage of tests testing positive—because if we put more tests in, we do not want to punish an area for having a higher number of positives—and the impact on the NHS. Thankfully, in London, the NHS has performed remarkably in this second peak and has coped with it, despite the pressures, admirably well.
Mr Speaker
I am going to suspend the House. We think we are going to get the Prime Minister back, but we just need to check the new line, so I will suspend the House for five minutes while we reconnect. Thanks, everybody.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
We will recommence the statement. I believe that we have the Prime Minister virtually, so first we will go to Alex Davies-Jones.
Alex Davies-Jones (Pontypridd) (Lab) [V]
Diolch, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am grateful that both the Prime Minister and I are now back virtually. I am pleased to hear from the Prime Minister that the devolved nations are finally being included in talks on planning for the Christmas break. However, like so many of his other promises, it comes too late for people in Wales, and they have had enough.
The Prime Minister may remember that earlier this year, he told the House that he would passport money for Welsh councils, such as mine in Rhondda Cynon Taf, that were particularly badly hit by Storm Dennis. He told us that the money would be there for the landslip in the Rhondda. We need in excess of £100 million, but we have had just £2.5 million. The Prime Minister says he is committed to the Union, but we all know that actions speak louder than words, and his negligence in supporting the Welsh Government through flooding and in co-operating with them over coronavirus speaks volumes. Will he therefore please confirm his exact plans to make good on his financial commitments—
The Prime Minister [V]
For the record, Madam Deputy Speaker, the problem does not appear to be at our end. I hope that viewers will not think I am in any way trying to avoid scrutiny by hon. Members. I can tell the hon. Lady that we are investing massively in Wales, as we are across the whole UK. If she contains her impatience until Wednesday, she will hear about perhaps the biggest package of investment in infrastructure across the whole UK for generations. I remind the House that it was the Welsh Labour Government who managed to spend £144 million on a study into the M4 bypass, and then decided not to proceed with the bypass. That is not the approach that this Government take. We will be investing hugely in Welsh infrastructure and taking Wales forward. I am delighted that Mark Drakeford and other leaders of the devolved Administrations are working with us on a plan for Christmas.
Madam Deputy Speaker
It is wonderful to have the Prime Minister back with us.
Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)
Does the Prime Minister agree about the importance of sport and exercise to both mental and physical wellbeing? Will he confirm that going forward into the winter, facilities for outdoor sport and indoor swimming should remain open in all tiers?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right about the vital importance of sport. I can tell him that even in my current confinement, I am taking whatever exercise I can—mainly on a treadmill, I am afraid. He is totally right. We will ensure that gyms, leisure centres and swimming pools are open in all tiers and that organised sport can resume.
Charlotte Nichols (Warrington North) (Lab)
As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on pubs, I have been contacted by pubs not only in my constituency of Warrington North, but from across the country. They are dismayed by the extension of the substantial meal requirement to tier 2, but also by the agonising wait to find out what tier their premises will be in as we come out of national lockdown. For those who will be allowed to reopen, in order to be able to do so, they need to be getting their orders in now with suppliers. Those who cannot will be losing out on one of the most profitable times of the year. As they have been absolutely battered by the restrictions, is it not time for a sector deal for pubs, which are the heart of our communities, and for their supply chain?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady makes an important point, and it is appalling that pubs, or any businesses, have had to face the restrictions that they have. Nobody has wanted to do this. The reason for the delay that she talks about until Thursday is that we need to look at the data and make sure that we get it right about which tiers various areas should be going into. Of course she is right that we have to have plans for our whole economy to bounce back, and indeed we do. She will be hearing from the Chancellor on Wednesday about that, but we must not forget that pubs and other businesses that have been forced to close remain entitled to furlough until March.
Gary Sambrook (Birmingham, Northfield) (Con)
In Birmingham, the data suggests that the biggest driver for transmission is household mixing. With that in mind, will the Prime Minister give serious consideration to allowing places such as Buzz Bingo and Hollywood Bowl in Great Park, in the Northfield constituency, to open in all three tiers—not just to save jobs and those businesses, but so that family and friends can socialise in a covid-secure way?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is totally right to support bingo halls and bowling alleys. They will be open, as he knows, in tiers 1 and 2. Alas, we cannot yet do it in tier 3, but, as I have said to the House, there is the prospect that where communities come together to get tested together, they can thereby drive down R. There is now a route out of these restrictions for communities and towns, not just through the vaccine but through mass testing.
Feryal Clark (Enfield North) (Lab)
Schools across Enfield North face a daily avalanche of challenges to stay open before a single class has taken place. They face mounting costs associated with enhanced cleansing regimes, procurement of laptops for virtual learning and skyrocketing bills for staff absence and supply teachers as a result of teachers having to self-isolate. What additional funding and financial support is being made available to schools to support them with those additional covid-related costs?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady is completely right about the heroic achievement of schools and teachers in keeping going. The vast majority of schools—99% or so—are open, to the best of my knowledge, and most pupils are getting the education that they need. That is one of the reasons why we have had to put pressure on other sectors, such as hospitality. We do not want to do that, but social justice means that we have to keep schools open. We have put about £1 billion into supporting catch-up funds for schools, and another £96 million is now going in for one-on-one tutorials to help kids who are in danger of falling behind.
Scott Benton (Blackpool South) (Con)
The Government’s support packages for cultural venues throughout this pandemic have provided a lifeline for many attractions in my constituency, and I know that the Prime Minister will join me in welcoming the £760,000 grant that we received over the weekend to support and renew the Blackpool Tower ballroom. As soon as our local attractions can reopen, will the Prime Minister join me in the UK’s premier resort of Blackpool to reopen the Tower ballroom and make sure we can launch a campaign to encourage people to holiday here in the UK next year?
The Prime Minister
Like many of us, I have spent happy hours in the Blackpool Tower ballroom, and I know it well. It would be a fine thing to see Blackpool open up again as fast as possible. I repeat the answer I gave a moment ago: we cannot say yet what the tiering will be, but mass testing does offer a route forward for Blackpool and all its attractions—illuminations included.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
Small Business Saturday is only a couple of days after the lifting of this lockdown, but the fantastic small businesses in Newcastle do not know how or whether they will be able to trade. Many small businesspeople are excluded from all support, for one reason or another, and their losses are mounting, so will the Prime Minister set out the per head economic support he will be providing to local authorities to help small businesses make it through to the promised land of covid-free vaccines?
The Prime Minister
The local authorities have been given about £4.6 billion so far to support them through the pandemic and to help them to support hard-hit businesses in their areas, and that is on top of the investment that we have made in the VAT cuts—the business rate cuts—right the way through to next year. Altogether, it is about a £200 billion package of support. The whole point of coming out into the tiers now, or next week, is to allow small businesses to get going again. It was awful to have the restrictions that we have had. We hope that we will be able to take them off and keep them off, but clearly that depends on everybody doing their bit.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con) [V]
I understand that my right hon. Friend is going to require London to be in one regional tier. However, as at the end of last week, the rate of infection in the worst affected borough was at 372 per 100,000, but in the least affected area it was at 125 per 100,000. What will drive which tier London goes into—the position in the worst affected area, the middle, or the least affected area?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend will have to wait until the announcements by the Health Secretary on Thursday about exactly who goes into which tier. As my hon. Friend knows, the point about London is that although it is very diverse and massive—650 square miles or so—it is held together by a very dense mass transit system, and although there are fewer people on it right now, the transmission within London means that it is quite difficult to separate one bit of London from another.
Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP) [V]
Whatever tier of protection, people expect frontline workers to get the support they need to keep themselves and their colleagues safe. In response to a judicial review initiated by the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain, the High Court ruled that the UK Government were wrong in not extending health and safety protections to gig economy workers. Will the Prime Minister ensure that this is corrected and that his Government do not appeal against this finding?
The Prime Minister
We will study the judgment and take appropriate action to protect workers.
Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)
I thank the Prime Minister for his statement, and join my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton) in praising all the staff at the Royal Stoke for the work they have been doing. It is the scientists that are giving us the most hope at the moment, particularly with the vaccines. I ask the Prime Minister to join me in congratulating Cobra Biologics in Newcastle-under-Lyme, who have been part of the Oxford project. Does he agree that the fact that the vaccines are so close now is a reason why we should redouble our efforts to observe the guidance and be responsible with the extra permissions we will get over December?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend completely sums up the strategy that we need now, just as we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Now is the moment when it is vital that we concentrate on the road ahead and do not veer off one way or the other, and do not allow ourselves to throw away the gains that we have made. It will be a tough few months, but the vaccines that he talks about have unquestionably changed the logic, and massively, massively improved our position, but it is too early—far, far too early—to be complacent about that. Obviously I thank the company in his constituency profoundly for what it has done.
Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)
The Prime Minister failed to answer the question from the Leader of Opposition about the extent to which local areas would be consulted on what tier they would be returned to, and the Secretary of State was fantastically vague about the geography of any such areas. Will the Prime Minister therefore clarify what exactly the criteria are that are going to be used to make these decisions?
The Prime Minister
With great respect to the hon. Gentleman, perhaps that was one of the answers I gave that was mysteriously truncated in the course of my giving it. I think I said pretty clearly that the criteria we would use to decide who went into which tier would be case detection rates in all groups, case detection rates in the over-60s, the rate at which cases are rising or falling, positivity rates, and pressure on the NHS. Those are some of the criteria that we will use.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
“He loved Big Brother.” The last ruler that told us how we may or may not celebrate Christmas was Oliver Cromwell. It didn’t well, did it?
The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend is completely right in his basic instincts, which I share, and his fundamental libertarian yearnings, which I also share. I love Christmas; I love a big get-together. The trouble is that the people of this country can see that there is a real risk that if we blow it with a big, blowout at Christmas, we will pay for it in the new year. They want a cautious and balanced approach, and that is what we will deliver for the whole UK.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
May I make a plea to all Members to be as brief as the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne)? After two hours, we are not even halfway through the number of people who are hoping to ask a question. I remind people that they are not making speeches; they are asking questions—brief questions—and they should not read them. I am quite sure that I can rely on the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant).
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
You always say that before you call me, Madam Deputy Speaker. [Laughter.] I see you have united the House in that plea.
May I make a plea to the Prime Minister? I have asked him about this before this year. We had terrible flooding in the Rhondda. It led to a landslide from a coal tip, which could all too easily have landed on top of people’s houses, God forbid, as it has elsewhere in Wales in the past. We need £100 million. So far, the Prime Minister has promised one Member of this House to passport the money, in February. He promised me in June that this was going to be sorted. We still have seen only £2 million of the £100 million we need. Please, please, please, just say now we are going to get that money on Wednesday.
The Prime Minister
This is a matter for the Welsh Labour Government in Wales to deal with, but I understand the fundamental inability of the Welsh Labour Government to deal with so many matters that concern the people of Rhondda, and we will do what we can to address the hon. Gentleman’s point.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
Many will be relieved that collective worship, outdoor sports, gyms, shops and personal care will resume business as usual, but can the Prime Minister tell us when the limits for spectators at spectator sports and business events will be set, as this will affect many self-employed contractors? Most importantly, what does my right hon. Friend think the chances are of getting the over-80s and the most vulnerable vaccinated before Christmas so that that great festival can be a lot more stressful for everyone—a lot less stressful for everyone? [Laughter.]
Madam Deputy Speaker
While the Prime Minister computes what that question actually was, I should point out that the hon. Gentleman—I am being kind to him, because he is an hon. Gentleman—had two questions. I am not allowing any more two questions; it is one question, not a speech, or we will be here all day. Of course, some people want to be.
The Prime Minister
I am interested in my hon. Friend’s Freudian slip about Christmas, but the answer is, I am afraid, that it is just too early to say whether we will get any vaccine before Christmas that we can deploy at scale. We are optimistic but we cannot be confident at this stage.
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD) [V]
Regardless of today’s announcement, many businesses and people in my constituency of Edinburgh West and across this country are still completely excluded, and have been for many months, from Government support. Can the Prime Minister assure us that his Government will address the issue of those millions of people who have been excluded?
The Prime Minister
We hope that nobody has been excluded. There is a massive package of support—and Barnett consequentials for Scotland running to many billions—with £13.5 billion for the self-employed alone.
Anthony Mangnall (Totnes) (Con)
I know that the whole House will want to join me in sending our condolences and thoughts to the two crew members of the Joanna C, which sank at sea this weekend.
With regards to today’s announcement, will the Prime Minister make the desire to get the R level to 1 a time-specific objective, or a permanent one?
The Prime Minister
I very much echo my hon. Friend’s tribute to the sailors lost at sea. My hon. Friend is right to focus on the R. We want to get it down and keep it down, if possible for good.
Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
Wales is already out of its successful circuit-breaker. When England comes out of lockdown into a tiered system, will the Prime Minister ensure that people who live in tiers 2 and 3 are not in a position to make non-essential travel out of those regions into other English regions or into Wales, in order to contain the spread of the transmission of the disease?
The Prime Minister
If the hon. Gentleman looks at the guidance on travel in tiers 2 and 3, he will see that it sets out clearly that in tier 2 people should reduce the number of journeys that they make and avoid travelling into tier 3 areas, and that in tier 3 they should avoid travelling out of the area altogether. There is more detail in the guidance, which he might care to study.
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
I welcome the changes today for gyms, God and golf, opening in all tiers, but will the Prime Minister confirm that the hospitality sector, forced to close in tier 2 and tier 3 areas, will continue to receive grant support in the future?
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed. I can tell my hon. Friend that local restrictions support grants are still available—£3,000 for every 28 days that a business is forced to close.
Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)
Under the previous tiering system, my constituents in Lancaster and Wyre were frustrated that, although they had infection rates at the bottom of the Lancashire table of infections, they were bound by the rest of the county when it came to the tiering system. Will the Prime Minister reassure my constituents and businesses that operate in my constituency that district councils will be taken into account and consulted when deciding which tiers we are going into?
The Prime Minister
I very much sympathise with the hon. Lady’s constituents in Lancaster and Wyre, and I thank them for the efforts that they have gone to in helping to bring the virus down in their area. It is very difficult, as I said earlier, to draw up the boundaries of these regions in a way that is satisfactory, but I hope that people will work together to get the test, to kick covid out and to drive down the virus, thereby—hopefully—to reduce the restrictions in their area.
Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend tell us exactly what the criteria will be for moving up and down the tiered system, and how often a review of each area will take place?
The Prime Minister
Yes. The criteria are as I have set out a couple of times now. The areas will be reviewed every 14 days.
Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)
While the Prime Minister might hope that coronavirus will take the day off this Christmas, key workers in prisons, local authorities and emergency services will be working hard to keep vital services running. Despite that, the Chancellor is apparently set to freeze their pay. Will the Prime Minister order the Chancellor to reverse that decision, or do key workers need to set up unproven personal protective equipment companies if they want to receive Government money?
The Prime Minister
I thank prison workers and all who have done an incredible job in fighting covid and helping the country to fight covid over the last few months. I think the public understand the need to keep the pressure down on public spending at the moment. We have had inflation-busting pay rises previously, but, as the Chancellor will be setting out, the economic situation is not easy as a result of what this country has been going through. We will ensure that prison workers are among the very first to be able to use the lateral flow testing system to help them get the virus down in their line of work.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con) [V]
I strongly support what the Prime Minister has said today. He will know that despite the strong financial support for businesses, many businesses in my constituency of Harlow have really struggled. Therefore, as well as paying tribute to Harlow’s small businesses, may I urge him to ensure that he takes into consideration the really tough—sometimes devastating—effects on small businesses in future decisions on covid?
The Prime Minister
I thank my right hon. Friend for what he does to champion small businesses in Harlow. They are the backbone of our economy, which is why the Government have done everything we can to keep businesses going, including through the furlough system, the grants of £3,000 per month for businesses forced to close, and backdated grants for businesses in tiers 2 and 3 that have been affected by reduced demand. I mentioned earlier the support for businesses through local authorities. That is about £1.1 billion of the £4.6 billion. He will have heard me mention many times the reductions in business rates and VAT that will go on until next year, and plenty of schemes with loans and grants to help small business. I have no doubt that that investment will be repaid by growth and dynamism next year as those businesses bounce back.
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister said that he plans to extend mass testing. Some 2,000 military personnel were needed to deliver mass testing in Liverpool, and they were not able to extend it to the rest of the five boroughs in the city region. They are now due to return to other duties. Meanwhile, other public sector workers are flat out on the crisis already, so what is the plan for rolling out mass testing? Would it not be better to concentrate on getting contact tracing right?
The Prime Minister
The advantage of mass testing is that it is instant. Contact tracing by any system takes 24 hours or so to get the result to people. Mass testing can tell people whether they are infectious within 15 minutes. The Army has done a fantastic job in Liverpool and will continue to be very valuable as we roll it out.
Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)
The Prime Minister has given a clear policy direction, together with the rationale behind the changes about to be introduced. People will be particularly pleased that spectators can return to sporting events. Will he share the scientific evidence and thinking behind this with the Welsh Government, in the hope that my constituents can benefit from the same privileges that will be available in England?
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed; we will share all the relevant scientific evidence with my right hon. Friend and the House.
David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)
Showpeople who run our fairs and showgrounds have been adhering to lockdown rules since March, but because they do not have fixed premises, they are not eligible for rates relief or many other aspects of financial support. Will the Prime Minister agree to meet me and the Showmen’s Guild to look at how we can support people who run our fairs and showgrounds?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman will have to forgive me; I think that was a request to meet him. I am very happy to ensure that his request is taken up at the appropriate ministerial level. I think his question was about support for those who have suffered during lockdown. I am more than happy to do what I can to help.
Bill Wiggin (North Herefordshire) (Con) [V]
I thank Tom Keith-Roach of AstraZeneca for producing a vaccine that, when fairly compared, is actually 90% effective. Will my right hon. Friend revisit the restrictions that he is proposing today if the vaccine is approved in the coming days?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to be optimistic about the AstraZeneca vaccine. The trouble is that it may not be deployed or, indeed, deployable on a rapid enough timescale to allow us to dispense with the kind of restraints that we need to employ. The risk is that we would simply see a surge in the virus and a devastating impact on communities before we got those shots into people’s arms.
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
My constituents in Blaydon, along with others across the north-east, have been working really hard to stop the spread of coronavirus. Our councils have responded magnificently, too, but questions still remain about the funding for the more effective local test and trace, additional support for businesses already in tier 2 or 3 before the shutdown and funding for the local roll-out of the vaccination programme. Will the Prime Minister ensure that funding is now made available urgently to local authorities to meet these costs?
The Prime Minister
Indeed. We will make sure that we support local authorities, which will clearly be playing an important role in rolling out the vaccine. As I said, we have already given £4.6 billion to support local authorities. They will continue to play a crucial role, as will the NHS, the Army and other bodies.
Dehenna Davison (Bishop Auckland) (Con)
I am incredibly grateful to the Prime Minister for sticking to his word and ending the national lockdown on 2 December as promised. Looking ahead to the new tiered system, I have been speaking to hospitality businesses today that very much welcome the changes to the curfew but just want the Prime Minister’s reassurance that additional support packages will remain in place if they are to go into tier 2 or 3.
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend, who is entirely right to support the hospitality industry in her community, and, of course, support packages will remain in place.
Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab) [V]
On Friday, I met online with nurses in Birmingham who said that they had never seen so much death on the wards. They have had to bid goodbye to colleagues who have left the hospital in hearses. Many are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. We owe it to them to play by the rules to save our NHS, but we have to save livelihoods, too. I have read the action plan that the Prime Minister has published. There is one mention of the self-employed on page 39, but in the west midlands, half the self-employed are not eligible for the Government support scheme—that is 121,000 people. They are not going to be helped by VAT cuts, bounce back loans or the art and culture schemes. What they need is eligibility for the self-employment scheme, so will the Prime Minister bring forward changes to the scheme, or is he hell-bent on starving our entrepreneurs this Christmas?
The Prime Minister
Of course not, and I feel very much for those who are in a difficult position. We have spent £13.5 billion supporting the self-employed so far—I think possibly more by now. Universal credit remains there and the increase in universal credit is also intended to help those in tough times, as well as all the other provision that I have mentioned. But the best thing we can do for all self-employed people is to get our communities and our country moving again, and this winter package offers the best way forward.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
A localised tiered approach is definitely the best way forward, and in Wiltshire, we very much look forward to going back into what I hope will be the lowest level of restrictions. Will my right hon. Friend commit to publishing very clear indicators so that local leaders know what they need to do in order to exit down the tiers and eventually get out of the restrictions altogether?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend will have seen or heard several times the criteria that we are using to decide which tiers people should go into. The inverse is obviously true and everybody now has several exit routes. There is obviously the vaccine and obeying the tiering system scrupulously, but also the possibility now of mass testing—get a test as a community, kick covid out and reduce the restrictions you face.
Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab) [V]
On 12 October, I asked the Prime Minister if he would ensure that British Sign Language was available at future press conferences. He said:
“the point is registered.”—[Official Report, 12 October 2020; Vol. 682, c. 39.]
Registered, but not delivered. Six weeks since that question and eight months since the start of the pandemic, there is still no progress on a sign language interpreter. Will the Prime Minister meet me and others, who rely on sign language interpretation, to work out a solution so that Government communication is inclusive of all disabled people?
The Prime Minister
I certainly will make sure that the hon. Member’s delegation is properly received and that we try to come up with a solution.
Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con)
Prime Minister, you will know more than anyone else in this House that London is a wonderful diverse city. Many Londoners will welcome much of your statement. However, we are not a single homogenous unit. So can I have your reassurance that when considering the tier system, you will look at the regulations, consider London borough by borough and not treat us all as one unit?
The Prime Minister
Alas, the virus is no respecter of borough boundaries, as I understand things. My hon. Friend is, of course, totally right in his analysis. The incidence is different in different parts of the city, but there are many things that unite London and encourage transmission across its vast network and I am afraid that is still I think the most sensible way of dealing with it.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]
People living in care homes need visitors. The plans to test family members so they can visit are welcome, but there is a big issue with insurance and the need for care homes to have indemnity if they experience a covid outbreak after visits. Care homes are already struggling financially and they should not be left facing ruinous legal fees because they tried to do the right thing and facilitate safe visits. So will the Prime Minister commit to extending the indemnity to care homes, which the NHS already has, plus financial support to help the care sector to pay for spiralling insurance premiums?
The Prime Minister
I will certainly study the hon. Member’s suggestion, but the best way forward is for care homes to take advantage of the testing system we have in place: not just lateral flow, but PCR—polymerase chain reaction—testing, too. That is the way to check that employees are not spreading it and of course to stop employees going from care home to care home. As has been pointed out throughout the pandemic, very often, it is not the visitors or family members who are importing the disease. Alas, I am afraid that sometimes it is the disease moving from care home to care home through employees and we have to stop that as well.
James Sunderland (Bracknell) (Con)
International travel is vital for our recovery, not least in the aviation, hospitality, leisure and business sectors. Has the Prime Minister given any thought to the utility of having vaccination stamps in passports, or an equivalent scheme, to get our planes off the ground?
The Prime Minister
I can assure my hon. Friend that the Secretary of State for Transport is looking at all such schemes. I am sure he will have heard what my hon. Friend has said loud and clear. He will be making some announcements very shortly.
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
Today’s covid winter plan confirms a further £7 billion for test and trace, taking the full bill this year to some £22 billion. Could the Prime Minister confirm how much of that additional funding will be going to the highly effective local authority contact tracing teams, how much will be squandered on management consultants and Serco’s failed national contact tracing system, and how much will go on further supporting those asked to self-isolate?
The Prime Minister
I cannot give the hon. Member a breakdown of the figures now, but what I can certainly tell her is that, actually, NHS Test and Trace has been working hand in glove with local authorities from the beginning. There are, to the best of my knowledge, about 198 local authority testing teams now actively going out there and doing what is necessary. They are doing a fantastic job.
Edward Timpson (Eddisbury) (Con)
Dr Andrew Wilson and the Cheshire clinical commission group have done a great job maintaining a high standard of care for patients alongside their covid workload. Can my right hon. Friend reassure Dr Alistair Adey at the Tarporley Health Centre that additional support will be made available to GP practices, so they can continue to deliver that standard, alongside any vaccination programme?
The Prime Minister
Yes, absolutely, and I thank Dr Andrew Wilson and the Cheshire clinical commissioning group, and Dr Alistair Adey from the Tarporley health centre, for everything they have done. GPs will obviously play a crucial role in this vaccination programme, as they do in all vaccination programmes, and they have been backed with £150 million to prepare.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP) [V]
Household mixing in a major vector for covid, so unless the Prime Minister has negotiated a ceasefire with the virus, the only mixing we should be considering over the next six weeks is our Christmas drinks. Does the Prime Minister have an exit strategy, or is he content to accept a certain level of risk through household mixing?
The Prime Minister
As the hon. Lady knows, we think we have been able to get the virus down through a tiered system, and we will continue to do that. The guidance about the number of people we are allowed to mix with in households is clear and, alas, it will remain very tough. It will remain tough because that is the way to get through and beyond Christmas, and through the new year. The exit strategy is very simple: it is to use these three techniques—tough tiering, mass testing and a roll-out of the vaccine to keep the virus down. We must push it down further until such time as we are able to say that all those who are vulnerable have been vaccinated and we can move forward and go back completely to normal. As has been pointed out several times already, that terminus, that end date, looks like being Easter. We may be able to do better and make considerable improvements before Easter, but we should aim for Easter.
Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)
On 2 November, I asked the Prime Minister what he felt we had learned in the summer after the end of the first lockdown, and he said that when people were contacted and tested positive, they should isolate. He went on:
“It does not look to me as though the numbers or the proportions have been good enough. We need to get those up in the next phase”.—[Official Report, 2 November 2020; Vol. 683, c. 58.]
Will the Prime Minister update me on that point? Yes, mass testing is critical and the vaccine may well save us, but there will be a gap between the first and the last.
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is right to say that that has been a problem; but in fact, more people have been self-isolating than is sometimes supposed or alleged, and they have done a great thing. We have instituted means-tested payments to help support those who are isolating, but what will now really change things are the lateral flow tests, which we hope will enable someone to have a shorter period of quarantine. They will not have to stick to the full 14 days, and they can get a rapid turnaround test—a lateral flow test—after a much shorter period. That is what we are aiming for.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab) [V]
The Government have failed to make provision for the delivery of remote education to pupils who live in a household where someone is clinically extremely vulnerable. A number of my constituents are suffering from extreme anxiety as a result, as they do their best to keep their family safe. Some are even considering home schooling, despite the fact that their children love their schools. Will the Prime Minister respond to their concerns and ensure that in his new guidance, no family is put under unnecessary stress in such a way?
The Prime Minister
I assure all the parents who are coping with exceptionally difficult circumstances and trying to do the best for their kids when it is very stressful and they have the difficulty of knowing whether to send them to school that it is much better to send them to school if they possibly can. We have distributed, I think, hundreds of thousands of laptops to help pupils to learn remotely throughout the summer. We continue to support catch-up and top-up learning for vulnerable kids, particularly via one-on-one tuition. I want to see every child supported, and that applies, as the hon. Lady rightly says, to the children of families who are facing particular difficulties.
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
I very warmly welcome the announcement of the end of national lockdown on 2 December. This morning, I had discussions with school leaders in Runnymede and Weybridge regarding the challenges that they face, and a key message was that our schools are open but that too many pupils are self-isolating at home. Whole year groups being sent home following a case and the self-isolation of teachers, and the impact and cost involved with that were causing huge challenges for the delivery of learning. We must minimise the harms from both covid and the measures being used to fight it. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, as soon as possible, we need to use targeted testing to support teachers and to change and improve our approach to contact tracing in schools to stop whole year groups having to self-isolate following a case so that our schools can continue to provide the learning and opportunities that our children deserve?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise the importance of testing in schools—testing the teachers and making sure that we do not send whole bubbles home. That is why schools and universities, along with NHS hospitals and care homes, are the primary settings where we want to roll-out not just PCR testing, but lateral flow testing as well.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
The whole House is very grateful to the Prime Minister for giving such full and thorough answers and really listening to what people are saying, but I shall forgive him if, in spite of colleagues giving ridiculously long questions, the Prime Minister feels like giving shorter answers.
The Prime Minister
I am very happy to do so, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I just do not want to short-change colleagues. As I was banished by telecommunications from your presence, I do not want people to think that I am trying to nickel and dime them here.
Madam Deputy Speaker
It is much more difficult for the Prime Minister as he cannot feel the atmosphere here in the Chamber, so it is better that I explain to him that both his Secretary of State and the Leader of the Opposition look as if they agree with the point that I have just made.
Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)
The hope that we have been given by our brilliant scientists will be dashed for millions if the Prime Minister pushes ahead with the public sector pay freeze, which, of course, is not levelling up, but levelling down. He does not want to be stand accused of saying one thing and doing another, so will he give a very short answer now and rule out the possibility of a public sector pay freeze?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman should wait until the Chancellor’s statement on Wednesday.
Paul Holmes (Eastleigh) (Con)
I welcome the Prime Minister’s statement and the clarity that he has given, but there are four independent tap shop and breweries in my constituency that have gone through a terrible time with being allowed to sell only takeaways very late in the day. Will he and the Chancellor look at extending business rate relief to these businesses and giving bespoke new grants to this industry?
The Prime Minister
I refer my hon. Friend to the answer that I gave just now.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab) [V]
I welcome much in the Prime Minister’s statement. Thankfully, Greater Manchester is seeing a downward trend in infections in all 10 boroughs, but we will have been in some form of restrictions now for four months. Clearer rules and better enforcement are welcome, but I still do not understand the logic of pushing people out of covid-secure, well-regulated, responsible hospitality businesses into illegal covid-insecure gatherings to drink. That would be counterproductive, would it not?
Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)
I welcome the change that will allow people in care homes to be visited by two members of their family, who will be tested twice a week. Can the Prime Minister ensure that care homes promote visiting and that there is a register that really calls out those care homes that do not allow it?
The Prime Minister
Care homes should follow their own instincts about the wellbeing of their residents. They should follow all the procedures that we have set out and make use of lateral flow testing and other types of protection to ensure that people can see their loved ones and hug them. That is what the people of this country want and that many families across this country want to see. That is what this Government are providing for.
Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab) [V]
Hull has had the highest covid infection rates in the United Kingdom. Two weeks ago, it was promised 10,000 lateral flow tests, but today they still have not arrived. When governing during a global pandemic, should the Prime Minister not focus on delivering on the ground what has already been announced, rather than on grand new promises lifted from the Downing Street public relations grid?
The Prime Minister
I will take up immediately the hon. Lady’s point about Hull and try to understand why it has not got the lateral flow tests that she rightly wants to see.
Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)
Nottinghamshire went into tier 3 just a few days before the national lockdown, but it was a very stressful few days for the beauty industry in Nottinghamshire, which was uniquely forced to close, unlike in any other tier 3 area in the country. Given that the premise of the tiered regional system was to have consistent and fair restrictions in each tier across the country, will the Prime Minister assure me that he will seek to avoid those kinds of irregularities under the new restrictions to avoid the upset felt by beauticians and make sure it is fair for small businesses?
The Prime Minister
Yes, we will indeed. As I said in my statement, we will make sure there is much more uniformity about the way we do things.
Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab)
Last week, the Health Secretary told “Good Morning Britain”,
“We don’t have parking charges in English hospitals”
for NHS staff
“and we’re not going to for the course of this pandemic.”
But that is not true, because they were reintroduced for staff at University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire in June, as they have been elsewhere. I have written to the Prime Minister about this matter, and I now ask him whether he will live up to the Government’s promise of free parking throughout the pandemic for NHS staff in Coventry and across the country.
The Prime Minister
I will look into the matter that the hon. Lady raises, and I will get back to her as soon as I can.
Angela Richardson (Guildford) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that by protecting NHS capacity during the autumn surge in cases, including at the Royal Surrey County Hospital in my constituency and investing £3 billion in reducing wait times, increasing treatments and mental health care, this Government are taking a balanced approach to all health needs?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is a balanced approach that we will have to continue to follow through to the spring.
Rachel Hopkins (Luton South) (Lab)
Luton airport supports thousands of jobs and provides an income stream that funds council services and local charities. Will the Prime Minister outline what plans the Government have to introduce a fast air passenger testing regime to prevent further job losses, restore consumer confidence and ensure that the local voluntary sector survives?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady raises an excellent point, and I direct her to the answer that I gave a few minutes ago about the statement that will be made shortly by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab) [V]
Local authorities have stepped up to the plate to tackle covid in their areas, but they are facing additional costs from local track and trace, while losing income from taxes and fees. Will the Prime Minister give us an undertaking that local government will be recognised in the current spending review and that there will be extra resources so that it can pay for the extra services it is required to provide?
The Prime Minister
I thank local government for everything it is doing. I think that it is doing an amazing job in incredibly difficult circumstances. The hon. Gentleman can be sure that it will be recognised in the spending review.
Mr William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)
Can my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister confirm that decisions over tiering will be based on local authority areas such as Stockport, rather than wider combined authority areas such as Greater Manchester?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend and can confirm that we will be taking decisions about tiering on the basis of the data and a common-sensical division of the areas concerned.
Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP) [V]
In a recent survey, 95% of disabled people said that their costs had increased even further as a result of the pandemic, with no £20 uplift to their legacy benefits. Will the Prime Minister listen to the Social Security Advisory Committee, the Work and Pensions Committee, cross-party MPs and peers, and those who signed the “Don’t leave disabled people behind” petition, and please take action to end this injustice?
The Prime Minister
I will study the point the hon. Member makes, although, obviously, I am proud that we have been able to uplift universal credit by £1,000 a year, helping some of the poorest families across the country and, of course, helping the disabled as well.
Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con) [V]
Families and businesses in Bexleyheath and Crayford will share my strong support for my right hon. Friend’s statement and approach today. However, we have a thriving hospitality sector that has particularly suffered this year because of the necessary restrictions to control the spread of coronavirus. While safety remains the top priority, does my right hon. Friend agree that the hospitality sector is the backbone of our local town centres, and it is vital we continue to provide it with the support it needs to help them survive and to protect jobs?
The Prime Minister
Indeed, and I have been with my right hon. Friend to many a fantastic hospitality venue in Bexley. I seem to remember going with him to one pub where he christened a blue drink: the Bexley Breeze Block I think it was, from memory. Let us hope that we are able to get the hospitality sector going across the country in the way that we would all want so that those fantastic businesses can recover strongly in the new year. We are going to do that by the techniques that I have mentioned—tough tiering, mass testing and rolling out a vaccine.
Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP) [V]
The Prime Minister will be aware of the positive role that churches play in our society and the importance of the act of public worship for so many. Churches across the UK are now closed, but I note the intention to reopen them soon in England. Does the Prime Minister agree with me that the role of churches as we live with covid cannot be overestimated or overvalued, and that we should be looking at opening our churches again right across the United Kingdom? Does he also recognise that, as we deal with the legacy of lockdown, churches have a key role to play in supporting what is a broken land and a broken people?
The Prime Minister
I think I might quarrel with the hon. Member’s description of a broken land and a broken people, because I think actually the people of this country have shown fantastic resilience. I do not think that they or we are broken; I think that we are going to come back very strongly. I also think that churches play an enormous part in that, and I am glad that they are going to be reopening from next week.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
My right hon. Friend will know that while Stoke-on-Trent may be a small city, it is a mighty one. Having removed itself from Government attention over rising coronavirus figures twice this year, the city is once again showing its hardy spirit in pushing down case rates during the second wave by 100 per 100,000 cases in the last week. Will my right hon. Friend consider the approach made today by Stoke-on-Trent City Council leader, Councillor Abi Brown, of placing Stoke-on-Trent into tier 2 as we exit this national lockdown?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is so right in the way he champions Stoke and the community spirit of the people of Stoke. I cannot say which tier, alas, they will go into. It will depend on all the things that I have discussed, and the figures are not easy. The incidence of the virus is still high, and we have to face that grim, grim truth, I am afraid. But the hope is there that, with mass testing—and the people of Stoke can do this if they choose: you can drive down the incidence, you can drive down the R, you can find the asymptomatic positives and you can reduce the virus in your area. If they can reduce the virus in their area, as Liverpool has done, by about two thirds, partly thanks to the participation of the people of Liverpool in mass testing, then they have the prospect of removing those restrictions as well. So “Get a test to kick covid out” is what I would also say to the people of Stoke, in addition to thanking them and my hon. Friend for all their hard work.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
Those areas that are placed in tier 3 will be keen to get any help they can receive to get themselves out of that. Can the Prime Minister tell us how many of the reductions in infection can be directly attributed to the mass testing scheme in Liverpool, and what level of population buy-in is needed for that system to be effective?
The Prime Minister
That is an incredibly good question. In Liverpool, 37% or more of the population has now been tested, and a lot of asymptomatic positives have been found. I have to stress that it is not the only thing—it can make a big difference, but to be absolutely certain that it is playing a decisive part in getting the R down, we need a bigger proportion of the population to take tests, and we need more community buy-in. That is why we are working with local leaders across the areas that may be going into tier 3 to help them with that and to get mass testing programmes going, not just like in Liverpool but even more ambitious.
Marco Longhi (Dudley North) (Con) [V]
Will my right hon. Friend join me in praising all our care workers, our staff at Russells Hall Hospital in Dudley and, in particular, staff at the Barchester Broadway Halls care home, who went out of their way to enable residents Stan Plawecki, aged 94, and Myra Staves, aged 87, to be part of our Armistice Day commemorations at this very difficult time?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to pay tribute to the work of those remarkable staff for what they did to allow Remembrance Sunday commemorations to go ahead and allow people to attend them. I thank them personally, and I thank all care home staff for the unbelievable service they have given and continue to give.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
There have been very positive discussions with the devolved Administrations, including in Wales, about a joined-up Christmas, but can the Prime Minister do something about the terminal incontinence of the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in continuing to leak the details of those discussions, undermining the trust and respect needed for those discussions to succeed?
The Prime Minister
What I can certainly say is that it does not help to read about confidential discussions in the papers. I must say that a lot of the stuff I have read seems to be very wide of the mark, but I am grateful to all colleagues in the DAs for the co-operation that they are showing in the work we are doing together.
Mrs Natalie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)
Will the Prime Minister join me in congratulating all the arts venues, such as the Astor theatre in Deal, the churches and parish halls that have opened their covid-secure doors to help others during the pandemic and encourage such kindness and neighbourly behaviour to continue as we tackle the virus together across the nation?
The Prime Minister
I do indeed congratulate all the arts venues in Deal that have pulled together in the way that my hon. Friend describes. Let us hope that we can get them all fully open as soon as possible, so that they can enjoy the benefits of a new deal for Deal, or an even better deal for Deal, which I am sure she is championing.
Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
My constituents are excited about seeing their families over Christmas, but they are also nervous about putting their elderly relatives at risk. Will the Prime Minister consider using the expanded testing capacity to allow families to get a covid test ahead of visiting elderly relatives at Christmas, even if they do not have symptoms?
The Prime Minister
That is certainly one of the use cases that we are considering. Rolling that out across the whole country in time for Christmas might be difficult, but the hon. Lady will have heard what we are doing with those types of test in care homes to allow people to see their loved ones.
Craig Williams (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
I thank the Prime Minister for his statement and welcome the return of the local approach—something that I hope the devolved Administrations, particularly in Wales, will copy. I pay particular tribute to Powys County Council and its track and trace team, which has contributed massively to both the local and national efforts. What they and my constituents want for Christmas is a united approach across the United Kingdom. To please the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan), will my right hon. Friend, as the Prime Minister for the whole United Kingdom, announce that?
The Prime Minister
I very much hope that we will have a united approach to Christmas. I think that is what the people of this country want. I repeat that there is much more that unites us than divides us on these issues, which matter so greatly to the hearts of everybody in our country. We are working together and will, I think, come up with a good solution.
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD) [V]
As an Oxford MP, I echo the Prime Minister’s congratulations to the Oxford Vaccine Group on today’s fantastic news. Will he join me in further congratulating it on being shortlisted for the NHS parliamentary awards?
I chair the all-party parliamentary group on coronavirus, and we have repeatedly heard in the course of our inquiry from experts and scientists who are concerned that a prospective vaccine, as welcome as it may be, is not, in and of itself, an exit strategy. Will the Prime Minister meet me and a cross-party delegation from both Houses to discuss our forthcoming recommendations, so that we can create a covid-secure UK that includes testing at the borders and locally led test, trace and isolate systems?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady is entirely right about the vaccine—it is wonderful news, but it is premature to say that it constitutes, on its own, an exit strategy. That is why I have insisted throughout this afternoon that it must be accompanied not only by NHS test, trace and isolate, but by new types of testing, plus the tough tiering that we have had and that we will have when we come out of this lockdown. The way forward is to make those things work together—to make the tiering work in tandem with testing—so that people get a test with a view to reducing the restrictions under which they, we and she are living. Get a test and help to kick covid out—that is the way forward.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Finally, with the prize for patience and perseverance, I call Jason McCartney to ask question No. 100.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. With a case rate of 552 per 100,000 and the sixth highest case rate in England, many people expect Kirklees to be in the highest tier when the announcement is made on Thursday. That will mean the closure of hospitality, apart from takeaways, at a time of year when many cafés, bars, pubs and restaurants try to make profits to see them through the rest of the year. Can I end this session by asking the Prime Minister one more time: please will he speak to the Chancellor again about support for the hospitality supply chain and for breweries and cider producers; will they look again at grant funding; and will they please consider once again cancelling business rates for another year to support our hospitality businesses?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes a passionate plea for breweries, cider producers and others. I know that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor will be listening keenly to all of that, particularly the points about business rates and other measures. We want to support the hospitality industry in Kirklees and across the country.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I thank the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care for answering 100 questions and for bringing the House up to date with their plans.
Virtual participation in proceedings concluded (Order, 4 June).
Points of Order
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Thank you for granting me this point of order. If you could help me on this matter, I would really appreciate it. On 15 June, in response to my written question regarding laptop provision for schools, the Minister for School Standards said:
“ The Department has ordered over 200,000 laptops and tablets. This order was placed on 19 April.”
On 2 July, here in the Chamber, I asked the Secretary of State for Education why documents released by his own Department therefore suggested that the first order was in fact placed on 15 May. The Secretary of State responded:
“I will write to the hon. Gentleman with clarification on that matter.”—[Official Report, 2 July 2020; Vol. 678, c. 543.]
He failed to write to me. I asked the same question to the Secretary of State in the House of Commons on 1 September. He said:
“I will write to him with reference to that if he will be so gracious as to accept a letter.”—[Official Report, 1 September 2020; Vol. 679, c. 56.]
He failed to do so again. I followed this up with his Department on 2 November. It failed to reply. I followed this up again with his Department on 19 November. I received a holding email, but I have yet to receive a substantive response. Madam Deputy Speaker, will you please advise me on what steps I need to take to secure a response from the Secretary of State for Education, given that he first promised to write to me almost five months ago?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
The hon. Gentleman’s point is not a point of order for the Chair, because the Chair does not have responsibility for what Ministers say or write—or do not say or write —but I nevertheless understand his purpose in raising his point of order in the Chamber at this moment. I can say to him, as Mr Speaker has said on many occasions, that Ministers ought to reply to questions and letters from Members of Parliament in a timely fashion, and the saga that he has just described is not acceptable. Although I cannot deal with this from the Chair as a point before the Chamber now, I can say that I hope the matter has been noted by those on the Treasury Bench and hopefully also by the Leader of the House’s office, and that the hon. Gentleman will receive his answer soon.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. You were not in the Chair last week when I made the longest point of order that had ever been made in the history of points of order—for which I apologise—but at the time I suggested that the Government had tabled their motion on virtual participation in debates and who should be allowed to take part in them at the very last moment and without notifying the Opposition. The Leader of the House has written to me to clarify that he had, in fact, been in touch with the shadow Leader of the House, so that channel had been open and I want to correct the record. I should have been much more precise in saying that the Government Whips Office had not notified the Opposition Whips Office, so I apologise to the House. I just wonder, Madam Deputy Speaker, whether the process that I have used for correcting the record would also be available to the Leader of the House, because he said last week that the reason he was tabling his motion in the way that he did was that the Government rule was that people should to go to work if they could—that is, physically—whereas this afternoon the Prime Minister has made it absolutely clear that even if we are in tier 1, the rule is that we should work from home if we can.
Madam Deputy Speaker
The hon. Gentleman has now made the second longest point of order—
Madam Deputy Speaker
Oh, I am quite sure he will make the third longest ere long. I appreciate the point that he is making. It is quite in order, as he has realised that something he said in this Chamber was factually incorrect, that he should come to the Chamber and correct it, and I am grateful to him for doing so. As to whether the Leader of the House will consider that he is in a similar position, that is a matter for him and not for me.
We will now suspend the House for three minutes in order to allow the safe exit of hon. Members and the entrance of hon. Members for the next item of business.
Road Traffic
(4 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Rachel Maclean)
I beg to move,
That the draft Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 1) (Amendment) Order 2020, which was laid before this House on 22 October, be approved.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
With this we shall take the following motion:
That the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 2) (Amendment) Order 2020 (S.I. 2020 No. 1155), dated 21 October 2020, a copy of which was laid before this House on 22 October, be approved.
Rachel Maclean
These amendment orders relate to the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 1) Order 2019 and the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 2) Order 2019. Although the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 3) (Amendment) Order 2020 is subject to the negative procedure, the House should be aware of it when considering the other two amending orders. Together they support the effective management of Operation Brock and strengthen the enforcement regime that underpins it.
Operation Brock is a co-ordinated, multi-agency response to cross-channel travel disruption. It replaces Operation Stack and has been specifically designed to keep the M20 motorway in Kent open in both directions, with access to junctions, even in periods of severe and protracted disruption. The Kent Resilience Forum is responsible for the Operation Brock plans. Any decisions relating to the activation and timing of the different phases of Operation Brock will be taken by Kent police silver command.
It is crucial that these instruments are brought into force in time for the end of the transition period, to ensure that the scheme operates as efficiently as possible to reduce the impact on businesses and local communities in Kent. I am grateful, therefore, that time has been found for this debate to take place quickly and also for the speed with which the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments has scrutinised the instruments.
Amendment order No. 1 extends to 31 October 2021 the sunset clause in the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 1) Order 2019. To give a little history, the 2019 order gave new powers to traffic officers in Kent, enabling them to, first, require the production of documents to establish the vehicle’s destination and readiness to cross the border; secondly, direct drivers to proceed to a motorway, removing the vehicle from the local road network; and, thirdly, direct drivers not to proceed to the channel tunnel or port of Dover except via a specified road or route.
The amendment sets the amount of the financial penalty deposit, which will be issued and taken immediately at the roadside by the police or staff from the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency. The amount of the deposit for breaching the traffic restrictions introduced by the other two instruments is set at £300.
Amendment order No. 2 extends to 31 October 2021 the sunset clause of the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 2) Order 2019, which prohibits cross-channel heavy goods vehicles from using local roads in Kent other than those on the improved Operation Brock routes. The amendment goes further to define local Kent roads that will require a Kent access permit, which can be obtained from the “check an HGV is ready to cross the border” service.
Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)
My constituency is, in many ways, the gateway to Kent from both London and Essex, via the Dartford crossing. Will she assure me that her Department will use its best endeavours to ensure that lorries do not use local, small roads either for travelling to a different location or for parking up overnight?
Rachel Maclean
I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He and his constituents can be assured that the powers we are taking in this legislation require Kent lorries to stick to certain specified routes only if they are crossing the border. I hope that that provides him with some reassurance; I am more than happy to meet him to discuss this matter much further.
To complete the picture, the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No.3) (Amendment) Order 2020, which is subject to a negative procedure, will extend the sunset clause in the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 3) Order 2019 to 31 October 2021. The order also further defines the strategic roads that need a Kent access permit, as issued by the “check an HGV is ready to cross the border service”, and allows the fining of HCV drivers without a Kent access permit on those roads. It will also allow HCVs carrying only specific goods of fresh and live seafood for human consumption and day-old chicks to obtain a priority goods permit that allows them to bypass the Operation Brock queues. It also clarifies who local haulier permits may be issued to, in line with Kent County Council guidelines. These orders are vital to enable sensible traffic management in Kent. We must show the public and businesses that Operation Brock will be ready, fully operational and enforceable on day one, should it be needed to deal with impact of cross-channel disruption. I commend the orders to the House.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
Let me start by saying that of course we accept the need for this legislation, although the timing, so late in the day, is hardly ideal, particularly for those in the haulage sector. The fact that we are still discussing statutory instruments, not to mention the fact that we still appear to be teetering on the brink of a no-deal Brexit, with only 16 sitting days to go before the end of the transition period demonstrates just what a shambles this Government’s handling of Brexit has been from start to finish.
Many of the stakeholders in the haulage sector I have spoken to feel that the Government have done nowhere near enough to prepare for what the Road Haulage Association has described as:
“the most challenging task the supply chain has ever faced”.
This sector has helped to keep the country going during the coronavirus outbreak, especially in maintaining essential deliveries of food, medical supplies and other goods. However, the sector has also been hard hit this year, and chaos at our ports and on our roads come January is something it does not need. Those in the sector just want to do their jobs, but the Government are making it difficult for them. I am yet to be persuaded that the Government have done what is needed to prevent huge delays in Kent for those making the short straits crossing. The Government’s own reasonable worst-case scenario suggests there might be a freight flow of 60% to 80% of the usual volumes in the near year, which could, according to the Government, lead to queues in Kent of up to 6,500 HCVs in January, rising to 7,000 in February. That could have significant consequences for the delivery of vital goods and could severely disrupt the lives of local residents, too. I would therefore appreciate clarity from the Minister on the additional measures being taken to avoid their own estimates of delays in Kent.
Unite the union and others have raised concerns about conditions for drivers caught in delays, who will need access to food, water and toilet facilities. There is also an issue as to what this would mean in terms of driver hours and driver fatigue. So what measures are being taken to provide these basic facilities for them? I understand that when giving evidence to the EU Goods Sub-Committee in the other place earlier today, the Minister said that she could not give details as to how many toilets would be needed in Kent because there are still some details the need to be worked out. I would be grateful if she elaborated for us what those details are and when she thinks the Government would be ready to give a figure. Mention has been made of a plan to deploy Portaloos along the queues if traffic is static for a prolonged period. I would be grateful if the Minister told us a little more about that. Rod McKenzie of the Road Haulage Association recently described information provided to hauliers by the Government as
“incomplete, inadequate and quite often totally incomprehensible.”
One measure that could have helped was the timely delivery of the haulier handbook. I gather that the launch date for the full version, which is intended to provide clear guidance to drivers, is now set for 7 December —only 25 days before the end of transition. Given that 85% of freight drivers are from the EU, the document will need to be published, translated and promoted across most of the continent in around three weeks, which includes the breaks for Christmas and new year. I understand that it will need to be translated into 14 languages.
Hauliers also face uncertainty about the use of the proposed fixed penalties for drivers who do not have a Kent access permit. Unite has expressed concerns about how they will work, because it is the driver who will be faced with paying a roadside fine if they do not have the correct documentation, but they rely on the employer or customer to provide it. I was a little confused by what the Minister said just now. I think she confirmed that the penalties would be roadside fines, but when she gave evidence in the other place this morning, she said that because the fine was levied on the owner, it could be sent by post. Perhaps she could give some clarity as to how those penalties will work.
Leaving the EU means that we will need to process around 270 million customs declarations a year, compared with only 50 million now, and we will need around 50,000 customs agents to manage that properly. In July, the Government announced a £50 million fund to try to achieve that figure, but the British International Freight Association warned in September that almost two thirds of customs brokers felt they would not have enough agents by 1 January, and that covid had made the task even more difficult. It was also very critical of the lack of clear guidance from the Government.
More recently, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster swerved an attempt by my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves) to find out from him how many new customs agents have been trained and are ready to go to. He now says that the 50,000 figure was only an estimate, and that there have been significant increases in the number. That makes me think that either he does not know the answer—that is bad enough—or he does know, and it is so bad that he does not want to tell us. Can the Minister do better than the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and tell the House how many customs agents we now have, and how many have been fully trained? I have been told that there are probably around 10,000 in place right now. I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm whether that figure sounds about right.
What does the Minister think will be the consequences if traders cannot find customs agents to do the paperwork for them? The Kent access permit involves a self-declaration process. Does she envisage any problem with false declarations by drivers? What will happen if those drivers are challenged in Calais, and they do not have the right paperwork and are sent back to the UK?
I have largely been speaking about potential border chaos using the future tense, but reports suggest that it has already begun, most notably in Felixstowe, which is struggling to cope with the volume of business as firms stockpile supplies in anticipation of severe disruption. Clearly, the Government have lost the confidence of businesses. As the holiday season approaches, would the Minister like to use this opportunity to reassure an increasingly concerned public about the timely delivery of vital supplies and Christmas presents?
As I started off by saying, my fear is that these measures are too little, too late to cope with impending chaos in Kent. However, given that they are all that we have in front of us today, and given our desire to prevent even worse disruption at the end of the transition period, we will not be opposing them.
Mrs Natalie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)
It is with great enthusiasm that I rise to discuss the motion concerning traffic management and heavy commercial vehicles in Kent. I am the Member for Dover and Deal, and in the Dover area we spend many hours considering, deliberating and discussing heavy goods vehicles, light goods vehicles, port traffic, holidaymaker traffic, camper van and caravan parking, local traffic and all types of traffic management. That is because we are home to our country’s most successful and busiest port of its type, the port of Dover.
In an ordinary year, the port of Dover deals with £122 billion-worth of trade—about a fifth of the whole UK trade in goods—transiting 4.5 million vehicles and 11 million passengers. Daily, that means up to 10,000 freight vehicles and up to 90,000 passengers. The importance of the short straits route is unquestionable. It will remain the foremost route for trading, not simply because of its geographical convenience and proximity to the continent, but because we are just very good at what we do. Passengers are processed at the rate of one per second. The time it takes for lorries to be managed off the ferries is a matter of minutes. Building on that success, we are determined to expand and thrive. That includes an exciting freeports bid. We want to continue to pursue transit excellence and make the opportunities for investment, jobs and money real for our area. That includes new global trading routes between Dover and the world.
As the Member of Parliament for Dover and Deal, that means working with Ministers to ensure that the Port of Dover is successful and that our area as a whole is successful, too. At the heart of the regulations and what they are seeking to achieve is the need to ensure that traffic can transition smoothly to the Port of Dover and Eurotunnel and, through such active traffic management, ensure that local businesses and residents can get on with their daily lives. It is what we locally call the “Keep Dover Clear” strategy.
I thank the Minister for working with me and listening to the positive suggestions and ideas that have been developed with Councillor Trevor Bartlett, the leader of Dover District Council, and Councillor Nigel Collor, as well as Councillor Roger Gough, Barbara Cooper and Toby Howe and the whole team at Kent County Council, who have been working on these Kent-wide proposals. We have a meeting with the Minister and the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster later in the week to discuss the next steps and fine-tuning of our Kent proposals, and I look forward to discussing the progress of the “Keep Dover Clear” plans at that meeting.
In that context, I particularly welcome the second order, which allows controls on local roads. As a backstop measure, it is vital for people that local traffic can get around for school, for work and to see family and friends. The orders give control powers to enable that, but controls also need people to manage and enforce them. Will the Minister consider whether additional traffic control officers can be deployed at our local traffic hotspots, such as the Duke of York and Whitfield roundabouts, together with real-time traffic cameras to optimise the traffic flow for weeks and months ahead?
In the Dover area, we are no stranger to traffic congestion from time to time when there are hold-ups at the port, usually because the French are on strike. We have well-developed and tested mechanics to escalate and manage extreme traffic events in TAP and Stack. Those are now joined by Brock, which is enabled by today’s regulations.
Undoubtedly, we face a period of some uncertainty as we transition to new arrangements in the transit protocols. It is a matter that is not wholly in our hands. Just as French strikes can cause some of our most severe disruption, French border and trade controls may be similarly disruptive, or they may not be. The Port of Calais, like the Port of Dover, has been working very hard to prepare for 1 January 2021. I wish them both every success over the coming weeks as this vital project reaches this major milestone.
I pay tribute to the port’s collaborative work under Doug Bannister, the chief executive of the Port of Dover, in its contributing to transition planning and today’s regulations. Recently, we were discussing the relationship between port and town. Mr Bannister expressed the port’s position to me in these terms:
“We never forget how much the success of the Port of Dover links together with the support of the Dover community. In the weeks and months ahead please be assured that the strategic traffic management will have firmly in mind the needs of residents to get to work, school and to see family and friends.”
With stationary lorry traffic comes the important issues of air quality and littering. The regulations bring additional traffic controls to the A20/M20 route. Residents of Aycliffe, which is situated next to the final part of the A20 coming into Dover town, have long argued that the Operation TAP point should be further back along the M20. Air traffic quality monitoring is in place and has been for some time, but I ask the Minister whether consideration could be given to a review of the location and effectiveness of the air quality monitoring in the next period, alongside these instruments. Will she also ensure that the traffic management regulations that are under consideration today are matched with appropriate litter and sanitation facilities along both arterial routes? The A2 does not currently have the same degree of sanitation planning as the A20, yet the needs of lorry drivers stuck in a queue are very much the same.
Let me turn to the bifurcated major road strategy of the M2 and M20, which is at the heart of the traffic management strategy underpinned by these measures. Dover is one of the best positioned locations in the land. It has two major motorways, the M2 and the M20, which become the A2 and A20 for the last few miles into the town. This excellent road positioning will be further enhanced in due course by the lower Thames crossing. This is, in essence, a new national bypass that connects the north and midlands straight through into Dover. To make the best success of that opportunity, there is a parallel programme in the completion of the dualling of the A2. Dover is just so well connected, yet the last few miles into town on the A2 are merely single track at key points. I welcome the Government’s commitment to the A2 traffic management today and, indeed, the A256, which links east Kent as a whole. However, I urge Ministers during this period of post-transition work to reflect on whether it is, as I believe, in the national interest to accelerate a mission-critical last few miles of tarmac on both these key strategic roads. In welcoming these provisions, I ask the Minister to continue working closely with our area post transition; 1 January 2021 is the starting point of an exciting journey to come.
Finally, I strongly welcome the jobs and investment that a new border control point in Dover can bring in July next year. Will the Minister continue working with me and local residents to ensure that it is designed sensitively in order to take into account environmental and further traffic considerations—matters on which I know the Minister is already engaging with the community and council? These measures are a vital first step in ensuring not only that Dover is ready, but that we are best placed to make the most of the opportunities to come—for Dover and for our country as a whole.
Rachel Maclean
I thank hon. Members for their consideration of this very important legislation.
My hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mrs Elphicke) speaks up for her port and the vital role that it plays in her town. Like her, I am absolutely sure that the work that we are doing today will open up more opportunities for her port and local community. I thank her and her colleagues in local government for engaging so closely with me, for putting on record their detailed concerns and for inviting me to the Whitfield roundabout to see for myself the problems that she identified in such detail today. I commit to working closely with her, her local government colleagues, her local district council and Kent County Council, and to listen closely to the concerns of the local community. We will absolutely look at air quality and sanitation, and we will look carefully at the results of the consultation. I look forward to more meetings with her, including those later this week to which she has made reference.
I thank the hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) very much for her consideration, for the detailed points that she has raised, and for her support for these important statutory instruments. The reason that we are taking this legislation through the House is so that we can put in place plans to manage any disruption that we have outlined in our reasonable worst-case scenario. I assure her that I engage regularly with the sector, including all the different trade bodies, along with the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Hornchurch and Upminster (Julia Lopez), who I see in the Chamber; we work together on many of these issues with the sector, so are aware of and pay close attention to the concerns, some of which the shadow Minister has articulated today.
On the issue of driver welfare, including sanitation and toilets, it is not just toilets that are essential, but all the facilities that drivers would expect. I thank again all the drivers who work in the transport industry, because they do play a vital role, as we have seen in the pandemic with how they have kept supplies moving around the country. We expect that to continue, but it is very important that we do everything we can to support them in that. The Kent Resilience Forum is working through detailed plans on the sanitation, and I am very happy to share the detail of that with the hon. Member for Bristol East when it is available.
The hon. Lady referenced the haulier handbook. This is one part of our plan to make sure that all this information is one place. The handbook will be translated into 18 languages and it will be ready very soon. It is already available on gov.uk, and we will also be making hard copies available in 43 information and advice sites, which are opening up and down the country.[Official Report, 26 November 2020, Vol. 684, c. 10MC.]
It is very important that we pass these measures into law this evening so that we can manage all the possible outcomes that we will see at the end of the transition period. I thank the House for its consideration.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That the draft Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 1) (Amendment) Order 2020, which was laid before this House on 22 October, be approved.
Resolved,
That the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 2) (Amendment) Order 2020 (S.I. 2020 No. 1155), dated 21 October 2020, a copy of which was laid before this House on 22 October, be approved.—(Rachel Maclean.)
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
We will now suspend for a few moments in order to have the Dispatch Boxes sanitised.
Exiting the European Union (Agriculture)
(4 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Victoria Prentis)
I beg to move,
That the draft Common Organisation of the Markets in Agricultural Products (Miscellaneous Amendments) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 19 October, be approved.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
With this we will take the following motion:
That the draft Common Organisation of the Markets in Agricultural Products (Miscellaneous Amendments) (EU Exit) (No. 2) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 19 October, be approved.
Victoria Prentis
Both these statutory instruments amend retained EU legislation relating to the common organisation of agricultural markets and domestic secondary legislation relating to that area. The first instrument also makes some provision in respect of organic production that will ensure the operability of retained EU law. I should make it clear that the amendments made by the instruments are technical in nature. They do not introduce new policy but instead maintain continuity as far as possible.
The aim of the instruments is to ensure that the relevant retained EU legislation is fully operable at the end of the transition period. The retained EU legislation was previously made operable to the UK as a whole on the basis that the UK left the EU without an agreement. However, as we have left the EU with the withdrawal agreement in place, the retained legislation now needs to be updated to reflect this—in particular, the terms of the Northern Ireland protocol. As such, the majority of the amendments made by these instruments relate to the implementation of the Northern Ireland protocol. For example, they might remove references to Northern Ireland or replace UK references with Great Britain references, as Northern Ireland will of course remain aligned with the EU under the protocol.
Amendments are also being made to a small number of transitional provisions, either to align them with the Government’s border operating model, which introduces new border controls for the movement of goods between GB and the EU in three stages up to July 2021, or because they were introduced on the basis that the UK would leave without a deal and are therefore no longer required. Those provisions concern the import of hops and hop products, notification requirements for the import of beef and veal from third countries, and marketing requirements for hatching eggs and chicks imported from the EU. All other transitional provisions will be retained, with references to “exit day” replaced with references to “IP completion day”.
As Members are aware, agriculture is a devolved policy area and of great importance to all parts of the UK. Although one of the instruments that we are debating is reserved, we worked closely with the devolved Administrations in producing both instruments, and they have given their consent as necessary.
These statutory instruments will help to provide necessary continuity for stakeholders and beneficiaries. They will ensure that retained EU legislation relating to the common organisation of the markets and organic production functions correctly after the end of the transition period, and that we have an operable legal framework that supports farmers and traders and delivers continuity. I urge Members to agree to the amendments proposed in these regulations.
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
As we are discussing agriculture, let me place on the record my traditional declaration of interest: my little sister is a farmer in Cornwall.
As these SIs appear to be technical and uncontroversial, we will not oppose them, but I have a number of questions that I hope the Minister is able to help with. I gave her advance notice of some of the most difficult ones, so I hope she has some good answers. British farmers and British farming matter, which is why Labour has consistently been so vocal on issues relating to agriculture and food standards, and I will continue that today.
These new regulations deal with technical matters relating to how food is sold, distributed and marketed, so forgive me for jumping into the detail right away. May I ask the Minister about the periods for bringing the systems contained in the regulations online? It is important that we have operable systems so that the whole framework of regulation works and people know what information is required and when it is required.
As the Minister will know, her Department told the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee that it has retained a two-year transition period for fruit and vegetables
“in order to allow policy teams to deliver the necessary IT system changes and recruit additional HMI inspectors”,
but for poultry meat the period is 12 months,
“as we do not currently enforce poultrymeat marketing standards, so will need sufficient time to operationalise the regime before being in a position to conduct the associated checks.”
When these SIs were debated in the House of Lords, the Minister in the Lords, Lord Gardiner, apologised, saying that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
“did not provide sufficient context on checks relating to poultry meat marketing standards and this may have caused concern, but it has since been clarified”.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 November 2020; Vol. 807, c. GC706.]
I will be grateful if the Minister mentions that clarification briefly when she gets to her feet to conclude the debate. Will she also set out the reason for the two-year delay in the implementation of those systems, and the difference between the fruit and veg and the poultry systems? I suspect that the IT system will not be ready for 1 January 2021, but I will be grateful if she confirms that.
We have been told that the Government have been engaging with businesses on a sector by sector basis. I am grateful for that, but may I ask what conversations the Department has had with businesses affected by these particular regulations and how they feel about them?
Lord Gardiner also told Members in the other place that the Government are working closely with the Animal and Plant Health Agency
“to ensure that we have the right calibre of inspectors.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 November 2020; Vol. 807, c. GC712.]
I thought that was a curious turn of phrase, so I will be grateful if the Minister sets out whether we have the right numbers of inspectors and, perhaps as hinted at by the Minister in the other place, whether they have all received the right level of training in order to be operational as well as present.
The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee also drew our attention to the fact that the UK does not currently enforce poultry meat marketing standards. Does that mean that if poultry meat and other products were imported from a third country, they could still be described as free range or organic and that would not be checked? Is that what enforcement of those standards means? I would be grateful if the Minister reassured us that that will not be the case. She knows my concern—I do not want to see any back doors for chlorine-washed chicken being marketed as anything else—so will she set out clearly that that is not one of those back doors? Could unregulated poultry meat be mixed with other products and given a misleading description? I do not believe that that is the case here, but will the Minister set that out? Also, the explanatory memorandum refers to the organic certifiers group having been consulted. I would be grateful if she set out whether it is now content with the regulations.
The Minister was correct that a great deal of the amendments in the draft regulations seek to change the designation of “United Kingdom” to “Great Britain”. Will she reassure us that all conversations with counterparts in Northern Ireland have been successful in respect of that, and that no issues are outstanding? Looking at the debate in the other place when that point was made, Lord Goldsmith had previously stated that there are now 72 planned border posts for inspections. As we are dealing with the inspection of agricultural products, which can cross the border between the Republic and Northern Ireland a number of times in the lifespan of a food product being made, will the Minister address some of the issues that Lord Gardiner may have omitted in his response to questions in the other place about whether the planned locations of those border posts have all been identified and published, and whether staff have been fully trained and will be operational by the end of the transition period, in particular in relation to the inspection of agricultural products, which the regulations deal with?
The Minister made mention in her remarks of the need to have fully operable regulations by the end of the Brexit transition period. The Opposition would like to see them in place, but we are here today because the original regulations were not properly transposed and a series of mistakes were made. That is why we are revisiting the regulations. I am of course grateful for the Minister laying statutory instruments to correct the mistakes and omissions of the previous SIs, but passing bad laws wastes the time of everybody here and is particularly frustrating when brilliant Bills such as the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill struggle to find parliamentary time. We are using a large period on Monday evening that could have been used to pass that important legislation.
When we look at the enormous volumes of secondary legislation and new regulations that will come from DEFRA in the next couple of weeks to deal with our exit from the transition period, it is important to ensure against any more pollution of our statute books with bad regulation that will subsequently need to be changed. It should concern us all that bad laws have been passed, and I will be grateful if the Minister sets out what lessons have been learned from the first time the SI was considered to ensure that we are not in a similar place again. Having had to present the SI twice, I know she probably shares my frustration.
The Minister knows that that is not the first time that this has happened. Indeed, regular watchers of Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs SIs will recall the debate on the Common Fisheries Policy and Animals (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, from 21 October last year, when the same problem was brought before this House. I stress the importance of ensuring that we get such regulations right the first time around. However, I am grateful to the Government business managers for bringing this draft SI before the House, so that the thousands of people who are clearly watching this debate will know what is going on, rather than hiding it away in a dusty Committee Room, for which the viewing figures on parliamentlive.tv might not be as profound as I am sure they are for this evening’s debate.
In all seriousness, there is a route to ensure that such regulations are gotten correct the first time around. I would be grateful if the Minister set out whether any lessons have been learned in relation to that, because a bewildering scale of new secondary legislation is about to come on to the statute books for farmers and for industry. It is important that farmers and the farming community have confidence that when the House passes regulations, they have been passed after detailed scrutiny and are correct.
Mr Deputy Speaker, you will know, because you have probably sat through me saying this a few times before, that I am concerned that the Government still use the phraseology in its impact assessments of “no impact” and “no significant impact” as similar terms. The Minister knows that, because she and I have sat in many statutory instrument Committees where I have bemoaned such usage. “No impact” and “no significant impact” are two very different things. The lack of an impact assessment for these statutory instruments concerns me, when there is potentially such a difference between “no impact” and “no significant impact”, and especially given that we are looking at these regulations for the second time and are having to correct errors from the first time. I know that the Minister will say that this is a House matter, but I would be grateful if she could confirm that she will be taking up that point with the Leader of the House to ensure that it is addressed for future statutory instruments.
Labour stands with our farmers, and we want our food and farming standards kept high after we leave the Brexit transition period. We want to keep high-quality food on our children’s plates, and to ensure that there is a level playing field for British farmers to stop them being undercut by food produced to lower standards from abroad.
We were pleased to see concessions from the Minister in relation to the campaign led by Labour and the National Farmers Union to put the Trade and Agriculture Commission on a statutory basis to allow more scrutiny of trade deals. There is still a long way to go, but many of those trade deals will be enacted by secondary legislation, and it is important that they are properly looked at. The market for agricultural products should matter to every one of us because a market tilted against the interests of consumers harms families, one tilted in favour of supermarkets harms consumer pockets, and one tilted in favour of importers over domestic production risks signing the death warrant for British farmers.
Labour will not oppose these regulations. However, I would be grateful if the Minister can set out how we can ensure that we get regulations right the first time round. Particularly for regulations dealing with Northern Ireland, we must ensure that the Northern Ireland Executive are comfortable with the proposals that the Minister has set out.
Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)
The Minister described the instruments as technical and largely ensuring continuity in their scope and measure. There have been discussions between the UK Government and the Scottish Government, and the Scottish Government have given their consent for them, so on that basis we will not oppose them.
I seek one key assurance from the Minister, which I hope she will address. She will understand the huge importance to producers of provenance, especially in Scotland, where the ability to identify Scottish produce as such is of enormous value in all parts of the value chain. I seek from the Minister an assurance that there is nothing at all in either of these instruments that might prevent Scottish produce from being identified as such in the export process, either now or in the future.
Victoria Prentis
I thank the hon. Members for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) and for Gordon (Richard Thomson) for their contributions. They asked a large number of questions, and if I do not answer them all, I apologise; it is merely an oversight, and I am happy to take them up offline outside the Chamber.
On the poultry meat issue, I am always happy to confirm that there is no possibility of chlorine-washed chicken entering our food chain unless this House votes for that to be the case, and I really do not see that happening—do you, Mr Deputy Speaker? As the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport said, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee in the other place drew the other place’s attention to the Department’s explanation on poultry meat. I apologise; our explanation did not provide sufficient context on the checks relating to poultry meat marketing standards, and that might have caused concern because it was not sufficiently clear. The reason is that on these particular operational indicators, no third country currently uses the standards, so there is no current need to have an operational enforceable system for checking that they are there. That is the reason that that has not been an issue to date. I assure all Members that although the specific matters are not covered by these regulations, the Government remain absolutely committed to high standards, as we said many times during the passage of the Agriculture Bill.
The difference between the poultry meat transition period, which is 12 months, and the fruit and vegetable transition period, which is two years, is to enable us, in a very pragmatic and practical way, to upgrade our IT systems and recruit the right sort of inspectors to do the checks. We are working closely with the EU Commission on that, and nobody should be afraid of the difference between the two. This is merely a pragmatic and appropriate response to an operational issue.
On Animal and Plant Health Agency inspectors, again I would not read too much into the word “calibre”. These are specialist staff, so of course they have to be of the right type. We are working hard to increase their numbers at the moment.
On border control posts, we have always been clear that following the Northern Ireland protocol there would be an expansion of facilities at some entry points where certain controls already take place. We are very much in touch with the Northern Ireland Minister. Indeed, I spoke to him twice last week and I expect to do so repeatedly in the next few weeks.
On the devolved Administrations, we have worked collaboratively with them on these statutory instruments. We have sought formal agreement from them on areas that intersect with devolved policy.
There are of course many ways of describing our produce. We frequently describe produce as being from Oxfordshire, for example. In brief, we expect to use the different terms GB, UK and UK(NI) following Brexit, but this is a very complicated issue. As we reach the end of the transition period, we will set out far more detail about labelling. There is some context in these statutory instruments, but not a great deal that needs to concern the devolved Administrations at this point on the labelling front. Discussions with the devolved Administrations have confirmed our mutual understanding of the UK’s alignment on marketing standards. They have always been very keen to align them, so we can work the internal market properly following the end of the transition period.
On lessons learned, as I said in my opening remarks the good thing that happened last year is that we have left the EU with the withdrawal agreement and the Northern Ireland protocol in place. The statutory instruments, which were done in something of a hurry at the end of last year, included the whole of the UK instead of carving out Northern Ireland, because the Northern Ireland protocol did not exist at that point. It is true that in the rush to have a functioning statute book for the proposed exit day at the end of last year, mistakes were made and references were missed. I think it is right that we take the opportunity to correct those mistakes wherever possible and that is what we have done.
To end, producers and consumers will be well served by the passing of these statutory instruments. They help to ensure that retained EU legislation, which protects our standards and supports our farming industries, remains operable at the end of the transition period. They are technical, but nevertheless crucial in ensuring the effectiveness and continuity of that retained legislation. I therefore commend them to the House.
Question put and agreed to.
Exiting the European Union (Agriculture)
Resolved,
That the draft Common Organisation of the Markets in Agricultural Products (Miscellaneous Amendments) (EU Exit) (No. 2) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 19 October, be approved.—(Victoria Prentis.)
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. The sitting is suspended for three minutes.
Exiting the European Union (European Union)
(4 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Julia Lopez)
I beg to move,
That the draft European Union Withdrawal (Consequential Modifications) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 21 October, be approved.
It is a pleasure to be here to discuss these regulations, and I hope that we are not drawing too much attention away from the Prime Minister’s press conference, which is under way as I speak.
As Members will be aware, at the end of this year the process of transition to our future relationship with the EU will be complete. We will have recovered our economic and political independence, upholding a key demand of the British people. The Government have already undertaken extensive work to provide for a functioning domestic statute book by 31 December. Ahead of our exit from the European Union on 31 January this year, the Government made a significant amount of exit-related legislation, including more than 630 statutory instruments.
The Government continue to deliver the secondary legislation required to ensure a functioning statute book at the end of the transition period, so that we are able to seize the opportunities of being an independent sovereign nation. This instrument is a clear example of that. It makes various consequential amendments and repeals in respect of retained EU law, relevant separation agreement law and other EU-derived domestic legislation. I will take the opportunity to explain that in further detail in a moment, but, in short, this instrument is highly technical and does not implement any new policy. It will ensure that the UK statute book works coherently and effectively following the end of the transition period.
This statutory instrument was laid by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, who cannot be here today, in exercise of the temporary powers provided for in the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 and the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020. These powers allow Ministers to make provisions that they consider appropriate in consequence of those Acts. I raise that because, during the passage of those Acts, some Members were concerned that these powers were too wide and would not afford Parliament the ability to scrutinise important legislation properly. The Government have always been clear that these are standard consequential powers that are commonplace in legislation and that such powers are inherently limited, with the main expected use of this power being for matters of a technical nature. This instrument is no exception.
The Government have already made several exit-related consequential statutory instruments in recent years, which were needed as a result of the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. Since those instruments were made, we have left the EU with a deal—namely, the withdrawal agreement—and entered into the transition period. The statutory instrument we are discussing today includes provisions required as a result of the withdrawal agreement and the legislation that implemented it: the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020. The main changes arising from that Act relevant to this instrument are that it introduces the transition period and delays the commencement of exit-related statutory instruments until implementation period completion day; it provides that retained EU law comes into effect on IP completion day instead of exit day; and it establishes relevant separation agreement law. In the light of the introduction of relevant separation agreement law, the instrument clarifies how references in UK legislation to EU instruments are to be interpreted after IP completion day. That includes how references to EU instruments that form part of relevant separation agreement law should be read.
The amendments made to the 2018 Act by the implementation of the withdrawal agreement mean that it is possible for EU instruments to form part of retained EU law for some purposes and have effect as relevant separation agreement law for other purposes. Therefore, after IP completion day, references to EU instruments in domestic legislation can have dual meaning. The instrument makes interpretation provisions to remove uncertainty about which version of an EU instrument applies, whether it is the retained version or the version applied by the withdrawal agreement. This ensures that the correct interpretation of the EU instrument applies following the end of the transition period and, crucially, removes room for confusion or uncertainty.
At this point, I draw the House’s attention to the fact that while the negative procedure could have been used for making this instrument under the consequential powers, we are following the affirmative procedure. This is to provide the opportunity for parliamentary debate on a piece of legislation of significant legal importance—particularly with regard to the updated interpretive provisions for relevant separation agreement law—even if it is not of note in policy terms. To make these interpretive provisions, the instrument makes minor technical amendments to primary legislation, including the 2018 Act, the Interpretation Act 1978 and the latter’s devolved equivalents—the Legislation (Wales) Act 2019, the Interpretation Act (Northern Ireland) 1954 and the Interpretation and Legislative Reform (Scotland) Act 2010.
Although the Government are not required to seek consent from or consult the devolved Administrations on the provisions included in this instrument, there was extensive engagement at official level prior to laying this instrument to make sure that it works effectively for the devolved legislatures. I take this opportunity to note our gratitude to the DAs for their constructive collaboration on this instrument and on the wider body of readiness secondary legislation that is needed by the end of this year.
The instrument also makes technical repeals to redundant provisions in primary legislation arising from the EU (Withdrawal) Act 2018, primarily due to the fact that it repealed the European Communities Act 1972. The 2018 Act provided for the repeal of the amended provisions of the 1972 Act, but not the amending provisions that lie behind them. As a consequence of those repeals, the amending provisions are redundant. Without these regulations, this legislation will continue to sit meaninglessly in our statute book, and repealing it ensures that the statute book remains clear and effective.
As well as repealing redundant legislation, this instrument also makes consequential amendments to the EU (Withdrawal) Act 2018 and the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 (Consequential Modifications and Repeals and Revocations) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 to reflect that they come into effect on IP completion day, rather than exit day, and ensure that they operate effectively in the light of this.
I hope, therefore, that all Members of the House can agree with me that the draft regulations before them perform a small but worthwhile role in our preparations for the end of the transition period and demonstrate the Government’s commitment to ensuring certainty and clarity in the UK’s statute book.
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)
I am sure that the Minister is wrong and that all eyes are on us and not on the Prime Minister’s press conference. I congratulate her for her introduction of this most exciting of the statutory instruments we are looking at over the current period. We are broadly supportive of this instrument, as it largely clears up the statute book and serves to ensure that cross-references to EU law in domestic law or in other EU law, which continues as retained EU law, make sense after the completion day from the implementation or transition period.
The repeals relate mostly to references to the European Communities Act 1972, which has already been repealed by the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, so it is further legislative tidying up and not the last that we can expect to see in the coming months. This continues the Government’s habit of amending primary legislation by statutory instrument, and in this case, certain provisions of the Interpretation Act 1978 will be directly amended by this instrument. It also amends parts of the 2018 Act.
I cannot help but note that the accompanying explanatory memorandum is longer than the legislation itself, and I wonder if the Minister can tell the House whether that implies a certain nervousness in the Department about publishing yet further changes to the withdrawal Act, this close to the end of the transition period. Within the explanatory memorandum, there is much emphasis on the fact that none of these changes is substantive and that the Government are not trying to sneak something through under the radar—indeed, the Minister herself made that point. Is that perhaps a result of the rather chastening experience that the Government have had when they have tried to sneak things—such as, for example, the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill—through under the radar?
We have concerns about legal certainty going forward and the fact that the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 has already had to be amended on several occasions. We warned about that when the Act was debated, and it serves to demonstrate the massive task that faces practitioners and judges when working out what law will be in force from 1 January 2021. That points to some incompetence and poor planning from the Government. How many more times will they need to amend the Act that they pressed through the House? How many more times will businesses and lawyers have to make a plan, scrap it and start again?
Although in principle, the withdrawal Act sets a basic rule that existing EU law will be retained, it is clear from the many subsequent changes to that Act, the enactment of other Acts such as the Taxation (Cross-border Trade) Act 2018, and the huge number of statutory instruments that have been tabled, that recourse to a wide range of statutory materials will often be needed to work out exactly what the governing provisions are.
I am told that jigsaw puzzles have been popular during lockdown, but the Government are creating a particularly challenging legal jigsaw puzzle in which the picture on the front of the box is constantly changing. Nevertheless, the outcome is crucial, because it underpins UK law. Although legal practitioners face a daunting task, they will at least have the resources to check for amendments. Again, as is so often the way, those without support and financial resources are the most vulnerable, and that includes litigants in person, or members of the public who want to know which law governs a particular situation. In some areas, that is becoming a near-impossible task, with extremely expert lawyers and judges harbouring concerns about the state of legal affairs from 1 January and the uncertainties that they envisage will arise.
At the same time as creating those challenges for the legal system, the Government’s failure to negotiate effectively on behalf of the services sector in the current talks on our future relationship with the EU is creating other challenges. By not securing mutual recognition of qualifications and—specifically for the legal sector—certainty regarding accession to the Lugano convention, there are real questions about the ability of UK lawyers to continue working across Europe with certainty and a lack of confidence in their ability to continue in their business.
Of course, this is not just about lawyers, litigants in person, or interested citizens; this is about businesses and jobs that need legal advice to draw up contracts and ensure that they comply with the seemingly ever-changing law. That costs money, time and resources, and while the economy is under such pressure from the fallout of the pandemic, I urge the Government not to add to that.
Will the Minister tell the House when the Government will have finished amending the legal framework for our departure from the European Union and say how we are to work with our European partners moving forward? Clarity is essential, and the Government have a responsibility to provide it.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
I am grateful to have caught your eye, Mr Deputy Speaker, because those paying close attention to the call list will see that my hon. Friend the Member for Stirling (Alyn Smith) ought to have been here, but he has been detained in Westminster Hall.
I am not sure whether it was a happy memory of or a nightmarish flashback to the parent legislation and my time served on the European Statutory Instruments Committee when I looked at this statutory instrument. The purpose of the instrument is
“to ensure that the UK statute book works coherently and effectively following the end of the transition period.”
I thought that was what the 2018 Act was for in the first place and all the 600 statutory instruments the Minister referred to, yet here we are, years after the referendum and years after the Act was passed, still having to through this process. It is the legacy of the mess of Brexit, caused by Cameron and his cronies, who had no real vision and kicked off a referendum process with no idea what would happen if people actually voted to leave. Here we are dealing with the consequences, and now we have a Government who do not particularly want any kind of deal. They would quite happily crash out and deal with all the consequences afterwards. That is why we are barrelling towards no deal.
This might be a necessary statutory instrument, but it really should not be. It is disappointing on a number of levels. First, as I have said, it is disappointing that it is happening at all. Secondly, it refers to the interesting concept of a UK statute book. Scots law has always been distinct from English and Welsh legislation, before and after the union of Parliaments in 1707, let alone after the re-establishment of the Scottish Parliament in 1999. I accept what the Minister says—of course there has been constructive dialogue with the devolved Administrations, because nobody wants a messed up statute book or acquis of law, but it does not change the fact that the UK Government are using a statutory instrument to directly amend primary legislation passed by Scotland’s Parliament, in the shape of the Interpretation and Legislative Reform (Scotland) Act 2010.
This goes on with a host of repeals of primary legislation by statutory instrument, which is being done late at night in a not very busy Chamber. Thus these laws are amended. Where is the European research group, where are the Maastricht rebels for this great act of taking back control? In effect, this is ministerial fiat. Ultimately, the Brussels bureaucrats are being replaced by Whitehall mandarins. This is not parliamentary sovereignty; it is effectively executive diktat.
Frankly, let them get on with it, as my hon. Friend—he should be my right hon. Friend—the Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) likes to say. Scotland wants no part of this shabby Brexit process. The more the Government hasten its implementation through statutory instruments like this, the more it hastens the day when Scotland takes full control of its statute book once again as a fully independent and sovereign nation.
Julia Lopez
As I have set out, the purpose of the instrument really is to ensure that the statute book works coherently and effectively following the end of the transition period. It does this by making various consequential amendments and repeals in respect of retained EU law relevant to the separation agreement law and other EU-derived domestic legislation.
I hear what the hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) says from the Opposition Front Bench. I spoke to my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) before the debate. He shares some of the concerns about the legislative aspects of leaving the EU and was very satisfied with the regulations. He has consulted his friends and colleagues in the legal and financial services professions, and they believe this to be a useful piece of regulation that clarifies and tackles ambiguity. He has also raised concerns about the complexity of leaving the EU. Yes, leaving the EU is a complex process, and it was always going to be. I am glad to say that the UK public deemed it to be an endeavour worth pursuing. They have supported it throughout the referendum and the subsequent general elections.
The hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady) bemoaned politicians kicking off referendum processes without due consideration. I hope that he will take his own advice. At least, we listened to the result of that referendum.
Finally, I reiterate my thanks to Members across the House for contributing to the debate. This is a highly technical issue and not exactly the most exciting television viewing, but it is a critical piece of secondary legislation that demonstrates the Government’s commitment to ensuring that there is certainty and clarity about the UK statute book.
Question put and agreed to.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I suspend the sitting for the sanitation of the Dispatch Boxes.
Business without Debate
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
With the leave of the House, we will take motions 6 to 15 together.
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),
Exiting the European Union (Patents)
That the draft Supplementary Protection Certificates (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 14 October, be approved.
Exiting the European Union (Environmental Protection)
That the draft Ozone-Depleting Substances and Fluorinated Greenhouse Gases (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 13 October, be approved.
That the draft Hazardous Substances and Packaging (Legislative Functions and Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 14 October, be approved.
Exiting the European Union (Sea Fisheries)
That the draft Common Fisheries Policy (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 14 October, be approved.
Mental Health
That the draft Coronavirus Act 2020 (Expiry of Mental Health Provisions) (England and Wales) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 21 October, be approved.
Financial Services and Markets
That the draft Bearer Certificates (Collective Investment Schemes) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 28 September, be approved.
Exiting the European Union (Financial Services)
That the draft Financial Holding Companies (Approval etc.) and Capital Requirements (Capital Buffers and Macro-prudential Measures) (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 15 October, be approved.
Exiting the European Union (Financial Services and Markets)
That the draft Securities Financing Transactions, Securitisation and Miscellaneous Amendments (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 15 October, be approved.
Financial Services and Markets
That the draft Bank Recovery and Resolution (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 15 October, be approved.
Exiting the European Union (Criminal Law)
That the draft Law Enforcement and Security (Separation Issues etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020, which were laid before this House on 13 October, be approved.—(David Rutley.)
Question agreed to.
Persecution of Ahmadis
(4 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Imran Ahmad Khan (Wakefield) (Con)
I am an Ahmadi—an Ahmadi Muslim. Ahmadis are a peace-loving community, whose motto is “Love for all, hatred for none”. At the core of Islam is a belief that the only true way to serve the Lord is to serve and love his creation. It is for this reason that Ahmadis devote themselves to serving the cause of justice and humanity everywhere. Sadly, however, the Ahmadiyya Muslim community is an object of hate and suffers vicious persecution around the world. The epicentre of this hatred is Pakistan.
Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)
In the light of what the hon. Member has just said, is he aware that, only yesterday, another Ahmadi—Dr Tahir Ahmad—was murdered in Lahore, Pakistan by a teenager? Does he regard it as frightening that the most radicalised and anti-Ahmadi of the community in Pakistan tend to be the young?
Imran Ahmad Khan
I thank the hon. Lady. The tragic news of Dr Tahir and his murder was on Friday evening. A gunman came to their home and shot at him and his family. He sadly died immediately. His father, I understand, is still in a critical condition, fighting for his life. Other members of the family sustained gunshot injuries. I understand they are believed to be making it through. But this is simply a sad testament to the environment of hate and intolerance that is being preached in Pakistan.
This is what I was saying: the Ahmadiyya Muslim community is an object of hate and suffers vicious persecution around the world, but the epicentre of this hatred is Pakistan, where Ahmadis are the only religious community to be targeted by the state on the basis of their faith.
Imran Ahmad Khan
Maybe in a moment or two—I will just make a little progress, if I may.
In 1974, the Government of Pakistan kowtowed to the extremist hate-mongers that characterise a perverted form of Islam we now sadly see in so many corners of the world, when Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto shamefully amended the Pakistan constitution to declare Ahmadis non-Muslims. It is a tragic irony that many of the preachers of prejudice from Jama’at-E-Islami are the political heirs of the exact same people who fought tooth and nail against the great Jinnah in his struggle to establish the state of Pakistan, wherein all Muslims, Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, Jews and others were promised the right to freedom.
Since then, increasingly more draconian measures have been inflicted on the Ahmadiyya community, including the promulgation of Ordinance XX in 1984 under the brutal dictator General Zia. Under that ordinance, it is punishable with three-year imprisonment, an unlimited fine and even the death penalty for Ahmadis simply to call themselves Muslim, or to call their mosques a mosque. As a consequence, Hadrat Mirza Tahir Ahmad, the 4th Caliph, was forced to leave Pakistan. Today, Ordinance XX is used to persecute minorities in Pakistan, including Christians and Hindus. Pakistan suffers the great ignominy of having codified and granted constitutional legitimacy to religious discrimination and persecution.
Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. He touches on the nub of my intervention. Does he not agree that the real tragedy in Pakistan is that it is the very constitution and laws of Pakistan, particularly the blasphemy laws, that are so often the basis for the persecution of the Ahmadis and indeed other religious minorities, when, in any country, these should be the cornerstone of the protection of fundamental rights such as freedom of religion and belief?
Imran Ahmad Khan
I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention, with which I agree entirely. Her points are incredibly well made. The great tragedy is that Pakistan was set up initially with a beautiful vision of a country that celebrated diversity and pluralism. Jinnah and the architects of Pakistan saw difference as the gold and silver threads that would weave into the tapestry of the state and make it stronger, not weaker. Jinnah’s lieutenant was Chaudhry Muhammad Zafarullah, with whom I grew up and had a very close relationship. He has been declared a non-Muslim. He was Pakistan’s first Foreign Minister, the President of the UN General Assembly and the President of the International Court of Justice. The state was built by great jurists who were great lovers of freedom and justice and that legacy has been shamefully discarded.
This persecution and that loss of the legacy that could have been is just as evident, sadly, in Pakistan’s civil society. Ahmadis are openly declared “wajibul qatl”, which means “deserving to be killed”, in the Pakistani media and by religious and political leaders. The recent successive murders of four Ahmadis in Peshawar is the evil evidence of just how impossible it is for Ahmadis simply to live and worship as they please. Those murdered include Mr Mairaj Ahmad on 13 August, Mr Tahir Ahmad Naseem on 29 July, Professor Naeem Ud Din Khattack on 5 October and Mr Mahboob Ahmad Khan on 8 November. All four men were murdered in the same city on account of their belief. As the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) mentioned, last Friday, 31-year-old Dr Tahir Ahmad was murdered at his home when a gunman shot at him and his family.
Horrifyingly, the vile abuse and persecution suffered by the Ahmadiyya Jamaat is not confined to those who are alive. Some 39 Ahmadi bodies have been disinterred from what should have been their final resting place, and 70 Ahmadi Muslims have been denied burial in communal cemeteries. This year, in July, dozens of Ahmadi graves were desecrated and their gravestones destroyed by Pakistani state law enforcement officials in Gujranwala district. Heartbreakingly, members of the Ahmadiyya community are spared no respite from persecution either in life or death. How is it possible that these atrocities occur in a country whose leaders answer when questioned that their constitution provides its citizens with the right to freedom of religion and belief?
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
I commend my friend the hon. Gentleman for bringing forward this Adjournment debate. He is making a powerful speech. I am shocked not only by the deaths and murders he describes, but at the fact that the Ahmadi people are denied the right to call themselves Muslims and to call their place of worship a mosque, and that they are denied the vote. Does he agree that this is a shocking suppression and persecution of a people?
Imran Ahmad Khan
The right of people everywhere to live, work and worship as they choose is the most fundamental and universal right that we have. It makes no sense, either to an individual or to a state, to inhibit, stamp on or impede that right, because that means that the very blossom and flower of the state and of the children of the state is trampled on. We in this venerable place should not think, “Why would they do such a thing?” because what is happening is of no purpose and of no sense—it is senseless and deeply upsetting because of that.
Freedom of religious belief, as the hon. Gentleman has mentioned, and other values that we in the United Kingdom hold dearly, such as tolerance and celebration of pluralism, are not just ideals to be debated in this House, discussed in lecture halls or written about by academics; they have, as we have discussed, very real consequences for the lives of people everywhere.
My own family understand this only too well. I could place on the record the numerous attacks against my immediate family, my larger family and myself. For example, my first cousin’s Syrian husband, Dr Mousallam Al-Droubi, left Damascus and was worshipping at an Ahmadi mosque in Lahore in May 2010 when gunmen stormed in, massacred 87 supplicants around him and left him and over 120 other worshippers with grave injuries, all on account of their belief. Their crime? To worship as Muslims.
Pakistan is the world’s leading exporter of hate across the globe, which it fabricates on an industrial scale. This dangerous extremism and religiously inspired violence has been broadcast, transmitted and normalised in communities around the world, who ape this hideous behaviour.
For example, anti-Ahmadi hate speech has been broadcast through television and radio in the United Kingdom. Channel 44, an Urdu language current affairs satellite channel, was fined £45,000 by Ofcom for airing two episodes of a discussion programme which featured a participant making serious and unsubstantiated claims against the Ahmadiyya community. That was not the first such case. In 2013, Takbeer TV, a free-to-air Islamic channel, was fined £25,000 after broadcasting statements describing Ahmadis as having “monstrous intentions” and being “lying monsters”.
There is a direct connection and correlation between that sort of hate speech and violence perpetrated against members of the Ahmadiyya Jamaat. Freedom of speech certainly is a vital pillar of our way of life, but incitement to murder and violence is not, and never has been, freedom of speech. Hatred preached in Pakistan does indeed result in violence on the streets of the UK and around the world.
The 2016 murder of Scottish Ahmadi shopkeeper Asad Shah, while working peacefully in his shop in Glasgow, evidences that truth. His crime? Sending out Easter greetings to his Christian neighbours and friends. Like all Ahmadis, he felt a part of that community, and they a part of his. Here we see the Ahmadis’ belief in love for all and hatred for none juxtaposed against the peddlers of hate.
A report by the all-party parliamentary group for the Ahmadiyya Muslim community entitled “Suffocation of the Faithful” has raised concerns that the deliberate targeting of members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jamaat in the United Kingdom originates from Pakistan—a result of the filthy reservoir of hate that Pakistan permits and enables. Worse, there is evidence, as outlined in the APPG’s report, that aid money given by Her Majesty’s Government is spent on supporting Government-run schools in Pakistan that encourage intolerance and hatred.
Professor Javaid Rehman provided damning evidence on nationalised schools in Pakistan when he spoke at the second session of the APPG inquiry, which the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) so ably chaired. He said:
“I was just horrified to see what is being taught to our young children, for example this word ‘Kafir’ non-believer or infidel is openly said about Ahmadiyya but also about other communities, it’s part of our teaching system”.
I fear that the international aid provided to Pakistan by Her Majesty’s Government for the purpose of helping education is, on occasion, unwittingly fuelling hatred and prejudice in a new generation of Pakistanis. In order to ensure that that never happens again, I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister can provide assurances from the Dispatch Box on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government that UK aid and development funding will not go to groups, individuals or programmes that are engaged in the promotion of hate, whether that be directed against Christians, Hindus, Ahmadis or others.
I have briefly outlined the nature of some of the outrages suffered by Ahmadis and their Jamaat, but what effect does the persecution and discrimination of the Ahmadi community have on Ahmadis and on Pakistan itself? Thousands of Pakistanis have sought refuge in freedom-loving western nations. Even the global Ahmadiyya headquarters was moved to the United Kingdom in 1984. Others, having escaped from Pakistan, find themselves in third countries where they are unwelcome and face again the horrors of persecution, predicated upon their faith.
I urge Her Majesty’s Government to employ their influence and create a coalition of our friends and allies to pressure the Government of Pakistan to reverse the abhorrent constitutional vandalism that has been engineered on the freedom of religious belief, and to release all Pakistani citizens from the bondage of zealous tyranny and the fear of persecution.
John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member on bringing this important issue into the public debate. He mentioned the large community who are established here, but will he also mention the huge contribution that they make in the United Kingdom particularly in charitable work and also in community work? Quite apart from their peaceful message, they play a very valuable and active role, working hard in the community.
Imran Ahmad Khan
I think it is well known that the Ahmadi community—wherever they stay and live, whether they are persecuted or otherwise, whether they are abused or celebrated—always come to be among the vanguard of the most loyal citizens, playing a full role in the country that they call home.
Elliot Colburn (Carshalton and Wallington) (Con)
My hon. Friend is being generous with his time. The UK has been a welcoming home for the Ahmadiyya community. Indeed, many have settled in my constituency because of its proximity to the Baitul Futuh mosque in the constituency of the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh). Does my hon. Friend agree that the UK needs to continue to play a leading role in providing refuge and a safe haven for Ahmadis fleeing persecution across the world?
Imran Ahmad Khan
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. For Ahmadis and so many others, the United Kingdom has long been a beacon of hope and safety, and we should continue to provide this support and offer Ahmadis escaping religious persecution a route to safety. Sadly, Pakistan is not a lone perpetrator in the persecution of Ahmadis. There are many countries that maintain and enforce discriminatory laws against Ahmadis. The United Kingdom is a staunch friend of Pakistan. Ending the persecution of Ahmadis will serve to strengthen Pakistan and allow all those who truly love it to be active participants in their country’s life and future, fulfilling the dream of Pakistan’s founder, Quaid-i-Azam, who famously said the following words at the very moment of Pakistan’s birth:
“You are free; you are free to go to your temples. You are free to go to your mosques or to any other places of worship in this State of Pakistan.”
As my hon. Friend the Minister is aware, there are a number of powerful tools at our disposal that I urge him to employ to serve all the citizens of Pakistan, irrespective of their belief. The first is the establishment of a structured engagement at a senior level by the Foreign Office with Pakistan on the persecution and discrimination facing the Ahmadi Jamaat. The second is the employment of the Magnitsky-style sanctions established earlier in the year against preachers, politicians and others who incite and orchestrate violence and hatred against minorities, and the refusal of their entry into our country. The third is that the establishment of criteria when it comes to the protection and freedoms of all to live, work and worship as they choose in Pakistan should be tied to any future trade that Pakistan seeks with the United Kingdom.
I will be listening intently to my hon. Friend’s response as to whether Her Majesty’s Government are willing to consider employing such measures in the name of universal freedom and justice for all. In helping Pakistan to right the wrongs of persecution against Ahmadis, minorities such as Christians and Hindus, who also suffer great persecution and wrongs against them, will be protected. If we are to realise the vision of global Britain, we must be the ones to lead in defence of those innocents persecuted wherever they may dwell, and to champion and encourage others to follow suit.
The Minister for Asia (Nigel Adams)
It is a real pleasure to respond to this debate. I am incredibly grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Imran Ahmad Khan) for securing it, and for his passionate, thoughtful and considered speech. I pay tribute to his work on freedom of religion and belief, including in promoting and protecting the rights of Ahmadi Muslims, and his work as a member of the all-party parliamentary group for the Ahmadiyya Muslim community. I am also grateful for the contributions and interventions of other hon. Members.
I thank the APPG for the Ahmadiyya Muslim community for its recent report. On 21 July, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, who is Minister for South Asia, spoke at the launch event for the report, and expressed the UK Government’s deep concerns about discrimination and violence against the Ahmadiyya Muslim community, including in Pakistan. Today we have heard of the appalling discrimination suffered by Ahmadi Muslims in many countries. Hon. Members have mentioned Pakistan in particular, but, as we have heard, the UK is not immune from such religious intolerance—I think particularly of the horrendous case of the gentleman in Glasgow. That is why this Government work tirelessly to promote and defend the rights of people of all faiths and none around the world. People must be able to practise their faith and express their beliefs without fear or discrimination. I will address some of the specific issues raised by my hon. Friend.
John Spellar
The Minister has rightly drawn the attention of the House to the appalling incidents that take place at the extremes of the spectrum, but are there not also lower-level activities—for example, attempts to organise boycotts against businesses owned by Ahmadis and general lower-level harassment? Should not the authorities be cracking down on such activity and saying, “This is unacceptable in this country”?
Nigel Adams
The right hon. Gentleman is bang on; of course we should be calling out this behaviour. Many of these activities take place on social media. We will be bringing forward an online harms Bill, and we hope some of these issues will be addressed. In this country, we pride ourselves on people’s ability to practise freedom of religion or belief. He makes an incredibly important point.
We have heard about recent incidents of discrimination, including violence, against the Ahmadiyya Muslim community in Pakistan. Its constitution does not allow Ahmadiyya Muslims to call themselves Muslims. Ahmadiyya Muslims face violence, killings and attacks on their places of worship and, as I have said, social media hate campaigns and discrimination in employment and education. There have been recent horrifying examples of this discrimination. Lord Ahmad publicly condemned the murder of Mr Mahboob Ahmad Khan in Peshawar in November. Everything points to Mr Khan having been murdered for his faith, as an Ahmadiyya Muslim. We have heard from the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) about the tragic killing of an Ahmadiyya Muslim, Dr Tahir Ahmad, in Nankana Sahib in Pakistan during Friday prayers last week. I extend my personal condolences to the families of Mr Khan and Dr Ahmad, and to members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community.
Those are not isolated incidents; as we have heard, there have been other abhorrent murders in Pakistan of Ahmadiyya Muslims and other apparently religiously motivated killings. We condemn all these murders in the strongest possible terms. My ministerial colleague Lord Ahmad also raised the UK Government’s concern about these murders with Pakistan’s human rights Minister, Dr Shireen Mazari, as recently as 16 November. We have pressed for full, transparent investigations into these killings that result in the identification and prosecution of those responsible.
Matt Western
I am interested in these points. The Minister was saying that the Government are working tirelessly. I appreciate that and I welcome it, as everyone else does. Given that the Prime Minister of Pakistan was formerly of this country—he lived here for many years—do we not have a special relationship with him? Is there some way of encouraging, through that special relationship and good understanding, a repeal of those laws, so that the Ahmadiyya people can be reinstated as citizens and be able to practise their faith, like any other in Pakistan?
Nigel Adams
The hon. Gentleman raises a good point. We regularly communicate our concern about these issues. People should be able to practise their religion and belief freely, without persecution. We regularly raise this matter with the Pakistan authorities. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister knows the Ahmadiyya community well and knows his holiness Mirza Masroor Ahmad, the spiritual head of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community. The Prime Minister made it clear in this House, on 11 November, that we frequently raise our concerns about freedom of region or belief in relation to the Ahmadiyya Muslim community with the Pakistan Government.
I can also attest to my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield’s love for all, hatred for none maxim by which the Ahmadiyya community lives. In my constituency, we had horrendous floods in 2015. The town of Tadcaster had its bridge destroyed and the town was separated. Many people came to support that community, not least members of the Ahmadiyya community, who came all the way up from London, at their own expense, and provided a fantastic resource for the community in bringing succour and support to families who had been flooded. I am incredibly grateful for all the support that the Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association provided to the people of my constituency, and I was more than happy to visit them at their mosque in south London shortly afterwards.
Earlier this month, officials from the British high commission in Islamabad visited Rabwah in Punjab province to meet representatives of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community. They were able to hear at first hand about the community’s experiences and challenges, as well as the concerning rise of persecution and the tragic rise of killings of members of that community. We also provide support to civil society organisations working on freedom of religion or belief issues in Pakistan. Our Aawaz II inclusion, accountability and reducing modern slavery programme will spend £39.5 million over five years in the provinces of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It is worth pointing out that followers of other religions, including Christians and Shi’a Muslims, also suffer discrimination and violence in Pakistan.
Let me take this opportunity to underline the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s due diligence in providing funding. We ensure that all organisations that receive funding have procedures in place to tackle any discrimination, including against religious minorities such as Ahmadi Muslims. We continue to urge the Pakistani Government to guarantee the fundamental rights of all their citizens and strengthen the protection of minorities in accordance with international standards. As part of that, we continue to raise our concerns about the implementation of blasphemy legislation and the misuse of anti-terror laws to discriminate.
My hon. Friend rightly raised the issue of trade. The EU’s generalised scheme of preferences plus tier includes provisions that make preferential market access conditional on compliance with human and labour rights, environmental standards and good governance. On 1 January 2021, the UK will introduce its own generalised scheme of preferences. We are committed to securing Pakistani businesses’ ability to trade freely with the UK through an independent unilateral preferences scheme that will offer the same level of tariff-free access as the EU’s generalised scheme of preferences plus. The UK’s trade preferences scheme will replicate the EU conditions for the enhanced framework, similar to the EU’s generalised scheme of preferences plus tier, of which Pakistan is a beneficiary.
We work closely with United Nations agencies and civil society organisations to ensure that the immediate needs of any displaced refugees are met. We raise issues of Ahmadi Muslim persecution regularly with other Governments, including in Algeria, Thailand and Malaysia, and we engage with representatives in those countries.
My hon. Friend raised sanctions. Our global human rights sanctions regime is a powerful tool to hold to account those involved in serious human rights violations and abuses. That could potentially include those who target individuals on the grounds of their religion or belief. As he will understand, we do not speculate on who may be designated, as to do so might reduce the impact of those designations. To return to the issue of aid, our relationship with any Government is based on an assessment of commitment to our partnership principles, including human rights.
I turn to our counter-extremism work at home. We are committed to tackling those who sow hatred and division against any community in this country. Our counter-extremism strategy seeks to address all forms of extremism by challenging those who spread extremist propaganda. We need to strengthen communities and disrupt the most dangerous extremists. As the House will be aware, policy on this issue is being led by the Home Office.
My hon. Friend mentioned the media and how they can play a negative role in propagating harmful views, as can social media. Propaganda also finds its way into more traditional channels. We are working to tackle that by using existing legislation, and we are countering those damaging narratives with a range of civil society groups, including overseas groups. We are working with tech companies, law enforcement and our international partners to tackle the abhorrent exploitation of online platforms. As I said earlier, our online harms White Paper sets out plans for world-leading legislation to make the UK the safest place in the world to be online. It will also introduce a new duty of care on companies and will be overseen by an independent regulator.
This has been a timely debate on an incredibly important issue, and I thank my hon. Friend for bringing it to the House.
Fiona Bruce
Before the Minister draws his remarks to a close, can I ask whether officials are raising concerns about an issue that the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) touched on—the fact that Ahmadis do not have an equal right to vote in Pakistan or to stand in elections as candidates, and that there is a separate electoral list kept of Ahmadis, which can unfortunately be used as a source of intimidation or harassment?
Nigel Adams
My hon. Friend, who is a long-time champion on issues of freedom of religion and belief, raises an incredible point. We see that issue in other parts of the world too, including with the Rohingya population in Myanmar. I struggle to see how any election could be called free and fair when large sections of society are denied the opportunity to participate.
Imran Ahmad Khan
Following on from the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), what consideration will be given to the point that I made about establishing structured engagement at a senior level between Pakistan and Her Majesty’s Government? I imagine that it may not be particularly popular with our high commission in Islamabad, but it may produce some good outcomes and enable us to discuss things issue by issue and find some common ground in a structured way. Will the Minister undertake to give it thorough consideration?
Nigel Adams
I thank my hon. Friend for bringing this debate to the House, and I can assure him that we will obviously continue to stand up for the rights of all religious communities, including the Ahmadiyya Muslim community, around the world. We will protect our communities here in the UK from hatred and discrimination. My colleague Lord Ahmad, who I understand is an Ahmadiyya Muslim, continues to raise this issue at the highest level with Pakistani Government officials.
It is without question that the Government will continue to defend the right to freedom of religion and belief for everyone, everywhere.
Question put and agreed to.
Draft Law Enforcement and Security (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020
(4 years ago)
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The Chair
Before we begin our proceedings, will any colleague who intends to speak ensure that Hansard gets their speech?
The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Robin Walker)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Law Enforcement and Security (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020.
The regulations, which were laid before the House on 22 October, are needed to implement requirements of the Northern Ireland protocol, which, as hon. Members will be aware, was designed as a way of implementing the needs of the UK upon its exit from the EU in a way that works for Northern Ireland and, in particular, for maintaining the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, the gains of the peace process, and the delicate balance within the community. The regulations implement niche aspects, under annex 2 of the protocol, relating to explosive precursors and firearms.
I will give some background. In early 2019, the Minister for Policing and the Fire Service made the Law Enforcement and Security (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019, the purpose of which was to ensure that a number of existing security-related regulatory regimes continued to operate in substantially the same manner as before exit day. As a result of the protocol, and in advance of the end of the transition period, some further amendments are needed. These are included in the statutory instrument before the Committee. They cover only explosive precursors and firearms, and will ensure that Northern Ireland continues to implement European Union law on those two matters, as a consequence of the protocol.
It is important to point out that the impact of the SI will not be the same on both matters. On explosive precursors, the impact of the regulations will be that licences issued by the Home Office to allow members of the public in Great Britain to acquire, import, possess or use explosive precursors will no longer be valid in Northern Ireland. That is because the Northern Ireland explosive precursors licensing regime will continue to be aligned with EU regulations, as required by the protocol. Members of the public based in Great Britain who wish to acquire, import, possess or use explosive precursors in Northern Ireland will need a separate licence from the Northern Ireland Office, which already issues such licences for individuals resident in Northern Ireland.
I emphasise that this change will affect only the small number of Great Britain-based licence holders who also wish to acquire, import, possess or use explosive precursors in Northern Ireland. They are mainly hobbyists who, for example, make use of those substances to propel model planes. The SI has no impact on current Northern Ireland-based licence holders or on businesses. The Home Office will be issuing letters to current Great Britain-based licence holders to make them aware of the change, and public guidance on the gov.uk website will be updated.
In line with the UK Government’s objective of ensuring preparedness for 1 January 2021, we have included the provision on firearms, which are largely a devolved matter, with the consent of the Northern Ireland Justice Minister. The regulations mean that Northern Ireland will continue to issue and recognise the European firearms pass, a form of passport allowing lawful travel with a legal firearm across the EU and Northern Ireland. That will not be the case in Great Britain. Again, that is a requirement of the protocol to provide for Northern Ireland to remain aligned with the EU weapons directive, which sets minimum standards for civilian firearms acquisition and possession.
The Home Office has already written to relevant stakeholders, such as shooting associations, making it clear that residents of Great Britain will no longer be able to use or apply for the European firearms pass to travel with their legal firearm. That correspondence also makes it clear that residents of Northern Ireland will still be able to request a European firearms pass and use it to take a lawfully owned firearm to an EU country, including Ireland, after the end of the transition period.
The Committee will appreciate that none of this is a new concept or policy. The draft regulations are representative of the legislative building blocks necessary to ensure readiness at the end of the transition period. They apply to the niche and already tightly regulated area of explosive precursors and firearms, and they will have no impact on business.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)
I do not wish to detain the Committee longer than necessary, because the Labour party clearly supports the statutory instrument, which ensures that the existing regulatory regime continues to operate in substantially the same manner as before the end of the transition period.
I know that the Northern Ireland Justice Minister, Naomi Long, has consented to the devolved aspects of the SI being legislated for in Westminster, as the Minister said. However, given that the SI and the provisions in the protocol will require separate licences to be issued by the NIO to individuals in Great Britain for possession or use of explosive precursors, will the Minister outline how the NIO intends to ensure the ongoing continuity of those licences as regulations from the EU change over time? The impact of Northern Ireland aligning with a certain set of single market rules and regulations is not limited to explosive precursors but applies to all product requirements and safety, so it would be helpful to understand the NIO’s thinking on how the inevitable changes to these regulations and others will be monitored and implemented under the protocol.
Democratic input from representatives in Northern Ireland must be actively sought and understood in Westminster for that monitoring and implementation to be effective. Today’s regulations may be niche, with minimal impact on businesses and communities, but tomorrow’s almost certainly will not be, with much broader implications. Is it clear to the Minister what would happen if, for example, an Executive Minister refused for devolved aspects to be legislated for in Westminster? What will the process for democratic engagement and input into those decisions look like? Has he considered whether joint committees between Westminster and Stormont might be an effective way forward for the ongoing scrutiny of such regulations?
These regulations might represent the necessary legislative building blocks to ensure readiness at the end of the transition period in a niche area of security co-operation, but in other areas of security co-operation there is simply nothing of the same readiness, as the Minister knows. I would be grateful to him if he provided the Committee an update, perhaps in writing, on security concerns on data adequacy arrangements for policing co-operation, access to SIS II—the Schengen information system—European arrest warrants, ECRIS—the European criminal records information system—and Europol, all of which are necessary for ongoing security co-operation with Northern Ireland after the transition period. I will not detain the Committee any longer; the Opposition give our unqualified support for the SI.
Mr Walker
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her support and for her brief speech. To reiterate, neither the provisions on explosive precursors nor those on the European firearms pass will impact on business or trade. The changes will affect only members of the public. As she mentioned, we have worked closely with colleagues at the Department of Justice and will continue to talk to and engage with them. She spoke about joint committees for scrutiny and arrangements of that nature. I am not aware of any discussions about that, but we certainly continue to engage regularly with Departments in the Executive, and I think it is important that she does.
The hon. Lady spoke about the wider security issues. She may or may not know that later this week I will give evidence to the Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs for its inquiry into precisely those issues, so I commend that evidence session to her and to the Committee. As she said, licences for explosive precursors in Northern Ireland are issued by the Northern Ireland Office, while licences in Great Britain are issued by the Home Office. We will continue to work carefully to ensure that that process is managed properly, in consultation, as she said, with our colleagues in the Executive and the Department of Justice.
Question put and agreed to.
Draft Customs Safety, Security and Economic Operators Registration and Identification (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020
(4 years ago)
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The Chair
At the beginning of the sitting, I am asked to remind people to sit in the seats marked with ticks, and to respect social distancing. May I also ask members of the Committee who have speaking notes to send them to hansardnotes@parliament.uk? That would be helpful to our colleagues from Hansard.
The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Jesse Norman)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Customs Safety, Security and Economic Operators Registration and Identification (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I notice that some of my colleagues, due to the covid safety requirements, have adopted ticked seats on the other side of the room. It is a little bit unnerving for me to look over, and I hope it is not a sign of widespread defections, but I thank all colleagues for joining us for this important event.
This statutory instrument was debated in the other place last Thursday, 19 November, and passed unanimously. It is part of the Government’s package to prepare for the end of the transition period. The instrument concerns safety and security declarations, and registration for an economic operators registration and identification or EORI number.
The statutory instrument is essentially technical in nature. As well as correcting a deficiency in retained law, it provides support to help businesses prepare for the end of the transition period. My hon. Friends and colleagues will be aware that the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee reported the regulations as an instrument of interest in its 32nd report, published on 29 October 2020.
The safety and security provisions of this instrument are best understood in the context of the UK’s existing safety and security regime. The UK is guided by the World Customs Organisation’s SAFE framework of standards to manage the risks associated with goods entering and leaving the country. SAFE sets out minimum standards for customs administrations to control for security risks in the international supply chain. This includes collection and risk assessment of data on consignments of goods. The collection of this data is required before arrival or departure for all goods movements. These declarations are currently implemented through the Union customs code and will be retained in UK law after the end of the transition period by the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018.
While we have been part of the EU’s safety and security zone, we have only required these declarations for goods moving into or out of the EU. When the transition period ends on 31 December 2020, goods moved between Great Britain and the EU, as well as the rest of the world, will require these declarations. This statutory instrument introduces a temporary waiver on the requirement for safety and security declarations for goods imported into Great Britain. An additional statutory instrument, laid on Monday 16 November, will introduce contingency powers for export safety and security requirements, allowing the Government to take appropriate action if necessary in relation to exports.
As we announced in June, the Government are adopting a staged approach to the introduction of controls at the border after the end of the transition period. This will see the introduction of a six-month waiver on the requirement to submit entry summary declarations for goods imported from the EU. This waiver will give time and flexibility to businesses affected by covid-19 so that they can meet the new requirements. There will be no requirement for entry summary declarations for goods imported into Great Britain from territories where the UK does not currently require such declarations during the waiver period. From 1 July 2021, these declarations will be required on all goods moved into Great Britain. This waiver only applies to goods movements for which there is not currently a declaration requirement. As is the case at present, Border Force will undertake intelligence-led risk assessments of these movements. The requirements for entry summary declarations for goods imported from the rest of the world will not change. As a result, there is no significant short-term increase in the security risk to the UK from this waiver.
The instrument also updates retained legislation amending a list of locations currently granted shorter timing requirements for the submission of safety and security declarations for maritime movements. The time limit pre-arrival or pre-departure by which safety and security declarations are required varies by mode of transport. The retained legislation was drafted for the geography of the European Union. It contains a list of territories allowed shorter time limits for the submission of safety and security declarations for movements by sea. This accounts for the practicalities of those shorter journeys, where the default time limits can be challenging for carriers to meet.
Places such as Morocco, from which the journey to Great Britain by sea is lengthy, are currently on the list. However, the list does not currently allow shorter timing requirements for our closest neighbours and trading partners. Default timing requirements are impractical for the well-established trade routes, including channel crossings and movements to and from the Atlantic coast of Spain and Portugal. This instrument corrects the territory list in the retained legislation, adding territory to cover some of our most significant trade routes and removing those distant territories at the border of the EU that no longer need this consideration. This amendment corrects a deficiency in the retained legislation to reflect the UK’s new status as an independent customs regime.
The instrument also updates the retained law governing EORI registration. EORI numbers are unique identifiers that businesses are required to have to interact with Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, as the UK’s customs authority. EORI numbers are required to make customs declarations, apply for customs simplifications or undertake other customs engagement with HMRC. Existing UK EORIs will remain valid after 31 December 2020 for use in Great Britain and will continue to be prefaced with the letters, “GB”.
A UK EORI will be required for individuals or businesses established in Great Britain who want to trade with the EU or the rest of the world from 1 January 2021. Individuals and businesses without a UK EORI will need to obtain one. Persons established outside Great Britain who wish to undertake customs processes in Great Britain will also require a UK EORI. This instrument updates references in retained law that are no longer relevant. In doing so, it ensures that we continue to have a functioning EORI system. It also maintains a registration requirement where such a requirement exists in national law. No new requirements are imposed by this instrument.
The Northern Ireland protocol means that there are no safety and security requirements for goods moving between Northern Ireland and the EU. The protocol applies EU Union customs code rules in Northern Ireland. Therefore, the safety and security aspects of the instrument do not apply in relation to goods movements in and out of Northern Ireland. Goods moving between Northern Ireland and the rest of the world will be subject to safety and security requirements. Traders in Northern Ireland will continue to register for EORI numbers under UCC rules.
Amending the list of territories is a necessary step in updating our legislation to be fit for purpose after the end of the transition period. The temporary waiver on the requirement for entry summary declarations for movements from the EU strikes an appropriate balance between maintaining safety and security standards while giving businesses time and flexibility to adjust. The technical amendments to the EORI regime will allow businesses to register as they do currently. I commend these regulations to the Committee.
Abena Oppong-Asare (Erith and Thamesmead) (Lab)
On behalf of the shadow Treasury team, I welcome this opportunity to address this draft statutory instrument. I should also like to pass on the apologies of my colleague the shadow Financial Secretary to the Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing North (James Murray). He has not been attending Parliament during the covid-19 outbreak for medical reasons, although he and I have discussed this statutory instrument in detail before today’s sitting.
The Opposition recognise that the UK has left the EU and very much support the Government in ensuring as smooth an end to the transition period as possible on 31 December. However, we have concerns about three issues in the draft instrument, on which I would welcome a response from the Minister. As he just mentioned, the Union customs code is the overarching legislative framework for customs, adhered to by all EU member states and the UK during the transition period. The code’s registration requirements were due to be incorporated into UK law at the end of the transition period, with amendments made by the Customs (Economic Operators Registration and Identification) (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019. However, as the explanatory memorandum to the draft instrument makes clear, the necessary amendment to the Union customs code power to require businesses to register with a customs authority for other legislation was omitted from the regulations. We understand that the draft instrument corrects that error, revokes the previous regulations and ensures that there is no change in the UK’s registration powers after the end of the transition period.
Although it is welcome that the error was identified and, we hope, corrected in time, how can the Financial Secretary be confident that the Government have not made any other such errors, particularly given the scale of the necessary preparations for the end of the transition period? I would be grateful if he explained with references to specific processes that may be in place how he is making sure that any such errors are identified and corrected in time.
Secondly, as the Financial Secretary said, the draft instrument introduces a six-month temporary waiver on entry summary declarations for goods from the end of the transition period. It would therefore run from January to June 2021. The explanatory memorandum explicitly asserts that that is to mitigate the impact on readiness that the covid-19 pandemic has had on the logistics industry. However, the original statutory instrument, which the draft instrument intends to replace, also envisaged a six-month waiver from March to October 2019. Although we recognise that situations then and now are not directly comparable for a number of reasons, that raises questions about whether six months is a reasonable period for the situation we face now. I therefore ask the Financial Secretary to make clear today why the six-month waiver is needed. Assuming that he now considers covid to be the contributing factor, how can he be confident, if the six-month waiver was needed to deal with the process pre-covid, that six months will be enough now, given the additional effects of covid on the situation?
The draft instrument changes the deadline for when declarations need to be submitted for short sea journeys to reflect the fact that goods coming into and going out of the UK will come into contact with a customs border much more quickly after the end of the transition period. To achieve that, a number of changes will have to be made. They include allowing declarations to be submitted up to two hours before arrival or departure. The period is currently longer—in some cases, up to 24 hours. We understand and appreciate that the change seeks to avoid congestion as a result of late changes to the transportation of goods, and it seems to make sense in principle. However, the explanatory memorandum notes that HMRC will need to put processes and procedures in place so that entry summary and pre-departure declarations are submitted within the relevant timescales.
We are very conscious that HMRC is subject to job cuts and reorganisation and will have a significant amount of work in the coming months, not only assisting with the end of the transition period, but, realistically, also managing many of the Government’s covid support schemes. How can the Financial Secretary therefore be confident that HMRC will have the capacity to put in place the processes and procedures that the draft instrument envisages?
Thank you again, Mr Stringer, for the opportunity to raise concerns with the Financial Secretary about the draft instrument. As I said at the beginning of my speech, we recognise that the UK has left the EU, and we very much support any steps that the Government are taking to ensure that the ending of the transition period on 31 December is as smooth as possible. However, I would welcome a detailed response from the Financial Secretary to the concerns that I have set out.
Jesse Norman
Let me say how much I welcome the hon. Lady to the shadow Front Bench. If the fiendish complexity of the questions that she asked and the charm with which she asked them are any indicators of the future, she is destined for a long and successful career. I thank her very much indeed for those questions.
The hon. Lady asked three questions. The first question was how can the Government be comfortable that there are no, as it were, remaining errors left in the legislation. I hope that I can give her some comfort by reminding her of the extremely detailed process that the measure has gone through. There was a formal consultation on this legislation. Predecessor versions have been debated in the House, and it has gone through the mill of review by committees. It has been subject to significant cross-examination and reflection by intermediaries and other communities that it would affect. It has been specifically reviewed in the House of Lords. Human error being what it is, in an imperfect world, we cannot say that perfection is given to everything, but we would like to think—and we strongly believe, for the reasons I have indicated—that this is a sound and good piece of legislation.
Secondly, the hon. Lady asked whether or not the six-month period would be adequate, especially given that covid has been an additional factor. All I would say is that when this was originally framed, covid was not in the picture but, at the same time, there was considerably greater uncertainty about what the timing of this would be and what its effect would be on the relevant traders concerned. Since then, an enormous amount of work has been done to recruit over 250,000 traders to the EORI-number process, to stand up a very substantial programme of investment in intermediaries and training. Those are things that, on due consideration and in consultation and discussion with stakeholders, give us—and HMRC in particular—cause to believe that six months will be adequate.
Finally, the hon. Lady raised the question of the timing of journeys and whether or not it might be an unrealistic burden on HMRC, given all the other constraints that the organisation has met. I am sure that she would join me in saying that it is a source of national wonderment how well HMRC has done in dealing with the covid crisis, in standing up in record time furlough, self-employment and other schemes, and in adapting and elaborating them as the pandemic has evolved. However, I think that it does not feel—and we have not been advised—that there is any particular concern in this area. On the contrary, it has been successful in recruiting 6,000 of 7,000 needed and new customs agents. There is every expectation that that process will be completed as needed. I should also say—of course, we must not prejudge future spending announcements and discussions —that there is widespread understanding in HMRC and the Treasury that the organisation has reacted extraordinarily effectively and well, not least in dealing with the potential risks to its own staff from covid and in the reorganisation, in terms of working from home, that it has managed to achieve. For all those reasons, I hope that I am able to give the hon. Lady satisfaction on the three topics that she has raised, and I commend the statutory instrument to the Committee.
Question put and agreed to.
Westminster Hall
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Covid-19: Restrictions on Gyms and Sport
(4 years ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
David Mundell (in the Chair)
I remind hon. Members that there are some changes to normal practice in order to support the new call list system and ensure that social distancing can be respected. Members should sanitise their microphones using the cleaning materials provided before they use them, and dispose of them as they leave the room. Members are also asked to respect the one-way system around the room. Members should speak only from the horseshoe. Members can only speak if they are on the call list. This applies even if debates are under-subscribed. Members cannot join the debate if they are not on the call list.
I remind hon. Members that there is less of an expectation that Members stay for the next two speeches once they have spoken. This is to help manage attendance in the room. Members may wish to stay beyond their speech, but they should be aware that in so doing, they may prevent Members in seats in the Public Gallery from moving to seats on the horseshoe.
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered e-petitions 333869 and 309851, relating to Covid-19 restrictions on gyms and sport.
It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. The two petitions we are debating have a combined total of almost 1 million signatures, and they speak to a very deep concern: that we are sitting on a ticking time bomb when it comes to physical and mental health. The first petition, on preventing the closure of gyms, was started by Liam Brannon from north Lincolnshire and has over 614,000 signatures. The second, to exempt golf courses from covid-19 restrictions, was started by Monty Florin from Donnington and has over 257,000 signatures.
During this pandemic, it has become very clear just how much people value sport and exercise. It keeps us fit, helps us maintain good mental health, and is crucial for our resilience to the virus. With sports facilities closed during the first lockdown, many took up running and cycling. Joe Wicks is now a national hero, with an MBE to prove it, leading PE classes from our living rooms. However, it is the ongoing support and inspiration from gyms and other sports that motivates many people and keeps them active.
My inbox has been flooded with correspondence from people keen to see facilities reopen. To share just a few from my constituents, Malcolm, 69, says:
“I try to keep as healthy as I can, especially during the current situation. I go to the gym 3 times a week. Senior citizens like myself should have access to facilities.”
Natalia says:
“Leisure centres, gyms and swimming pools are an essential part of our community and have massively helped with my mental health. It’s a place to go to burn off energy and be in my own head that I just cannot achieve in my home environment.”
The power of petitions has clearly paid off, with the Government announcing today that gyms and outdoor sports will be able to get going again. That news will come as a relief to many, but it is not the end of the challenge. From financial support for struggling fitness venues to tackling health inequalities and ensuring sport is truly open for all, there is still much more to do, and I urge the Government to step up and use this opportunity to build back fitter from the pandemic.
Despite Joe’s best efforts, we know that people have been less active this year. Sport England research shows that more than 3 million people did less exercise during the first lockdown. Shaun, a personal trainer in my constituency, has had a similar experience. He says:
“I have 80 members who exercise regularly at the gym but during lockdown very few of those keep up with exercise. The average weight gain of my members during the first lockdown was 18 pounds.”
As Huw Edwards, chief executive officer of ukactive, has warned,
“the closure of the sector is creating a second public health crisis”.
Many community gyms and sports facilities are now in a very precarious position. The sector usually takes £7.7 billion in membership fees, which have crashed during the pandemic. There are 60,000 self-employed workers whose livelihoods have been destroyed, and many missed out on the self-employment income support scheme, whereas ukactive has warned that without urgent Government support, up to 20% of facilities could close permanently by the end of the year. The earlier support package from Sport England has been welcome, but many providers, particularly charities and social enterprises, have fallen through the cracks. Although the £100 million fund for leisure centres announced last week is positive, there are still big questions around eligibility. Will councils have the freedom to provide help where it is needed most, or will it be a case of devolving that money but with strict criteria attached?
The early months of the year are especially crucial as many fitness businesses make good on all those good new year intentions. Many people sign up to the gym in January, motivated to get fitter. As the Government finalise their plans for the Christmas period, the science says that tougher restrictions might be needed later. It would be a catastrophe for many businesses if we faced a spike after Christmas and the Government then said that they were shutting down again. As Martin, a gym owner, told me,
“if we are closed for January—we will probably have to close our doors permanently.”
Clearly, there is a balance to be struck between managing the spread of the virus and the wider public health risks, so I ask the Minister whether the Government will consider the wider consequences of shutting down the sector in any future lockdown.
The concerns of individual sports are wide and varied, and I will do my best to summarise them in the time that I have. Gyms are where many people spend their fitness time. The sector has put in place stringent measures to be covid-secure. As petitioner Liam told me, gym users are following the safety rules to the letter because they do not want their gyms to close. Data from Test and Trace suggests that that is working, with cases from venues relatively low in comparison with those from other settings.
Golf is a comparatively safe sport played in wide-open spaces. Petitioner Monty questions why people are permitted to walk across a golf course as a public right of way, but cannot play a game with members of their own household. As one of my constituents put it, “Why is it safe for me to sleep with my wife, yet I can’t play a game of socially distanced golf with her?” The sport is especially popular with older people, helping them to stay active later in life.
Swimming is one of the most popular physical activities, with 14 million adults going swimming every year, but in many communities swimming pools have not reopened since lockdown. West Denton swimming pool in my constituency is one of those. The not-for-profit operator has warned that it could remain permanently closed. There is a real danger that we will be left with a situation in which facilities in more affluent areas can reopen while those in more disadvantaged areas stay closed, worsening the health inequalities that we know we need to work hard to address.
The tennis sector was pleased to reopen in the summer as a naturally socially distanced sport with a relatively low risk of transmission, but restrictions on sporting activity have hit revenues for community tennis venues, coaches and organisations that help to deliver the sport. Grassroots football clubs have lost significant pitch time this year. The Government must lift the ban as an immediate step. There are concerns that without community support through spectators, clubs will struggle to generate the income that they need to survive. The spectator funding package announced last week is welcome, but the support must reach clubs at every level so that no community is left out.
Gymnastics clubs are a popular place for fitness activity, especially for our young people who have had a particularly difficult time during the covid-19 crisis. Even amateur athletes need to be able to continue their training to maintain their strength and ability. I have also been contacted by the horse-riding sector, which is deeply concerned that horses should not just be left in the stables for weeks on end. There are so many other sports and activities—I am sure we will hear of many from hon. Members today—but it will take much more than just lifting restrictions to make sport accessible for all.
I am particularly concerned about the impact that all this has had on children. We know that children lose up to 74% of their fitness over the summer holidays when they are away from PE, with those from the poorest backgrounds affected the most. Swimming lessons have been cancelled, dance classes postponed, and footballers are unable to get together. With venues and facilities at risk of permanent closure, inequalities could deepen further.
What action do we need from the Government? First, we need clarity on their strategy and the scientific basis for restrictions. The reopening of gyms and sports is welcome and crucial for the physical and mental health of the country, but the sector needs to know that that will continue and that it will not face another round of restrictions after Christmas.
The pandemic has been tough on many sports and businesses, so the second thing that they need is financial support. The extension of furlough has helped, but there is a time bomb of rent going into next year. Some facilities have found that they do not meet the prescriptive criteria to access Government support. We have already seen established providers such as Xercise4Less calling in administrators. Action is needed before more facilities close for good. The Sport and Recreation Alliance is calling for a sport recovery fund to support clubs and facilities across the country.
Other helpful measures would include business rates relief, in line with other sectors, and a cut to VAT to support ticket sales and cashflow, but beyond that direct financial help there is a strong case for promoting exercise and fitness more widely, whether that is inducements to buy home exercise equipment or support for gym memberships. Just as eat out to help out was a boost to the hospitality industry, an equivalent to encourage fitness in the new year would be a boost to not just the fitness economy but the health of this country.
People have faced huge pressures throughout this crisis, and physical exercise is one of the best tools that we have to stay healthy and resilient to deal with them, but without renewed effort to get people fit and active we are storing up bigger public health problems for the future. We also risk reinforcing health inequalities as community leisure centres battle for survival.
After a difficult year, we have the opportunity to build back fitter from this pandemic, to make a collective new year’s resolution to get fit and active, and to support local sports clubs, gyms and fitness facilities to ensure that sport truly is accessible to all. I urge the Government to take the health and mental wellbeing of our country seriously and make this a national priority.
Several hon. Members rose—
David Mundell (in the Chair)
Order. I am not going to impose a formal time limit at this stage, but to get everybody in Members should stick to approximately four minutes. I call Chris Green.
Chris Green (Bolton West) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Mundell. It is fantastic to follow such a good speech from the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell). She captured so much of what the debate is about and what people around the country are feeling. There is a sense that we appreciate something only when it has been taken away. That certainly applies to gyms.
Rather perversely, my attendance at the gym went up slightly with the lockdown, because I had to make an appointment to go and then felt that I had to keep that appointment. It helped to a small degree, but I would hardly recommend having this lockdown approach just for that reason.
A great many of my constituents have been in touch on this matter, which shows how much it affects their lives. It is not just about the obvious effects on physical health, but the effects on mental health. When so much else in society has been taken away, this is one of the areas that could and should have been left open, especially because of the very limited evidence that there is transmission within the pub—[Interruption.] Well, in the pub as well, but there is very limited evidence of transmission in the gym environment. We need evidence-based policy, because that is how we give confidence to people to follow the rules and instructions.
We also need to recognise just how much time and effort gym owners and their staff have put into making these environments covid-secure. It is phenomenal. The people working in gyms and the people attending them are so conscientious in what they are doing. The equipment is spaced out and people clean it afterwards. There are certain things that we would like people to carry on doing after this covid phase has washed through entirely.
There is another indicator of the importance of gyms and why they should be left open no matter what future national lockdowns we have. Other people in the Chamber can speak far more clearly and articulately than I about the experience of the Liverpool city region, but the outcry in Liverpool when the decision was taken to close gyms, in contrast with what happened in Greater Manchester and Lancashire, really showed the importance of keeping gyms open. I am glad that gyms reopened in Liverpool.
From the evidence across the board, it is so clear now that gyms and other exercise venues are incredibly important. This is not just about gyms, but other forms of sport, such as team sports. Golf was already highlighted. I will not use the same analogy as the hon. Lady’s constituent, but people could go for a walk and visit every tee on that 18-hole golf course, which is legal, but they cannot knock a ball, no matter how long it takes, from the tee to the green. That is not realistic. It is not seen as a serious consideration when dealing with covid-19. These flaws ought to be resolved. We can understand why the decisions were made in the short term, but they need to be corrected.
With team sports, those who have been doing the sport for a while share that experience with the next generation coming through. If we put a brake on that sharing of experience, it will be difficult to get those teams back up and running, especially if this draws on and on. There is so much more to say, but I am conscious of time. I am not overly keen on the phrase “building back better”, but we all ought to focus on building back fitter.
Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) and the Petitions Committee for giving us the opportunity to have the debate, as well as those people who signed the petition.
Throughout this period in Parliament, it has been difficult as when we get the opportunity to speak—when we are successful in the ballot—we often must speak about the biggest ticket issue. Due to the nature of the virus, the pandemic and the medical emergency we are going through, speeches are often limited to those subjects and we do not get the opportunity to speak about others. This subject is very important, but it has been difficult to speak on it.
I have two concerns. The first is about the lack of Government long-term strategic planning since the beginning, which has impacted people’s health and wellbeing. The second is about the nature of gyms and their importance going forward. That first concern has been an intense frustration to me, as I represent the community of Hove and Portslade, which had the first outbreak of covid-19 in the second week of February. We had the first so-called super-spreader at the time, which dominated the news. I benefited from daily briefings from the deputy chief medical officer and Ministers, because of the focused nature of the situation.
They told me then that their strategy at the very beginning was to delay. They wanted to delay in order to learn from the foreign experience, because things were occurring elsewhere first and fastest. As the pandemic rolled across the continent of Europe, I saw that testing, tracing and contacting people was crucial. The second thing we learned in that period was that a third of people who died in Spain and a quarter of those who died in the first wave in France, before the outbreak here, died in social care. The Government did not put a protective ring around those institutions.
I understand that the challenges were overwhelming. Gyms had to be closed and exercise had to be limited in the first wave, because of the nature of a first-wave response. Over the summer, however, rather than preparing for the next stage, summer was all about, “Show some guts and get out on to the beach. Get down to bars and restaurants.” None of it was about a national debate on what the second wave would look like. In every single pandemic for which we have data the second wave was larger than the first, including the Spanish flu in 1918. It was entirely predictable that we would be in this situation, but we did not prepare for it.
On my second concern about gyms and their nature, health and wellbeing is important. The Prime Minister himself learned that the hard way. Being healthy helps you survive illnesses, including covid-19, yet no preparation went into keeping gyms open during the second wave. There are ways of doing it, because of how modern gyms operate. The gym that I use has electronic entry systems and, since February, it has limited the number of people who can be in the gym at any one time.
I asked the Government over the summer whether they could devolve responsibility for which gyms can stay open and are safe to local authorities. Local public health officials should have been able to make an individual assessment of whether gyms could do social distancing. We could have had additional measures, such as wearing masks inside the gym, allowing fewer people in, and closing changing rooms, where it is quite difficult to socially distance. All those measures could have been put in place; all could have been consulted on way in advance of the need for a second lockdown, but that did not happen, which is why we are in this position—not by accident, but because of bad planning.
James Grundy (Leigh) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell.
I thank the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for securing this debate. She pointed out that about 1 million people had signed the various petitions we are considering today; I suspect that I am not alone in this Chamber in feeling that all 1 million of them have been emailing me personally.
I very much welcome the announcement today on gyms. Gyms are important not only for mental health but physical health, and as the nights draw in it becomes increasingly difficult to engage in activity and exercise outside safely. Also, as others have already said, gyms have done a great deal to try to make themselves covid-secure, so it is very important that we had the announcement today that they can reopen. That will be welcomed, certainly by the very large number of people who have been emailing us all.
Amateur sports teams, of which there are many in my constituency playing football, rugby and other sports, have been suffering sorely from the restrictions. Constituencies like mine, and I suspect that that includes the hon. Lady’s constituency, are rather poor, so the clubs’ inability to take in funds has an effect on their long-term viability. Leigh Centurions is very much looking forward to reopening. It is not in the dire circumstances that other rugby league clubs have been in, due to both Government help and the sound financial management of the club itself. It would be remiss of me not to mention the club’s attempt to join the Super League this year, which would be a tremendous boost to the physical and mental health of all my constituents, as well as to the economics of the town.
This has been an incredibly difficult year and restrictions on the return of spectators will continue, especially for those in tier 3 areas, but we are getting there. Hopefully, the vaccine will come along in the new year and we will be able to transition back to normal by Easter. I hope that we are able to make that transition as smooth as possible.
Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for securing this debate.
I voted for the current lockdown and I do not regret that decision. Indeed, the scientific advice was that it should have been imposed earlier, so my only regret is that Parliament did not support Labour’s proposal for a two-week circuit-break shutdown in October.
One of the sectors hardest hit by the lockdown is the gyms sector—Members can obviously tell that I go to gyms a lot. I have received a considerable number of letters from constituents—both owners and users of gyms—outlining the problems that they have faced.
From the owners, there has been one major complaint. During the full lockdown that began in March, many of them did not receive the financial support that they needed to survive. Notwithstanding the financial support systems put in place by the Treasury as the lockdown unfolded it became clear that many of the Treasury’s conditions and subclauses fell well short of the fulfilling the Chancellor’s original promise of, “Whatever it takes.” As a result, many gym owners were forced out of business. For gym users, the issue was more to do with the fact that exercise is a vital element of both physical and mental health, and the longer gyms remained closed, the more people’s health suffered.
If gyms have to be closed during this second lockdown because they are a major source of infection, then so be it—I am clear about that. But the period between lockdown 1 and lockdown 2 raised my suspicion that the Government have not followed the science. They did not provide any data to show that, during the tier system, gyms were a major source of infection. Even worse, when gyms were forced to close as my constituency was placed in tier 3, gym owners were given less financial support than previously, despite many having spent considerable amounts of money to make their gyms covid-secure. It seems the Government were more concerned about allowing grouse shoots to go ahead than about the amenities vital to the health and wellbeing of my constituents.
That double standard was dramatically exposed when Lancashire went into tier 3. As gyms were closed in my constituency, I expected the same rules to apply. That has been sorted out today by the Prime Minister, but could Lancashire County Council be so different from the Liverpool city region and Birkenhead? No reason was given and gym owners on Merseyside were handed hefty fines for breaking the rules—a classic example in the Dominic Cummings mould. One rule for them and another rule for the rest of us.
I was deeply concerned by that, and with other MPs from the city region I challenged the Government to explain why there were tiers within tiers and to show the science. No business should be breaking the lockdown, but once it is over, we must guarantee that gym owners are given the financial support they need to survive. They and other indoor and outdoor sports, such as tennis and football, should be provided with scientific advice on any possible risks, so that they can take the necessary safety measures in line with covid rules and restrictions.
Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I thank the petitioners, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) and, of course, the 1,659 people in my constituency who signed the petitions.
I recognise that this unprecedented situation has required us to take unprecedented steps to protect the public, including temporarily curtailing some freedoms. However, physical activity and sport play a critical role in building individual resilience and tackling obesity, in addition to the excellent benefits to mental wellbeing. It is vital that that is recognised.
Loughborough, including its world-renowned university, is synonymous with sporting excellence and is home to a number of national governing bodies. It should therefore come as no surprise that many of my constituents are passionate about health and wellbeing. That is especially true of the large student population. Mr James Greer, the Athletic Union president of Loughborough students’ union, recently explained to me that organised sport is important to the wellbeing of all students, not only those who are world champions in their chosen field.
From correspondence I have received, local residents agree. People from all walks of life want gyms and sporting facilities of all types to be back open as soon as possible, so I was ecstatic to hear the words of our Prime Minister earlier today. Earlier this month, local sporting facilities followed the new rules and closed. That included CrossFit gym, which is in a converted warehouse and has a huge bay door that could remain open for ventilation, in addition to the social distancing already practised. I urge that we look at a risk assessment of individual venues in any future arrangements, rather than implementing a blanket ban on the operation of all sporting facilities.
I have been contacted by Swim England, which set out a compelling case for why it is particularly important for swimming facilities to remain open throughout the outbreak. It has explained that the unique properties of water mean that swimming pools are an ideal place for people who may otherwise struggle to be active on firm ground. Furthermore, swimming pools are chlorinated controlled environments where the risk of transmission can be successfully mitigated. That has been proven by the safe way in which they operated between the first and second lockdowns.
The impact of the strict restrictions on pools is exacerbating the existing problem of permanent pool closures. Before covid-19, Swim England was already forecasting a 40% reduction in the number of swimming pools by the end of the decade. The Government’s announcement of £100 million for public leisure centres is welcome, and I am hopeful that that will alleviate the situation. I am keen for swimming facilities to be available, now and in the future, as a key element in the education of every child and as a much-needed facility for many adults.
I put on record my support for Swim England’s calls for swimming pools to be allowed to remain open throughout any restrictions. I also support starting from the presumption that gyms and other sporting facilities and activities should stay open, unless their particular circumstances mean that it is unsafe.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) and the Petitions Committee for securing this important debate.
I am proud to chair the all-party parliamentary group on parkrun and I have seen at first hand the impact that parkrun can have on deprived communities. In a pre-pandemic world, 170,000 people were taking part in this fantastic activity across the UK. On many Saturday mornings at 9 o’clock, I ran for 5 kilometres around our beautiful Parc Bryn Bach in Tredegar in Blaenau Gwent, and 18,000 children took part in junior parkrun on Sundays. I have regularly volunteered on both days. It is a delight to encourage young people to get active.
The joy of parkrun is that it is free to join, accessible to all age and ability groups, and led by the community itself. There is a further incentive at Parc Bryn Bach, where people are given a free piece of toast to have with their tea. As well as being a fun weekend activity, parkrun also has a proven record of addressing health inequalities. Research has shown that parkrun attracts even the hardest-to-reach groups: those who live in deprived areas, those who were previously inactive and those who fit into both those groups. Even better, participation in parkrun is often a catalyst for further physical activity.
Like all sports organisations, parkrun is ready to get back to what it does best—encouraging people to get active and to stay healthy. It is particularly keen to restart events for children and young people. Children may not be the face of the covid-19 pandemic, but they have certainly been among those who have been hardest hit. In areas like mine, keeping children active is a vital part of tackling inequality. Involving children in sports when they are young helps to maintain healthy habits throughout their lives, and prevent issues, such as obesity, before they arise. Parkrun wants to restart events for primary school-aged children from January, because it knows that early intervention works. Getting children running again would be good for their wellbeing and mental health, and good for our communities.
This strange year has reminded us of the importance of our health and wellbeing like no other. Sport needs to be a fundamental part of the covid-19 recovery, not an afterthought. Organisations such as parkrun, and many others, want to restart as soon as it is safe and feasible to do so, but they must be supported.
I am sure there are many keen parkrunners in the Government, as there are across the country. I can see some running colleagues from across the House here today. I ask them to reflect on the important contribution that parkrun makes and to work to support the organisation as it plans return. Getting active again benefits us all. I look forward to my first parkrun back as soon as possible.
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to be here with you in the chair, Mr Mundell. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for securing the debate and speaking in the way in which she did at the beginning of it.
Very many of my constituents—well over 4,000—have signed the petition, and hundreds also contacted me separately to ask me to be here today to put forward their concerns. We have had a difficult situation in the Liverpool City Region, because we have had a bit of hokey-cokey: open, closed, open, closed, open again next week. We need more stability for our gym businesses and to at least understand the evidence on which they have been closed so frequently.
Advice from the meeting of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies on 21 September was that closing gyms would have a “low to moderate impact” on the spread of covid-19, and that closing gyms could lead to
“potentially increasing health inequalities for…groups that do not engage in outdoor physical activity due to safety concerns.”
We are now entering winter. It is particularly cold in here at the moment, which reminds us that it is about to get a lot colder outside, and perhaps many people who would want to exercise will not feel like doing so in the cold, the wet and the dark and in the ice and the snow. If gyms can be safely opened, we want them to be open all the way through the winter and for as long as possible thereafter while it is safe.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) said, the Government have not set out the basis on which they said gyms ought to close. My understanding from the industry is that since gyms reopened on 25 July they have had over 50 million visits, with a virus prevalence rate of 1.38 cases per 100,000, which is not bad compared to some other settings. Given the physical and mental health and wellbeing advantages of having them open, perhaps there is a balance to be struck.
At the end of the lockdown, we may be going back into the tier system and there may be more national lockdowns in the new year—we do not know yet, but that cannot be ruled out at this stage—so will the Minister say whether, if there does have to be another national lockdown, gyms will be expected to close again, or are the Government now satisfied that they are safe places and that it is worth keeping them open for their mental and physical wellbeing and health and fitness advantages? Should we be watching out yet again for gyms to close?
One thing that affects those businesses more than anything else is the uncertainty of being open, then closed, then open again and then closed again. Nobody can plan sensibly in that situation. I hope the Minister will have something to say about that. It is welcome that the Prime Minister announced—when his sound was working—that gyms are to reopen next week. Will the Minister say whether the Government are now satisfied that they are safe, even when there has to be a broader lockdown?
Finally, local councils in deprived areas are often the custodians and operators of gyms and fitness facilities, but they have had only half of the costs of covid reimbursed to them. Even though they have deprived communities with more people at risk of ill health, their financial situation means it is toughest for them to keep their gyms open. Will the Minister say what the Chancellor will do next week to ensure that leisure and sporting facilities can stay open in our most deprived areas?
Simon Jupp (East Devon) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this timely debate. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle). We have heard some excellent points about the merits of exercise for our physical and mental wellbeing—I will take a personal note of all of them. The communities I represent in East Devon in the south-west depend on their local gyms and leisure centres regardless of their age. For example, constituents in their 80s have contacted me this month, really disheartened about not seeing friends at weekly aerobic classes or swimming. They are some of the 1,000-plus signatories to the petition from my area.
More than 500 members of the LED leisure centre group, supported by East Devon District Council, have emailed me asking for the physical activity centre to be recognised as essential and able to remain open safely over the winter months. It is important to recognise that we must stay healthy, but it is important that we do so safely in an environment designed to help people reach their goals.
Gyms and leisure centre owners such as Cranford Sports Club in Exmouth are desperately worried that, having received welcome Government funding since March to keep afloat and keep staff on their books, money is drying up. They sometimes feel that their role in our communities is underappreciated. Cranford Sports Club is so much more than just its title: it hosts Help for Heroes, Parkinson’s support groups and disabled rackets sports, as well as junior and teen tennis and badminton. It is also a centre for GP referrals from the two nearby medical practices. Those recovering from serious medical conditions have closely supervised exercise sessions in small groups, which reduces the burden on our NHS. Close proximity to the new Deaf Academy in Exmouth has already meant that children facing profound difficulties are being taught to swim safely in a small pool with their carers. The new Move Forward Gym in Ottery St Mary offers memberships to NHS-referred cancer patients, as well as special programmes for cancer survivors. Great work is being done locally across East Devon.
The Government have announced a £100 million support fund for leisure centres, which will help to cover losses incurred in the pandemic. While we await specific allocations, councils including East Devon District Council should also look to the discretionary grant funding scheme to support local gyms and independent leisure centres.
I know that the members of Cranford Sports Club in Exmouth would welcome the support.
We should welcome the move from national to local restrictions next week. I believe that Devon should be in the lowest tier of restrictions to reflect the hard work and significant sacrifices that we have made to suppress the virus. As the Prime Minister announced, leisure centres and gyms will reopen next week—I may even sign up myself—but councils must explore every opportunity to safely reopen leisure centres to support those that they do not have a hand in running.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) on introducing a very timely debate. I will speak about rugby. My hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (James Grundy) mentioned rugby league, but I will talk about rugby union. Both codes have their birthplace in my constituency.
Rugby union is normally played on Saturdays, and there was a pretty good win by England on Saturday, if you noticed, Mr Mundell, but the busiest day for a rugby club is Sunday. On Sunday mornings, hordes of young people take part in mini rugby, at the youngest levels often chasing the ball like bees around a honeypot. We often think of rugby as being a game of big men running into each other—
Mark Pawsey
Forgive me, but I was going to draw attention to the fact that rugby is a sport for players of all sizes, and we have the mini game, the junior game, veterans, and women’s rugby, which is part of every club. When the principal rugby club in Rugby got into financial difficulty, it was the community game—the youngsters and the women’s game—that kept the club alive. Neil Back’s book “The Death of Rugby” draws attention to that.
Rugby is one of the most social of games, and among its values is loyalty to teammates. We sometimes see a bit of argy-bargy on the pitch, but after the game it is traditional to meet in the clubhouse and have a drink with players from the opposing side. Many players have missed the social side as much as they have missed the action on the pitch. The top tier of the game has resumed. We have a new international tournament and the premiership—all without spectators, although they are who the major clubs rely on for money. Local clubs, of course, rely tremendously on hospitality and bar takings. All levels of the game welcome the package announced by the Minister only last week, which is much appreciated.
I mentioned the different versions of the game. The one that I did not mention is golden oldies—the version played by the parliamentary rugby team. That game enables old people to continue playing. There is less contact, and with less contact we have a safer game. Many of the players in the parliamentary team are old players who know what to do but are not fit enough to do it. That is where gyms are important, because we go to the gym to make certain that we are able to do what we know we should be doing.
I have had a huge number of representations from members of gyms in my constituency. The biggest site, and the one I have had the most contact from, is the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Centre, which is owned by Rugby Borough Council, the local authority—I think another Member raised that issue. It is operated by Greenwich Leisure Ltd under the “Better” brand. That is where I have my membership.
Like many, I missed the gym during the first lockdown, and I have seen the substantial measures that the club has put in place to ensure that it is safe. There are booked timeslots, there are no showers or changing rooms available, the machines are set apart and sanitiser is readily available, with a trigger spray immediately adjacent to most machines. I see everybody honouring the etiquette of wiping down before and after use. Many constituents have told me how important going to the gym is to their mental, as well as physical, health. We welcome the measures that have been announced today, which will enable us to return on 3 December.
David Mundell (in the Chair)
Thank you, Mr Pawsey. I am glad that you did not define “old” in that speech.
Ms Nusrat Ghani (Wealden) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) on securing the debate. We are hearing today that we will exit a national lockdown and move to a tiered approach. I am anxious how that will be prescribed. As a member of the Covid Recovery Group, I am pleased that some of our concerns seem to have been met: looking at the 10 pm curfew, opening up outdoor sports, opening up covid-safe gyms, and opening up covid-safe retail.
Covid-19 is a deadly disease—many in this room will have lost family and friends to it—but, just as we want to limit the spread of the infection, we need a long-term strategy for living with the virus that goes beyond Christmas. Our sports and gyms sector needs that certainty.
I will raise four cases with the Minister. First, on gyms, Daniel Sanger, who lives in Uckfield, wrote to me asking how we can justify that a takeaway such as McDonalds, which serves fast food, can be open, whereas he has had to close his business. Of course, he is grateful for the furlough scheme, but people have been limiting their subscriptions and a business like his may have to face further financial damage and lay off people in the future. Of course, the Minister knows that Wealden is stunning, and we have lots of golf courses. Mr Robert Hessey wants to know how he can walk down the street with one of his golfing friends but cannot play golf with them at one of our stunning golf sites in Wealden. Hopefully the Minister can explain that away.
We have a couple of local football clubs, which I want to talk about. They are low-key, local football clubs doing great work for our community. Uckfield, Crowborough and Hailsham football clubs have been put under extreme hardship with the uncertainty of lockdown. Perhaps the Minister will explain how the £550 million that was going to go to local football clubs and associations will be spent in an area such as mine.
I want to move on to the bigger picture. I hope the Minister will answer these questions, which I will try to put in the most constructive way possible. It is not rare that when large organisations face huge risk, the managers, our Ministers, tend to go native—that is, they start to become deal-makers rather than deal-questioners. Deal-makers ask what should and should not stay open, but deal-questioners ask what the real scientific evidence is behind the decisions we are taking.
Given that, I would like the Minister to address three key things. Will he work with us Back Benchers on the evidence that shows us the real impact on people’s livelihoods of every restriction that is put in place? Will he work with the Government to show us the full cost-benefit analysis of every proposed restriction? Those affect not only people’s livelihoods, but their mental and physical health. The lockdowns have been particularly harsh in East Sussex and for my Wealden constituents: we have had a very low infection rate and few beds have been taken up, but people’s livelihoods have been lost.
Finally, I ask the Minister to work with the Government to publish the models that inform the policies that they are taking forward. We, as Back Benchers, should be able to review the data that is made available to Ministers and the Government, so that we can make the best judgment on behalf of our constituents.
The cure of endless lockdowns, which we are prescribing, runs the real risk of being worse than the disease itself. It is time to start removing these restrictions. It is fantastic news that our vaccine is coming down the line. We need to ensure that people can live their lives to the fullest. Every restriction needs evidence. Surely that is the basis of good democracy.
Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell, and a delight to be in another debate led by my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell). Perhaps like you, Mr Mundell, being a rugby fan and a Scotland supporter, I did not have such a great weekend. However, we must go forward. We live in hope with the navy jersey and the white thistle every week. One never knows one’s luck.
Like the hon. Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani), I have two golf courses in my constituency and many upset constituents who are unable to keep taking their constitutional. That also refers specifically the indoor piece: gyms, leisure centres, indoor tennis and cricket centres, and, of course, swimming pools. In these brief remarks, I will focus on swimming.
The hon. Member for Loughborough (Jane Hunt) has outlined the lifelong benefits of swimming, but as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on swimming, may I thank the Minister for twice attending the APPG and listening carefully, and crucially, for ensuring that school swimming continued during this second lockdown? It is so important that we do not lose a cohort of children, some of whom would carry a lack of swimming ability through their secondary school years and beyond, and perhaps end up in Spain or somewhere during a gap year and tragically lose their lives because they had never learned to swim.
I am really pleased that, in theory, swimming lessons have continued, although that depends on people’s access to a swimming pool. We know that the statistics on swimming pool sufficiency have dropped over the past decade, owing to austerity and to developers not building enough pools under their section 106 and community infrastructure levy agreements. I hope that when the Minister gets a chance, he and his officials will look at the issue of swimming pool sufficiency, because there are lots of regions in the UK where children will not have access to this crucial hardware, so that they can actually learn to swim.
I also hope that the Minister will use any time that might be available to be strategic and look at the role of swimming instructors, paying those people properly and having them in proper arrangements, whether through local authorities or the third sector.
The other element of the announcement I am pleased about is the fact that the third sector will be able to apply for funds. Obviously, all our local authorities are really stretched, so given that some money has had to be spent—I would hope—on mitigating the impacts of covid, there has not been enough to cover all the leisure estate in many of our local authority areas.
I am pleased that the provider in my local authority, which is the charity Fusion, will be able to apply to the Minister for funds. In my constituency, I have an active outdoor swimming group, the Park Road Lido User Group, which is vocal about how much it is missing its swimming and keen to get back in the pool. A case study has been carried out by Hesketh Benoit, one of our key swimmers. He swims every morning—he is up at six, then down to the swimming pool—and also runs basketball and other sports for young people during the summer. He is a fantastic example of a lifelong swimmer.
I pay tribute to those workers who look after our swimming pools locally. I am thinking of West Reservoir in Hackney, the ponds on Hampstead heath, and all these outdoor swimming areas, because research has come out recently that suggests outdoor swimming can play a role in preventing dementia—something I recommend that the Minister look at.
I hope that, as the fund is brought forward, the Minister will come back to this House and tell us exactly how it has been spent, and hopefully that our disadvantaged communities will have access to sport in the same way that everybody else does.
Greg Clark (Tunbridge Wells) (Con)
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I was sorry to miss the speech of the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) and congratulate her on having secured the debate.
We had a few delays in the main Chamber, which I think colleagues have mentioned, but I am glad to be here because we have discovered, as has also been referred to, that sport will be coming back. That is a very welcome development, but it still raises the question of why it was cancelled in the first place, because the one thing we know about sports and exercise is that there is scarcely anything better when it comes to a defence against covid, whether practised by older people or children. A comprehensive ban on an activity that helps against covid is a mystery.
That mystery is deepened further when one considers that outdoor sport was—and at this moment, still is—prevented from taking place as well, especially as the incidence of covid transmission out of doors is virtually unknown across the world. Again, the environment in which we can feel most secure and safe from this dangerous and serious disease is the outdoors. The fact that for the last month the activities that have been enjoyed by our constituents up and down the country have been suppressed for, it seems to me, no good reason is something that we need to learn the lessons of, to prevent this situation from happening again.
However, this is not the first time that this has happened. During the summer, I was supported by Members from all parties in the House when I asked why cricket had again been banned in leisure settings involving children and adult teams across the country. Again, it is difficult to imagine a more covid-secure sport.
On the Select Committee that I chair—the Science and Technology Committee—we know that Professor Whitty and Sir Patrick Vallance have both commented on the very low incidence and risk of infection from outdoor sport, and that outdoor sport’s impact on the R rate, in so far as it can be modelled, is negligible. However, one of the things that they said that concerned me was that their advice was at a general level—a strategic level—and they did not give specific advice on activities such as sport. That is a concern because, as has been evidenced by the subscription to and participation in this debate, sport is of great importance to all our constituents. I completely respect the expertise of our leading scientists, but we need to have the ability to influence these decisions, and to scrutinise the evidence that is being adduced to cause lockdowns, and we should not just to have to accept this as a fait accompli.
I hope that the Minister, whose commitment to and passion for sport is known to all Members of the House, can take from this debate a resolution that in the future it will be possible to consider the views of Members and to share with them the evidence on which important decisions are based, so that a return to sport will endure and we will not again be subject to these unexpected and, it seems to me, unnecessary restrictions. I hope that his closing remarks might confirm that the lifting of restrictions that we heard about in the main Chamber today—indeed, just a few moments ago—will extend to spectators at amateur clubs and children’s sporting events.
My hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani) referred to Crowborough Athletic Football Club. She will know that the much-awaited derby match between Tunbridge Wells Football Club and Crowborough is on Boxing day. I will be there to support my home team
David Mundell (in the Chair)
I must ask the right hon. Gentleman to conclude his remarks.
Greg Clark
Exciting as the occasion will be—indeed, it will be a red letter day—I suspect that there will be social distancing outdoors. I hope that there will be no other restrictions on our being able to support that event and the many other sports that have been referred to in this debate, including rugby, tennis and golf. Indeed, I hope that many of us will be able to enjoy that event on Boxing day and other sporting events on many weekends ahead.
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell, and to follow the right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark). I will concentrate particularly on gyms, rather than making general comments on sport, although I support all those we have heard.
Also, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), who, before she even stood up to speak, had persuaded the Prime Minister to do what she asked him to do in this debate. [Laughter.] Nevertheless, we need to hear a bit more detail from the Minister, given the arbitrary nature of some of what has gone on in the last year, particularly with respect to gyms.
I will mention Nick Whitcombe, who owns and runs Body Tech Fitness in Moreton and who is a constituent of mine, and Thea Holden, who runs EmpoweredFIT. She is also a constituent of mine, although her gym is close to Arrowe Park Hospital, which I believe is in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley). We all know how important the battle against obesity is if we are to make covid-19 less of a problem, and how important it is for people to have a chance to become fitter, which is guaranteed if you manage to get yourself embroiled in a gym.
I want to talk about the mental health benefits of being able to work out, which have been alluded to and are very well known everywhere. Both Nick and Thea Holden, my constituents, would attest to that. There is another aspect: going to the gym can help people to deal with health conditions. Thea, who runs her own gym, suffers from Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which results in multiple joint dislocations. She was confined to a wheelchair and on medication before discovering that the disease could be managed by going to the gym. She is now drug-free, wheelchair-free and very fit as a result of the work that she did. She helps clients with the same issue and keeps them out of wheelchairs. When I spoke to her the other day, she told me that some of the people that she helped have been going backwards, because the gym has closed and they cannot get the workout that they need.
Thea has clients with mental health problems. One had a history of self-harming, attempted suicide and other mental health conditions. They could not relate to many people, but found that the atmosphere in the gym, the friends they made there, the effort they put in and the support they got there were very good for her mental health. Thea worries that, with her gym closed, people are really missing out and being put in danger.
Nick, who runs Body Tech in Moreton, asks why we cannot make health and fitness an essential service—not like a blue-light service, but in terms of the role that it plays in physical and mental wellbeing—and protect it more. Will the Minister tell us the scientific basis for the decision to close? Will he admit publicly that we now know more about the disease, and that the prevalence of covid was very low over the summer months, making it much safer, with the process that has been put in place, for gyms to remain open? I hope he will say that, even in tier 3-plus, gyms can look forward to remaining open.
David Mundell (in the Chair)
If the Minister and the shadow Minister confine their remarks to about 10 minutes each, that will allow Catherine McKinnell to respond to the debate. I call Alison McGovern.
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
I will do my best to do that, Mr Mundell. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for leading the debate. She made a compelling argument, and as my very good hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) mentioned, it is good that she has already persuaded the Prime Minister. What more could we ask for? I thank all Members for their excellent contributions. We had a huge number of speeches from Members from all over the country, but I feel that Merseyside has been represented well this afternoon. It is possibly the sporting capital of the nation, so we would expect nothing less. [Interruption.] It is the home of the champions—just saying.
The debate is very important. It comes at a slightly odd moment in the day, after we have heard the Prime Minister announce in the Chamber some of the details of the next phase of our pandemic response, including the important details that we have heard Members discuss. However, we have yet to see how that will affect our daily lives in practice. None of us knows exactly which areas will be in which tiers, so we are still at a loss to understand how the announcement will affect our sporting and physical activity, and our constituents. That feeling is not new. Too often during this crisis, sport and the physical and mental wellbeing that comes from it has felt like an afterthought. That is not good enough. Every Member who has spoken today has said that it is a fundamental part of life for many of us in this country, so we need better. As my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North and others have said, we need clarity from the Government on what is going to happen, not just at the end of this month and into December, but in the months to come.
I have questions for the Minister that I hope will help us to get clarity. First, while the return of sports and gyms is welcome, we know we are not out of the woods yet. What will happen to sport if further lockdowns are required in January? Will sport be cancelled again? Will team sports be cancelled? Will gyms be affected again?
As the right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark) asked, what is going on with spectators? We have seen the Secretary of State’s tweets saying that spectators will be back, but why have those limits to the number of spectators been chosen? I will not ask any further questions about this now, because we have not got time for all the questions that there will be in the coming days about the return of spectators to sport. The issue is very important to people, so I know we will return to it, potentially on Wednesday, when we will be talking about football.
Secondly, we need to consider the possibility of a third wave. We hope it will not happen. We all hope that the vaccines that are being worked on, and the mass-testing, which Merseyside has been trialling, are going to work, but if there is a third wave and we face a future lockdown, what will happen? A number of leisure centres up and down the country—they were mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle)—have been shut since March. Many of them serve some of the most deprived communities in our country. Several have been mentioned in the House by hon. Members. Will the Minister commit to getting in touch with each of those Members, and to shifting heaven and earth to get those leisure centres open? I know he has allocated £100 million, but there is a difference between paying the money out and getting the doors open. Will he work with me to get the doors of those leisure centres open?
Thirdly, I mentioned mass-testing. Can the Minister say what conversations he has had with Mayor Steve Rotheram, Mayor Joe Anderson or the director of public health for Liverpool, Matt Ashton, to work out how we can apply the lessons coming out of mass-testing to sporting participation? That has to be part of the answer. Will he have those conversations with people in Liverpool?
Fourthly, sports have made huge changes to their coaching processes to make themselves covid-safe. Has that work been a waste, or will the Minister encourage sports and others to work with him on plan B? If we go back into lockdown, those covid-safe measures can help us keep sport open.
Fifthly and importantly, as several Members have asked, what conversations has the Minister had with the Schools Minister? As my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey said, our kids have lost out massively from this. Will the Minister explain what steps his Department is taking with the Department for Education to make sure that every child has sporting opportunities, if not before Christmas, then in the new year?
While we are talking about our children and the health of the nation, we need to look at the facts about what this virus has done, not just to those who are vulnerable, but to all of us. It has had an impact on the health of every single one of us, so, sixthly, what work has the Minister commenced with the Department of Health and Social Care to understand the physical health of the nation, to assess where sport can help, and to create a proactive plan?
The Conservative manifesto, published last December, included promises about sports facilities and an allocation of money. This is an issue close to my heart, Mr Mundell, so forgive me for banging on about it. Grassroots football is in dire need of better facilities. There were promises made in the Conservative manifesto about that. Can the Minister say where he is up to with that plan? As ever, we are a constructive Opposition, and if there are things that he wants to do to improve our sporting facilities, I, for one, will help him.
I come to my seventh and final question for the Minister. I hope to finish a little under time to give the Minister plenty of time to answer my questions fully. The right hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells rightly said that the chief scientific officer and others can give broad advice, but not specific advice on the sporting issues that have been raised by hon. Members on both sides of the House. It is clear that we must go much further if we truly care about the health of the nation.
We need a proper plan. The future of our country, including its economy, happiness and longevity, depends absolutely on the wellbeing of us all. I ask the Minister—he has heard me ask this before; I am sorry to be boring about it—for a cross-Government, comprehensive plan for future wellbeing beyond the virus. Is he prepared to create that, and where is it? The Government have spent far too long running from crisis to crisis. Frankly, when it comes to sport—and everything else—we need much better than that.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Nigel Huddleston)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for leading this important debate, to the hundreds of thousands of people—nearly 1 million—who have signed the petitions, and to the hon. Members who have spoken so eloquently today, and with whom I have had many conversations over the past few weeks and months.
It is worth noting that since the debate was scheduled, we have entered a four-week period of national measures, which means that almost all businesses, including gyms and leisure centres, have had to close their doors to the public. As all hon. Members present are aware, the national lockdown, with its vital purpose of protecting our NHS and saving lives, will last until 2 December.
As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced in the main Chamber earlier—in fact, I think he is still on his feet—organised grassroots sport will be allowed to resume from 2 December. There will be some restrictions on higher-risk activities in very high alert level areas, and on indoor adult sports, but this is a good day for sports. Gyms and leisure centres will be allowed to reopen in all tiers. As ever, we expect social distancing and the requirements for heightened hygiene to remain in place. More detail will be available on the announcement in the coming days.
The importance of sport and physical activity for the nation’s physical and mental health has never been more apparent, as many hon. Members have mentioned. Sport can be one of the most powerful defences against the covid-19 pandemic, and we will need raised levels of fitness among the population as we prepare to return to our normal lives, now that an effective vaccination programme looks imminent.
As we have said before, nobody, including me as Sports Minister, wanted to introduce further national restrictions, or restrictions on sport. However, as the Prime Minister said when introducing the second lockdown, with the virus spreading faster than expected, we could not allow our health system to be overwhelmed. We introduced very serious lockdown measures; there was no question of making exceptions. We needed to go into lockdown and allow people out for only a very strict and limited number of reasons, including going out to exercise, albeit not necessarily the exercise that everybody would personally desire.
The national restrictions are designed to get the R rate under control through limiting social contact and reducing transmission. For the measures to have the greatest impact, we all need to sacrifice, for a short period, doing some of the things that we would like to do. As the Prime Minister announced today, it will be for a short period; after 2 December, we can go back to some of those activities.
Unlike in the previous lockdown, sport is still taking place behind closed doors. At schools, which are still open—I have spoken, and speak regularly, to the Schools Minister—PE lessons are able to take place. Exercise can be done with one other person; that recognises that we are in winter, and many people, for safety and other reasons, wish to exercise with another person outside their household.
Sport has been and will continue to be a priority. Even during peak lockdown in March, in this country, unlike in many others, exercise was still an absolute priority and could be taken by everybody. That was not the case everywhere around the world, and it shows how important sport and physical activity are to the UK.
There have been many calls, from many sports representatives and the public, for exemptions to the current restrictions, some of them giving highly plausible reasons why their sport should be exempt. I heard many of those arguments again today, and of course the petitions are good examples. I have heard the arguments for gyms, golf, tennis, swimming, basketball, children’s football, parkrun, cricket, rowing and many other sports. That exemplifies why we have had the problem and the issues that we are facing. As I am sure hon. Members will understand, the difficulty is that when we unpick one thing, the effectiveness of the whole package of restrictions is compromised. When we keep taking individual bricks out, the whole wall falls down. Instead of there being one exemption for one person to conduct their preferred activity, all of sudden there are tens, hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, and millions of potential additional interactions—the very thing that we wanted to avoid.
The focus had to be on minimising the number of potentially risky interactions. That is not to say that any individual sport is high risk—quite the contrary. If we thought that, we would never have allowed them to take place. The point, as many have mentioned, is that there is a very small risk of the infection spreading in each of those interactions. We therefore had to take action, and the Prime Minister was very clear that there should be no exemptions, for clarity, and to ensure that everybody understood that this is a deadly serious lockdown.
Unfortunately, that meant that everybody had to make compromises. I know that closing these facilities was incredibly inconvenient, compromised people’s health and was very upsetting and disturbing, but there is no doubt that the restrictions that we have all had to live under for the past few weeks, and for the next week or so, will have saved lives, so that inconvenience, I think, was worth it.
David Mundell (in the Chair)
Order. Members need to come to the horseshoe in order to speak.
Chris Green
A number of colleagues have raised concerns about evidence and data. The Minister talks about the risks that interaction poses. There must now be data and evidence, accumulated over the last nine months. A report could be published and shared on the evidence of the impact that opening clubs and gyms would have on covid transmission.
Nigel Huddleston
I thank my hon. Friend for his comments. Many people have asked for the data. I think I have articulated that the point is the possibility of there being a risk. As the chief medical officers and others have said, there is always a risk with any social interaction. We saw death rates go from a dozen or so a day in August to dozens a day—in fact, there are now more than 500. That is the evidence. That is why we had to take significant action.
I have always said, though, that as soon as it is possible to start lifting restrictions, grassroots sport will be among the first things to return. That has been confirmed by the Prime Minister today, as promised. I pay tribute to all the hard work carried out by sports’ governing bodies and clubs across the country to ensure that we were ready for the return of sport—from gyms, leisure centres and pools, to rowing and badminton clubs.
Maria Eagle
Does that imply that if there is a further national lockdown in the new year, gyms will all have to close again?
Nigel Huddleston
The hon. Lady raises an important point, but let us be “glass half full”, rather than “glass half empty” on this issue. We are at the point at which we are reopening sport. She and everybody knows that we have to respond to circumstances; it is ridiculous to ask a Minister to come to the Dispatch Box and make promises based on future hypothetical scenarios. We will base decisions on the information at the time, but we are now in a pattern. We have the vaccination coming. I am very confident that we are looking to a much more positive future, and that is what the Government will be focused on.
I pay tribute to the hard work and effort of so many sports bodies and clubs that have made their facilities as safe as possible and minimised the risk. It has involved a huge amount of work for them at not inconsiderable cost to ensure that social distancing, improved hygiene and other measures have been implemented to increase safety and lower the risk to their members and, indeed, their staff. I thank all those who have played their part, many of whom volunteered to go the extra mile for the work that has got us this far.
Alison McGovern
This is a simple question. The Minister thanks sports groups for their work, and I agree with him. If we have future lockdowns, either the work done to make sports covid-safe is good enough that they will not be included, or they will need to prepare to be included if there is a future lockdown. Which is it?
Nigel Huddleston
What everybody is going through at the moment—the sacrifices everybody is making—is precisely to reduce the chances of a future lockdown. I appreciate the work that everybody is doing.
The return of golf has had a tremendous amount of support from the public, as seen by over 250,000 people signing one of the petitions that led to the debate. Golf has great reach across society for all ages, backgrounds and abilities, bringing people together to experience the great outdoors. Like gyms, leisure centres and pools, the golfing community has made strenuous efforts to ensure that its players can take part safely. Once again, I pay tribute to its shared efforts. I say to the hon. Lady that every piece of effort and energy that has gone into making grounds and sports facilities safe has been well worth it. That is exactly why we have been able to make the progress we have so far. The Government recognised those efforts and the importance of golf by ensuring that golf courses were among the first facilities to reopen following the lockdown in the spring.
Sports and physical facilities are at the heart of our communities and play a crucial role in supporting adults and children to be active. The Government have provided unprecedented support to businesses through tax reliefs, cash grants and employee wage support, which many sports clubs have benefited from. However, many leisure centres have faced acute challenges during the pandemic, which is why on 27 October the Government announced a £100 million support fund for leisure centres affected by the pandemic, which many hon. Members have mentioned today. My Department is currently working closely with Sport England and MHCLG on the design of that scheme. Further details will be released shortly. Once the funds are open, I urge local authorities to bid for the money. I hope that people will make the most of these precious local facilities once they are open again.
That funding is all on top of what DCMS’s arm’s length body Sport England has already provided, which has comprised over £220 million directly to support the sport and physical activity sector, with £35 million set aside as a community emergency fund for our very important sports clubs and exercise centres through the pandemic. We continue to work with organisations to understand what they need and how we may be able to support them into the future when restrictions are lifted.
I am in regular dialogue with representatives from sports’ governing bodies, member bodies and providers of leisure facilities and gyms through the DCMS-hosted sports working group, which provides a forum for representatives from the sports sector to discuss the impact of the pandemic on the sector and allows members to put questions and suggestions directly to me and the Department. I am grateful to all those involved for their continued advice and support.
I thank hon. Members for their contributions and interest in helping to get sport and physical activity up and running again. I look forward to further increasing our efforts, particularly with the increasingly good news about vaccines. People from all backgrounds and of all levels of ability should have the opportunity to play sports and keep active, and that is a commitment of this Government.
Catherine McKinnell
I thank right hon. and hon. Members for what has been an excellent debate, putting the arguments on behalf of all the petitioners who live in our constituencies and many who are not represented in the Chamber because there are not enough spaces for all Members to come and speak. Members of the public have been emailing their MPs in huge numbers, which is a powerful way of conveying the strength of feeling on this issue.
My personal inbox is now pinging with emails from local sports clubs—those for my children’s swimming lessons and my daughter’s gymnastics—that are getting in touch to say how delighted they are that they will be able to reopen. That is why it is hugely concerning that we are not really getting any certainty from the Government that that could be long lasting in any way. I absolutely appreciate—we all appreciate—that we cannot predict the virus or how things will go, but we have learned some things over the last nine months. I would have thought that one of the lessons that we have learned it that it is absolutely fundamental that people stay fit, active and healthy. That is not a nice-to-have or a leisure activity, but a fundamental part of people’s health, mental wellbeing and ability to stay resilient and resistant to the virus.
I had hoped that the Minister would be much clearer that any of the relaxations announced today will not mean that the very sports that are delighted about finally being able to reopen may have to close down again in January. That is just unthinkable, to be perfectly honest. I really hope that the Minister will take that away and that, once the Government have been able to iron out all the detail on the relaxations being announced, they will give greater clarity, certainty and reassurance to those sports clubs that they will not be open just a matter of weeks, until another spike after Christmas. That spike could come as a result of the relaxations, but also because of the inability to track and trace the virus properly through a system that truly works.
My final point, which has been made by colleagues, is about how vital it is that we have resources in place to ensure that every community—not just in those where people can pay—can keep a whole variety of sports, gyms, leisure centres and swimming pools afloat. The Government should commit not only to ensuring that every community that had those facilities before the pandemic still has them afterwards, but to building on those facilities, making them even better, so that we come out of the pandemic knowing not only that sport, health, fitness and mental wellbeing matter in this country, but that we are truly going to build back fitter and even better than before.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered e-petitions 333869 and 309851, relating to Covid-19 restrictions on gyms and sport.
Nigeria: Sanctions Regime
(4 years ago)
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Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered e-petition 554150, relating to Nigeria and the sanctions regime.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I thank the 220,330 people who have signed the petition—when I last checked it this morning—especially the 853 who are my constituents in Chipping Barnet. This petition has been prompted by disturbing events in Nigeria over recent weeks. There have been widespread protests regarding the activities of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad of the Nigerian police, known as SARS.
That unit has a deeply controversial reputation and the hashtag #EndSARS started to appear prominently on social media in 2017. Reports of violence and human rights abuses by SARS date back several years, but these latest protests followed circulation of a shocking video in early October, which many believe shows a man being killed by SARS officers.
On 11 October, President Buhari announced plans to disband the unit. However, such promises have been made in the past, yet SARS has seemingly continued to operate. This would be the fourth time the unit was abolished. Many protesters felt that disbanding SARS—even assuming it happens—would not be sufficient to tackle long-standing problems with police brutality, particularly if SARS officers are simply assigned to different parts of the police service. Activists are now calling a complete overhaul of policing in Nigeria. They also want police officers responsible for beatings, killings, extortion, unlawful detention and other crimes to be held to account.
The protests continued and thousands of Nigerians, mostly those under 30, took part in peaceful marches, candlelit vigils and multi-faith prayer sessions. People came together despite having different social, cultural and tribal backgrounds. Supportive comments flowed in from the Nigerian diaspora around the world, including from celebrities, and the #EndSARS movement quickly widened beyond the initial concerns about policing. It started to capture the general frustrations of a young population demanding an end to poor governance and corruption.
I am afraid, however, the situation became far graver on 20 October when the Nigerian army and police opened fire on a peaceful demonstration at the Lekki tollgate in suburban Lagos. What happened is disputed, but Amnesty International has tracked events through photos and video footage posted by protesters. These show army trucks approaching the protesters from both sides of the tollgate and blocking them in. Shooting with live rounds started almost immediately with no warning.
A local musician, Obianuju Catherine Udeh, was streaming the events live on Instagram as it happened. She later said:
“There was a guy that was running and he just…he fell, and we looked at him. He was shot in the back”.
Several people are looking for missing loved ones, including Elisha Sunday Ibanga. An eyewitness told CNN that Elisha’s brother, Victor, was shot in the head during the protest and his body taken away. The US broadcaster reported that it has seen and geo-located a photo of Victor Sunday Ibanga lying in a pool of blood and wrapped in the white and green Nigerian flag, one of the same flags held by protesters earlier in the evening as they sang their national anthem. Similarly, and equally tragically, Peace Okon has not seen her younger brother, Wisdom, since he went to the demonstration on the night of the shootings. She said:
“I’ve gone to hospitals, I’ve gone to police stations, I’ve gone to everywhere. I can’t find him”.
It is not clear how many were injured or lost their lives at Lekki, but Amnesty International estimates that 56 people have died since the protests began, and it has documented many instances where excessive and disproportionate force has been used to try to control or stop protests. The shootings at the Lekki tollgate shocked many in Nigeria—it has seemed like the last straw. The Government there have promised judicial panels of inquiry to investigate what happened, but there is widespread scepticism about whether these processes will be effective in holding to account those responsible for the bloodshed and human rights abuses that have occurred. That concern, I believe, is felt by many constituents here in the UK, especially those with Nigerian heritage or family links to Nigeria. That is illustrated by the huge support for the e-petition we are considering this evening, which asks the UK Government to consider imposing sanctions.
As I read it, the petitioners are asking for Magnitsky-type sanctions against known individuals within the Nigerian Government and security forces. There is a recognition that generalised, old-style sanctions applied to the country as a whole might cause hardship to ordinary people not in any way responsible for the problems highlighted by the petition, so this debate is a vital opportunity to hear from the Minister and have her respond to the urgent appeal from the e-petitioners that the Government consider imposing targeted sanctions against certain individuals believed to be culpable in relation to the violent and excessive police response to peaceful protests in Nigeria.
The new Magnitsky sanctions regime started to operate in July, and I believe its creation is one of the best and most important foreign policy decisions made since the Conservatives returned to Government in 2010. It puts us ahead of many other countries in showing how seriously we take human rights abuses around the world; I gather that it even earned us praise from Guy Verhofstadt, which is undoubtedly a rare thing. I believe that the petitioners have a credible case for the imposition of individualised sanctions such as travel bans and asset freezes. Of course, I appreciate that there are real sensitivities about anything that might be considered interference in the domestic affairs of another country, especially where there was a previous colonial involvement. However, I still hope that Ministers will give serious consideration to what the e-petitioners request.
My second ask of Ministers is that they provide reassurance about UK aid and security programmes which involve Nigerian police, military and security forces. In their responses to written questions on this matter, the Government have emphasised that these programmes are intended to improve transparency and accountability, as well as strengthen respect for human rights, the rule of law and protection of minorities. However, my constituents who have signed this petition want more clarity and certainty about what these UK programmes have achieved and how they are assessed. They will be reassured if we have a clear statement that UK taxpayers’ money cannot be misused by security forces in Nigeria or, in any circumstances, used on activities that suppress peaceful protests.
My third question for Ministers is what representations they have made, or are prepared to make, to the Nigerian Government about human rights abuses against Christians. Charities such as Christian Solidarity Worldwide and Open Doors have documented a worrying increase in attacks on Christian communities in Nigeria by terrorist groups over recent years, and their plight must never be forgotten.
Fourthly and finally, I ask Ministers to step up engagement with the Nigerian diaspora in the United Kingdom. There are many British Nigerians who want to deploy their knowledge and understanding of the country to help shape the UK’s response to unfolding events in Nigeria. Worried about the situation and distressed about the Lekki tollgate tragedy and other loss of life, they are brimming with enthusiasm to help, to make a difference, and to be involved in building a better future for Nigeria. In this regard, I particularly want to thank my constituent Lara Ayodeji Akindiji for contacting me to share her concerns and offer her help—her support and briefing for this debate has been invaluable. My final request is therefore to ask the Minister to meet me and a group of constituents to discuss these matters further.
Nigeria is a country with so much going for it: a young and hugely talented population, massive natural resources and a rapidly developing economy. If the #EndSARS protesters secure the reform and improved governance they are demanding, Nigeria could become a formidable economic powerhouse, and the diaspora community here can be a vital bridge linking our two countries in a brighter future of increased trade and prosperity in the years to come.
Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I thank the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) for her passionate opening speech. I also thank Silas Ojo for creating the petition, which now has more than 220,000 signatures, including from almost 2,000 of my constituents in Edmonton.
I am sure that I am not the only Member to have been inundated with messages from constituents in recent months urging them to do whatever they can to lend their voice to the #EndSARS protests. As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Nigeria, I was keen to speak in the debate and highlight the need for the UK to stand with the Nigerian people against an increasingly cruel and brutal regime.
The situation in Nigeria is incredibly serious, with tragedy after tragedy unfolding on the streets in state after state, as the Nigerian Government and their security forces take ever more repressive measures to end a protest movement that has given hope to millions across the globe. The #EndSARS movement is not just about disbanding the Special Anti-Robbery Squad; it is a movement led by the youth of Nigeria who took to the streets peacefully to demand an end to brutality, extortion and extrajudicial executions, and a truly democratic Nigeria. The bravery of the youth-led movement will never be defeated.
Today, we need to consider how the Government should respond to both the movement and the violent actions of the Nigerian regime, but we must also take the opportunity to look beyond sanctions to the way that development funding is spent in Nigeria. Instead of funding corrupt security services and investing in projects that do not benefit ordinary Nigerians, we need a new focus on poverty relief and anti-corruption programmes.
It is vital that we recognise the role of the UK in how these events have unfolded in Nigeria. Despite previously stating the opposite, the Government have now admitted to funding SARS units for the last four years. That funding included not only the provision of training to those units, but the supply of equipment. At the very moment that Amnesty International declared SARS units to have been involved in extrajudicial killings, corruption and torture, the Government were using the aid budget to train and equip those units. In fact, between 2016 and this year, more than £10 million went towards programmes from which SARS units benefited.
That not only is immoral, but makes it harder for the UK to play a positive role in Nigeria during this vital period. How can the Government call for an end to violence against protesters with a straight face, having helped to train and equip the security forces that are carrying out the violence? I hope that the Minister will publicly apologise today for the decision to fund the SARS units, and pledge a full and independent inquiry into the matter.
The day of 20 October 2020 will be remembered for the Lekki tollgate massacre—the day a deliberate and coldly calculated attack on peaceful Nigerian civilians was carried out by the Nigerian army. The Nigerian Government have since taken part in an attempted cover-up of the massacre. Security forces in Nigeria make muted responses to the murder of protesters. While Governments across the world have called on the Nigerian Government and the security forces to stop killing protesters, the UK Government have hedged their bets and issued only weak and timid statements. It is therefore a gift to the Nigerian Government when our Government fail to explicitly condemn them for killing their own citizens. Will the Minister today finally condemn the Nigerian regime for its part in the tollgate massacre and the continued killing of peaceful protestors in Nigeria?
The Nigerian Government say that they have disbanded SARS, but the corruption and brutality of the security forces continues. The Nigerian Government’s violence against their own citizens appears only to be intensifying. The Nigerian Government need to stop freezing the bank accounts of key protestors and illegally detaining them. The Minister for the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture went on record to state that the CNN reporting of the massacre was “fake news”. That is undemocratic conduct that needs to be called out.
I ask the Minister to use this opportunity to end the UK Government’s neutrality on this issue. The UK must never be neutral when it comes to human rights abuses. Are the rights, needs and dreams of young Nigerian people not the same as those of young people here in the UK? The UK should not be safe haven for anyone who denies their own citizens the same freedoms they have come to enjoy in the UK.
All too often, when a repressive regime is targeted with economic sanctions, it is the civilians who pay the price, while the regime itself becomes more entrenched and less open to change. The UK Government can use the sanctions under the global human rights regime that targets individuals involved in human rights violations and abuses. If the UK’s position is as a global force for good, then I ask the UK Government to add the names of the Nigerian Government and the security services to the designated list of those responsible for the worst human rights abuses.
To close, it is time for the UK to change course and stand in solidarity with those fighting for a new Nigeria. Let us stand together and get rid of corruption, extortion, extra-judicial murders and massacres, because it is time for a new Nigeria.
Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)
Thank you for calling me to speak, Mr Gray. It is a pleasure to follow my friend, the hon. Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor), who speaks quite rightly with passion about one of the world’s great countries, which is sadly being wracked by violence against young people.
There may be some debate about this, but I argue that the greatest book in the English language is “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe, the great Nigerian writer. The beauty of that book is the way it explains the challenge to changing generations of living together, and the way it speaks about values falling away and community being eroded by outside pressure.
What we are seeing in Nigeria today is part of that story. It is a tragedy that we are all watching and witnessing. As we see things falling apart, the pressure this time is not foreign colonialism, but corruption, violence and attempts at control. I totally agree with my friend, the hon. Member for Edmonton, that we need to call out the corruption and use the powers we have in this country to stop those who are profiting from the wealth of that great nation, and hiding it here.
Some people will remember when General Gowon left Nigeria with half the Central Bank of Nigeria, so it is said, and moved to London. We know that today, even now in this great city of ours, there are some people who have taken from the Nigerian people and hidden their ill-gotten gains here. Sadly, we know that our banks have been used for those profits and for that illegal transfer of assets. That means that the UK is in an almost unique position in being able to do something to exert pressure on those who have robbed the Nigerian people.
This puts a particular onus on my hon. Friend the Minister, and I know she knows it. Using Magnitsky sanctions today is not just about protecting Nigeria, although it is. It is not just about respecting Nigerian young people who have been robbed and murdered by the SARS units. It is about protecting the United Kingdom, because what happens in Nigeria matters fundamentally to us here.
This country is the third country of the Commonwealth and has 200 million people. It will be the great economic powerhouse of Africa and one of the great economic powerhouses of the world. Its wealth is not just in the oil of the Rivers state, but in the imagination and creativity of its people, as witnessed every day in Nollywood and, perhaps more my style, at the great University of Jos. It is a country that gives so much to the world already, despite the fact that it is ill governed, brutalised and robbed. Imagine what it could give if the Plateau state was not a scene of conflict and anti-SARS movements, but instead was the global centre of learning that it really and truly could be, and indeed was up until the 1960s.
This is an opportunity for the UK to do something real, not just in the interests of Nigerians, although it would be, and not just in the interests of Africans, although it would be that, too, but fundamentally in the interests of the British people. This is a moment when the petitioners have got it absolutely right. They are not just arguing for the rights of young Nigerians who are claiming their own rights, but for the rights of democrats, free people, and honourable people everywhere. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister and her colleague, the Secretary of State, will listen, look at the sanctions regime and choose carefully where they apply.
Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to speak in this meaningful debate and to follow the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat).
The events surrounding the #EndSARS protests in Nigeria have caused global concern and outcry. Last month, mainly young Nigerian people took to the streets in a peaceful protest against police brutality. On 20 October in Lagos and in other parts of the nation, the military are alleged to have attacked peaceful protestors with disproportionate force, and to have killed and injured civilians. The world watched the horrific videos, saw the awful pictures from the scene, and heard the eyewitness accounts from survivors who managed to escape the horrors of that night. Human rights agencies such as Amnesty International have supported those claims.
Despite overwhelming evidence, the Nigerian Government and military initially denied that the military were at Lekki and labelled the events as fake news. Media companies received a memorandum from the Nigerian National Broadcasting Commission to silence them, telling them not to embarrass individuals, organisations and the Government, or to cause disaffection or panic in society at large, following reporting on the events of that dreadful night.
Some media houses that did report on the events were fined. The bank accounts of some organisers involved in the protests have been frozen by the Central Bank of Nigeria pending investigations. Some organisers have been arrested or harassed by the authorities. Such actions equate to the prevention and indeed stopping of free speech and the right to peaceful protest by the state. That is unacceptable. Peaceful protests are vital to the functioning of democracy and are a fundamental human right. Such rights should be upheld and respected.
Many of my constituents who have a Nigerian background are in great distress. Those that have relatives and friends in Nigeria are concerned about the safety of their loved ones and have contacted me about the situation. I have close friends in Nigeria who are also deeply concerned and have contacted me about this. They all ask for one simple thing: that the UK Government defend the right to peaceful protest and free speech and ensure that those within the Nigerian Government and army are held to account for the atrocities committed against peaceful protestors.
Given the shared history between the UK and Nigeria, and given that Nigeria is a fellow member of the Commonwealth and our ally, the UK has a duty to stand up for the human rights of Nigerian citizens. In the case where Nigerian officials are avoiding accountability over the killing of protesters, I believe that the UK should consider imposing sanctions on state officials involved in the human rights abuses of Nigerian citizens.
In July, the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs introduced the Global Human Rights Sanctions Regulations 2020. Under this statutory framework, priority themes relate to cases that threaten media freedom and human rights defenders. Furthermore, another priority theme considers cases where the relevant jurisdiction’s law enforcement authorities have been unable or unwilling to hold those responsible for human rights violations or abuses to account.
The Government clearly have the tools to ensure that Nigerian state officials respect the constitutional and fundamental human right to protest and free speech. If those who ordered and facilitated the killing and harming of protesters are not held accountable, the UK Government should advocate for independent investigations to take place, and following such investigations any individuals found responsible for these atrocities against human dignity must face sanctions.
Ms Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray, and it is really good to see you looking so well.
I, too, thank the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) for introducing this debate and for her passion about the subject. I also thank all my hon. Friends for their passion and expertise, and for the clear demands that we are all making today in this Chamber. It is good to hear that the demands are being made unanimously and across what is sometimes a divide.
As we know, the SARS police unit was suspected of abuses against thousands of innocent Nigerians over the past 28 years. Sadly, it is clear that Nigeria has a serious problem with abuses of state power and corruption that goes way beyond SARS. The protest movement that we are seeing rise in Nigeria wants all these abuses to be addressed.
SARS and other police forces in Nigeria were well known for targeting young people for arrests, extortion and beatings, almost at random. I am told that if someone is young and has the wrong hairstyle or clothes, or if they are driving a car and playing music, they could be targeted. Their money or possessions could be seized without any evidence, and people know that if they resist they will be beaten and possibly killed.
SARS created an environment of fear and injustice, and until the protests there was no real sign that those in power were listening or prepared to act. Sadly, it appears to be just the same with many other issues in Nigerian society. There is terrible unemployment, little access to healthcare or education and a poverty rate as high as 70%, according to Oxfam. The people of Nigeria have the right to come together and call for an end to those injustices. As we know, however, in recent months their powerful but peaceful actions have been met with horrific violence. Amnesty says that at least 56 people were killed during the recent protests, including at least 10 in Lekki.
I have been fortunate enough to hear from a young journalist with direct knowledge of what happened at the Lekki tollgate. I will read out her words: “It was devastating—something you don’t want to imagine. The protesters did not know that the cameras and the lights were going to be removed. There were no cameras to witness anything.” Then, as we have heard today: “The soldiers opened fire on the crowd of protesters, and my contact said, ‘One of the survivors jumped in the water, but the soldiers kept on shooting’. For days after, a friend of mine didn’t come online because of the shock and the fear, and it took him a long time to come to Facebook and say, ‘Thank God I survived. I did not think I was going to.’” She said: “Someone else I know left the tollgate with a bullet in him, and later they moved all the bodies so that there would be no evidence. For them to close their hearts and kill protestors like that is simply unforgiveable.”
The response from the authorities, who feel threatened by the protests, has been insidious, as we have heard. Media agencies have been fined for telling the truth. Bank accounts of activists have been suspended because they supposedly finance terrorism, and Government spokespeople have even blamed the protesters for a rise in food prices. Those in power will clearly do anything to ensure that the movement ends now and that SARS is technically disbanded. They are terrified that the calls for action on corruption and police brutality will go on and on.
My plea to the Minister is that we stand with the young people of Nigeria who are demanding change far beyond the closure of SARS. They are demanding a future worthy of their courage and leadership, and here in the UK we need that too, because Nigeria is a massive, fast-growing, youthful country, which has massive potential. It is a country that will play a leading role in decades to come, not just within Africa but in our world. For that positive leadership to happen, the sense of justice that motivates the #EndSARS protests must prevail, to shape Nigeria’s future and our future too.
I do not think that words from the Government today will be enough. We have to demonstrate our solidarity by identifying and targeting those who we know are responsible for the terrible violence and abuses that the activists have faced. The least we should do is ensure that those who have murdered Nigerians and deprived them of their human rights cannot benefit from trade or travel to the UK. In my view, that should include the leaders of the Government and the military, who are even now refusing to allow transparent and fair investigations to happen, and justice to be implemented.
I want to hear from the Minister that a list of Magnitsky —I never say that word properly—sanctions is being created, and action against those on that list will be taken in weeks, not years. Our role must be to work with everyone we can to identify those responsible and ensure that justice is done. I would be so very grateful if, on this occasion, the Government act decisively.
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray, and to follow my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Ms Brown), who spoke so passionately in favour of justice for Nigerians. I thank the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) for securing this very important debate. This was, of course, a popular debate, and it is unfortunate that my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi) was not called to speak in it. She sends her solidarity to the #EndSARS movement.
I must begin by addressing the horrific violence inflicted on young Nigerian civilians who were peacefully expressing their fundamental human rights against police brutality. We have seen on media platforms armed military officers discharge live ammunition at those peaceful protesters, injuring and killing them. It is unfortunate that, as of today, both the federal and state Governments in Nigeria have issued conflicting statements on the events that occurred at the Lekki tollgate, which has left us with a series of yet unanswered questions. Who exactly ordered the military to shoot live ammunition in a civilian territory? Why were the bank accounts of some individuals who partook in the protests frozen?
If a democratic country deprives its people of their aspiration, livelihoods and voices; strips them from their loved ones; forces them into hiding; and instils in them fear of retribution through violent attacks on free speech, that country can only be a dictatorship disguised as a democracy. Is Nigeria a dictatorship? Having asked the question, I will leave the Nigerian public to decide for themselves.
On sanctions, which we are here to discuss, if we can ensure that they will not negatively affect civilians—directly or indirectly—I support a travel ban and asset seizure sanctions for individual officials who are found responsible. Although our discussion of sanctions is crucial to determining how we as a nation respond to the violence that has cumulated in the recent #EndSARS movement, it can only be the tip of the iceberg. We must use our platforms to hold the Nigerian Government accountable through more than just sanctions. We must do the right thing by the people in Nigeria who are protesting for their human rights, and ask the questions that we have been given the platform to ask. What role do the Nigerian Government play in these attacks? Will there be an independent investigation into the 100-plus cases of torture, rape and extrajudicial executions throughout the #EndSARS protests?
The world knows about the violent attacks on Nigerian protestors because civilians at the Lekki tollgate massacre bravely risked their own lives to post videos on social media. Only a few Nigerian news outlets even reported the stories and were all subsequently fined, before the Nigerian Government denied the attack’s existence and began silencing reporters. Agencies and individuals have since blamed one another; no one seems to be taking responsibility. Nigerian civilians risked everything to give themselves a voice that they used to expose the atrocities inflicted upon them, and today, 4,000 miles away, the Nigerian Government propose to strangle that voice with a social media censorship Bill. We must demand transparency about what is happening to civilians and amplify that news using our platform.
We must continue to seek clarity about what happened on 20 October, when power was cut from the Lekki tollgate, and SARS police forces began spraying with bullets the protesters gathering there. I am sure that many of us have seen the footage of peaceful protesters linked arm-in-arm, singing the Nigerian anthem, while they were indiscriminately gunned down. Now is the time to hold officials to account for the crimes against humanity that they have embarked on, so I am calling for an impartial UN investigation into those human rights violations, to begin a process of securing justice for the victims and their families.
As we try to make sense of those incidents, we must ask ourselves uncomfortable questions. I am referring to the fact that British officials trained SARS officers from 2016 to 2020, as well as the Nigerian army. What did that training entail? Could it have prevented escalation of this kind? Standing here as a proud British Nigerian, I implore the Minister and colleagues across the House to pursue answers to those questions and to do what they can to facilitate Nigerians’ fight for freedom.
Abena Oppong-Asare (Erith and Thamesmead) (Lab)
Thank you for chairing the debate, Mr Gray. It is an honour to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Taiwo Owatemi). I thank the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) for leading the debate in response to the petition, which calls for sanctions against the Nigerian Government and officials. It is a very timely debate that needed to be had.
The atrocities in Nigeria in recent months are, understandably, very worrying for my constituents, many of whom have friends and relatives in Nigeria and want our Government help to ensure their safety. I firmly believe that we have an obligation to condemn violence and human rights abuses wherever we see them, which is why I have publicly condemned the violence that took place on 20 October, when young people’s right to protest was tragically suppressed.
Some 4,469 from Erith and Thamesmead have signed the petition—the highest number of petitioners from a single constituency—and I have been contacted by dozens of individuals who want to see action to ensure that human rights are upheld in Nigeria. One constituent recently wrote to me to say she had watched a documentary on how the Nigerian military opened fire on unarmed children who were happily and peacefully demonstrating and carrying Nigerian flags. Many were killed mercilessly. She cried, and she said, “This could’ve been anyone.”
My constituents are right to demand long-term action. As hon. Members have said, a statement of condemnation is not enough. As a country that subscribes to international human rights law, we must be quicker to act to support those around the world who are having their rights infringed.
Accountability is the cornerstone of democracy. I was pleased that the Minister for Africa, the hon. Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), wrote to me to confirm that the UK Government will continue to work with the Nigerian Government and international and civil society partners in support of police reform. However, it is clear that suitable accountability methods have not been implemented. It was only yesterday that the Nigerian military admitted that soldiers fired live bullets at anti-SARS protesters on 20 October. However, there is still no confirmation of the number of young protesters who tragically lost their lives. According to the Nigerian officials, two young people were killed in the shooting, but reports by Amnesty claim that 10 lives were lost. How can it be considered there is appropriate accountability if we cannot even reach a consensus on the number of lives taken at Lekki toll plaza in Lagos in October?
I do not believe that placing economic country-wide sanctions on Nigeria will help address the ongoing issues of police and military violence. The UK Government should first call for an independent investigation into allegations of misconduct by the Special Anti-Robbery Squad. Organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, which have followed the abuses taking place in Nigeria for years, should be consulted, with their evidence collated alongside an independent investigation to form a judicial review. Furthermore, that investigation should look at the wider issues of violence and human rights abuses by military and police across Nigeria.
The UK Government should regard the findings of an independent investigation with the utmost seriousness and take action to implement sanctions against individuals identified as responsible for those atrocities. They should also make appropriate adjustments to the overseas security and justice assistance funding and the training of any Nigerian military security and policing organisations that may have committed violations in line with their guidance to ensure that OSJA funding meets our human rights obligations and our values.
This issue does not begin and end at Lekki toll plaza on 20 October. There have been reports of violence by the Special Anti-Robbery Squad since 2017, and there continue to be serious consequences as a result of the protests that took place earlier this year. Young people have reported intimidation by the Nigerian Government and, as hon. Members have said, there have been reports of bank accounts being frozen, social media being banned and people being detained in prison for their involvement in speaking out against police violence and calling for accountability for those wrongdoings. Those actions are unacceptable in a democracy.
No action can replace the lives that have already been lost, but that does not mean that we should not take action. I hope, at the end of the debate, we will get a commitment from the Minister that the UK will follow up its actions by holding officials in Nigeria responsible.
Finally, I take the opportunity to raise the case of the Nigerian DJ and songwriter, DJ Switch, who has had her life threatened for her role in speaking out against military and police violence. The prominence of young Nigerian females at the forefront of the #EndSARS protests has highlighted the need to take more action to end violence against women and girls in Nigeria. Will the Government take this opportunity to ensure that their actions to uphold human rights around the world extend to protecting women and girls against violence?
Alyn Smith (Stirling) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray, and to take part in such a cross-party consensual discussion. I am glad to have heard some excellent contributions from right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House about events in Nigeria. I, too, warmly congratulate the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) on securing the debate and the drafters of the petition. Above all else, I commend the #EndSARS movement, which has done so much to shine a bright light on the corruption and oppressive practices of the regime in Lagos.
I have read the Government’s response to the petition carefully and I have some concerns. Nigeria is not a far-off place of which we know nothing. The UK has clear links to the issue and to Nigeria, historically and in future. We have influence and we could use a lot more of it. We know that the UK funded, supplied equipment for, and trained the police and paramilitary forces that we now know have been involved in abuses. At the very least, we need an urgent review of the UK’s involvement in those programmes. I would be glad of an undertaking from the Minister this evening that such a review is under way.
On the Magnitsky sanctions that have been called for, the Government’s response to the petition says:
“This sanctions regime will give the UK a powerful new tool to hold to account those involved in serious human rights violations or abuses.”
I have yet to hear any hon. Member speak against the Magnitsky regime; we all support it, but it is only a tool if it is used. I appreciate that speculation is unhelpful, but we need some announcements.
I am glad that in his discussion with the Governor of Lagos on 11 November, the Minister for Africa, the hon. Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), called for an investigation into the specific instances that we have heard of. Can we have an update on how that investigation is going? Can we also have an undertaking that there will be consequences of the findings of that investigation and that if it has been insufficient, there will be an independent review?
More generally, we need to look in the round at whether the UK’s actions help or hinder the aims of the #EndSARS protests. Between 2015 and 2020, the UK licensed arms exports and riot control equipment to the tune of £43 million. At the very least, pending a review of our actions and the effect of the UK’s foreign policy and trade policy in Nigeria, we should surely suspend arms exports to the country.
The #EndSARS movement could be a new Arab spring for Nigeria. Given the demographic and economic forces in play, the enthusiasm is there. We must learn from history and not let the #EndSARS movement down as we did the Arab spring. That would be a tragedy and would bring culpability on us even more.
It is not enough to express solidarity while aiding, abetting, arming and funding the oppressors. The UK has a case to answer. We need to look at the consequences of our actions and make sure that we do all we can to ensure accountability on the ground. I look forward to the Minister’s comments.
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure, as always, to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I thank the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) for introducing the petition today and all hon. Members for their incredibly powerful and passionate contributions on a crucial issue. I thank the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), for his comments, and the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Nigeria, my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor), who has done so much to speak out on the atrocities and, long before they happened, on the wider SARS movement and the brutality that it has exposed.
We have heard incredibly powerful speeches from my hon. Friends the Members for Lewisham East (Janet Daby), for West Ham (Ms Brown), for Coventry North West (Taiwo Owatemi) and for Erith and Thamesmead (Abena Oppong-Asare), and indeed the hon. Member for Stirling (Alyn Smith). As has been pointed out, other hon. Members would have been here who have been speaking out equally powerfully on the issue.
I also thank the more than 200,000 individuals who have signed the petition and its creators, which includes many significant signatures from the Nigerian diaspora in the UK and many others who share deep concerns about what is happening in Nigeria and about wider human rights abuses around the world. This is not a country that will turn a blind eye when such atrocities happen. The scenes we have witnessed and the reports that have come out of Nigeria of the response by the police and the army against protesters in the #EndSARS movement have shocked us all.
We have heard from colleagues about the events of 20 October, when it appears a group of #EndSARS protesters were fired upon by members of the Nigerian army at the Lekki tollgate plaza, after the CCTV was taken down and the lights were turned off. That resulted in tragic deaths and injuries. I spoke to those who had been in the vicinity of those incidents, who saw and witnessed first hand the brutality meted out by SARS and those attempting to defend them. I can tell you, Mr Gray, that they were shocking testimonies. Many of us have witnessed the video footage and pictures of the events, which are absolutely horrific.
Despite having denied it for over a month, the Nigerian army has been forced to admit at the judicial panel inquiry that soldiers were deployed to the tollgate protest with both blank and live ammunition. As many hon. Members have pointed out, some of those protesters are still in detention today, and many others have had financial restrictions on them and other actions taken against them. I would be interested to know what assessment the Minister has made of the situation of those who were involved in those protests.
As hon. Members have explained, this massacre and the other atrocities that we have seen are part of a picture of brutality that has gone on over a number of years—extraordinary brutality and violations by the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, known as SARS. The report from Amnesty International documented 82 cases of human rights violations between January 2017 and May 2020, including various methods of torture against detainees such as hanging, mock execution, beating, punching and kicking, burning with cigarettes, waterboarding, near-asphyxiation with plastic bags, forcing victims into stressful bodily positions, sexual violence and rape.
That is a shocking record of behaviour, yet few of those cases have been investigated and hardly any officers have been brought to justice on credible accounts of torture and other ill-treatment. The authorities have promised investigations, but often they have not occurred. The Federal Government of Nigeria have repeatedly promised to reform SARS but have failed to do so. The recent protests originate not only in that record of brutality, but in other documented incidents across the country, in Delta and Oyo states. In recent days, I have received reports of extra-judicial killings, allegedly by the Nigerian army in Oyigbo in Rivers state. What assessment has the Minister made of the most recent reports? This is still carrying on after the shocking events we saw just a few weeks ago.
The violent repression of protesters in Nigeria is unacceptable and has rightly garnered international condemnation. President-elect Biden has called on the Nigerian Government to end the violent crackdown. The Secretary-General of the United Nations has said that Nigerians’ right to protest peacefully needs to be guaranteed and that police brutality needs to stop. The official Opposition absolutely agree with that sentiment. The violent crackdown on these protests must end and there must be accountability for those responsible for such brutality and loss of life.
The Leader of the Opposition and the shadow Foreign Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), have made it clear that the UK must act as a force for good in the world, in line with our international partners and multinational organisations, whether the United Nations, the African Union, the UN Human Rights Council or others, to encourage and strongly advocate for the end of violence in Nigeria, to end police brutality in Nigeria and, crucially, to call for independent investigations into these violations by Nigerian policing, security and military forces. It would be better if we had confidence in the systems of investigation within Nigeria, but the ongoing failure and the record of the Nigerian Government in dealing with SARS underlines why many people do not have faith in that process. That is why independent investigations will be crucial.
The petition refers specifically to sanctions. The official Opposition welcome the Foreign Secretary’s establishment of a Magnitsky-style sanctions regime, which we have been calling for since 2018, to allow for targeted sanctions based on attacks on human rights, and to enable us to target the wider network of perpetrators, including all of those who facilitate, incite, promote or support such crimes. That extends beyond state officials to non-state actors, as well.
At that time, the Foreign Secretary told us in the House that those sanctions would be used to target
“those with blood on their hands.”—[Official Report, 6 July 2020; Vol. 678, c. 663.]
It is clear that individuals do have blood on their hands in relation to the activities of SARS and these atrocities over the past few months. Given the allegations against members of SARS and the growing evidence of the atrocities that were committed, we urge the UK Government to use their full investigative capacity, including by drawing on the evidence provided by independent human rights organisations in Nigeria and elsewhere, to identify individuals responsible for those atrocities and, if appropriate, designate them for sanctions under our Magnitsky regime. We cannot stand by in the face of such wilful perpetration of human rights violations and killings. Not least given our close political, economic and security relationship with Nigeria, we cannot be a disinterested or unconnected party.
I turn now to the UK’s role in relation to SARS. We have heard about this from a number of hon. Members in the debate. Despite initially denying it, the Minister for Africa has admitted that through the conflict, stability and security fund in Nigeria, SARS members were trained as part of the Nigeria policing programme and that the UK Government have been involved in training of members of SARS, despite that happening during a time when there were ongoing public, well-known allegations of extrajudicial executions, extortion, torture and rape by this unit. I am sorry to say that although this is shocking, it is not an entirely unexpected revelation to me. It is also not surprising—I have the review of the programme here—that this programme was led by the Foreign Office rather than the Department for International Development.
UK support for security and justice reform in countries around the world can have positive impacts, but what is absolutely obvious is that in a growing number of cases, it is not clear what impact we are having or whether, in the worst cases, we are actually supporting agencies that have a role in committing atrocities or human rights violations. What we are discussing today is just one example. Whether it is this example, the ongoing supplying of arms to the Saudi Arabian Government for use in the Yemen crisis or the training of the special investigation unit in Bahrain, which has been complicit in the torture of prisoners—of course, that country uses the death penalty—the UK Government are having to repeatedly come and justify their involvement with organisations and institutions that appear to breach our own standards, let alone international law and human rights.
Can the Minister tell me whether she has considered suspending support and training for such programmes for Nigerian security, military and justice institutions until she is absolutely satisfied that they are not supporting individuals and organisations that have been implicated in these atrocities, and will the Government commit to a review of the effectiveness of OSJA—overseas security and justice assistance—projects? It was extraordinary to find, while reading the summary, that the programme was listed as scoring an A and an A in 2018-19 and to read that the risk was only medium. That sounds completely out of kilter with the facts that we have heard today and have been hearing for many years.
Looking beyond Nigeria, given the deeply concerning news coming from locations across Africa in recent weeks, what measures are the Government taking to protect human rights across the continent and to tackle those responsible, whether it is those responsible for atrocities in Ethiopia, those who are involved in suppressing the democratic process in Tanzania and Uganda, or whoever? We cannot have impunity for those causing or carrying out atrocities or war crimes, whatever their role or status, whether that is official or unofficial—whether they are official Government forces, official military forces, or irregular forces who are acting on behalf of different groups, and whether those are central Government, regional government or rebel groups. It does not matter who they are—we cannot have impunity for the people who are carrying out these atrocities.
It appears to be a double irony that we are seeing support for wrong programmes like this one when the Government, we hear, are proposing to cut the right programmes; they are proposing to cut the 0.7% target and support to development and peace programmes across the world. I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure us that that will not happen.
From the Black Lives Matter movement in the USA to the #EndSARS movement in Nigeria, it is clear that any democratic Government must respond to the needs first and foremost of their citizens in providing policing and security. They must be accountable to the people they serve and not hold themselves above the law. They must defend the law and conduct themselves in line with the principles and values that underpin it. We stand on the side of all those in Nigeria who are calling for peace, for democracy and for the rule of law to be upheld. Killings must end. Democracy and the rule of law must prevail, and the UK should be a partner to all Nigerians seeking peace, justice and development.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (Wendy Morton)
It is a pleasure to take part in this debate under your excellent guidance and chairmanship, Mr Gray, so thank you. Let me begin by saying that I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) for securing the debate and to all the hon. Members who contributed today. We heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), from the hon. Members for Edmonton (Kate Osamor), for Lewisham East (Janet Daby) and for West Ham (Ms Brown), and from others. I will endeavour to answer as many of their questions as I possibly can—I cannot say “within the time allowed”, because we are doing quite well on time at the moment, Mr Gray, but I know you will keep me in good order and not let me get carried away.
This is an important debate. The Minister for Africa, my hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), has asked me to offer his apologies to Members present, as he is away on ministerial business and is therefore not able to attend. However, he has a very close interest in this topic, and I feel sure that he will be paying great attention to this debate, as we would expect of the Minister for Africa. I will therefore respond in his place on behalf of the Government.
We are grateful to the nearly 220,000 members of the public who signed the petition and enabled this debate to take place. Quite rightly, there is significant public concern about the recent protests in Nigeria, especially the issue of police brutality. I also acknowledge the strong feeling about this issue in this place, and am thankful for the contributions made by all colleagues today. As I said, I will try to respond to all of the points that have been raised, but I will first set out the Government’s position on the protests and on police reform, and will then address the topic of sanctions.
I assure the House that the Government have been following developments in Nigeria very closely since the protests. We are deeply concerned about violence during the protests, which tragically claimed lives, and I am sure right hon. and hon. Members present will join me in passing on our condolences to the families of those affected. The UK supports the right to peaceful protest. We condemn violence by any party, and in doing so make an important distinction between the rioting and looting that took place and the original, peaceful protest movement.
We have raised the protests and the response to them at the highest levels in the Nigerian Government. The Foreign Secretary issued a statement on 21 October calling for an end to the violence. He called for the Nigerian Government urgently to investigate reports of brutality by its security forces, and to hold those responsible to account. The Minister for Africa spoke to Foreign Minister Onyeama on 23 October to reiterate his tweets that recognised the Nigerian people’s democratic and peaceful calls for reform, and encouraged the Nigerian authorities to restore peace and address concerns regarding brutality towards civilians. The British high commissioner in Abuja continues to raise the protests with senior representatives of the Nigerian Government, including our concerns about intimidation of civil society groups and peaceful activists.
We welcome President Buhari’s decision to disband the federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad, the police unit at the centre of recent protests, and it is important that historical reports of police brutality and violence during recent protests are investigated fully. We also welcome the emerging dialogue between state governors and young people: in a country where more than 50% of the population is under 25, that conversation is important in understanding the concerns of the next generation. We also welcome the President’s request for his Cabinet Ministers to do the same in their home areas. Lastly, we welcome the establishment of judicial panels of inquiry to investigate all the alleged incidents.
I can inform Members that the Minister for Africa spoke to the Governor of Lagos on 11 November, and also spoke to the President’s chief of staff, Ibrahim Gambari, on 21 November. He stressed the importance of police and military co-operation with the panels, and expressed the urgent need for panels to progress investigations, including into the incident at Lekki. As Members can see from the Government’s written response to this petition, we continue to monitor these investigations and their outcomes very closely. We also continue to monitor progress on police reform, and support Nigerian-led reform. Earlier this year, for example, we supported civil society efforts to secure the successful passage of the new Police Act. Implemented effectively, that Act will be an important step towards a more transparent and accountable police force.
I would like to set out the Government’s position on sanctions. On 6 July, the Government established the global human rights sanctions regime. In a statement to Parliament, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary set out its full scope. It gives the UK a powerful new tool with which to hold to account the perpetrators of serious human rights violations or abuses. It is a long-standing practice not to speculate on future sanctions designations, as doing so could reduce their impact. The sanctions regime complements our ongoing human rights activities around the world and demonstrates this country’s commitment to being a force for good, and we will continue to keep all evidence and potential listings under very close review.
Ms Lyn Brown
I am grateful to the Minister for being here this afternoon, given that the Minister for Africa, the hon. Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), was not able to be with us because of foreign travel. All of us have asked for sanctions. It would be courteous if the Minister for Africa wrote to us to outline the Government’s position on this issue, and to explain why we are not being assured this afternoon that sanctions will be imposed.
James Gray (in the Chair)
Order. Although that is a perfectly reasonable question, and no doubt the Minister will read Hansard, it is not actually in order to call for that letter in this debate. It is a perfectly sensible thing to ask for, and no doubt it may well occur, but the Minister is not required to answer that specific point.
Wendy Morton
Thank you, Mr Gray. I am grateful to the hon. Lady. As I said, I am sure the Minister for Africa will be following the debate. I will make a few more comments about sanctions, but if the hon. Lady will bear with me, I want to answer a few more of the other questions.
I reiterate that it is long-standing practice not to speculate on our future sanctions, as it could reduce the impact of those sanctions. Right hon. and hon. Members raised the issue of corruption; I agree that tackling corruption in Nigeria is absolutely critical to the country’s prosperity and security, and to reducing poverty and inequality. Work is under way to consider how a global corruption sanctions regime could be added to the Government’s armoury.
Several Members gave examples of intimidation that had been highlighted to them, and we are aware that some protestors have reported facing intimidation. The British high commissioner in Abuja continues to raise our concerns about the intimidation of civil society groups and peaceful protestors with the Nigerian Government, because it does not build an environment for groups and protestors to come forward and help build genuine accountability. I can assure Members that we are aware that some protestors face intimidation.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet and others raised the matter of UK aid. I reassure her that no UK taxpayers’ money goes directly to the Nigerian Government. The UK provides assistance to Nigeria to meet immediate humanitarian needs, and to address long-term structural issues. While I am on the topic of aid, the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) tried to tempt me to speak about the Government’s commitment to spending 0.7% of GDP on aid. As I am sure he anticipated, I will not speculate ahead of any spending review.
Stephen Doughty
Will the Minister elaborate on that? I appreciate that she is not the Minister for Africa, and that she will be less familiar with the specific programmes, but it was very clear in the Minister for Africa’s letter to us that the UK Government were funding training programmes that directly involved SARS, despite the allegations. Does she not believe there is a problem with our wider security and justice assistance programmes across the world? There is example after example of their impact being questioned, or, worse still, of our being implicated in some way when organisations do not uphold our standards.
Wendy Morton
The hon. Gentleman pre-empts part of my notes, as I will touch a little more on the SARS programme, and I hope to give a bit more detail about work that we are doing and supporting.
Before I come to that, I want to note quickly that my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet raised the issue of the persecution of Christians. That is another important topic, and I reassure her that we have made clear to the Nigerian authorities, at the highest levels, the importance of protecting civilians, including Christians, and human rights for all Nigerians.
I will now discuss the Special Anti-Robbery Squad. The UK supports police and justice reform in Nigeria. All assistance is compliant with our human rights obligations and values. Through our Nigeria policing programme, funded by the conflict, stability and security fund, which ended in March 2020, federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad officers participated in training on amended Nigerian police guidance designed to improve human rights, training on public finance, and community policing workshops. The Nigeria policing programme was part of our security and justice reform programme, which is working to help to deliver a criminal justice system that will better protect the human rights of all Nigerians.
As a result of the programme, relationships between communities and the police improved in four states. Trust was built, with communities and the police working together to resolve safety and security issues. The Nigerian police force’s recent adoption of the community policing framework developed by the Nigeria policing programme is a positive outcome. Our support to civil society was instrumental in the President recently passing the Nigeria Police Act 2020, which provides for greater citizen protections and improved police training, which we believe will benefit Nigerians.
Through the CSSF-funded north-east public safety and security programme, part of which is delivered jointly with USAID, radio equipment was issued to Borno police command. That was for police units working to improve local security, and to counter violent extremist organisations, including Boko Haram and Islamic State in West Africa. Borno police command distributed free radios to the local FSARS unit, which were returned after FSARS was disbanded. The north-east public safety and security programme is part of our north-east Africa security, conflict and stabilisation programme, working to help to stabilise one of Nigeria’s poorest and most fragile regions, affected by Boko Haram and Islamic State in West Africa.
I acknowledge and understand the strength of feeling in the House and among the public. The UK and Nigeria have a long and close relationship that extends beyond our Governments to our people, especially through the British Nigerian diaspora community, which contributes so much to this country. The diaspora was also mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet. The UK is home to more than 200,000 members of the Nigerian diaspora, who contribute much to the country. As I am sure you will be aware, Mr Gray, my hon. Friend the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, the Member for Saffron Walden (Kemi Badenoch), was the first British Nigerian Minister.
As to communications and engagement with the diaspora, on 18 November my hon. Friend the Minister for Africa led a virtual business roundtable with members of the Nigerian diaspora business community, the better to understand challenges in increasing trade and investment between the UK and Nigeria. That roundtable was joined by my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant), who is the UK trade envoy to Nigeria, and the British deputy high commissioner in Lagos. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet asked about requesting a meeting with the Minister for Africa, and it would perhaps be wrong of me to commit him to that, but I can certainly pass on her request.
This Government will continue to press the Nigerian Government and their security services to uphold human rights and the rule of law; to investigate all incidents of brutality, illegal detentions and the use of excessive force; and to hold those responsible to account. We will closely monitor the judicial panels of inquiry, and will continue to advocate for investigations of police brutality. The Government will consider their options as the panels’ work progresses.
The Government will also continue to work with the Nigerian Government, and international and civil society partners, to improve the accountability and transparency of the Nigerian police, for the benefit of all Nigerians.
Theresa Villiers
Like others, I believe this has been an excellent debate, with well-informed contributions and real insight from Members on the Back Benches and Front Benches.
I will take the last minute to urge the Minister and the rest of the team at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office to use all diplomatic means available to get the message to the authorities in Nigeria that they need to listen to what the protestors are asking for. While the Minister, for all sorts of reasons, has felt unable to make commitments on targeted sanctions today, there is a strong case for putting them in place. I hope that behind the scenes, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office will continue to pursue this, so that we see an announcement about it in the not-too-distant future.
In the debate, we heard disturbing accounts of what happened at Lekki, and about a long history of brutality and extra-judicial killings. Particularly grim accounts were given by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty). I hope that we also take away from the debate the optimism that everyone has shown about the future of Nigeria. It has so much potential. As the hon. Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) said, there is potential for a new Nigeria and a better future. I hope that these protests signal a change in addressing concerns around corruption, brutality and poor governance. If there is real progress on those issues and they are resolved, we will see a Nigeria that is successful and flourishing, not least economically.
It has been my privilege to lead this debate. I thank everyone who signed the e-petition. This is a great example of the e-petition process working effectively, because nearly a quarter of a million people signed that petition. We in the mother of Parliaments get the opportunity to urge and advocate for change and reform in Nigeria, and it has been my privilege to take part in that process.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered e-petition 554150, relating to Nigeria and the sanctions regime.
Written Statements
Hong Kong: Six-monthly Report
(4 years ago)
Written StatementsRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs and First Secretary of State (Dominic Raab)
The latest six-monthly report on the implementation of the Sino-British joint declaration on Hong Kong was published today, and is attached. It covers the period from 1 January to 30 June 2020. The report has been placed in the Library of the House. A copy is also available on the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office website (https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/foreign-commonwealth-development-office). I commend the report to the House.
[HCWS591]
Dental Patient Charge Uplift 2020-21
(4 years ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Jo Churchill)
The National Health Service (Dental Charges) (Amendment) Regulations 2020 (“the Amendment Regulations”) will be laid before Parliament to increase National Health Service dental patient charges in England from 14 December 2020. Band Description 2020-21 (Proposed Patient Charge) 1- This band includes examination, diagnosis (including radiographs), advice on how to prevent future problems, scale and polish if clinically needed, and preventative care (e.g. applications of fluoride varnish or fissure sealant) £23.80 2 - This band covers everything listed in band 1, plus any further treatment such as fillings, root canal work or extractions £65.20 3 - This band covers everything in bands 1 and 2, plus course of treatment including crowns, dentures, bridges and other laboratory work £282.80 Urgent -This band covers urgent assessment and specified urgent treatments such as pain relief or a temporary filling or dental appliance repair £23.80
This is the fifth and final year of the spending review 2015 commitment to annually uplift dental patient charges by 5% for the duration of the spending review period.
Following a six-month freeze, the dental charge payable for a band 1 course of treatment will rise by £1.10, from £22.70 to £23.80. A band 2 course of treatment will increase by £3.10 from £62.10 to £65.20, and a band 3 course of treatment will increase by £13.50 from £269.30 to £282.80.
Details of the revised charges for 2020-21 can be found in the table below:
[HCWS593]
Ministerial Code: Home Secretary’s Conduct
(4 years ago)
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The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
I would like to update the House on the outcome of an investigation under the ministerial code.
In reaching my decision I took advice from the independent adviser, Sir Alex Allan, in relation to the allegations made earlier this year around the Home Secretary’s conduct. I take this issue very seriously and recognise that it is always difficult for individuals to come forward and raise concerns. I am grateful to those who have done so. I am also grateful to Sir Alex for his advice and considered his conclusions carefully.
It was clear from Sir Alex’s advice that at times there have been difficult working relationships all round. Sir Alex’s advice found that the Home Secretary had become —justifiably in many instances—frustrated by the Home Office leadership’s lack of responsiveness and the lack of support she felt in DfID three years ago. He also found, however, that the Home Secretary had not always treated her civil servants with the consideration and respect that would be expected, and her approach on occasion has amounted to behaviour that can be described as bullying in terms of the impact felt by individuals.
He went on to advise, therefore, that the Home Secretary had not consistently met the high standards expected of her under the ministerial code.
I have noted Sir Alex’s advice that many of the concerns now raised were not raised at the time and that the Home Secretary was unaware of the impact that she had. I am reassured that the Home Secretary is sorry for inadvertently upsetting those with whom she was working. I am also reassured that relationships, practices and culture in the Home Office are much improved. As the arbiter of the code, having considered Sir Alex’s advice and weighing up all the factors, my judgement is that the ministerial code was not breached.
Together with the Cabinet Secretary, I have this morning written to all Ministers and permanent secretaries. This letter sets out the paramount importance of relationships of mutual trust and respect between politicians and their officials. This includes keeping internal conversations private, feeling able to speak freely and honestly about matters of state and to speak constructively about things that are not working so that we can fix them together promptly. I am clear that there is a particular duty on Ministers and permanent secretaries to create jointly across government a culture which is professional, respectful, focused and ambitious for change and in which there is no place for bullying.
The Cabinet Secretary and I are enormously grateful to civil servants for the commitment they have shown as we navigate through these challenging times. We are also immensely proud of the fantastic work that is going on across government, and know that this work would not have been possible without strong relationships between Ministers and their officials.
I have full confidence in the Home Secretary and consider this matter now closed.
I am placing a copy of Sir Alex Allan’s findings in the Library of the House. A copy of the letter to Cabinet Ministers and heads of Department will be made available on gov.uk.
[HCWS592]
House of Lords
Arrangement of Business
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
My Lords, the Hybrid Sitting of the House will now begin. Some Members are here in the Chamber, respecting social distancing and others are participating remotely, but all Members will be treated equally.
Royal Assent
Monday 23rd November 2020
(4 years ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Amendment Paper: HL Bill 136-I Marshalled list for Committee - (22 Oct 2020)
Arrangement of Business
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
My Lords, Oral Questions will now commence. Please can those asking supplementary questions keep them sensibly short and confined to two points, and I ask that Ministers’ answers are also brief.
Hate Crime: Misogyny
(4 years ago)
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Baroness Donaghy
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to make misogyny a hate crime.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)
My Lords, any hate crime is completely unacceptable. The Government are committed to stamping them out. We have asked the Law Commission to conduct a wide-ranging review into hate crime to explore how to make current legislation more effective and whether additional protected characteristics should be added. It will report next year and we will respond to the review in full when it is complete.
Baroness Donaghy (Lab)
The Home Office has the opportunity today to state clearly that unintended or apparent bullying is still bullying. A woman has been murdered every three days for the last 10 years, 62% of them by partners or former partners, yet there is no co-ordination among the authorities to build an accurate pattern of abuse. Making misogyny a hate crime will go some way to addressing this scandal in our society, but when, Minister, when?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
The noble Baroness will know, because I have said it here before, that the Law Commission will report on its findings next year. She will also understand that equality of protection is a crucial element of ensuring public support for hate crime legislation.
Baroness Primarolo (Lab) [V]
My Lords, charities and campaign groups have raised concerns about closed online groups mobilising to incite hatred and violence against communities. The Government need to act now to protect ethnic, religious and LGBT+ communities living in fear. Will the Minister agree to provide an urgent Written Statement to your Lordships’ House at the beginning of January, after the end of the Law Commission review, on what plans the Government have to introduce hate crime legislation and protect those communities now from this insidious crime?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
The noble Baroness will know that there are already numerous strands of hate crime legislation. After the Law Commission has reported, I fully expect that Parliament will be updated on its findings.
Lord Vaizey of Didcot (Con)
My Lords, I will make one brief point. My noble friend will have noticed the concession made by the Scottish Government on their hate crime Bill that one has to show intent to incite hatred. Will my noble friend keep this in mind when the Law Commission reports next year?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I thank my noble friend for that point. We will certainly keep all aspects of findings and law in mind when thinking about future plans.
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
With apologies, I think I will move on. I call the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza.
Baroness D’Souza (CB) [V]
My Lords, hate speech that results in criminal actions such as incitement to violence is to be both deplored and subject to legislation. That said, I am concerned that one of our most precious democratic freedoms—freedom of expression—might be hampered if this is widely applied to include any offensive or misogynistic speech. The distinction between unpleasant, even hateful, speech and criminal incitement is often determined by the context in which it occurs. Does the Minister agree that each hate speech incident should be considered on a case-by-case basis rather than by means of broad legal sanctions?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I certainly agree that freedom of speech is one of the most precious things we preserve in this country, but it comes with responsibility. Where freedom of speech is used as an excuse to inflict a hate crime on someone else, that line has been crossed.
Lord Garnier (Con) [V]
My Lords, I agree with my noble friend’s last answer. We are all against the hatred of women, but does my noble friend agree that we do not need to create more offences when there are already laws dealing with misogyny? Is it not already a crime, for example, to breach the peace, to threaten violence against a woman, physically to attack a woman, both sexually and non-sexually, and to incite violence against a woman? Where those crimes are aggravated by hatred of the victim or women generally, the court will take that into account when sentencing the defendant. If the evidence is there, we can and should prosecute. We do not need more offences.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
We will keep an open mind until the Law Commission reports but my noble and learned friend is absolutely right in some of the things that he says. As I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy, if we created a hate crime in relation to gender, we would have to think very carefully about whether it would apply to the entire population or just women. That is what the Law Commission is considering.
Baroness Wilcox of Newport (Lab) [V]
This week is White Ribbon Week. Despite much progress around support for victims of domestic abuse, Citizens UK has found that hate motivated by gender is already a factor in 33.5% of all existing hate crime. It is therefore no wonder that many people feel that the current legislation is outdated. Further to my noble friend Lady Primarolo’s question, may I press the Minister a little further? Will she commit to accepting the Law Commission’s final recommendations on this issue and to bringing legislation forward next year?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I do not know what those recommendations are yet but I can say to the noble Baroness that the Law Commission’s review will include how protected characteristics—including sex, gender and age—should be considered by new or existing hate crime law, as well as how legislation protects the existing protected characteristics.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, one of the problems in making sure that killers and abusers of women are prosecuted is the fact that the police often—that is, in the past and still now—do not take women seriously. Misogyny is clearly a problem in police forces. What is the Home Office doing about it?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
The noble Baroness asks about domestic abuse, primarily, and misogynistically motivated crimes against women. In recent years, training for front-line police responders has been improved significantly, so what might have been seen as a domestic 20 years ago is now taken extremely seriously and the appropriate action is taken.
Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD) [V]
Following on from the question from the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, in 2016, Nottinghamshire Police introduced its misogyny hate crime policy, which enables women and girls to report cases of abuse and harassment as misogyny and for them to be recorded as such. Four other police forces have followed its excellent example. Will the Minister ensure that a similar policy is adopted nationwide, at least to assist with the collection of data for the Law Commission in the preparation of its report, promised for the coming year?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I was aware of Nottinghamshire and other police forces doing that. I welcome police forces across the country disaggregating hate crime into, say, anti-Semitic hate crime, Islamophobic hate crime or, as the noble Lord said, misogyny. The data that they produce is very helpful but, again, I hesitate to say anything further until the Law Commission has reported.
Baroness Deech (CB) [V]
Reflecting on an earlier answer from the Minister, I would point out that a French author has published a book called I Hate Men. Far from being condemned, it has received widespread and pretty favourable coverage. The Law Commission’s work shows that this is a very complex area. Research has even thrown doubt on the deterrent effect of sentences aggravated by hate crime. So, should we not wait, even if it takes another year, for the outcome of the Law Commission’s consultation before rushing to create a specific offence?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I thank the noble Baroness for pointing out the complexity of this area. The consultation will finish on 24 December and the Law Commission will report next year. I agree with her that we should not pre-empt the outcome of the review just yet.
Baroness Crawley (Lab) [V]
My Lords, non-fatal strangulation is often part of the pattern of abuse leading up to attempts on women’s lives. Can the Minister say whether an amendment to the Domestic Abuse Bill—shortly to be debated in this House— to include a new offence of non-fatal strangulation would be welcomed by the Government?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I am aware that such an amendment may come forward to your Lordships’ House; the debate on it will be very interesting and thoughtful, as debates on such amendments always are. I look forward to discussing it with the noble Baroness before the Domestic Abuse Bill comes to your Lordships’ House.
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked. We will now move on to the next Oral Question.
Farming: New Entrants
(4 years ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of opportunities for new entrants into farming; and what steps they are taking to increase any such opportunities.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Gardiner of Kimble) (Con)
My Lords, I declare my farming interests as set out in the register. The Government are working with the skills leadership group to introduce a professional body for agriculture and horticulture to promote the sector and the vibrant careers in it. New technologies are transforming food production, generating opportunities that require skills in farming, environment and business. The Government are also developing a new entrants’ scheme to provide funding for councils and other landowners, providing opportunities for new entrants.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, my noble friend will recall that, during the passage of the Agriculture Act, a lot of emphasis was placed on opportunities for new entrants into farming, just as he described; I welcome that. Does he share my concern that a number of councils, including Scarborough Borough Council, are seeking to dispose of agricultural land, including tenant farmers’ land, from their portfolio? This will lead to fewer opportunities for tenant farmers. Will my noble friend and the Government address this grave issue?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, we value the role that council farms play in providing opportunities for new entrants. That is why we want to incentivise councils to retain and invest in their farm estates so that they can continue to provide opportunities into the future.
Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]
My Lords, post-Brexit British agriculture and horticulture require a new generation of farmers and a larger and more highly skilled UK-based workforce. In response to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, about county farms, will the Government urge counties to stop divesting their county tenancies and start investing in new opportunities for those who wish to farm but do not inherit and cannot buy the land? Are they proposing to produce an updated recruitment, skills training and career structure for UK land workers in agriculture and horticulture?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, one of the reasons the Government are reforming post-16 technical education to provide clearer routes into skilled employment in agriculture and other associated sectors is precisely to address the point the noble Lord has made. The other issue, as I will repeat, is that we want councils to retain and invest in their farm estates and for other landowners to take the opportunity of the new entrant scheme that we are developing because we think that this is a positive part of the future in agriculture.
Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD) [V]
My Lords, with the changes in funding arrangements for farmers, many of the older generation are thinking about retirement, and ensuring that there are plenty of opportunities for the younger generation to take over these farms will be essential. How are the negotiations promised during the passage of the Agriculture Act for nieces and nephews to take over farms is progressing? If nothing has happened so far, can the Minister update the House on when this will take place?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, so far as tenancy agreements are concerned, our first priority is to bring forward the regulations that are required following the Agriculture Act 2020 into modernising those areas of the tenancy regime that we think will be very productive. Once we have done that, working with the Tenancy Reform Industry Group, which engages with all parties, will enable us to bring forward any other changes with consensus.
The Earl of Shrewsbury (Con)
My Lords, I refer noble Lords to my interests as set out in the register. From his earlier answer, my noble friend will doubtless agree that a considerable part of the problem of attracting new entrants into the agriculture industry has been the demise and disposal over many years of the county council smallholdings estate which has otherwise provided an excellent entry point for those who might have found it impossible to gain access to farming in their own right. Will there be an opportunity within the Agriculture Act, perhaps under the public good requirement, for larger landowners to be encouraged to make available land that will enable small entry-point farms to be established?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, my noble friend has picked up on something very important. Going beyond our new entrants scheme and councils with rural estates, we also want to work with landowners and other organisations that want to invest in creating new opportunities for talented new entrants. We think that there are strong reasons for county local authorities to work with private landowners so that we can create a continuing momentum of availability of land. We want to have innovative and new agriculture entrepreneurs.
Lord Carrington (CB) [V]
My Lords, I declare my interests as a farmer and landowner as set out in the register. Opportunities are principally linked to the availability of land, availability of finance and likely profitability. Without resolving these points, the entrant is limited to apprenticeship or employment on an existing farm. Given the enormous amount of capital required to enter farming, can the Minister assure us that thought is being given to either the Government providing guarantees directly to a new entrant or to the banks, the landowner, the machinery manufacturer or other meaningful supplier to encourage their working with the new entrant?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, my noble friend has raised a key point. Not only do we need access to land and skills, we want to ensure this through the productivity grants, which are part of the Agriculture Act and the work we want to undertake in this area. This important part of the Act addresses not only access but also equipment, technology and so forth, whether it is for entrants or indeed established farmers. That is part of our continuing work.
Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)
My Lords, I am sure that the Minister will acknowledge that increasing the number of affordable rural homes is vital to enabling new entrants to come into the farming sector. However, the housing Minister revealed to me recently that the Government do not keep data on the number of existing affordable homes that are lost through sale or inflated rents. When are the Government going to address the haemorrhaging of cheap homes for rent in rural areas so that young families can afford to live and play their part in the rural economy?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
The noble Baroness is absolutely right that affordable rural housing is key to ensuring that we have a vibrant agricultural industry. That is why in 2018 the Government launched the revised National Planning Policy Framework. The rural housing chapter gives strong support to rural exception sites and includes new policies to support the building of homes in isolated locations where that supports, for instance, farm succession. In addition, the Government have amended the permitted development rights to support rural housing and agricultural productivity by enabling up to five new homes to be created from existing agricultural buildings, an increase from a maximum of three.
Lord Fox (LD)
My Lords, more than 50 years ago, my mum and dad got their first foot in farming through the tenancy of a county council holding. A survey by Who Owns Britain? shows that up to 2017, the acreage of county farms halved. Only yesterday, Staffordshire had eight farms for sale. The Minister has said warm things about county farms, and we welcome that, but unless the Government put up money now, that haemorrhaging of county farms will continue. What are the Government going to do now in order to encourage councils to do what they want them to do?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, we are working on a co-design with councils, landowners and others so that the new entrant scheme works precisely with county farms and local authorities. That is because, as I have said, we want that to be retained. This work is under way and will be co-designed in 2021, and we hope to roll out the programme in 2022. Not only are there county farms, but a third of the land in this country is tenanted and there are obviously opportunities in the tenant farming sector as well.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, will the Minister keep in mind the land mobility scheme in Northern Ireland? It has been in operation for three years and facilitates the transfer of land from older retired people to new young entrants. Will he discuss these matters with the Minister responsible for agriculture in Northern Ireland in order to ensure the implementation of best practice?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, I shall certainly do that. Our proposals on lump sum and delinking are to facilitate retirement. That is an issue on which we are consulting, and I am most grateful to the noble Baroness.
The Earl of Caithness (Con)
My Lords, in order to turn opportunities into reality, farming has got to be profitable or the Government must subsidise farmers. Is my noble friend any clearer on what the costs of implementing ELMs properly will be, and if he is, does he know whether the Treasury will fund them in the current economic situation?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble (Con)
My Lords, it is fair to say that arrangements on agriculture and finance will be announced shortly.
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed and we now come to the third Oral Question.
Travel Agents
(4 years ago)
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Baroness Clark of Kilwinning
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the future of high street travel agents; and what plans they have to appoint a Minister to be responsible for the travel sector.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Callanan) (Con)
My Lords, we are regularly assessing Covid-19’s impact on tourism businesses. We recognise that these are extremely challenging conditions for those in the sector. High street travel agents have, of course, been able to access the Government’s comprehensive economic support package. While we have no current plans to appoint a new Minister for the travel sector, a cross-government global travel task force has been established to consider what steps the Government can take to enable a recovery of international travel.
Baroness Clark of Kilwinning (Lab) [V]
I declare an interest as a member of the TSSA parliamentary group. In the summer, nine out of 10 holidays were either cancelled or changed. ABTA said in August that 90,000 people’s jobs were either at risk or had already been lost. That figure increased to 164,000 people by the end of October. Will the Government look at a specific strategy for this sector and specific support? The TSSA and many businesses are asking for one Minister to have specific responsibility to put forward a strategy for this area because responsibilities lie across a number of departments—some are with the Department for Transport, some with other departments, and some fall between. Is this not something that the Government could look at and perhaps discuss with industry and the trade unions?
Lord Callanan (Con)
We have many consultations with the industry and we have put in place a strong package of financial support that businesses in the sector can access, including government-backed loans, various grant schemes and the extended furlough and self-employed support schemes.
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
I call the noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft. No? We will move on. I call the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan.
Lord Moynihan (Con)
My Lords, I declare an interest as someone whose holiday was understandably cancelled due to Covid. Does my noble friend the Minister agree that it is unacceptable that some travel agents should still be holding back on refunding customers and using customer payments as interest-free loans to their business without customer consent? Should not the ending of such practices be a condition precedent of eligibility for government support schemes, as well as future certification as fit and proper travel agents?
Lord Callanan (Con)
Companies have a legal obligation to ensure that they treat their customers fairly and that they pay refunds when they are due. Where disagreements exist we encourage customers and businesses to seek to find a solution that is mutually acceptable to both.
The Earl of Clancarty (CB)
My Lords, while the imminent threat to the travel and holiday industry is the pandemic, can the Minister say what support the Government intend to give from 1 January to British holiday firms and the thousands of British workers, permanent and seasonal, including young working-class people, whose jobs and job opportunities are at risk following the UK leaving the single market?
Lord Callanan (Con)
The noble Earl makes a good point. We have published lots of information for the travel sector to access. As I said, we are putting in place a comprehensive range of support to help the sector through this difficult and challenging time.
Lord Snape (Lab)
I draw noble Lords’ attention to my entry in the register of interests. Would the Minister accept that the call for a dedicated Minister is no reflection on the way he carries out his own duties? Such an appointment might help to bring sector-specific support for the travel industry, where, as I am sure he is aware, the number of redundancies is now expected to exceed 160,000. Would he agree that such an appointment would enable the Government to offer a cost-effective Covid-19 testing system to allow holidaymakers to travel and to shorten quarantine periods for those who return?
Lord Callanan (Con)
There is of course a Minister for Tourism: Mr Huddleston, in DCMS. He is currently convening a cross-ministerial task force on the travel industry. The noble Lord can look forward to announcements tomorrow on that.
Baroness Doocey (LD)
My Lords, the Government are currently developing a tourism recovery strategy to rebuild the £30 billion of export earnings that inbound tourism generates for the UK. What financial assistance are the Government providing to UK tour operators to enable them to get through this year and next year to deliver the tourism strategy that the Government want?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I outlined the measures that we put in place for individual travel businesses, but bigger operators have been able to access extensive loan and grant schemes. However, I readily accept that it is a very difficult time for businesses in these areas.
Baroness Pidding (Con)
My Lords, all aspects of the travel industry, international and domestic, have been hit as a consequence of the pandemic. With the continuing uncertainty in making foreign travel plans, would my noble friend the Minister agree that there is a unique opportunity for our domestic tourism and hospitality sector to be restored and to flourish? However, for this to happen, we first need to ensure these sectors survive what are likely to be an incredibly challenging few months ahead. Can my noble friend outline what steps the Government are taking to assist with this, especially in the hospitality sector?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I agree with my noble friend. She is absolutely right that there is a unique opportunity for our domestic travel industry and hospitality sector to flourish once they get through these extremely difficult and challenging few months. She will be aware that the furlough scheme extension and the tourism and hospitality VAT cut extension both run until March next year. We hope that they will help the industry.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab) [V]
My Lords, the Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association has said that the Government have “ignored calls for help” from our travel trade and that the buck
“has been passed from the Department of Business to the Department of Transport and back again.”
Can the Minister explain why that is the case and why the travel sector has slipped between departmental cracks during the pandemic? Can he explain what support the Government will give because of the existential threat to high streets and travel agencies in particular? What additional help could the Government consider giving to this sector so that good companies do not go out of business or have to make people redundant?
Lord Callanan (Con)
It is nice to see that the TSSA is well represented in today’s questions from noble Lords. As I said, there is a Minister for Tourism. A cross-departmental tourism task force has been set up and, as I said to the noble Lord, Lord Snape, there will be an announcement tomorrow.
Baroness Altmann (Con)
My Lords, following on from the previous question, could my noble friend look into the somewhat misleading, confusing and contradictory statements applied to travel agents? On 31 October, all non-essential retail was ordered to close. On 5 November, the Chancellor said in the other place that
“Travel agents’ businesses … will benefit from business grants”,—[Official Report, Commons, 5/11/20; col. 513.]
but when the regulations and guidance were published, travel agents seemed to be excluded. I urge my noble friend to clarify what the situation is, especially since florists and pubs, which can do click and collect, have qualified for support that seems not to have applied to high street travel agents.
Lord Callanan (Con)
I will certainly have a look at the issue that my noble friend refers to, but I think the guidance has been very clear and most sectors of industry have been rigorously applying it.
Lord Bradshaw (LD) [V]
I believe that the advent of a vaccine gives a real glimmer of hope that the people working, as travel agents are, to the future have a lot to look forward to, provided they can get through the probably three months that we will have to wait until the industry starts to recover. I am quite happy that, if the Government believe they have made things clear so that people know what help is there, they have in fact done all we can ask.
Lord Callanan (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his support. The developments on the vaccine are encouraging. It is not my area of responsibility, but we all have our fingers crossed that the vaccine will prove successful, and that we will be able to help the industry through its current short-term difficulties and that it has a bright future ahead.
Lord Balfe (Con) [V]
My Lords, I draw attention to my interest in the register. I ask the Minister to urge on his friend convening the cross-departmental tourism task force the need to take on board the genuine concerns of the trade unions, and in particular pilots, who, because they have a need for a certain amount of flying hours, are being quite challenged on keeping their flying credentials up to date. I hope the Minister will be able to encourage his friend to look across the whole spectrum of problems in the travel industry.
Lord Callanan (Con)
I will indeed pass on my noble friend’s concerns. As I have said, I cannot predict what will be in the announcement tomorrow, but we have been looking very closely at all the problems that exist for the tourism sector, in particular for those who want to travel abroad. I will certainly pass on my noble friend’s remarks.
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked. We now come to the fourth Oral Question.
Migrant Women: Domestic Abuse
(4 years ago)
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Baroness Lister of Burtersett
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to protect migrant women who have been subjected to domestic abuse who have no recourse to public funds.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)
My Lords, it is essential that migrant victims of domestic abuse, including those with no recourse to public funds, are treated first and foremost as victims. Already, the destitution domestic violence concession provides emergency crisis support to protect victims on certain spousal visas. We are taking steps to provide further protection through the £1.5 million scheme to support migrant victims, and to assess and address shortfalls in the current provision.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab) [V]
My Lords, instead of listening to the Joint Committee on the Draft Domestic Abuse Bill, organisations on the ground and the commissioner-designate, the Government’s review of migrant domestic abuse victims has produced a pilot widely condemned as unnecessary, totally inadequate and, despite what the Minister has just said, potentially discriminatory, because it subordinates abused women’s needs to their immigration status. Will the Government act on these concerns and rethink the pilot or, better still, enshrine in the Bill protection for abused migrant women and the Istanbul convention principle of non-discrimination, as is widely called for?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
We listened very carefully to the Joint Committee’s recommendations. I will discuss with colleagues whether there is any discrimination inherent in the scheme. While it will be in force for only four months, we fully intend to roll it out far beyond March. I will keep the noble Baroness updated, and certainly take back her point about discrimination within the scheme.
Baroness Warsi (Con) [V]
My Lords, the destitution domestic violence concession is a limited way in which some of these women can access some support, but can the Minister confirm how long it currently takes for such applications to be considered, and for a payment to be made to these vulnerable women?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I cannot confirm the time but, particularly during Covid, our intention is to get funds to people and to lift any restrictions on recourse to public funds as quickly as possible, so that those people—mostly women—get the support that they need when they need it.
Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB) [V]
I refer to my interests in the register. Can the Minister take into account that, among migrants subjected to domestic abuse, there may be those in enforced marriage situations?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I agree that the two are not mutually exclusive at all. One might assume that, having been forced into a marriage, those women are more vulnerable to specific types of abuse than the general population.
Baroness Armstrong of Hill Top (Lab) [V]
My Lords, the Joint Committee, of which I was a member, was shocked by the evidence from those women with no recourse to public funds about how perpetrators exploited their immigration status. We now know that many of these women, during the pandemic, have been forced by those same perpetrators into sex for survival. It is shocking that in Britain today we are unable to support these women, so that they do not have to resort to such extreme and deplorable activity. This is urgent. What are the Government prepared to do to support them so that they are not exposed to such huge vulnerabilities?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
If anyone is subjected to domestic violence or any other type of exploitation outlined by the noble Baroness, we will treat them first and foremost as victims. The Government have—particularly during the Covid situation, as she outlined—put quite substantial funding into ensuring that people in these vulnerable positions, and their children, get the help that they need, when they need it.
Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD) [V]
The Minister has told me that she believes that all domestic abuse victims should be protected, no matter what their status. Therefore will she confirm that, when amendments to the Domestic Abuse Bill to afford financial protection to all are put forward, they will be favourably received?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I do not know what the amendments are, but the noble Baroness will know, since I have responded to her previously on this, that we will look as carefully as we can at any amendments that seek to protect women at a very vulnerable time in their lives, hence the support for migrant victims scheme which will be rolled out very shortly. We will look at gaps in provisions but, to return to her initial point, people will be treated as victims first and foremost.
Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)
My Lords, this is such a difficult area. On 19 October, the Government put forward the support for migrant victims scheme, which we have been alluding to. The day after, they reported to the authorities of the Council of Europe that this was evidence of their making progress towards ratification of the Istanbul convention and their need to comply with its requirements. The trouble is that I have here 58 signatures from leaders in this field who feel that this was an entirely misconceived initiative that will end up with measures that “directly contravene” Article 4.3 of the Istanbul convention, the non-discrimination principle in relation to migrant or refugee status. Can the Minister help me to see my way through these apparently contradictory remarks?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, I do not think that the Government wish in any way to contradict themselves on what they intend to do on the Istanbul convention. I understand that when the Domestic Abuse Bill becomes an Act, extraterritorial jurisdiction over specified offences, as required by the convention, will enable the convention to be ratified. However, I will look into it further and perhaps get back to the noble Lord on any further measures that are needed—or indeed any contradictions that do exist, because we would not want that unintended consequence of the passage of what I think is quite forward-leaning legislation.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes (Con) [V]
My Lords, many of these women have very little English, so huge language barriers isolate them from help that could be available to them. Will the Minister encourage local authorities and voluntary organisations to help groups and individuals to overcome these barriers? An additional problem that has been researched by charities in north Kensington is that very few such individuals have internet contact of any sort—the figures are quite alarming—so there will be no help for them at all until they become more conscious of using the internet and can afford to get some appliances.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I agree with my noble friend that accessibility to online services is crucial, and in fact we announced funding to help with online services during the Covid period. I wholeheartedly support her point about people who have very little English. I have met women in such situations who not only cannot speak English but have had their passports taken away from them. That leaves them in the most vulnerable situation imaginable, as they are not even able to explain what has happened to them.
Lord Woolley of Woodford (CB) [V]
The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants argued, even before the Covid pandemic, that having no recourse to public funds had pushed families into abject poverty, unsustainable debt and homelessness. Covid has exacerbated this problem, particularly with regard to the rise of domestic violence suffered by migrant women. As a matter of urgency and decency, can we massively widen the exceptions to “no recourse to public funds” or, at best during this difficult time, abandon it?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
As a matter of course during the Covid pandemic, if someone is a victim of domestic violence, they are effectively supported as such first and foremost, before any other considerations are taken into account. Certainly, “no recourse to public funds” change of conditions grants have been 89% successful. I do not take away from what the noble Lord says at all, because he is asking whether we can help these people as victims of domestic violence first and foremost.
The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)
My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed and it brings Question Time to an end.
Windrush Compensation Scheme
(4 years ago)
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Lord Dholakia
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress has been made in settling claims under the Windrush Compensation Scheme.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)
My Lords, the Windrush compensation scheme was established in April 2019 to compensate members of the Windrush generation for the losses and impacts that they suffered because they were unable to demonstrate lawful status. The first payment was made within four months of the scheme’s launch and, to the end of September, over £2.8 million has been paid or offered in compensation, including multiple offers of over £100,000. More payments and offers are being made every week.
Lord Dholakia (LD)
My Lords, there are serious allegations of racism and racial discrimination against those who are dealing with outstanding Windrush compensation claims. The injustice has lasted for over 70 years. The evidence from Wendy Williams has been accepted. We deal with contracts on Covid, awarding millions of pounds, without proper scrutiny. The Home Office cannot be the fit and proper body to sort out these grievances. Many people have died awaiting their claims while the Home Secretary’s mind is on other matters. I ask the Minister to set out a date when all the outstanding claims will be resolved. Failing this, experience proves that the anger of the community will spill on to our streets.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I will not give some sort of defensive response to the noble Lord’s point because, if serious allegations of racism are being put out, we need to take that extremely seriously. If the noble Lord can provide me with further detail, I will take that back. He also asked whether the Home Office is indeed the right department to deal with this. I think it is the right department to deal with this in the sense that people’s identity needs to be established—which, of course, is the purview of the Home Office—before the claims are looked into. He is absolutely right to raise the issue of deceased people: first, it is tragic that someone is deceased before their claim is heard; secondly, it says to us that we need to be quicker at responding; but, thirdly, where someone is deceased, that claim can be dealt with in the appropriate manner with respect to their next of kin.
Lord Rosser (Lab) [V]
Wendy Williams, who carried out the Windrush review, told the Home Affairs Select Committee last month that she was surprised that only 168 people—certainly, at that time—had been compensated. She also expressed concern that there had been so little progress in reviewing the hostile environment policies and said that the Home Office could either embrace her recommendations or pay lip-service to them, and not institute fundamental cultural change. There is clearly a lack of leadership at the very highest level in the Home Office. A culture change was promised; it still has not been, and is not being, delivered. It is actions, not words, that count. Do the Government agree, or has even Wendy Williams got it all wrong?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I totally agree with the noble Lord that a culture change is badly needed. A culture change does not come in a quick timescale but over time. On the figure of 168 people, we need to move faster in processing claims, and I know my right honourable friend the Home Secretary is looking at that. We have also enlisted more resource to try to help process those claims. On complexity, yes, it is complex; people have complex lives, and each case has to be taken on the evidence and information that is brought forward. We do not want people to go short on what they receive but to get the full amount they deserve—and all these people are very deserving of the compensation they get. Regarding the slow progress on the recommendations, I do not contradict what Wendy Williams said at all. One thing she said was that we should reflect, rather than jump to action, in implementing some of the recommendations. That is not to say that we should drag our heels, but we are going as fast as we can in what is a very sensitive area indeed.
Baroness Hamwee (LD) [V]
My Lords, is it appropriate that, as reported, many officials working on the compensation scheme have immigration enforcement backgrounds, where the default response for so long has been to say “No”, rather than “Yes”?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I cannot substantiate the point that the noble Baroness makes; that is possibly my ignorance rather than anything else. First and foremost, however, we must assist people to get the compensation that they deserve for the wrongs that they have suffered over the past 70 years under successive Governments.
Baroness Prashar (CB) [V]
My Lords, as a result of the complaints about the way the scheme is being administered, the Home Office is reported to have launched an internal inquiry about racism and so on. Can the Minister please tell the House: what is the remit of this inquiry, when will it be completed and will the results be made public?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, I shall provide the noble Baroness with more details, in terms of whether it will be made public and other details, because I am afraid that I have scant information on that at the moment.
Lord Sheikh (Con) [V]
My Lords, about 12,000 people are expected to claim under the compensation scheme. Nine have died before receiving any compensation and, unfortunately, there may be more deaths before the payments are made. Can my noble friend the Minister explain the Government’s plans to support the bereaved families?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I have to agree with my noble friend that someone dying before they receive compensation is absolutely tragic. Of course, we would work with the next of kin to ensure that any compensation due to that person is paid to the next of kin or to the designated chosen person. The point is that it is not acceptable that people die before they get the compensation they deserve. It is incumbent upon the Home Office to ensure that these claims are expedited more quickly than they have been.
The Lord Bishop of St Albans
My Lords, the Windrush protests are a wake-up call to all of us and to every institution in this country. Indeed, the Church of England has set up an antiracism taskforce to look at this issue and to achieve change. Is it correct that the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which is investigating this issue with regard to the Home Office, does not have a single black commissioner on the current board? What do Her Majesty’s Government plan to do to make the EHRC more representative so that it can undertake this work?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I do not think it essential that there is every protected characteristic on the EHRC. However, I take the right reverend Prelate’s point that—certainly in the current climate—BAME representation or indeed black representation might be a really good asset to the EHRC. I am sure he is correct, but I will check out the veracity of that and get back to him.
Lord Woolley of Woodford (CB) [V]
My Lords, this is particularly personal to me. My mother was part of the Windrush generation and gave the best part of her life, more than 50 years, to working for the NHS. The most senior black civil servant working on the Windrush compensation scheme resigned, citing racism and stating that there was a complete lack of humanity in dealing with applicants. Equally strong was Wendy Williams’ Windrush review, which highlighted that people were not coming forward because the burden of proof for their legal status was far too high. Given that trust in the system is at an all-time low, particularly among black people, and that things are still going catastrophically wrong, does the Minister agree that we should pause deportation flights such as the one to Jamaica scheduled for 2 December?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
On the last point, I understand that none of the people scheduled for deportation is Windrush, and actually there are some very serious criminals due to go on that flight. That said, as I said earlier to the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, the fact that the most senior black civil servant made those claims is not something that I can stand here and be defensive about. We need to listen very carefully to what people are saying as opposed to dismissing it—although I am not saying that it is being dismissed at all. The scheme was designed with some of the claimants in mind, but it is something for us as the Home Office to reflect on in the weeks and months ahead.
Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston (Non-Afl)
My Lords, we have known since 2013 that there was a documentation problem regarding the Windrush generation. We have had years of trying to put this right but the progress we have made so far is clearly insufficient and inadequate. Identity is sometimes difficult to prove, but are we making that process too difficult? Will the Minister at least undertake to update the House, shall we say on the anniversary in April 2021, on what further progress has been made?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I would be very happy to update the House. Regarding the EU settlement scheme, the attempt was to make identity assurance very easy. The noble Baroness says that we have known about this since 2013; the sad thing is that we have actually known it for decades, and we all need to reflect upon that.
Lord Loomba (CB) [V]
My Lords, we are all aware that in situations such as this where a wrong has been committed, there can be a ripple effect and wider family members suffer as well. What is being done to ensure that everyone who has suffered is compensated in due course?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
As I said earlier, each case will be treated sensitively and each person who makes a claim will be assisted through that process—not to prove them wrong but to prove them right regarding the compensation they are owed. There is no cap on the level of compensation or indeed on the scheme itself. However, we need to encourage more people to come forward. There have been communications campaigns and money has been given out to community organisations to promote the scheme, but by this point we would have expected more people to have come forward for their claims to be processed.
Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)
My Lords, does the Minister recognise that many of the Windrush generation who have been treated so badly for so long are actually quite frightened about approaching the Home Office because they see it as an institution that has been responsible for many unfair deportations? Will the Home Office think about being much more proactive about going out and talking to these people, many of whom are now in the last stages of their lives? If we do not get this sorted out soon, it is going to be a real travesty of justice for all those people.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I totally take that point on board. I agree with the noble Baroness that they might be frightened and that any notion of “state” might be frightening to them. As I have said, we have done quite a lot of outreach through church leaders, faith leaders and community leaders, but I shall certainly take that back. I know we will be reflecting on how far we have got with people coming forward and trying to make that process better, because clearly, more people should be coming forward.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
My Lords, the time allowed for this Private Notice Question has now elapsed.
Integrated Review
(4 years ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)
My Lords, the first duty of any Government is the safety and security of its citizens. The Statement on defence spending is obviously welcome news. The Prime Minister’s announcement of what he called, without any sense of irony, an end to the “era of retreat” is necessary, given that the Conservatives’ last two defence reviews have led not only to spending cuts of £8 billion but to a reduction in the size of the Armed Forces by 40,000 full-time troops.
The enormous international uncertainty we face today reflects the diversity of the dangers we face: adversaries investing heavily in new military; the devastating effects on our health and finances of the global pandemic; economic and security uncertainty as we hurtle towards the end of the Brexit transition without knowing if, when or what the deal will be; technological developments such as AI and sophisticated internet communications that we previously only imagined; and a climate emergency—while the Government’s seeking to write into legislation the right for Ministers to break the law has done little to enhance our international standing. So, there are huge challenges.
However, these uncertain and dangerous times also provide an opportunity for the Government to outline a new vision of the UK’s place in the world. We have been here before: soon after the Second World War, the leadership of Clement Attlee and his Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin was instrumental in setting up NATO. Its enduring strength in providing collective security serves as a constant reminder of what the UK can achieve on the world stage. In 2002 the significance of our landmark International Development Act was recognised throughout the world, and during the 2008 financial crisis we worked globally to secure an economic rescue plan. I know I am not alone in wanting us to show such global leadership again, because when we have the vision and the moral imperative, the UK is a force for good in the world. We must ensure that our Armed Forces are properly funded and that they are integral to that vision.
It was almost 60 years ago that Dean Acheson, a former US Secretary of State, observed that Britain has lost an empire but failed to find a role. We ceded that issue with our membership of the EU but, as we leave, the need to define our place in the world again becomes key. This is why it is so disappointing that the Prime Minister’s Statement fails to provide the strategy to meet the many challenges we face today. For a Statement on an integrated review, it does not feel very integrated, lacking both a wider foreign policy context and clarity about the Government’s priorities. For example, other than passing references, the Statement fails to mention the security implications of climate change and how we will respond. Can the noble Baroness tell the House when the MoD’s climate change and sustainability strategy will be published?
Also, there is no commitment in the Statement to the Conservatives’ election manifesto pledge to maintain 0.7% GNI on aid. Following the abolition of the Department for International Development, this could have been an opportunity to restore confidence in how we see our international role. The former Prime Minister David Cameron’s statement that abandoning the 0.7% pledge would be
“a moral, strategic and political mistake”
was endorsed by the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Richards, a former Chief of Defence Staff, saying that this spending is hugely in the UK’s interests. The benefits that such funding has brought across the world reinforce why an integrated strategic approach is so important, and again bring home why those cuts to the budget jeopardise Britain’s soft power and influence. We have had many debates on this in your Lordships’ House and that soft power is critical to how we meet the threats faced and define our place on the international stage.
People need to be placed front and centre of our defence strategy, whether our brave Armed Forces personnel or those working in supporting industries. With the current jobs crisis, we welcome the commitment in the Statement to 10,000 new jobs every year. Can the noble Baroness say where these jobs will be and how they will be recruited and monitored? Will she today rule out any more personnel cuts across the Army, the RAF and the Navy? Can she also say what lessons the MoD have learned from previous overspends and mismanagement?
Last year, the Public Accounts Committee reported on the disastrous failure of the deal with Capita for Army recruitment. That contract has seen costs soar up to £677 million in 2018 and yet it has failed to deliver, leaving the Army understrength. The PAC also highlighted problems with other contracts and added:
“We are disappointed to see the MoD replicate the contract management errors that our Committee sees all too often across government.”
Our military deserves better and increases in spending must be matched by rooting out such scandalous wastes of public money.
I also ask the noble Baroness about the certainty of this funding and its impact on other areas of public spending. The costs of the pandemic are eye-wateringly large. Government borrowing between April and November was £215 billion and is projected to rise further. The deficit continues to grow. The announcement that the defence budget will grow by 4.2% above inflation each year means that, by 2024-25, it will be £7 billion higher than at present, in real terms. That is a significant increase, as she is aware. With the spending review this week, there are strong indications that the Chancellor will impose a public sector pay freeze, including for military personnel and those who have been at the heart of tackling this pandemic and protecting the public. Post Covid, we need to invest to regrow our economy and protect jobs. We all know that difficult decisions will have to be taken. Can the noble Baroness, without pre-empting the Chancellor’s Statement, tell the House whether the additional costs of defence spending will be met from increased taxation or cuts in other areas of public spending?
In his Statement, the Prime Minister is correct to say that
“our national security in 20 years’ time will depend on decisions”
that he is making today. Unlike the extensive consultation in 1998, the call for evidence for this review lasted just one month. We expected to see the integrated review published this month and I understand it has now been delayed until next year. I do not know if the noble Baroness is able to explain the reasons for the delay, but I hope that she will tell your Lordships’ House that the delay will allow for engagement and consultation with all involved. Doing so will have an impact on the likely success of such an integrated review and strategy. We need an ambitious strategy to develop new international relationships and protect our country against serious threats in the years ahead. Defence spending is essential to this, but the Government still need to address the strategy and identify the diverse threats to peace and stability. Doing so requires a coherent, co-ordinated plan with, at its core, a vision of the UK as a moral force for good.
Lord Newby (LD)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness the Leader of the House for answering questions on the Prime Minister’s Statement. The Prime Minister begins by saying that he
“will update the House on the Government’s integrated review of foreign, defence, security and development policy”
but the Statement does nothing of the sort. It is simply a statement of increased military expenditure, particularly on the Navy. The Prime Minister has successfully wrenched the nation’s credit card from the Chancellor’s possession long enough to provide for significant additional expenditure on defence kit. In themselves many, if not all, of the items on the shopping list are clearly desirable. Who could possibly object to having more frigates or drones, better AI or the National Cyber Force? But it seems more than somewhat bizarre to be announcing this additional spending in advance of the completion of the integrated review. Could the noble Baroness explain to the House exactly when that review will be published?
It is particularly worrying when we hear repeated rumours of a cut from 0.7% to 0.5% of GDP spent on overseas development. Can the noble Baroness the Leader confirm that these rumours are simply untrue? If she cannot, what is the rationale to spend more on military kit and to cut the aid budget? How could robbing Peter to pay Paul in this way possibly lead to a net gain in our credibility and reputation, taking account of the soft, as well as hard, power we wield as a nation?
The Statement waxes lyrical on the need to fight terrorism, and no one can disagree, but the best way to fight terrorism and protect our security as a nation is in the closest possible co-ordination with our nearest allies. Is it therefore not reckless of the Government to have completely failed to address security co-operation with our EU partners, as part of the Brexit negotiations? Does leaving the EU systems for sharing information on criminals and terrorists, and the European arrest warrant, not present a body blow to our ability to identify, track and trace individuals who pose a direct threat to our security?
There is no update or set of principles on foreign policy, just a general statement that the world is an increasingly dangerous place. This a pretty thin basis for detailed defence procurement priorities. In the Statement, the Prime Minister says that new technological advances will
“surmount the old limits of logistics”,
but there are no advances that mean that fighting ships do not require refuelling or that sailors do not require feeding. When one of our carriers is deployed to the Far East, for example, how is it to be provisioned and, given that the new frigates will not be built for a number of years, how will it be protected?
While there is quite a lot about the Navy in the Statement, there is nothing at all about the Army. What does this mean for Army expenditure? For example, are the Government committed to keeping troop levels at their current levels and are rumours about reducing the number of tanks correct? How does this increased expenditure fit into the Government’s overall public expenditure plans? We will be hearing more from the Chancellor later this week but, given the weakness of public finances, the expenditure being discussed today simply cannot be funded by increased borrowing. To echo the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, which other areas of public expenditure will fall or which taxes will rise to pay for this?
The noble Baroness will no doubt say that she cannot give an answer to these questions because that would pre-empt Wednesday’s Statement—but today’s Statement pre-empts Wednesday’s Statement. The truth is that the Prime Minister has done what he does best: making exaggerated claims for future policy developments, while leaving the Chancellor of the Exchequer to pick up the bill. That is the fundamental problem with this Statement. It is isolated from the integrated foreign, defence, security and development review and from the overall tax-and-spend strategy of the Government. With its soaring rhetoric, Boy’s Own breathlessness and glowing references to past glories, it runs the risk of being isolated from any realistic assessment of Britain’s place in the modern world.
The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Evans of Bowes Park) (Con)
I thank the noble Baroness and the noble Lord for their comments. I will start by talking briefly about the integrated review, as they both asked some questions about it. We will conclude and publish the full integrated review early next year. Both noble Lords asked about the delay and, as they rightly said, the review was announced in February; it was then paused in April, due to Covid, and restarted in June. So we did have a delay in the review and it will now conclude early next year. However, we are in the final phases of it, aligning our ambition with our resources. The defence settlement outlines the first conclusions of the review, which will put us on the front foot as we equip our Armed Forces for the threats of today and tomorrow, while ensuring that long-term defence projects have certainty and are not put on hold.
When the full integrated review concludes early next year, it will set out our overarching strategy for national security and foreign policy, including defence, diplomacy, development and national resilience. It will set the direction for more detailed strategies and departmental activity in the coming years. It will also set out the way in which the UK will be a problem-solving and burden-sharing nation, and a strong direction for recovery from Covid at home and overseas. That issue was touched on at the G20 virtual summit held over the weekend, when all the leaders discussed it.
The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, rightly talked about making sure that all parties were engaged. I can certainly reassure her that this is a cross-Whitehall process, allowing all to contribute expertise and analysis—not only within Whitehall but with partners, including NATO. Our closest allies have been involved during the process and will continue to be so. She also asked about the defence review, which is ongoing. Further details will be updated in due course.
Both noble Lords asked about spending. This is the only multiyear settlement for any government department that will be announced this year. I can reassure them that it has been fully costed, building on extensive work by the Treasury and MoD to understand what future capabilities will cost and how much can be delivered through efficiencies.
The noble Baroness talked about jobs, quite rightly. We expect this settlement to create up to 10,000 jobs each year across the UK, and as many as two-thirds more in the supply chain. Both noble Lords will be aware that in 2018-19, the MoD supported over 400,000 jobs, while defence spent £19.2 billion with UK industry last year. This new settlement will support further jobs in a whole array of areas: in shipbuilding, for instance, and obviously in emerging technologies—in space and in the building of the Tempest. We hope that this spending will create jobs in a range of ways. Part of the investment will also be looking to upskill and make sure that we can provide jobs for people around the whole of the United Kingdom—Scotland obviously being key to some of the developments that we are talking about. Hopefully this will be a UK-wide investment in jobs.
Both noble Lords rightly asked about international development. We are of course extremely proud of our work there. We remain committed to supporting international development and helping the world’s poorest people. Of course, our Armed Forces are also a humanitarian force for good, coming to the aid of the most vulnerable following natural disasters, bringing stability to countries marred by conflict with peacekeeping missions and bolstering efforts to tackle Covid in the developing world. Both noble Lords will both know that the spending review will be announced on Wednesday; funding will be announced then.
The noble Lord, Lord Newby, asked about the Army. I can assure him that the UK will continue to have full-spectrum Armed Forces, including an armoured capability. But we also need to ensure that we focus on how the Army is equipped and what we want it to do. This settlement will ensure that our soldiers have some of the best equipment in the world, so that they can continue to do their fantastic job.
Both noble Lords talked about global leadership. They are absolutely right, which is why this settlement raises our defence spending to 2.2% of GDP. That is more in cash terms than any other European ally or NATO member, other than the United States. We will continue to lead internationally. Next year is a critical year for our international leadership, as we have the G7 presidency, COP 26 and the 75th anniversary of the first UNGA meeting in London. We will continue to play our part on the global stage, and this settlement will help us to do that.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
We now come to the 20 minutes allocated for Back-Bench questions. I ask that questions and answers be brief, so that the maximum number of speakers can be called.
Lord Howell of Guildford (Con) [V]
My Lords, does my noble friend agree that the battlefields of future warfare will lie increasingly right inside our societies and inside people’s minds? So, while these measures are obviously extremely welcome for our Armed Forces, in the Prime Minister’s own words, we must
“upgrade our capabilities across the board”.—[Official Report, Commons, 19/11/20; col. 488.]
Will she also assure us that when the integrated review eventually appears, having looked further at our defence needs, it will fully reflect what the Trade Secretary calls the “Pacific mindset”—along with the “Commonwealth mindset”—since these are the areas where our key future alliances increasingly lie for security and defence, as well as for trade and investment?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
I thank my noble friend. He is absolutely right that we must look across all our capabilities to ensure an integrated response across the board to the threats and opportunities of the modern world. He is also right to emphasise the importance of the Commonwealth and the Indo-Pacific region. One of our greatest strengths is our alliances, along with our deep ties with the nations of the Commonwealth. We will continue to work closely with them, and of course the Indo-Pacific is the fastest-growing economic region in the world, so it is a crucial transit point for global trade, and a home to UK allies and trading partners. They will be at the forefront of our thoughts.
Lord Houghton of Richmond (CB) [V]
My Lords, the Statement last week is to be welcomed, albeit I think that it brought relief rather than jubilation to most defence and security experts. However, I too thought that the style and content of the Statement were somewhat disappointing. It is potentially a missed opportunity—little more than a hubristic announcement of a list of new defence capabilities. Will the integrated review itself give more evidence that the capability choices that have been made are matched to reconsidered strategy, particularly in the areas of modernised deterrence, national resilience, an integrated approach and—dare I say it—a more effective use of strategic information?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
I thank the noble and gallant Lord and, yes, I can say that as we are now in the final stages of the integrated review, we are aligning our ambition with our resources. As I said in response to the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, this defence review outlines the first conclusions of that and gives certainty to our defence projects. But the noble and gallant Lord is absolutely right: when we publish the fully integrated review, it will set out our ambition for the UK’s role in the world and our long-term strategic aims for our national security and foreign policy.
The Lord Bishop of Portsmouth [V]
My Lords, I welcome this announcement, with its impact on jobs and industry, including in the diocese I serve. I note the welcome emphasis that the Government appear to give to defence and security. Will the Minister therefore recognise that previous defence reviews set out grand, strategic ambitions but were not backed by the necessary resources? Will she specifically confirm the Government’s commitment to providing those resources to match the ambitions of the review, and will she further recognise that as we wait for spending commitments on development aid and public sector pay, how much the Government propose in additional investment is an accurate barometer of what they consider to be most important?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
I reassure the right reverend Prelate that this settlement puts the defence programme on a sustainable footing and will make sure that our Armed Forces can meet today’s threats at the same time as delivering on a once-in-a-generation modernisation. This £16.5 billion increase over four years is the biggest uplift in 30 years, and, as I mentioned, it cements the UK’s position as the largest defence spender in Europe and the second largest in NATO.
Baroness Blackstone (Ind Lab)
My Lords, I am sure that I do not need to remind the noble Baroness the Leader of the House that the Conservative Party manifesto contained a commitment to spend 0.75% of GNI on development aid. She failed to answer the direct question put by my noble friend Lady Smith and the noble Lord, Lord Newby, about whether this would be maintained. How, in the circumstances, can abandoning an election manifesto commitment of this kind even be considered—it is enshrined in law? Can she tell the House what the effect of doing so will have on the lives of millions of poor people living in dire poverty around the world, quite apart from the damage it will do to our international reputation?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
As I have already said, we are, and should be, proud of our international development work. I have also already said that the spending review will be on Wednesday and announcements will be made there. I will not say anything further on that today, but I can certainly say that we are absolutely committed to supporting international development and helping the world’s poorest people. We will remain a world leader in this area through, as I have said, hosting COP 26, our G7 presidency and hosting a major girls’ education summit next year.
Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD) [V]
My Lords, I suspect that the Prime Minister’s Statement divides Peers, MPs and everybody else, to an extent, into those of us who speak on defence issues and those concerned about wider issues. Therefore, while I obviously welcome what the Statement said on defence expenditure, like other Peers, I ask the Minister what has happened to the 0.7% legal commitment to development aid. In the defence sphere, the Prime Minister talked about a
“once-in-a-generation modernisation”
programme and how we are going to get away from the “vicious circle” of
“squandering billions along the way.”—[Official Report, Commons, 19/11/20; col. 488.]
Given that the cart has come before the horse—the expenditure has been flagged up before the integrated review is complete—could the Minister explain to us how the Government intend to avoid “squandering billions” and how they will improve defence procurement?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
As the noble Baroness says, we believe that this settlement gives a chance to break free from the vicious circle whereby we ordered ever decreasing numbers of ever more expensive items of military hardware. We have set out a number of projects that we will move forward across the Navy in particular but also with the RAF and others. We have also set out a very ambitious plan focused on using new technologies, AI, our new National Cyber Force and space. This is a broad package that we believe will truly help our Armed Forces modernise and be able to tackle the emerging and very different global threats that they are currently facing.
Lord Robathan (Con)
My Lords, I certainly welcome this pledge to increase defence spending: the world is a very much more dangerous place, and I will take the noble Lord, Lord Newby, through a few more of the threats outside later, if he likes. Can my noble friend say whether I can be confident that this announcement marks a reverse in the defence cuts that have taken place over the last 30 years since the end of the Cold War? Before I sit down, I will also say that I was on the International Development Committee for six years in the other place and saw some quite excellent work done with British taxpayers’ money. I also saw some shocking waste: an example that particularly springs to mind was an African country buying a fleet of Mercedes cars for its Cabinet Ministers with British taxpayers’ money. I have to say, if I might, that not all money spent on international development, or indeed on defence, is well spent.
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
I can certainly say to my noble friend that this is a significant investment in defence, and, as I have said, it is the biggest uplift in 30 years. The MoD is committed to making a step-change in defence transformation so that it delivers the digitised, efficient, productive and modernised defence that we require. We will also accelerate the adoption of new technologies, ensuring, all in all, that our military has the best capacity and capability that it needs, as he rightly says, to address the ever-growing challenges that we face.
Lord Boyce (CB) [V]
My Lords, the Prime Minister’s defence announcement is to be greatly welcomed, especially the multi-year settlement. Also welcome is the firm recognition of the strategic priority to keep the sea lanes open. The key to this is destroyer frigate forces, which are of barely sufficient size for this task. Their numbers are imperilled by the decay, through old age, of the Type 23 frigate. The intent to build more ships for the Royal Navy is good news, but this ageing out of the Type 23 means that this intent must be expedited. Would the Minister agree that an in-service date of 2027 for the Type 31 is an unacceptably long time to have to wait for this much-needed asset to join the fleet and that the shipbuilding industry, which is much favoured in this announcement, should be made to do better?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
I thank the noble and gallant Lord. Certainly, this settlement will significantly expand the Royal Navy: as well as confirming the current frigate orders, as he rightly says, we have also committed to the next-generation warship, the Type 32, and to research and support vessels. We are sticking to the timescale of 2027 for both the Type 31 and the Type 26. The Type 32 will represent an investment in UK shipbuilding of over £1.5 billion over the next decade and will, of course, create and sustain more jobs. We plan for this to be a UK-led programme that will revitalise the shipbuilding sector and create thousands of jobs. We believe that this is a strong settlement for the Navy, which will enable us to invest in new technology and ships and provide our Royal Navy with the capability that it needs.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, I am delighted that the Government are investing an extra £24.1 billion over the next four years. It is desperately needed after the reductions since 2010. The decision to base our defence and security on a maritime strategy is also correct and welcomed. As you can imagine, it is music to my ears to have the Prime Minister say
“If there is one policy that strengthens the UK in every possible sense, it is building more ships for the Royal Navy”,—[Official Report, Commons, 19/11/20; col. 488.]
and that we should become the “foremost naval power” in Europe. It would be very easy to express concerns about the many unknowns and possible pitfalls in this announcement: the timing of the frigate build, for example, is one of them, as the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Boyce, mentioned. However, today, I believe we should celebrate the extra money for defence in this increasingly dangerous and unstable world. Many of the details will have to await the review’s outcome in January next year, but I ask the Leader of the House to confirm that, as the Prime Minister is so positive about running two operational carriers by 2023, we will still be ordering a minimum of 90—if not more—F-35Bs to ensure that we have two air groups and an operational conversion unit.
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
I welcome the noble Lord’s welcoming of this announcement. He has been a vocal and consistent strong voice for the Navy within this House, and I am glad that he is pleased. He is right that the carrier strike group 21 is an ambitious global deployment. From 2023, it will be permanently available to be routinely deployed globally, and, in fact, HMS “Queen Elizabeth” will lead a British and allied task group on our most ambitious deployment for two decades, encompassing the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean and east Asia. We are currently finalising our plans for the deployment with regional partners.
Baroness Northover (LD)
My Lords, pandemic was on the 2015 review risk register. Does the noble Baroness recognise that failing to address that has resulted in costs to the economy which are multiples of this defence uplift? What is the point of an integrated review, dismantling DfID even before the review began and this announcement before it concludes if we do not know what challenges the Government think we face and how we might tackle them with our allies? Does she think that global Britain is enhanced or undermined by cutting the development budget?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
As I said, we have already worked through the main findings within government to inform this announcement and they are the first conclusions of the integrated review. The Government are working to ensure that we have an integrated strategy. As I have said to a number of noble Lords, that will be published in its entirety in the new year.
Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton (Con)
My Lords, the investment in space and cyber is most welcome. Many of the skills required are already held in the private sector, so will this review provide the catalyst to implement the whole-force approach? Is this not a golden opportunity to reset the relationship between defence and industry into one of genuine partnership?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
My noble friend is absolutely right. That is certainly what we intend to do. On AI, for instance, the MoD is working with partners across government, UK industry and academia, and will invest in AI hubs to test and develop new models of collaboration and co-creation. On space, Space Command will be staffed jointly from the three services, the Civil Service and key members of the commercial sector, and will bring together three functions: space operations, space workforce generation and space capability. Such working together, as my noble friend set out, is at the centre of our approach, particularly in these new and emerging technologies.
Lord Stirrup (CB)
Although the UK will still be spending a smaller percentage of its GDP on its defence than at the end of the previous decade, I welcome the financial settlement and the commitment to new and emerging technologies. However, conflict tends to bring with it rather unpleasant surprises. Will the noble Baroness the Leader therefore confirm that the four structures and processes that will be set out in the integrated review will retain the necessary agility and adaptability to enable us to respond effectively to those things that we did not or could not foresee?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
The noble and gallant Lord is absolutely right. Flexibility and being able to adapt to emerging threats are certainly at the heart of what this review will look to do. A lot of our investment in new technologies is based on the very issues that he raises: that we need to be able to adapt, because what we face now may not be what we face in years to come. We are all cognisant of that.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD) [V]
My Lords, it is 53 years since the British Government announced our withdrawal of forces from east of Suez, and we well know that our current Prime Minister wants nothing better than to move an increasing proportion of our forces back east of Suez. All the report says about that is that we will be extending our influence, but it does not tell us what influence over whom. Do we intend, as we build up our Gulf base, to defend Saudi Arabia against Iran? If we are to send a carrier task force next year into the South China Sea, is it our intention to challenge China and would that be good for our trade relations with it?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
As I have said, the full integrated review when published next year will set out our overarching strategy for national security and foreign policy.
Baroness Helic (Con) [V]
I join noble Lords in welcoming this significant and long-overdue spending commitment. What impact will it have on job creation in all four nations of the United Kingdom?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
As I said in a previous answer, we believe that this settlement will create jobs across the United Kingdom. For instance, in Scotland, we already spend £1.7 billion a year supporting 10,000 jobs, and we are taking forward our plans for the eight Type 26 and five Type 31 frigates currently being constructed on the Clyde. There will be further growth of jobs in Northern Ireland and, we hope, in Wales. This is indeed a good settlement for job creation in the United Kingdom. We want construction on those projects to be UK-led. As I said, we hope that 10,000 jobs a year will be created, with many more within the supply chains, across the UK.
Baroness Uddin (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I am rather disappointed that one “shoddy practice” can be cited to discredit a whole generation of excellent international development work. What assessment have the Government made of the defence and security implications of the proposed US withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan? What consideration has been given to ensure the empowerment and education of women and girls in conflict regions where our past military interventions continue to cause death and destruction in the present day?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
The noble Baroness will know our absolute commitment to supporting women and girls in areas of conflict. It is one of the personal priorities of the Prime Minister, and we will continue to work on it. Indeed, it was one of the issues discussed by the Prime Minister with other world leaders at the G20 over the weekend. We remain committed to supporting security and stability in both Afghanistan and Iraq and will continue to work closely with our allies and partners on a collective approach to ensure that.
Baroness Goudie (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I welcome the commitment to our Armed Forces and the Prime Minister defending our people and keeping the world safe, but it would be a moral, strategic and social mistake if we did not continue our foreign aid at the present 0.7% target. Since we have had such a target, Britain has achieved soft power and saved millions of lives in Africa by reducing the number of deaths from malaria and HIV. I hope that the Government will continue with these projects.
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)
The noble Baroness is absolutely right. I have said on several occasions in response to noble Lords that we are committed to supporting international development and helping the world’s poorest, but, as I said, spending issues will be covered in the spending review on Wednesday.
Arrangement of Business
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
My Lords, the Hybrid Sitting of the House will now resume. Some Members are here in the Chamber, respecting social distancing, others are participating remotely, but all Members will be treated equally. If the capacity of the Chamber is exceeded, I will immediately adjourn the House.
I shall call Members to speak in the order listed in the annexe to today’s list. Interventions during speeches or “before the noble Lord sits down” are not permitted, and uncalled speakers will not be heard. Other than the mover of an amendment or the Minister, Members may speak only once on each group. Short questions of elucidation after the Minister’s response are permitted but discouraged. A Member wishing to ask such a question, including Members in the Chamber, must email the clerk.
The groupings are binding, and it will not be possible to degroup an amendment for separate debate. A Member intending to press an amendment already debated to a Division should have given notice in the debate. Leave should be given to withdraw amendments. When putting the question, I shall collect voices in the Chamber only. If a Member taking part remotely intends to trigger a Division, they should make that clear when speaking on the group.
United Kingdom Internal Market Bill
Monday 23rd November 2020
(4 years ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 View all United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 150-III(Rev) Revised third marshalled list for Report - (23 Nov 2020)
16:29 - Division conducted remotely on Amendment 15 - Ayes: 319 / Noes: 242 - Amendment 15 agreed.
20:17 - Division conducted remotely on Amendment 54 - Ayes: 285 / Noes: 224 - Amendment 54 agreed.
Lord Callanan
“(8A) Before making regulations under subsection (7) the Secretary of State must consult the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require the Secretary of State to consult the devolved administrations before making regulations amending the “legitimate aims” in Clause 8 (which can mean that provision does not count as indirectly discriminatory against goods).
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Callanan) (Con)
My Lords, I start by bringing to the attention of the House an inadvertent error that I made in one of my replies last Wednesday. In response to the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, I misread my note on the relationship between the non-discrimination principle and employment law requirements, and got one word wrong. I should have said:
“If the employment law requirement were to meet that test, they would not be disapplied unless they had discriminatory effects.”
I reassure that House that my misspeaking in this case was, of course, entirely unintentional.
To be absolutely clear about this point, we have already delivered the relevant legislative measures to give effect to Article 2 of the protocol. I again assure noble Lords that the rights for individuals in Northern Ireland captured within the scope of the Article 2 commitment will continue to be protected going forward and will not be impacted by the outworkings of this Bill. Even if employment law requirements were in scope of the non-discrimination principle, which they would not generally be as they would have to relate to goods sold, they would not be disapplied unless they had discriminatory effects. As I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, last week, I would be happy to facilitate a meeting between her and interested parties and the relevant Ministers and officials, and I stand by the commitment that I gave then.
On the subject of today’s groupings, the amendments in my name would ensure that the Government consult with the devolved Administrations when seeking to use powers. As we made clear in Committee, if the powers are required, we will of course engage with the devolved Administrations in the spirit of the devolution memorandum of understanding. We have been listening to colleagues in the House and appreciate that there is an appetite for these commitments to be included in the Bill. We are therefore introducing these amendments to put beyond doubt our commitment to consult each of the devolved Administrations if any of the relevant powers are used. The consultation requirements and the commitment behind them are clear. However, once consultation is undertaken, the right place for final decisions should be back in Parliament, where parliamentarians from all parts of the United Kingdom can debate and vote on the proposed use of these powers.
It is also worth noting the separate amendment we have tabled, requiring the Secretary of State to review and report to Parliament on the exercise and effectiveness of the powers in Parts 1 and 2 within five years. That will provide an additional degree of accountability and scrutiny, and will again involve consultation with the devolved Administrations—something that I know the House is keen on. For the reasons I have set out above, I hope that noble Lords will accept the amendments in my name, and agree that Amendments 18, 32 and 43 are therefore unnecessary.
Having set out the reasonable measures that Government have tabled, I turn to Amendments 15, 20, 34, and 46. These seek to add additional processes around devolved Administration consent before use of the relevant powers. We have been listening to noble Lords and appreciate the appetite for these commitments on devolved Administration engagement to be included in the Bill. As I have already explained, we are therefore seeking to amend this clause to require consultation with the devolved Administrations prior to use of the power, putting our commitment beyond doubt. As part of this, we will of course set out reasoning for seeking to use the powers, both to the devolved Administrations and to Parliament. We will also seek to reach agreement with the devolved Administrations wherever that is possible. Because of this, it seems to us that putting into legislation the process proposed by noble Lords in their amendments would be duplicative and unnecessary. For these reasons, I hope that the amendments we have already tabled address the concerns of noble Lords, so these amendments are unnecessary.
Amendment 16 requires the publication of the results of consultation on the exercise of the power in Clause 8. While this power was removed from the Bill last week, I will speak briefly about the Government’s position on the subject. The exercise of this power would require consultation with the devolved Administrations. They are perfectly capable of deciding to publish their responses if they so choose. It is not necessary to make that choice for them in this Bill. For these reasons, I ask the noble Baroness not to press that amendment either.
Amendments 26, 27 and 28 would require the Secretary of State to consult all three devolved Administrations before preparing, revising or withdrawing guidance on the operation of the UK market access principles. Amendment 27 specifically stipulates that the Secretary of State should seek the consent of the devolved Administrations. However, should formal consent not be received within a month, the Secretary of State may proceed none the less. This amendment further states that where the Secretary of State makes regulations without obtaining consent, he must publish a statement explaining why. The guidance is itself explanatory; it is important to note that it is not a power to make or amend regulations.
It goes without saying that as part of the guidance process we will engage with all the relevant stakeholders, including the devolved Administrations, because we are committed to helping regulators and traders understand the principles and make the best possible use of them. However, this guidance will not change the rules that apply, so the formal consent of the devolved Administrations should not be required. It is also unnecessary to have a legislative consultation process with the devolved Administrations alone in respect of the guidance, when the guidance will be explaining, not making, the law.
I hope that with those words I have reassured noble Lords on this matter and they feel able not to press their amendments. In the meantime, I beg to move.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, first, I thank the Minister for his correction on the unforced error, I think it is called, in what happened on Wednesday. The noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, will be speaking later and I am sure will comment on that; I hope the House can let her even if it is not specifically in this group. When the Minister responds, I would ask him to ensure the meeting that he has kindly offered takes place before Third Reading, so that if anything needed adjustments, we would be able to look at it at that point. As I say, I am absolutely certain that it was an unforced error, but it would be nice to have that clear.
We are pleased about parts of this, and certainly the review of the use of powers. It may seem odd to the House that we are continuing with these amendments, almost all of which—the guidance being the exception—set down how regulations should be made, even as the very power to make such regulations is about to be removed from the Bill. Nevertheless, we are in agreement with the Minister that it is helpful to deal with the amendments in his name and those in mine and others’ which deal with how these powers would be handled, should they be put in.
Therefore, it is helpful to have our Amendment 15, which I will formally move in due course, as well as Amendments 20, 24 and 26 in the Bill, so that the Commons and the Government will be well aware—assuming that our amendments are passed—that this House would expect any regulation about the functioning of a market across four nations to be made in partnership with those other three participants.
Amendment 15 and the others go further than what the Minister has offered in his. He has quite rightly added consultation; ours go further than that, but they do not hand a veto to any one of the devolved authorities. What they do is take further the welcome admission by the Government, in their Amendments 14, 19, 36 and 45, that it would be unthinkable to make regulations affecting devolved competences without consulting their Governments and legislatures. Our further step is to add some grip to the consultation by making it a proper involvement. The amendments say that the devolved authorities must either give their consent to the regulations within a month, or else the Government can continue but would have to explain to Parliament and the public why they were proceeding without agreement. This does not seem much to ask. It will not cause any delay, but it would ensure that there was no risk of any tokenism in the consultation. Instead, the devolved authorities will have to reply, and speedily, and the Government would simply have to explain why they wanted to proceed contrary to any of the devolved authorities’ views before proceeding.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I warmly embrace my noble friend—in a metaphorical sense, he will be pleased to know—for adopting in Amendment 14 and others what was in my amendment in Committee, which is why I have appended my name to his Amendment 14. I congratulate him on moving in this regard and listening to the concerns expressed in this House so forcefully by myself and the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, and as drafted for me and briefed to me by the Law Society of Scotland.
By the same token, I urge the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, and the co-signers of Amendment 15 and others in this group not to press them. I would be interested to know the provenance of, and thinking behind, Amendment 15 and the others, because I have not picked up on any move, certainly from the Scottish Government and Parliament, to seek consent in this regard. I would be interested to know why the noble Baroness is going to press this when the Government have gone so far to meet the concerns expressed by the Law Society of Scotland and others in Committee. If we do not welcome and congratulate the Government and this Minister when they move as far as they have, it puts down a poor marker for future amendments to this Bill and others on these matters.
My noble friend has said that Amendments 18, 32 and 43 in his view are unnecessary. I think that Amendment 18 is paralleled by and complementary to his own amendment—government Amendment 19. I think that Amendment 32 is also paralleled by his Amendment 36 and his Amendment 35, which I have also signed. Amendment 43, in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, I think is also complemented and paralleled by his Amendment 45, for which I am extremely grateful; I would like to pay tribute handsomely to my noble friend for moving in this regard.
I do have a hesitation as to why my noble friend has not accepted Amendments 26 and 28 in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock. They are actually seeking to consult in much the same way as an earlier clause that my noble friend has moved and agreed—which is extremely welcome—but, if my understanding is correct, he has not agreed to move in regard to Clause 12 to consult with the devolved Administrations before preparing guidance under Clause 12. I may be mistaken—in which case, I would be grateful if my noble friend would correct me.
I would also like to warmly welcome government Amendment 29. I would like to take this opportunity to commend the spirit of inclusion shown by my noble friend and the Government on this occasion to commit to obliging the Secretary of State to carry out a review of the use of Part 1 amendment powers and, in that regard, his commitment to consult the devolved Administrations. I wish to warmly commend his movement in that regard.
I would perhaps like to nudge my noble friend also to accept Amendments 26 and 28 as being on the same page as his own thinking. I repeat that I do hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, and the other co-signers of Amendment 15 and others will take this opportunity to withdraw or not move their amendments, given that the Government have moved as far as they have on this consultation, to which they are now committed. So I do not beg to move.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB) [V]
My Lords, I also welcome the Government’s amendments in this group and the speech of the Minister. If I may, I will try to answer the concern just expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. I think it is fair to say that some of us fear that the Government might be tempted to try to overturn the amendments of the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, in the other place, and so we would like the House to fully consider all the amendments in this group that have been tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, and myself.
I would like to speak in favour of Amendments 15, 20, 27, 34 and 46. All of these amendments are based on the same principle: that, when issuing guidance as to the implementation of market access principles, or when seeking to extend or further limit the exceptions to the application of the market access principles, the Government must obtain the consent of the devolved Governments to doing so.
However, we are sensitive to the nervousness of the Government and wish to be helpful by providing clear reassurance in statute of coupling a consent requirement with a limited-time proviso. This states that, should consent not be forthcoming from one or more devolved Governments within a month, the Government may proceed to make the changes or issue the guidance, subject only to the need to make a statement to Parliament as to why this is necessary.
This is not an onerous requirement, and I know that what we have proposed is less than the unqualified requirement for consent that the devolved Governments in both Wales and Scotland would have preferred. But this amendment is a healthy, open compromise which can comprehensively allay the fears of the Government Front Bench as to the risk of the process somehow grinding to a halt should a Scottish or Welsh Minister try to delay. Indeed, our approach, advocated in the slightly different context of appointments to the office for the internal market by the Welsh Government, has been adopted by the Minister in government Amendments 56 and 57, so it seems difficult to see how the Government could object to this.
I therefore hope that the Minister will think again and accept these helpful amendments, rather than put us in a situation where we need to go to a vote.
Baroness Humphreys (LD) [V]
My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendments 26, 27 and 28 in this group, and in so doing I would like to thank noble Lords who tabled the amendments in this group and introduced them so clearly today.
Clause 12 of the Bill provides the Secretary of State with a power to issue statutory guidance about the practical operation and effect of the market access principles for goods. These amendments to the clause highlight what is, of course, a recurring theme in this Bill: the assumption that such decisions will be made by the UK Government, in the guise of the Secretary of State, without any input from the devolved Administrations, dismissing any attempt at building on intergovernmental relationships to come to consensus. It is this assumption and its consequences that I wish to address quite quickly today.
In a recent article published by the Centre on Constitutional Change, Greg Davies of Cardiff University argues that this Bill—and, I would contend, particularly clauses such as Clause 12 and others in this group—represents a failure of soft law and amounts to the introduction of
“a new constitutional settlement by stealth.”
Since the creation of the National Assembly in 1999, our two Governments have used soft-law techniques of intergovernmental political agreements and memoranda of understanding to form and guide the relationship between them. Because soft law relies on mutual trust, good will and co-operation rather than legal enforcement, it can, this article argues,
“be exploited to sidestep more fundamental reform”.
The introduction of this internal market Bill has, I believe, opened the Welsh Government’s eyes to the reality of the weakness of a system that relies on soft law; they themselves have described the Bill as a “new low”. So, in a Bill which will curtail the ability of devolved Governments to regulate products and services within their territories that originate from elsewhere in the UK, Clause 12, and the additional powers it gives the Secretary of State to act in areas of devolved competence, adds insult to injury.
The Welsh Government have no official voice in this Chamber, but they have the voice of many Members who value the devolution settlements and are determined to see the devolved Parliaments flourish and grow. So I am extremely grateful to the noble Lords who have given us the opportunity to debate these three important amendments today, together with other amendments in this group. In these amendments, this House is being asked to reaffirm Parliament’s support for the devolved settlements, to confirm its continued confidence in the soft-law process of building intergovernmental relationships, and to reject the attempts to introduce—and reject being complicit in—what is, in effect, a new constitutional settlement by stealth.
Of course, I welcome Amendments 26 and 28 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, which call for consultation with Ministers in the devolved Governments when issuing guidance relating to Part 1 of the Bill, and Amendment 27, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, which calls for the Secretary of State to obtain the consent of Ministers in the devolved Governments to such guidance. My preference is, of course, for Amendment 27, as it places this Parliament’s commitment to the soft-law process on the face of the Bill and provides for a meaningful outcome to consultation.
I also support Amendments 15, 20, 34 and 46 in this group, which also call for the consent of the devolved Parliaments. In addition, I do welcome the Government’s conversion to consultation in their amendments, but I regret that they really do not go far enough. If the noble Baroness is minded to put any of her amendments, particularly Amendment 15, to the vote, I and my colleagues on these Benches will support it.
Lord Hain (Lab)
My Lords, although I welcome the Minister’s moving of government Amendments 14, 36 and 45, I still wish to speak in support of Amendments 15, 20, 27, 34 and 46, to which I have added my name.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, said, these are modest amendments which are almost painstaking in their attempts to be reasonable. They balance the right of the devolved Governments to be asked for their consent if and when Ministers want to use Henry VIII powers to clamp down still further on the very narrow exceptions to the market access principles, with the right of the UK Parliament to act if it believes that one or more of the devolved Governments are unreasonably delaying or blocking such changes. I am happy to put my name to these amendments, but the fact that they are so modest highlights the parlous state of the union. We are faced with a Government who are so paranoid about the potential threat of a nationalist veto to their plans that they are prepared to provoke the very thing they fear: the collapse of the house of cards which is our so-called current constitution.
The noble Lord, Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield, coined the phrase “the good chaps theory of government” as a description of the way the governance of this country functioned in the absence of a codified constitution. We are faced with a Government who have defenestrated the good chaps with an insurrectionist zeal that makes Robespierre appear a model of restraint. They are unapologetic when found by the Supreme Court to be violating the constitutional rights of Parliament, responding by attacking the judiciary; they use constructive dismissal as a routine way of neutering the Civil Service; they give consultancy contracts on a breath-taking scale to their friends and relations without any proper procurement; and they tolerate a Cabinet Minister with the brass neck to remain in one of the highest offices of state after being found to have broken the Ministerial Code by bullying her officials—the list goes on.
If we are to defend devolution and indeed the future viability of the union—which I believe your Lordships’ House has repeatedly shown it wishes to do—we need to compel the Government to respect the rights of the devolved Governments and legislatures. That is why it is so important that the market access principles should be brought into play only if this House and the other place are convinced that a real-world threat has emerged to the internal market which cannot be addressed by the common frameworks. That is why the consent of the devolved institutions to legislative devices which might limit their rights should always be required. Let us be in no doubt that that is precisely what the Bill would do. Even without using the Henry VIII powers to which these consent provisions would apply, the Bill poses a real and present danger to the capacity of the devolved Governments to do what they have been elected to do.
In Committee, many Members raised the issue of single-use plastics. The Welsh Government have consulted on a proposal to ban nine types of these items—a move in line with their recognition of the climate emergency which would be fully possible under EU law, and which is very broadly supported in Wales. Ministers did not give a clear answer as to whether legislation of this sort would be possible if the Bill was enacted. However, in the policy statements published on the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy—BEIS—website last week, the issue is now crystal clear. To quote from one:
“Conversely, non-pricing policies that place an outright ban on goods being sold, for example a ban on single-use plastics, would be caught by mutual recognition. Devolved administrations could introduce a ban on the sale of a particular good, but the ban would only cover local products produced in that part of the UK (or those imported into that territory from outside the UK). Devolved administrations could not enforce that ban against sellers of goods produced in, or imported into, other parts of the UK.”
That is a quote from an official government website. Will the Minister please confirm on the record that this official BEIS advice is accurate, because its implications are pretty serious? If it is, would he explain how this is consistent with his and his colleagues’ previous assertions that the Bill does no more than replace constraints that existed by virtue of our membership of the EU?
The Bill is a tale of two halves. The one half consists of legitimate fears on the part of the devolved institutions that their role and powers are in real jeopardy, and the other of bogus claims that the devolved Parliaments are lying in wait to sabotage the union as the chimes of Big Ben welcome in the New Year. We must face down the half-truths of this unscrupulous and power-hungry Government and defend the rights of the devolved institutions, as these modest amendments seek to do.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op) [V]
My Lords, I apologise for the fact that I am having to appear electronically, rather than be there in person, for logistical reasons. I am sorry not to be able to engage in a bit of banter with the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, for example, and in particular with the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, with whom I have had a few exchanges of interest in the past. Nevertheless, I am very happy to speak today in support of the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, and myself.
These amendments would require—the important word—the UK Government to consult with the devolved Administrations in the areas described. Thankfully, the Government seem to be moving in that direction, as we see from Amendment 14. For once, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, for accepting that. In Amendment 15, my noble friend Lady Hayter on the Opposition Front Bench, and others, add a requirement to seek approval from the devolved Administrations while allowing the UK Government to go ahead if that is not obtained within a month. I will support that amendment if there is a Division on it, because it puts extra pressure on the Government to find agreements. There is in fact no difference in principle between the amendments, but they underline the need for some greater understanding of the nature and the extent of devolution. However, I repeat what others, including the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, said, that we would prefer that the Bill had not seen the light of day and hope the Government and the Commons might think again in the light of their overwhelming defeat here in the Lords.
Meanwhile, we need to consider how these matters are dealt with if the Government do not take our advice and press ahead with the Bill. Some in Scotland, principally the SNP, have described the transfer of responsibilities from the European Union as a “Westminster power grab”. while the UK Government see it as a “power surge” to the devolved Administrations. The fact is that neither is the reality or correct. In truth, we were all willing to see common standards for the whole of the UK decided as part of the European Union common market, with some reservations as appropriate. Now we need to determine how we deal with all these powers in what will effectively be a UK common market.
There is however a constitutional difference between the European Union and the United Kingdom. Whereas the European Union is a federation of sovereign states, as we know, the UK has been a unitary state for centuries but has rightly decided to devolve some powers to three of its constituent parts over the past two decades. I support that and agreed with it, but we are still coming to terms with the new reality, and it is proving more difficult for some than for others.
In areas where there has been devolution of powers, those transferred from the European Union should of course go to the devolved Administrations as long as it can be done without any real distortion of the United Kingdom’s internal market operation. In our amendments, there is provision for them to be consulted, but not, of course, to have a veto, which I believe to be correct. However, there needs to be genuine consultation and, sadly, as my noble friend Lord Hain said, that has not been the case with the current UK Government, who have fuelled resentment and nationalist movements in the three nations.
Finally, I hope that the Minister will spell out in greater detail in his reply the procedures by which the Government intend to consult—the arrangements for consultation; secondly, how they will take account of those consultations within Westminster and Whitehall; and, finally, confirm that they will publish reasons if they are unwilling to accept the views of the devolved Administrations. That is the least that the devolved Administrations can expect, and I hope it will not be too difficult for the UK Government to do so.
I look forward to the rest of the debate and hope that when we get to Amendment 15, if there is a Division, the House of Lords will once again show its good sense.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, first, I thank the Minister for his statement at the beginning of this group, in which he indicated that he had made an error in winding-up last week on Amendment 24, which was in my name and those of the noble Lord, Lord Hain, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Suttie and Lady Bennett of Manor Castle.
I have listened to what the Minister said today. I wrote to him at the weekend about what was said on broadcast TV, which I quote:
“If the employment law requirement were to meet that test, they would not be disapplied because they had discriminatory effect.”
When the Official Report appeared, it stated:
“If the employment law requirement were to meet that test, they would not be disapplied unless they had discriminatory effects.”
The difference between “because” and “unless” leads to direct opposites, and that requires further clarification from the Minister and from the Minister who will hold the meeting. I thank him for indicating that he will facilitate that meeting with the members of both the Human Rights Commission and the Equality Commission in Northern Ireland on this issue.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, stated, if we are not satisfied with the outcome of that meeting—it is important that it takes place prior to Third Reading—I would seek to bring that issue back then. For the purposes of clarification, I think I need to point out that the withdrawal Act 2020 implemented Articles 2 and 13 faithfully. Clauses 5, 6 and 8 of the Bill threaten that implementation by allowing changes to legislation implementing the obligation to keep Northern Ireland in line with equality law in future. It does this by providing that such legislation cannot be challenged on the basis that it is indirectly discriminatory. Until last week, the Government had said that Clauses 5, 6 and 8 did not apply to such legislation. The Minister’s statement today makes it clear that they will apply and may be used to challenge legislation implementing the Article 13 obligation.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, I begin by echoing my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes. I, too, am deeply sorry that he is not with us, as he was in such splendid and rumbustious form last week. All I would say to him is, “Haste you back”, and I hope he will be able to take part again on the Floor of the House very shortly.
I also genuinely thank my noble friend Lord Callanan for tabling and moving Amendment 14. That has shown that he and his ministerial colleagues have listened to what was said in your Lordships' House in Committee, and for that I am sure we are all grateful. My noble friend is exactly right when he says in the United Kingdom Parliament—we are not a federation—the buck stops with Westminster. That is entirely right, but there is deep suspicion in many quarters about the word “consult”, because it can have a variety of meanings and interpretations. “Politely inform” is often what people mean by “consult”. That is why I am particularly attracted to the wording of Amendment 20 in the name of the noble Baronesses, Lady Hayter and Lady Finlay, and the noble Lord, Lord Hain. This requires an explanation. It is entirely proper that the buck stops here. It is entirely proper that the ultimate decision is made in Westminster, given the present structure of our United Kingdom, where, as has been said, certain specific powers are devolved, but ultimate power remains here.
Having said all that, it is important that “consult” means consult—discuss, evaluate and determine the merits before a final decision is made. Therefore, I say this to my noble friend: thank you for coming as far as you have. I in no sense question or impugn his sincerity because I know from experience that he understands the proper meaning of “consultation”, but not everybody in ministerial office does. There have even been recent occasions when advice has been totally jettisoned.
If we are to move forward with the devolved Administrations, it is important that we genuinely consult. I like the idea of giving them time but not allowing them to procrastinate indefinitely; a month seems a good length of time. Then, it is perfectly reasonable that the Westminster Parliament should insist on having its will, but that it explain precisely why. We have got to treat the devolved Administrations as bodies of articulate, well-informed public servants who are trying their best to serve Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Of course, the elephant in the room—we must all be honest enough to admit this—is that, whereas the Governments in Northern Ireland and Wales accept the union of the United Kingdom, in Scotland, they do not. In Scotland, we have a Government who, perfectly honourably—it is an entirely legitimate ambition to have, although I strongly oppose it—have one ultimate aim: to break up the United Kingdom by withdrawing from it. So, it is very important that those of us who believe in the United Kingdom do not succumb to those who want to manipulate themselves out of it, and that we are able, in the interests of the United Kingdom—while there is one—to argue for policies conducive to its continuance.
The balance and wisdom implicit in Amendment 20 commends itself to me. I hope that my noble friend will reflect on that and perhaps say that he will come back at Third Reading with a slightly amplified version of the welcome and, again, genuinely meant and perfectly sincere Amendment 14, because I do not really think we can just leave it at that.
Lord Empey (UUP)
My Lords, the starting point for this group of amendments is, I suppose, that not one of the devolved Administrations has given its consent to this legislation. That is an unfortunate place to be.
However, I welcome the changes that my noble friend the Minister has introduced so far. Listening to the debate, it seems that the gap between the different amendments and the Government’s position is not huge; to be honest, I would have thought it perfectly capable of being bridged. I certainly urge that efforts to ensure it is bridged be pursued, because there is no point in having unnecessary divisions if they can be avoided.
I must say to my noble friend that consultation is in the eye of the beholder. Having been a devolved Minister for just under seven years, I have a little experience of what consultation actually amounts to from time to time. Occasionally, it can be extensive, planned and productive. On other occasions, you read about it in the Daily Mail before you have even got into the office. There is a coherent argument for having a codified process to ensure that consultation happens, and within a framework. We all know that Ministers and departments are sometimes very good at it, but occasionally and, sadly, all too frequently, that is not the case.
I totally accept that no devolved Administration can be permitted to have a veto over what happens in the whole of the United Kingdom, because, as my noble friend Lord Cormack just stated, the buck ultimately stops with the Westminster Parliament; that is totally correct. But one is brought to a position by one’s experience in these matters. What is being asked for in some of these amendments is not unreasonable and would be beneficial. We know that, as has already been referred to, vociferous nationalism is attacking at every opportunity the legitimacy of the United Kingdom. It has been used and abused. So, even though some sections in government may find it a bit tedious, having a structured consultation mechanism is a protection against those who would use it as an anti-unionist argument.
To give an example, due to the action of some of its parties, the Northern Ireland Assembly was unfortunately out of business for three years during the critical Brexit negotiations. We repeatedly asked Ministers what mechanisms they were going to use to consult the people of Northern Ireland about the huge issues arising from those negotiations; indeed, barely a day goes by now without another obstacle and tank trap appearing in the process. We were given assurances that the consultation would be very significant, but I can tell noble Lords that that did not come to pass. It was sporadic and haphazard—it certainly was not structured—and we have ended up today in the most awful mess, which, sadly, we will no doubt return to frequently in the months ahead.
We should not really have to have an argument over these issues because there is a broad level of agreement. I urge my noble friend to harness the different threads of the argument and ensure that we take a united position as we move forward with this legislation, whatever we happen to think of it. Setting out clearly that there must be consultation and that it must be done in a formal, structured way without any devolved Administration being able to frustrate the operation of the UK single market—as it will be referred to—is entirely reasonable. I hope that my noble friend will reflect on that when he sums up.
Lord Naseby (Con)
My Lords, one of the pleasant features of this Bill is the extent to which probing amendments have been put down by all sides. It is clear to me from the consultations we have had between debates and the periodic guidance we have received that, for once—this is not true too often—we have on the Front Bench two Ministers who have tried very hard to find a way forward in a controversial and difficult area. I pay tribute to that; it is particularly reflected in the amendment before us today.
Baroness Clark of Kilwinning (Lab)
My Lords, I support Amendment 15 and the other amendments which would require the UK Government to obtain consent from the devolved institutions.
The big political issue from a Scottish perspective in what we are debating is whether this legislation takes back powers that currently reside with the Scottish Parliament to the UK Parliament without consent. It seems accepted by all involved in this debate that that could be the case; I believe that is what my noble friend Lord Hain was saying, and what the Minister clarified on the first day of Report. Any further information or response the Government could give to clarify that point would be greatly helpful, in terms of the political problems from a Scottish perspective regarding this legislation. There can always be situations where it would be completely appropriate for UK legislation to be enacted covering currently devolved areas, with the consent of all parties involved, but that is not the issue we are debating here.
The suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Empey, of a more detailed framework for consultation was incredibly useful, for all the reasons that have been outlined by noble Lords. As I understand it, the current legislation has no arbitration or other process that would deal with disputes. The genuine belief, which has been confirmed around this House, is that, as currently drafted, this Bill undermines the devolution settlements because it potentially involves areas where the Scottish Parliament currently has competence. There could be situations such as that outlined by my noble friend Lord Hain: for example, the Scottish Parliament currently has the ability to regulate for all goods in Scotland, but this legislation would mean it could regulate only for goods made in Scotland or those imported from abroad, and not those from other parts of the United Kingdom.
If that is not how this Bill, if it becomes an Act, would work in practice, or if it is impossible that that set of circumstances could come about, the Government need to be up front about that and make commitments and guarantees, given the political debate around this legislation. As I said on the previous occasion I spoke on this Bill, the concern in Scotland is that it could lead to a race to the bottom on standards and would enable a situation where the Scottish Parliament cannot legislate on matters that it could at the moment.
The concern is that the Government are effectively seeking, in certain circumstances, to take powers back from the Scottish Parliament. The backdrop is that all parties in Scotland, with the exception of the Conservative Party, have been asking and campaigning for greater powers for the Scottish Parliament, particularly financial powers, for many years. We have had rising support for independence, which gained momentum during the independence referendum in 2014, and a Brexit which is unpopular in Scotland, where there is a high level of awareness that 62% of the people voted remain. I therefore ask the Government to take all that into account.
Lord Morrow (DUP) [V]
My Lords, I will be very brief. I am concerned about Amendments 14 and 15, which both clearly state that:
“Before making regulations under subsection (7) the Secretary of State must”
consult
“the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy”.
I asked myself why it is specifically the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland but not in Wales or Scotland. Can the Minister clarify in winding up why it is specifically the Department for the Economy? The distinction is made in a couple of other parts of the Bill. Surely it is clear, given that the grounds for discrimination cover areas such as animal health and biosecurity, that the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs would have a deep interest in any changes. Thus the restriction to consult only the Department for the Economy is a bit difficult to understand.
I strongly contend that Northern Ireland should be treated in exactly the same way as other regions of the United Kingdom. Would the Minister be good enough to clarify in winding up on this group why it specifically states only the Department for the Economy, and not the Northern Ireland Assembly or other ministries? I will leave it at that.
Lord Liddle (Lab)
My Lords, it is welcome that the Government, in the shape of the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, have got up today and made some concessions to the position articulated in this House in Committee. We all welcome that, but he has not gone far enough. In Amendment 15 in particular, what he describes as imposing additional processes on government would actually be very valuable—particularly in the present political context, in which the Government have thrown a lot of doubt on their commitment to the devolution settlement.
In that context, I endorse the speech of my new Labour colleague, my noble friend Lady Clark. A serious political crisis is looming on the devolution question and, in everything we do, we have to behave with enormous sensitivity to the fact that that is a realistic prospect before us. Therefore, I do not see Amendment 15 as nitpicking, in the way that the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, described it; I see it as strengthening the principle that the Government have already conceded.
As a federalist and someone who believes in a federal Britain, I believe that this is an inadequate response to the devolution problem. I rather agree with the noble Lord, Lord Empey, when he says that we should have an arrangement where none of the four nations of Britain can veto a proposal that the other three agree with. I do not believe that England can always exercise that veto through the United Kingdom Parliament—that is what we have to change. If we are to keep the United Kingdom together, I believe that we have to think of new arrangements where decisions are made by a United Kingdom council that properly represents the nations, and, I hope, the regions and cities of England as well. That is a personal point about where I think we should be going.
Therefore, I do not see this as a particularly radical amendment that will address the present growing concerns about the devolution settlement. None the less, it is a sensible amendment, which I support, and I hope very much that my Front-Bench colleague, my noble friend Lady Hayter, will divide the House on it, unless we hear in the Minister’s response that the Government will make a significant move in its direction.
It seems to me that the merit of this amendment is that, by saying that the Secretary of State “must” seek consent, it puts on the face of the Bill the argument that disagreement should be the exception and that we should go into this with all sides—particularly the UK Government—determined to reach consent. Where there is no agreement, to win consent for that decision it is very important that there is a requirement for an explanation of how it is consistent with the devolution settlement, where the principle that the Government have set out is that the devolved Assemblies and Parliaments will have more, not less, powers as a result of withdrawal from the EU. In that explanation, the Government would have to demonstrate why that was so. They have already listened to some extent but I very much hope that they will listen more to what those of us on this side of the House have said, and that the Minister will indicate that he might go further.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
The noble Baroness, Lady Altmann, has withdrawn, so I call the next speaker, the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Bennachie.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD) [V]
My Lords, this has been a very constructive and interesting debate, which I think needs to be developed further.
We have all welcomed that the Government have softened their position in relation to the Bill and to consultation, and I think that that is genuinely the case. Certainly, up until this point, they had given the impression that, although they had produced the Bill in a hurry and not consulted on it, they were going to drive it through without any consideration of amendments. However, I think that they have now become aware of the degree of resistance towards the whole of the Bill and, in particular, towards the implications for devolution.
Lord Callanan (Con)
My Lords, I am sure that noble Lords will be happy to know that I can be brief, because of course I set out the Government’s position on these matters in my opening remarks. However, to summarise, we feel that we have set out a comprehensive package of changes to the delegated powers in the Bill to address many of the concerns that have been raised about the role of the devolved Administrations. Of course, it is always a great regret for me to disappoint the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, but I have to say that on these matters I am able to go no further.
Devolved Administration consultation is now required by legislation prior to any use of the key powers in Parts 1 and 2. The Secretary of State will also be conducting a thorough review of the exercise and effectiveness of each of these powers within five years, which again will require consultation with the devolved Administrations. Our approach will ensure a high degree of transparency and scrutiny and will guarantee devolved Administration involvement whenever the powers are used or, indeed, reviewed. The alternative approaches proposed in the group would, in my view, overcomplicate these very clear commitments.
I shall reply briefly to the questions that were put to me. In response, first, to the noble Lord, Lord Hain, I can confirm that the policy statement he referred to is accurate. With regard to his second question, the design of the Bill is different from the EU single market because the Government’s approach does not simply copy out EU rules, and that means that the constraints under which we operate are different.
The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, asked about the procedure for consultation. The Bill now requires that consultation should occur as a matter of fact before Ministers exercise their delegated powers. As is normal for such legislation, it does not spell out in great detail how this must be achieved, but we will engage with the devolved Administrations as part of the process of normal policy development such as, for example, sharing draft SIs and publications and co-operating on public-facing events wherever that is possible, and then in any case more formally before a decision is made.
The noble Lord, Lord Morrow, asked why we should consult with the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland. I can tell him that the reference to the department is consistent with the precedent of the Northern Ireland devolution settlement. Finally, perhaps I may confirm yet again to the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, that I will urgently seek to facilitate a meeting for her and the interested parties that she requested.
With those commitments and answers to the, I hope that noble Lords will feel able to support the Government’s approach to this matter.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
My Lords, I have received two requests to ask the Minister a short question. They are from the noble Lord, Lord Empey, and the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering.
Lord Empey (UUP)
Briefly, my Lords, a question has been raised in the House on a number of occasions: why are Welsh and Scottish Ministers referred to, but a Northern Ireland department is referred to? The reason is that, since 1921, power is devolved in Northern Ireland to the department, not to the Minister. The role of the Minister is to direct and control the department, but the department can still function without a Minister. It is a quirk that goes back 100 years, but it is there.
The noble Lord, Lord Morrow, made a relevant point. I do not know what the Minister means by “consistent with the devolution settlement”, because nothing in the settlement that I am aware of determines that this particular department is responsible. But, if you want a plural, because “Ministers” are referred to in the plural in Scotland and Wales, the only collective equivalent in Northern Ireland is the Executive—or, to meet the point made by the noble Lord, you could say, “Northern Ireland departments as appropriate”. But the reason for the difference is historic; it is not an error, as some people thought in the past. It is consistent with the fact that powers are devolved to the department and not to the Minister.
Lord Callanan (Con)
I of course thank the noble Lord for his help in answering the question more thoroughly than I did, and I can confirm my understanding that he is correct in what he says.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I am overwhelmed that my noble friend the Minister has accepted Amendment 14. Perhaps I may press him a little more on Amendment 16. If I understood him correctly, he said that it should be for all of the devolved Administrations to publish their responses to a consultation. I would beg to differ. It would be much better for all concerned, including myself, to find in one location on a national Westminster-based government website all the responses that have been published.
He did not comment—I would be grateful if he would—on why he would feel unable to give reasons for any decisions reached. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, who has also signed Amendment 16. Is there any problem the Government would have in giving reasons for any decisions if they were not prepared to accept the responses to the consultations from the devolved Administrations?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I will write to the noble Baroness with further information on that point.
“(8A) Before making regulations under subsection (7) the Secretary of State must obtain the consent of the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers, and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.(8B) But the Secretary of State may make regulations under subsection (7) without the consent required by subsection (8A) if that consent is not given within the period of one month beginning with the day on which the Secretary of State requests it. (8C) If the Secretary of State makes regulations without the consent required by subsection (8A), the Secretary of State must publish a statement explaining why the Secretary of State has proceeded with making the regulations.”
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
I wish to test the opinion of the House.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
My Lords, I inform the House that, if Amendment 17 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendment 18 because of pre-emption.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
My Lords, I am moving very carefully through these amendments on the grounds that I might get something wrong, but I believe that the next amendment is Amendment 19.
Amendment 19
Lord Callanan
“(4) Before making regulations under subsection (2) the Secretary of State must consult the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require the Secretary of State to consult the devolved administrations before making regulations amending Schedule 1 (which contains exceptions from the rules about market access for goods).
“(3A) Before making regulations under subsection (2) the Secretary of State must obtain the consent of the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers, and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.(3B) But the Secretary of State may make regulations under subsection (2) without the consent required by subsection (3A) if that consent is not given within the period of one month beginning with the day on which the Secretary of State requests it.(3C) If the Secretary of State makes regulations without the consent required by subsection (3A), the Secretary of State must publish a statement explaining why the Secretary of State has proceeded with making the regulations.”
“Exclusions from market access principles: public interest derogations
(1) The United Kingdom market access principles do not apply to, and sections 2(3) and 5(3) do not affect the operation of, any requirements which—(a) pursue a legitimate aim,(b) are a proportionate means of achieving that aim, and(c) are not a disguised restriction on trade.(2) A requirement is considered to pursue a legitimate aim if it makes a contribution to the achievement of—(a) environmental standards and protection,(b) animal welfare,(c) consumer standards, including digital and artificial intelligence privacy rights,(d) employment rights and protections,(e) health and life of humans, animals or plants,(f) cultural expression,(g) regional socio-cultural characteristics, or(h) equality entitlements, rights and protections.(3) A requirement is considered disproportionate if the legitimate aim being pursued in the destination part of the United Kingdom is already achieved to the same or higher extent by requirements in the originating part of the United Kingdom.”
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
My Lords, as Amendment 21 was debated earlier, I should perhaps make it clear that it would leave out Clause 10, as amended, and insert a new clause. The question is that Amendment 21 be agreed to. As many as are of that opinion shall say, “Content,” and to the contrary, “Not content”. I think I heard that the Contents have it, but I can give the House one more chance on this if it would like. No? Then this amendment is agreed to.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
We now move to the group beginning with Amendment 22. I remind noble Lords that Members other than the mover and the Minister may speak only once and that short questions of elucidation are discouraged. Anyone wishing to press this amendment or the other in this group to a Division should make this clear in debate.
Amendment 22
Lord Wigley
“Market access principles: protection of devolved competences
The United Kingdom market access principles do not affect the existing powers of Senedd Cymru, the Scottish Parliament or the Northern Ireland Assembly, with regard to—(a) their existing procurement practices and procedures, or(b) their existing competence to legislate to secure and apply procurement policies which underpin their economic and social strategies.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to ensure that existing policies pursued by the devolved legislatures are not undermined by this Act and aims to prevent uncertainty regarding the legitimacy of procurement rules and regulations currently in force in the devolved territories.
Lord Wigley (PC) [V]
My Lords, Amendment 22 stands in my name and that of my good and noble friend Lord Hain. It follows on fairly naturally from Amendment 21, which we have just passed. The objective of this amendment is to put on the face of the Bill an unequivocal statement that nothing in this Bill, if enacted, will diminish or constrain the devolved Governments from continuing to use their purchasing power to help achieve their economic objectives. As there have been many worries expressed in this Chamber, in the other place, in Cardiff Bay and in Edinburgh about the danger of a clawback of powers to Westminster, I believe that it would be helpful for the devolved Governments if an unequivocal statement along the lines which I propose could be included in the Bill. I know that Ministers in the devolved Governments would welcome such a definitive statement.
I have at earlier stages, and in the context of the Trade Bill, drawn the attention of the House to the way in which successive Welsh Governments—Labour, Labour/Plaid Cymru coalition and Labour/Liberal Democrat coalition—have all regarded the purchasing power of the Welsh Government as a valuable tool in implementing their policies and achieving economic objectives. It would be very strange were that not the case.
When the late Professor Phil Williams and I, with the help of many others, published in 1970—yes, 50 years ago—An Economic Plan for Wales, we identified that a key ingredient in Wales’s economic plight, namely that the GDP per head in Wales was significantly below the UK average, was the fact that activity rates in Wales were some six percentage points below those in England and that therefore a central objective of economic policy in Wales should be to raise those activity rates to the UK average. Over the subsequent three decades, it was an uphill struggle. Only after the establishment of the National Assembly—now our Senedd, of course—were real inroads made. It was only a couple of years ago that, for a brief time, activity rates in Wales were actually higher than the UK average.
I focus on this for a very good reason: that a significant contributory factor to this success was the deliberate strategy pursued by successive Welsh Governments of using their procurement policy to support businesses within Wales. They did this within the constraints of European competition policy, and without lowering standards. When the Assembly was established, between 30% and 35% of goods and services were procured by the Welsh Government from within Wales. By now, the figure is 55% and the target, I understand, is to achieve over 70% procurement from within Wales. As the larger corporations realised this was happening, some of them opened new sales offices in Wales. In due course, this led to their also establishing local suppliers within Wales. This means that, for every pound spent by the Government, there is a multiplier effect within the Welsh economy: more jobs are created and a virtuous circle is established.
Previously, we saw on occasion the total nonsense of purchasing bodies within Wales—central government, local government, our health authorities, universities and colleges—using suppliers many miles distant when a local capability existed. I well recall during my time as an MP a school in north-west Wales having its grass cutting done by a company from England and a hospital getting its sandwiches from a supplier in the Midlands. Now, the green agenda has at long last become more generally recognised as essential for the survival of the human race, and the concept of buying local and eliminating unnecessary product miles has become mainstream. Supporting local economies is now seen as a valid, indeed essential, objective of government policy. Last month, partly as a response to the devastation that Covid could cause to small businesses, a campaign began called Where You Shop Matters, underpinned by Visa. That campaign has gained widespread support in Wales and, hopefully, will do so elsewhere.
Clearly, it will never be possible to source all Welsh government procurement within Wales. We do not produce all the goods in Wales, and where we do, they do not necessarily compete on price, standards or punctual availability. The fact that they are made in Wales certainly should not overrule all other considerations, but, other things being equal or within a tolerable latitude of being so, economic, social and environmental good sense tells us that this is a valid governmental approach.
Let us not pretend that the sourcing of relatively mundane supplies within the local economy is going to solve all our problems; it is not. The truth is that, despite raising employee activity rates, Wales’s GDP per head remains stubbornly near the bottom of the UK league table. To get to the top of that table requires innovation, creativity, investment, enterprise, self-confidence and initiative. However, as we have slowly started to depend more on ourselves and less on others, we have seen those factors move in the right direction. Within a UK single market, Wales needs the latitude to develop its own solutions to what are long-standing psychological, as well as economic, challenges. The last thing we need now is for central government in London to impose dramatic straitjackets on our capability and capacity to help ourselves.
My amendment seeks assurances that the Bill will in no way limit devolved Governments in taking initiatives in their procurement policies to create economic gain that will serve their communities. It seeks to ensure that existing procurement practices and procedures will not be constrained and that the devolved Governments may continue to legislate in a manner that helps to ensure that their procurement policies underpin their economic and social objectives. That has been permissible under European single market rules, and I ask the Minister to confirm that the Bill cannot and will not be used to undermine those policies within the UK internal market. I beg to move.
Baroness Boycott (CB)
My Lords, I agree with many of the noble Lord’s points. I have tabled Amendment 23 and I am very grateful to the noble Lords, Lord Whitty and Lord Randall of Uxbridge, for supporting it. It simply seeks a derogation from market access principles to allow all four nations of the UK to put in place proportionate measures to protect the environment, to support the progressive improvement of environmental standards and to tackle climate change.
The combination of the market access principles in the Bill and the absence of an agreed common framework means that, although different Administrations will not be prevented from introducing different standards, in practice we risk seeing a stifling of innovation and a chilling effect when one nation wants to introduce different, higher environmental standards for a particular good or service, or wants to introduce other measures to tackle climate change. Effectively, we are disincentivising Governments from aiming higher because incoming goods from other parts of the UK implementing lower standards will not have to meet the new ones.
Some examples bring this issue to life. The first is the sale of peat for horticulture, which should not happen anywhere, but if any of the four nations were to decide to ban the sale of peat for horticulture due to its impacts on biodiversity, that nation would still have to sell peat from elsewhere in the UK. A second example is single-use plastic. The Welsh Government are currently proposing to ban the sale of nine single-use plastic products, but we are proposing to ban only three. Given how the mutual recognition principle currently operates, Wales would have to allow the sale of the six additional products if they had been manufactured elsewhere in the UK, which would totally undermine that policy. Thirdly, the Government are planning to phase out the sale of household coal and wet wood next year in England. However, under the mutual recognition principle the sale of both household coal and wet wood from other parts of the UK would carry on in England.
In Committee, the Minister said that protecting the environment and tackling child climate change are vital. The EU provides that in certain circumstances, it is possible to go beyond its commonly agreed standards to protect the environment—for instance, banning particular kinds of packaging, such as metal drink cans. However, the Bill as drafted does not allow for environmental or climate-related exceptions. It provides for exceptions in only a limited range of circumstances, such as to prevent the spread of disease or pests or to authorise the use of a chemical in a particular part of the UK. There also exclusions for fertilisers and pesticides, which were added during the Bill’s passage through the Commons.
My amendment asks for one further, crucial addition to the list of exclusions—for environmental standards and for tackling climate change. I would welcome the Minister’s clarifying the decision-making process. Why was it considered necessary to introduce exclusions in certain policy areas, but not in others such as the environment and climate change? I know that that is a broad brush stroke, but it is still possible to address individual elements, which currently we are not. Surely, there can be no more important time to incentivise ambitious climate and environmental policy.
Lord Hain (Lab)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott. I endorse everything she has said; indeed, her amendment is powerfully put. I shall speak specifically to Amendment 22, tabled by my good friend the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, to which I have added my name. He spoke very eloquently about the need for the amendment, and I shall briefly add one or two points to his compelling speech.
Procurement is clearly devolved to both Scotland and Wales, as is made clear the recent transposition of EU procurement directives being achieved via legislation in the Scottish Parliament. Does the Minister agree that that is indeed as clear-cut as I have stated and believe it to be? It would be helpful to get that on the record.
There is strong interest in the Senedd in improving the impact of procurement on the Welsh economy by encouraging suppliers to have operations located in Wales, creating employment locally and using local supply chains, a point well made by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. That is not discrimination. A company based in Scotland or indeed Lithuania can meet these conditions, but that flexibility is important so that the Welsh Government can continue to ensure that the billions of pounds spent by the public sector each year in Wales through procurement processes creates value in the local economy for a nation that has seen massive deindustrialisation. I still live in my old constituency of Neath, which was a heavy industry and mining constituency. The consequences of deindustrialisation have been huge, dismembering those communities and depriving them of the industrial base and secure jobs they once had. The ability, using the public sector, as the Welsh Labour Government are trying to do, to create and support strong local companies is very important. Such community benefit clauses and approaches were possible even under European law.
I had an informal conversation with the noble Lord, Lord Empey, about Northern Ireland’s position. Of course, Northern Ireland is still subject to the single market and customs union rules—even after the UK leaves the EU—under the Northern Ireland protocol. It is my understanding and belief that under EU law, it is still possible to use procurement in the proactive, positive way that the Welsh Government have done to support local jobs and businesses. Can we be assured that that will not be undermined, or even made illegal, by this centralising Westminster Government?
Procurement can also be used to discourage a race to the bottom—for example, by requiring bidders to have strong employment rights policies and equal opportunity policies in order to qualify for a successful procurement opportunity. It is really important that the devolved Administrations continue to have the opportunities and rights to use procurement in that proactive and creative fashion.
Lord Whitty (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I added my name to the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott. She has made most of the points that I was going to make, so I will be reasonably brief.
If there is any area that should override the assertion of a single UK market, particularly on mutual recognition, it must be the ability of each of the jurisdictions to go faster on our environmental commitments, particularly on the horrendously difficult task of meeting our carbon and greenhouse gas emissions targets and adapting to climate change. That is the key point in this amendment.
Northern Ireland is in a different situation, since it will still be within the single market of the EU, but if, for example, the Welsh or Scottish Governments wished to go faster in limiting carbon emissions or providing alternative energy sources, and that required specific legislation within those areas, then it would be perverse for the provisions of this Bill and UK internal market rules to prevent that. There are other environmental issues—the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, has referred to single-use plastics, which are clogging up many ecological habitats and having an effect on biodiversity and on the oceans—which might perhaps also be areas of exception.
However, my main point is on climate change. At present, the Bill does not recognise the prime importance of going faster—and, if necessary, going faster in one part of the United Kingdom than another—to achieve our climate change aims. At present, the Bill allows legitimate interests for health and pest control. These are important issues, but not as important as climate change. This single-issue amendment ought to be written into the Bill. We need a race to the top in environmental standards, not to enforce a race to stick to the bottom.
The proper functioning of the framework agreements would probably provide some way of resolving any conflict on these issues, but without framework agreements being referred to in this Bill, we need something such as the new clause that we are proposing here. As my noble friend Lord Hain said on the previous amendment, by keeping the Bill as it is, we are acting in a more rigid and top-down way than the EU single market.
Climate change needs a particular reference in this Bill, and this is the easiest way to do it in this section. I strongly support it being written in.
Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con) [V]
My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 23, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, to which I was pleased to add my name. We have just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, who has also signed it, and he put his finger on the case for this amendment, as did the noble Baroness herself.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, said, this amendment would ensure that there is a derogation from the market access principles of mutual recognition and non-discrimination which would allow all four UK nations to put in place proportionate measures to protect the environment and tackle climate change. I echo completely what she and the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, said. We do not need to emphasise the crisis that we are facing with climate change and the environment. It is the big issue of our time.
There are concerns that without this derogation there is a potential for stifling innovation, as there will be no incentive for a nation to set higher environmental standards for goods given that it will have to sell goods from the other three nations which may have been produced to a lower standard. I make no apology for repeating the example of a possible consequence if we do not include this amendment, and I want my noble friend the Minister to put my mind at rest on this.
A potential ban on peat for horticultural purposes is a good example, and something that I have been campaigning on for some time. It is an issue that affects climate change and biodiversity. If any of our four UK nations decided to ban the sale of peat for horticulture due to its impacts on biodiversity and emissions, and to preserve our precious peat bogs, what would that mean for another part of the UK that had, at that time, decided not to go down that line? Can my noble friend confirm that, as I read the Bill as currently drafted, the far-sighted nation that decided to ban peat would still have to sell peat from elsewhere in the UK? I am no expert on this, so can my noble friend the Minister also clarify what the situation was while we were still within the EU? I have often heard that one of the advantages of leaving the EU was being able to do exactly what we wanted.
I use that as an example, but I could have given a number of other similar scenarios, such as single-use plastics. I know well from my time as a special adviser to the previous Prime Minister that the devolved countries do not always move at the same speed on environmental measures. I do not want their ambitions to be stifled, however accidentally.
I do not want to detain your Lordships over this excessively, as we have heard already from several others, but I will just say this: without insurance, I regard this as a very serious flaw in the Bill.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]
My Lords, I speak to Amendment 22, in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Wigley and Lord Hain, and Amendment 23, in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and the noble Lords, Lord Whitty and Lord Randall of Uxbridge. I too will be brief, because those introducing the amendments—which the Green group support—have done a great job of explaining the urgent need for them both.
Amendment 22 deals with public procurement. I spoke quite extensively—for three minutes, anyway—on a statutory instrument on this issue on 16 November, so I will not go on at great length. I will just point out that we have seen many states in Europe make great progress on this issue, and, as the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, set out, Wales has also made significant progress—perhaps the most progress of the nations of the United Kingdom. We have also seen great progress in England for what is known as the Preston model. Public procurement is absolutely crucial for improving the quality of our public health and our environment, for tackling climate change and for supporting small independent businesses. We are setting the model here for what we might hope to be future devolution within England—for Yorkshire, perhaps, and Cornwall, so they should also be able to leap ahead with the resources and powers to do so.
On Amendment 23, as the noble Lord, Lord Randall, just said, it is crucial that no nation in the United Kingdom is held back by others being laggards—and we know which ones that is likely to be. The point of devolution is to allow nations to diverge, to take different paths and to act according to their local circumstances. The noble Lord gave the very good example of peat, something on which we keep hearing promises of action but where we have yet to see the action needed. We hope that we will see real leadership on this and then see the laggards follow.
Lord Empey (UUP)
My Lords, I raise an issue that has already been referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Hain, pertaining to Amendment 22. It came to my attention two weeks ago, and I suspect that many Members are not aware of it, but we need to make ourselves aware very quickly. I attended Grand Committee when we were discussing the SI on common rules for exports. It was introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Grimstone. Bear in mind that the SI dealt with circumstances in which the UK Government could require one of the devolved regions or a company not to export certain items, if they were deemed to be required for the national purpose. For instance, the UK Government could say to a manufacturer of PPE anywhere in the UK, “We need that in the United Kingdom. We cannot let it go abroad.” However, in his opening remarks, the Minister said that the European Commission would exercise these powers in Northern Ireland.
In a different context last week, I asked the noble Lord, Lord True, about this and in what other areas the European Commission would exercise powers. He was unable to answer and said he would write. I put down a Written Question to which I have not yet received a response, but I am trying to get at the significant change taking place to the internal governance of the United Kingdom. In this example, a Minister of the Crown is telling us that a foreign power—which the European Commission will become on 1 January—will exercise powers in a part of the United Kingdom. I do not believe that that SI, and we have had hundreds of them, is the only SI to which this applies. I have asked for research to be undertaken on this, but the question arises in this case specifically, so perhaps the Minister will address it. If he cannot address it today, I would be grateful if he would write and place his response in the Library.
As Northern Ireland will be left in the EU, and subject to the single market and customs union regulations, and state aid rules, where, ultimately, does the power reside? If the procurement rules in the rest of the United Kingdom change, or if they change in the European Union but not in other parts of the United Kingdom, who will ultimately decide on these matters? Public procurement is an EU competence at present. It is not entirely devolved, because competition policy was a reserved matter, as I understand it, but there is a question over who actually decides. In my opinion, the constitution of the United Kingdom is being changed by statutory instrument. Very few people even seem to be aware of all this. Things like this amendment tease out who decides.
The subsequent Amendment 23 has some noble aims and objectives. A question also arises there as, if European Union environmental standards change, how will they be translated into regulations that could affect what happens in Northern Ireland versus Great Britain? There are big questions to be asked here. If the Minister cannot deal with them today, I would be grateful if he would write to me and put the letter in the Library for Members to see. There are changes taking place to our country, and people seem almost to be oblivious to their full extent and what they will mean in the long term.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I speak briefly on both these amendments. I have a lot of sympathy with what the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and co-signatories are pushing in Amendment 23. I presume that, in responding, the Minister will say that the Government are putting forward an economic Bill to create an internal market to compensate for us leaving the internal market of which we have been a member for 46 years.
Amendment 23, like Amendment 21, does not have regard to the one remaining part of the original Article 36 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union that has been left out of Amendment 21. I gather this was an oversight that will be corrected at Third Reading. In my view, the fatal flaw is that any reference to public safety or security has been left out. It is interesting to note that environmental standards and protection of the environment—which, I would say, includes climate change—and many of the other issues in Amendments 21 and 23 are dealt with elsewhere. It is bizarre to leave out any reference to public safety and security when we are in the middle of a pandemic, which is why I could not vote for Amendment 21 at this stage.
I am full of praise for the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, for bringing forward Amendment 22. I presume that the Minister, in responding, will say that it is not this Bill but the Trade Bill that will prevent the Welsh Government or Yorkshire councils from seeking to favour their own produce in public procurement. I am particularly mindful of the work that Deliciouslyorkshire does. Obviously, all food in Yorkshire is delicious, but Deliciouslyorkshire is a marketing organisation that promotes foods made in Yorkshire.
I was very enthusiastic about one of the potential benefits, if there were to be any, of leaving the European Union in that we would be able to source more of our foods locally. Now I understand that, in the global procurement agreement in the Trade Bill, we will have to meet exactly the same threshold as we were required to meet in the European Union public procurement policies and tenders for bids. Am I right, or is the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, right? Will there be opportunities for the Welsh Government and Yorkshire councils to promote and source more of their own foods in, for example, local hospitals, prisons and schools than would otherwise have been the case?
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Non-Afl) [V]
My Lords, I support Amendments 22 and 23, but I shall refer in particular to Amendment 22 in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Wigley and Lord Hain. Again, this is about ensuring that no straitjacket or limit is placed on the procurement practices of devolved Administrations. It is about protecting their functions, with particular reference to the market access principles, which should not override devolution settlements. The noble Lords, Lord Hain and Lord Empey, referred to the situation of Northern Ireland which, in terms of goods for procurement purposes, will be subject to the Northern Ireland protocol and, therefore, the EU.
While I believe there is a need to ensure that there are no borders anywhere, whether in the Irish Sea or on the island of Ireland, notwithstanding that, there are areas of clarification required. Can the Minister say, or perhaps write to us on it at a later stage, whether any procurement practices would apply to the devolved Administration in Northern Ireland which would be subject to UK oversight as per the Bill? Will there be any at all?
Secondly, on the previous group I asked the Minister whether he could provide an update on the interparliamentary Brexit forum, which consisted of representatives of the devolved Administrations and the UK Government. It has not met since September 2019. Maybe he could provide us with an update on when its next meeting is likely to take place.
Further to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, I am reminded of those made by the UK constitution monitoring group. It said that government Ministers have occasionally asserted that the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill is not a constitutional measure at all but is concerned only with economic policy. It would therefore perhaps be better to characterise it as a key building-block in an emerging economic constitution for the UK, post Brexit. However that may be, the group believes that the Bill raises fundamental questions about the governance of the UK following withdrawal from the European Union, in particular whether it will be possible to establish a common understanding of the future role and importance of the devolved institutions in UK governance. Would the Minister like to comment on that statement in his wind-up, and will he assure the House that market access principles will not be used to override the devolution settlement?
Lord Liddle (Lab)
My Lords, I will speak briefly in favour of both these amendments, particularly Amendment 22 on the question of public procurement. When I was Europe adviser in Downing Street, I formed a view that the British authorities—in Whitehall and the Government Legal Service—took a more legalistic approach to implementing the state aid rules, the non-discrimination rules and so on of the European single market than did most other member states. It was quite an effort to get the system to think differently about these questions.
One of the most notable achievements where we thought differently was towards the end of the Labour Government, when my noble friend Lord Adonis, who is not in his place, insisted that the award of a big contract for railway carriages and new trains would go to Hitachi but on condition that it built a plant to construct them in Shildon, County Durham. That was a success in breaking the established orthodoxies; it came rather late in the day, but there we are. Then when my noble friend Lord Mandelson was trying to bring back the concept of industrial policy, also towards the end of the Labour Government, one of the big questions was that of public procurement. I really am not a protectionist; I believe in open markets and that, on the whole, the benefits of free trade are very considerable. But there are circumstances in which public procurement can be used to support local business in a way that is justified.
One of the ways of doing this, of course, is that if you have innovative local firms with a lot of potential to grow, they can easily be squeezed out of the market by competition from big companies which can produce at much cheaper prices. I believe that one reason why we have not been as innovative as we should is that we have not used public procurement to support small and medium-sized enterprises with great potential for growth. This was one of the things we were trying to do towards the end of the Labour Government.
However, I also believe that that kind of policy is difficult to run from London. That makes this kind of public intervention, which is about not spending subsidies on lame ducks but trying to grow the economic potential of a local area, one that is best decided upon as close as possible to that area. That is why it is a terrible mistake to try to limit the powers of the Welsh and Scots on these matters. In fact, I would like to see proper devolution in England so that English authorities could do this outside London. This amendment has my wholehearted support, and I hope that the Government will give it a very considered response.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, I have spoken in several debates on Report about the impact of further restrictions on the scope of the UK’s internal market for goods covered by the market access rules. The plain fact is that, the more that is taken out of the ambit of the rules on mutual recognition and non-discrimination, the more likely it will be that consumer detriment will follow, whether by way of increased costs or reduced choice. With that background, let me turn briefly to the two amendments in this group.
In respect of the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, on procurement, I have to confess that I am not an expert on procurement rules—unlike the noble Lord, Lord Liddle—so I will have to tread carefully not to display the extent of that ignorance. But my instinct is that if we try to take procurement out of the UK’s internal market rules, we will end up harming the UK’s internal market, which would be harmful for all parts of the United Kingdom.
The noble Lord, Lord Wigley, explained what had been happening in Wales in entirely reasonable terms, but it seems a relatively short step from that to applying discrimination in an unreasonable way—and for no reason other than to support nationalist views. I am sure that would not happen in the Welsh Government, but I can think of somewhere else where it might.
In addition, when we talk about benefits for one nation, we have to see the disbenefits to that nation’s businesses if they in turn are locked out from public procurement markets in other parts of the United Kingdom. In particular, we have to understand that Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland export more goods into other parts of the United Kingdom than England does into the other three nations. If we have an internal market that works on parochial or nationalist principles, that is likely in the long run to harm Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, as much as it may appear to give them gains in the short-term, so I do not support his Amendment 22.
I turn briefly to Amendment 23, which I am not sure would work in practice. Paragraph (b) of the proposed new clause refers to
“a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim”—
but the term “legitimate aim” has no definition here. It is defined in Clause 8, but that deals only with indirect discrimination, so I do not think that the amendment would work on its own terms. In addition, we had a good debate on the substance of these issues in the group of amendments that we discussed on the first day of Report, and this amendment does not take us any further than that, so I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, will not press it.
Baroness Randerson (LD) [V]
My Lords, I speak in support of the amendments. The internal market must be based on high environmental standards, as well as supporting progressive improvement, but there is nothing in the Bill to ensure that this happens—hence the amendment. There is no reference to common frameworks to support higher standards, and there is no non-regressive provision to prevent standards falling. Taken together, this could easily lead to a deregulatory race to the bottom, and have a chilling effect on attempts to improve environmental standards.
It is important to remember that improving environmental standards can be controversial in practice, even though there may be no debate about the science behind them. For example, in the early days of the pandemic, the Government very commendably made money available and encouraged councils to put in place new cycle lanes and pedestrianised areas—a policy which we would all agree is good for our health and for the climate. However, many councils found this very difficult to do in practice, and some backed down in the face of fierce opposition from motorists. Wandsworth council, for example, was one of those concerned.
So in this Bill, while devolved Administrations will not be legally prohibited from introducing new environmental standards, under the market access principles, incoming goods from the rest of the UK will not have to meet these new and higher standards—hence fundamentally undermining attempts at improvement. This is in contrast with EU law, which has created coherent shared mechanisms. The EU also allows countries to go beyond commonly agreed standards to protect the environment, such as by banning particular types of packaging. However, there is no possibility of derogation from mutually recognised requirements in the Bill, as envisaged by the Government.
Amendment 23 refers specifically to environmental standards, but the principle also applies to public health and to standards across the board. That undermines efforts at innovation, a key factor in all successful markets. In Committee, the Minister confirmed that exclusions are
“intentionally narrowly drafted, to ensure that there are no unnecessary trade barriers.”—[Official Report, 28/10/20; col. 339.]
Can the Minister explain how the Government have come to the conclusion that setting higher environmental standards or higher standards of public health creates a barrier to trade?
In the other place, the Government created an exclusion for pesticides, which was not initially in the Bill. Can the Minister explain why this is important, but not other environmental factors? Just as over the decades we have become increasingly aware of the dangers of pesticides, so we have been on a similar journey of discovery over plastics. Well over a decade ago, the Welsh Assembly voted to introduce a charge for single-use plastic bags. The reason was that there was concern that they did not break down in the environment, that they lasted for hundreds of years and that animals died after getting tangled up in them. After some protest, England followed, because it saw the success in Wales of that policy. A decade on, we know so much more about plastic and the microscopic particles that we all ingest, either directly from plastic bottles, or indirectly, for example from fish which have themselves ingested particles.
My point is that yesterday’s experiment becomes today’s norm. Wales wants to ban nine different types of single-use plastic next year, and England—via the UK Government, of course, but the Government for England in this case—seems to be thinking of banning only three. If the Bill is passed without amendment, the efforts in Wales to lead in this field will in practice be totally undermined.
I will finish with another example. Next year the UK Government want to ban the sale of house coal in England. This Bill would mean coal from Wales could still be sold in England and would thus undermine standards that the Government wish to set for England. It is important to remember that what applies to one nation applies to another. I support the amendment.
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab) [V]
My Lords, this has been a very interesting debate for a number of reasons, which I shall come back to as I conclude. The noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, as she often does, focused on the key issue in play here: where we best situate the balance in an internal market that is as integrated as we currently have, which needs and respects clearly harmonised rules but also allows for joint processes which allow individual parts of the market to develop at different rates in different places. I think we agree that that is the key issue but differ on where the balance must lie and whether it has to be uniform as much as the Bill seems to suggest it will be.
The main interest in this debate has been in focusing our minds on areas that we have not really touched on in recent groups. We have looked at goods and services and at qualifications and how they might be harmonised, and we are coming back to services and qualifications later in our debates this evening. The points made by the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, about whether current policy might be adapted because of the impact of this Bill when it becomes an Act need an answer, and I would be grateful if the Minister could respond in particular to that point. Is there a particular hook in this Bill that will cause difficulties across the devolved authorities?
Secondly, on the point made by my noble friend Lord Hain, could it have an adverse effect on current processes so that, for instance, we would lose the local benefit policies to which he referred? Thirdly, on the point raised by my noble friend Lord Liddle, if there are good and valuable initiatives on local growth and support for sectors that are perhaps subsets of the national economy that are appropriate and best organised and run from a local point of view, how will they be affected by the way in which the Bill imposes a straitjacket on the various initiatives that we want to see come forward? I look forward to hearing from the Minister.
Lord Callanan (Con)
My Lords, as the Government set out in Committee, we intend to consult shortly and deliver measures on procurement through a wider package of procurement reform. The aim is for primary legislation to be made in the second Session. Therefore, I hope that this will offer some reassurance to noble Lords that this amendment is unnecessary, because the market access principles will not typically operate in the area of public procurement, as they are about how business is regulated. The procurement rules cover how public authorities carry out their procurement activities. Therefore, I reassure the noble Lords, Lord Wigley and Lord Liddle, the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, and others that there will be no impact on public procurement.
Turning to Amendment 23, we have obviously had these debates before; in fact, I recall having them during the passage of the various Brexit Bills with many of the same speakers. As we explained on previous occasions, the exclusions we have drafted for goods in Schedule 1 are narrow and tightly defined to protect the functioning of important policy areas. This protects the ability of the devolved Administrations and the UK Government to preserve the proper functioning of important policy areas, while at the same time avoiding any harmful or costly barriers to trade within the UK internal market.
More generally, I understand that this amendment is designed to strengthen the devolved Administrations’ ability to take different approaches to public policy related to aspects of the environment. We have made it clear that the Bill contains derogations for the protection of the life of humans, animals and plants, which aligns with protection of the environment in many cases.
Secondly, the Government support and respect the devolved Administrations’ right to set policy in their areas of devolved competence. The Government also recognise the benefits of locally targeted policy and the potential for policy innovation. For example, on the environment, between 2018 and 2019 the UK nations all introduced a ban on microbeads in rinse-off personal care products, working together to take a landmark step in the fight against plastic waste. There is no reason why the provisions in this Bill would hinder similar collaborative initiatives.
However, it is important to acknowledge the unprecedented and significant flow of powers to the devolved Administrations, as well as the incoming ability of the UK legislatures to create new policy in areas previously overseen by the EU. This Bill aims only to ensure frictionless trade, movement and investment between all nations of the UK. The policies that different parts of the UK choose to pursue in future is a matter for each Administration.
A number of noble Lords, including the noble Baronesses, Lady Boycott and Lady Randerson, raised yet again the sale of coal across the English-Welsh border, and my noble friend Lord Randall introduced the new issue of peat. The same thing applies in both cases: there is a clear distinction between sale and use. Under mutual recognition, the use of coal or, indeed, peat—it is probably a form of coal, is it not?—could be banned, regardless of its origin in the UK. Requirements related to the use of goods are not within the scope of the mutual recognition principle. If the requirement instead relates specifically to the sale of coal or peat, the interaction with mutual recognition is slightly more complex and depends on whether the requirement in question counts as a relevant requirement for the purposes of mutual recognition. Broadly speaking, mutual recognition captures requirements that are intrinsic to the good itself, such as requirements for the composition of the good, whereas non-discrimination captures, among other things, requirements for the circumstances or manner in which a good can be sold. I clarified these matters in detail in a letter to the noble Lords, Lord Purvis and Lord Fox; it is in the House Library, I think, if Members require further details.
My noble friend Lord Randall asked me about the situation in the EU and whether we could ban the sale and use of such things. As noble Lords know, the machinery in the EU is wholly different: for example, there are technical notification requirements through which a member state may be delayed in implementing its legislation; or, indeed, the European Commission may step in and open negotiations on a harmonising measure. Any derogation applied by a member state is open to challenge, of course; the Scottish Government had to fight very hard to get their minimum unit alcohol pricing accepted.
The system established under this Bill is different. Pricing and other manner of sale requirements are totally out of scope. Furthermore, requirements governing how a consumer can use a good that may originally have been caught by Article 34 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union are also totally out of scope.
The noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, asked whether the Bill is a threat to devolution. No: the proposals are designed to ensure that devolution can continue to work for everyone. All devolved policy areas will stay devolved. The proposals ensure only that there are no new barriers to UK internal trade.
The noble Baroness also asked about the Interparliamentary Forum on Brexit. Of course, the clue is in the name: it is an interparliamentary forum. Such decisions are for the legislatures rather than the UK Government to take forward directly, so it is not my place to comment on that.
For all the reasons I have set out, I hope the noble Lord feels able to withdraw his amendment.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
I have received requests to ask short questions from the noble Lords, Lord Purvis of Tweed and Lord Randall of Uxbridge. I call the noble Lord, Lord Purvis.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, I am grateful for what the Minister said in referring to the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and to his correspondence with my noble friend Lord Fox and me.
I consulted the House of Lords Library on how the Minister’s letter referring to the sale of coal—not its use—interacts with the Air Quality (Domestic Solid Fuels Standards) (England) Regulations, which this House passed on 7 October and which are the governing legislation. The regulations specifically ban the supply and sale of coal and wet logs in England. One concern is that the Bill would not ban such sales if the goods originated in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, where bans are not in place. That is clear; in fact, the Minister’s letter confirmed that this issue falls within the scope of mutual recognition. In addition, the other terms of the regulations bring this issue within the scope of indirect discrimination.
However, more concerning is that the regulations have been made but are not yet in effect—they come into effect on 1 May 2021—so the Bill will take effect before them. That is a requirement under this legislation, so the regulations the House passed banning the sale of coal and wet logs in England will have no effect because they are now within the scope of the Bill. Clause 5(3) states:
“A relevant requirement … is of no effect”.
Can the Minister clarify that, regardless of whether this is allowed or not, the ban in England will have no effect because of this legislation?
Lord Callanan (Con)
Again, it is about the difference between sale and use. England can proceed to ban a sale in England but if the sale is allowed in Wales, it could still take place under the mutual recognition principle; but, presumably, use would be prohibited. My letter explains this in great detail.
Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con) [V]
I do not want to labour the point, but I am a little dense on this issue. As I understand it, my noble friend is saying that you could ban the use but not the sale of coal or peat, which is my particular interest. I wonder how that will be affected. I am sorry to labour this point—I am sure my noble friend has lots more important things to discuss—but I would be grateful for any elucidation he can give.
Lord Callanan (Con)
My noble friend is essentially right, but it would depend on whether it was legal for the good to be sold in the other nations of the United Kingdom. Again, the difference between sale and use is the important distinction here.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
I call the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, to conclude the debate.
Lord Wigley (PC) [V]
My Lords, first, I thank the dozen or so noble Lords who participated in this debate, which was very focused and has raised a number of issues that will need to be taken further. I was grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, for introducing her amendment, many parts of which overlap with mine; I certainly support her amendment in its own right, irrespective of how it interplays with mine. I am sure that she and other colleagues will accept the principle of product miles being an important element in the consideration of environmental and economic policy.
I was taken by the references the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, made to regional policy in England. This was touched on by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, as well. That is absolutely valid, because circumstances vary from area to area, certainly between the south-east and the north of England, and between other areas. Where there are different circumstances one needs different policies and mechanisms of government that can deliver those policies in line with the areas’ requirements.
Therefore, in advocating these powers for the three devolved nations, I also accept entirely the argument that there should be an ability to fine tune policy for the regions in England. It is for those regions to stand up and be counted, and to demand the powers to do so. After all, the facility in Wales of having our own Government has enabled us to take new initiatives that have helped to solve some problems—not all of them, but some of them. The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, whose support and that of the Green group I welcome for both amendments, has underlined on a number of occasions the need for there to be devolution to the regions of England.
I listened carefully to the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, in particular, who raised a question that I do not think has been fully answered by the Minister regarding how the use of orders might be undertaken in Northern Ireland. That leads me on to the question, in responding to the Minster’s argument that there will be a separate policy statement on procurement reform, of whether that new policy and the legislation associated with it will be driven through by statutory instrument. We might be in a position where Wales and Scotland could, like Northern Ireland but for different reasons, be subject to that sort of policy.
What I want from the Minister before I conclude this short debate is some assurance that, in drawing up the consultation and procurement proposals he has in mind for a later stage, that will not go through the back door, which he is not admitting to doing through the front door in this Bill. I would be grateful if he could respond specifically on that question: that the procurement reform will not undermine the thrust of the argument we have had in the debate. I would be grateful for his comments on that before I conclude.
Lord Callanan (Con)
The Government intend to deliver measures on procurement through a wider package of procurement reform. The aim is for primary legislation to be made in the second Session, as I said in my answer. I hope that is enough reassurance for the noble Lord.
Lord Wigley (PC) [V]
I am grateful to the Minister for clarifying that this will happen in the second Session, but I very much hope that it will not open a totally different view of the devolved competencies and the balance of powers needed not only between the three devolved nations, but regionally in England. I hope that that can be given greater thought.
I will not press the amendment, but I believe that the approach encapsulated in it can be combined with some of the other amendments we have already passed that will be part of the revised Bill that goes back to the House of Commons. If that is the case, there may be opportunities for Welsh MPs to pick up this matter in the House of Commons so that we can come back to it again when we consider how the House of Commons responded to the Bill as it finds it. Having said that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Judge
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment is consequential on the removal of Part 5 (Northern Ireland Protocol) at Committee Stage.
Lord Judge (CB) [V]
My Lords, Amendment 25 and the other amendments in the group are consequential on the amendments made in Committee when Part 5 was removed. To give your Lordships a simple example, Amendment 25 concerns Clause 11(8), which says:
“In this section ‘qualifying Northern Ireland goods’ has the same meaning as in section 43.”
Clause 43 has now gone and the provision is therefore meaningless. The fact of the matter is that the remaining amendments relate to provisions in the Bill that are absent of content now that the link formerly with Part 5 has been removed. I beg to move.
“(4A) Before issuing, revising or withdrawing any guidance under subsection (4), the Secretary of State must obtain the consent of the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.(4B) But the Secretary of State may issue, revise or withdraw any guidance without the consent required by subsection (4A) if that consent is not given within the period of one month beginning with the day on which the Secretary of State requests it.(4C) If the Secretary of State makes regulations without the consent required by subsection (4A), the Secretary of State must publish a statement explaining why the Secretary of State has proceeded with making the regulations.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that the Secretary of State must consult with the devolved administrations before revising or withdrawing guidance under Clause 12.
Lord Callanan
“Duty to review the use of Part 1 amendment powers
(1) In this section “the Part 1 amendment powers” are the powers conferred by sections 6(5), 8(7) and 10(2) (powers to amend certain provisions of Part 1).(2) The Secretary of State must, during the permitted period—(a) carry out a review of any use that has been made of the Part 1 amendment powers,(b) prepare a report of the review, and(c) lay a copy of the report before Parliament. (3) In carrying out the review the Secretary of State must—(a) consult the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland;(b) consider any relevant reports made, or advice given, by the Competition and Markets Authority under Part 4; and(c) assess the impact and effectiveness of any changes made under the Part 1 amendment powers.(4) The permitted period is the period beginning with the third anniversary of the passing of this Act and ending with the fifth anniversary.(5) If any Part 1 amendment power has not been used by the time the review is carried out, this section has effect—(a) as if the report required by subsection (2), so far as relating to that power, is a report containing—(i) a statement to the effect that the power has not been used since it came into force, and(ii) such other information relating to that statement as the Secretary of State considers it appropriate to give, and(b) as if the requirements of subsection (3) did not apply in relation to that power.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause would require the Secretary of State to carry out a review of, and to lay a report to Parliament about, the use made of the amendment powers in Part 1. The review cannot start within three years of Royal Assent, and the steps required would need to be completed within five years.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Lexden) (Con)
My Lords, we now come to the group consisting of Amendment 30. I remind noble Lords that Members other than the mover and the Minister may speak only once, and that short questions of elucidation are discouraged. Anyone wishing to press this amendment to a Division should make that clear in the debate.
Clause 16: Services: overview
Amendment 30
Baroness Neville-Rolfe
Member’s explanatory statement
This probing amendment is intended to clarify the extent to which the Government has considered how the provisions of the bill in respect of services will work in practice.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
My Lords, I seek clarification on the use of Clause 16 on services, on which hang the plentiful exclusions in Clause 17 and Schedule 2, and the related operation of mutual recognition, and of direct and indirect discrimination for services. I spoke to the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, in Committee but her concerns have been met by the interests of consumers being added to the objectives of the CMA in implementing this legislation by the Government’s judicious amendment to Clause 29, which we will touch on later, so I return to the charge alone. I refer to my interests in the register because of my involvement now and historically in various businesses, although I am not sure where their interests would lie.
The Government’s concession does not help to answer my questions about services, which are about the practical application of the services clauses. This is important because services make up over 80% of GDP, although I note that a large chunk—financial services, health and social services, legal services, transport, audio-visual and some others—are excluded from the reach of some or other of the clauses in Part 2. In a digital world, services are increasingly attached to goods, such as cars, white goods and smartphones, so the distinction between goods and services is also now blurred. Many service businesses sit outside London, including in the former red wall seats, and millions of them are small businesses—the sector closest to my heart for its innovation, dynamism and espousal of family values.
Services are at the heart of our economic success—it probably all dates back to the time when Napoleon accused us of being a nation of shopkeepers. However, they are also a mystery and ill understood, as I know from the excellent work we do on the EU Services Sub-Committee, of which I am honoured to be a member. Moreover, if you google services you find yourself lost between various motorway service stations and public services such as the NHS. It is our duty as a House to try to shine some light on this potentially confusing new area of law on services in the internal market.
Unfortunately, I do not really understand what Clause 16 and its associates are intended to achieve. I do not think I am alone in this. The Minister talked in Committee of the value of the non-discrimination rule and said that it is
“a fundamental safeguard for businesses, ensuring that there is equal opportunity for companies trading in the UK, regardless of where in the UK the business is based.”—[Official Report, 28/10/20; col. 357.]
But then there are exclusions on a major scale, suggesting that millions of businesses, and perhaps non-business entities, will not benefit from this principle.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for moving this amendment and giving us the opportunity to have a general debate on Clause 16. I will take this opportunity to ask my noble friend if he could elaborate a little on the background to this clause.
I understand that, in their consultation, the Government wrote:
“the UK Government’s proposals are an adaptation of existing rules in the Provision of Services Regulations 2009 which contain regulations on mutual recognition and non-discrimination. Rules included in the UK Internal Market Bill will look to retain the effect of the Provision of Services Regulations”.
I am sure my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe was being very honest when she said that this is not clear and that she does not entirely understand the background to it. I do not think that she is alone. Against that background, is it entirely fair to have only given businesses the opportunity to consult on these provisions for one month? My understanding was that the normal consultation period is at least two, if not three, months, and I wondered why the consultation on these provisions was restricted to four weeks.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD) [V]
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, for drawing this clause to our attention, and I agree with the comments that have been made. In particular, I agree with the question about how you distinguish between goods and services when, nowadays, many things are never sold but rather licensed or rented and must sit either with one foot in each camp or, possibly, goods become services and vice versa.
Other confusions also arise around things that originally can be excluded but then are not when there is a substantive change to their regulation. There was some discussion, in which I was not involved, on this in Committee. What constitutes a substantive change? If you have authorisation requirements and a list of 10 things, does it mean that five have to be changed or does it mean a significant change to one? If you had to add on another one because there are some changes in circumstances, who is to know whether it is then out or in?
There are certainly a lot of things that are not yet clear and, if it does—as the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, has said—interfere with our services, which are the majority of our trade, then we will be in a very difficult situation. I would welcome further clarification, or indeed amendments, to make matters clearer. I am not sure whether removing the clause actually helps because the knock-on effect elsewhere would of course be substantial, but I think that there is something that needs to be fixed.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, I am glad that my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe’s Amendment 30 is only a probing amendment. I very strongly believe that the UK’s internal market will be more robust as a result of this Bill and that it needs to cover all aspects of trade and professional activity occurring between the four parts of the United Kingdom.
However, like my noble friend, I have been struggling to work out just how important Part 2 is to businesses throughout the UK at the moment, and I also understand that there is relatively little current data on trade in services across the four nations. Given the exemptions that will apply to Part 2, the Government presumably do not think that the Bill will have very much real-world impact, at least in the short to medium term. I can see that it may be necessary to protect service providers in the future, if one or more of the devolved nations chooses to make it difficult for out-of-nation services providers, and, to that extent, I can see why we may well need Part 2 of this Bill. It would be good to hear from the Minister what he sees as the biggest problems that this Bill is trying to tackle.
Lord Naseby (Con)
My Lords, I think the House should be very grateful to my noble friend for putting this probing amendment down. All of us who have worked in the services industry, as I did before going to the other place, understand it very well. However, despite this, it is very difficult to comply with this part of the Bill.
The underlying problems I have are that, first, the services industry is a real growth market for the UK and shows every sign of continuing to be so. We must be very careful not to undermine it. I note my noble friend’s mention of consultation, which I am a great believer in; I have probably spoken about it on more amendments than anybody else. At any rate, consultation of only one month is not acceptable in any industry, particularly not at this crucial point.
I have two technical questions, having read and thought about this. First, what happens to those service industries that have no regulator, which would be a fair number of them? Sometimes they are in a licensed area, and sometimes they are not in any particular area, so it is not clear to me what happens to them. Secondly, will the register, when it appears, automatically approve every existing business in the services industry and transfer them across? If not, is there to be an appeal mechanism? Again, I ask these questions on a probing basis and look forward to my noble friend giving us some guidance.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, it is very telling that three of the Minister’s noble friends were seeking clarification as to the purpose of this part of the Bill. The fact that answers are still being sought on Report in the House of Lords should be quite worrying for the Government. The noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, is clearly an optimistic person. She believes that there are good reasons and it is just that, at this late stage of the legislation, the Government have not said what they are. We will give the Minister another chance to explain, in clear terms, what these good reasons are, and I wish the noble Baroness luck in trying to find out.
I also agree with the comments made about the grey area of businesses and people who are service providers and sellers of goods in the 21st-century economy. As the noble Baroness said, the previous reports of her committee show that a colossal part of the UK economy now sells goods and associated services. As my noble friend said, it is now commonplace for a huge enterprise such as Rolls-Royce to provide engine services but to retain the good and sell the service of providing that engine to many other markets; or, in effect, to provide generators on leasehold for UK engineering. That is just one example; there are many others, such as the sale of cars to many different households.
If a good is sold but the service is provided by the business enterprise, which part of this legislation will take precedence? If there is a dispute regarding a person who is selling a good that can be sold only if it is part of a service provision, what takes priority in this legislation? Is it the service component or the good component? Regarding those operating in other areas, be it creative services or other key areas, what legislative requirement would be considered first if there is going to be a restriction? We already know that there have been problems within the part of the legislation dealing with services. The next group of amendments, on teaching, illustrates that—the Government have had to clarify the position on education services. I am glad they have, to an extent; that is welcome.
The provision of water services brought into sharp focus the distinction between goods and services. When we raised in Committee the fact that Wales and Scotland operate under a different legislative model for the provision of water services, the Minister kindly wrote to me saying that the distinction in the legislation is between water services that are connected with an infrastructure and those that are not. How does that distinction come about in reality under Part 2? If Scottish Water, a service company that has one shareholder—the Minister—and the infrastructure of which is owned by the Minister, seeks to deliver different services in the future, that will come under the scope of this legislation. It is exactly the same enterprise and the same entity, but if he wanted to sell the infrastructure, that is excluded. I simply do not understand that. The Minister said in his correspondence to me that the question of whether the process needs to be extended is being looked at actively. The question is: when the Government have finished the process of looking at the areas to exempt, what will be left? That was the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes. What are the problem areas the Government are seeking to identify?
I turn to an issue that has not been addressed sufficiently in Committee. I asked the Minister why the legislation excluded the Isle of Man from consideration as part of the UK for goods but not services. Under the Bill, any services provided from the Isle of Man are considered to be within the United Kingdom; goods sold from the Isle of Man are not. We all know that service provision from the Isle of Man is huge—financial services, et cetera. That is no surprise, because if you are a service provider who wants to operate in a part of these islands that has no corporation tax and a wholly different set of beneficial conditions for your business, why would you not want to be based in the Isle of Man? If the Isle of Man is considered to be covered by this legislation, why have the Government brought forward amendments for consultation that do not include the Government of the Isle of Man? If services being provided from the Isle of Man fall within the scope of this legislation, there is a clear gap. Why would you not consult the Manx Government regarding any regulations that are going to be put in place?
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab) [V]
My Lords, this has been an interesting debate. It has revealed many gaps in our knowledge and understanding of the Bill, which, perhaps, is very comfortable for the Government. I would go a bit further than some of the previous speakers and say that the Government are making heavy weather of this part of the Bill, not displaying to their best advantage the knowledge and understanding they should have in this area. I presume that the starting point must have been that if there is to be an internal market, it must be regulated so that it works well. It is therefore necessary for the legislation to have regard to our services sector, which, as the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, said, accounts for some 65% of our economy. If that is right and it is such an important part of our economy, why is this Bill so sketchy about it? Do the Government not know much about our services sector? Is it not important that we get that right? The noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, again put her finger on it: is this just a protection against possible future unknowns? If so, does that explain why there is so little in the Bill itself to reflect that?
Others have made these points very well. The noble Lord, Lord Purvis, was right to say that we have to think harder than the Bill does about the way modern companies operate in providing goods. Companies are rarely without a service component, and the Bill does not deal with that bipartisan, hybrid approach. The noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, asked about services that are licensed or rented. In the virtual space of the internet, one is rarely talking about purchase. One is talking about usage, and there is nothing here about intellectual property, copyright or associated interests. What about those companies? Do they get affected by this legislation?
What sort of world are we living in if our Bills cannot embrace the fact that, in the digital world, services are not delivered by companies based in specific parts of the UK? That point was made by a number of speakers. Most operate in more than a single place, and it would be difficult to drill down to a point where the physical geography can be identified—the “brass plate” question that was raised earlier.
At the end of the day, it would be more helpful to the House if the lists given in Schedule 2 did not try to discriminate against services. The services listed in the schedule are not covered by the Bill, and it would be more of a challenge but more interesting for us if the Bill listed the services to which the Bill does apply, thereby making it easier to discuss this issue. I challenge the Minister to write to us before Third Reading with a comprehensive list of the services he believes are caught by this Bill and to explain to us, in simple language that we can understand, the impact the Bill will have if implemented.
Lord Callanan (Con)
I thank my noble friend for tabling this amendment, which seeks to clarify the extent to which we have considered how the provisions of the Bill in respect of services will work in practice. I shall endeavour to do my best to answer my noble friend’s concerns, because I know that she appreciates and promotes just how critical the services sector is to the United Kingdom, and I share that view. It is vital, constituting more than 80% of our GDP and four out of five jobs nationwide.
The principles of mutual recognition and non-discrimination in Part 2 underpin an internal market framework which will limit the emergence of new barriers following the return of powers from the EU. This will support UK businesses trading services in other parts of the UK, and authorities regulating these services. The Bill will complement the existing services regulatory framework while building in certainty for businesses and regulators.
The mutual recognition principle means that businesses authorised to provide services in one part of the United Kingdom will not need to satisfy further authorisation requirements to provide those services in the other parts of the United Kingdom. This principle of mutual recognition applies to authorisation requirements. It does not cover matters such as non-mandatory membership of organisations, which cannot prevent a service provider from offering a service but which might be desirable to join for other reasons.
A similar form of mutual recognition already operates as part of the existing UK-wide regulatory framework for services under the Provision of Services Regulations 2009. Regulators complying with that legislation will already be subject to the principle of mutual recognition. Similarly, the non-discrimination principle is a fundamental safeguard for businesses, ensuring equal opportunity for companies trading in the UK regardless of where in the UK that business is based, from where it provides services or where its staff are based.
As my noble friend Lady McIntosh highlighted, with the non-discrimination provision, regulators have until now had to follow rules in the Provision of Services Regulations 2009 which prevent discrimination towards service providers from other European Economic Area states. These rules will be revoked at the end of the year when the transition period comes to an end, as they will no longer be relevant to the UK’s situation. It is only right that rules that have previously prevented discrimination towards businesses from the other EEA states should now be applied to ensure the continued flow of services across our United Kingdom.
To help provide clarity, Clause 16 sets out a list of requirements and provisions that are neither regulatory nor authorisation requirements and therefore are not covered by the principles in Part 2. First, those requirements dealt with in other parts of the Bill—namely the mutual recognition principle in Part 1, which relates to goods, and provisions covered by Part 3, on professional qualifications—are not within scope of Part 2. This is because it is not desirable for one set of requirements to be subject to several rules from different parts of the Bill.
Secondly, existing requirements are out of scope because Part 2 applies only to new or substantively modified requirements that come into force, or otherwise come into effect, after this section comes into force. However, for the mutual recognition principle only, existing requirements will be brought within scope of the Bill where a corresponding authorisation requirement in another part of the UK introduces a new or substantively changed requirement.
Thirdly, a requirement which applies both to service providers and non-service providers is not in scope of Part 2. This part of the Bill is concerned only with the requirements which seek to regulate service providers and not all requirements which might affect service providers.
Finally, there are administrative requirements on service providers that we consider are reasonable in all circumstances, and therefore they are also not in scope of this part. Such administrative requirements could include, for example, where a service provider may be required to notify a local regulator of their presence, or where they are required to provide proof that they are in fact authorised to provide that service in another part of the UK. These requirements are necessary for regulators to continue operating effectively under the rules in this part, but it is our view that they are limited enough in scope so as not to create any unnecessary barriers to trade.
I can therefore assure my noble friend that the Government have considered carefully how the provisions in Part 2 will work in practice, and that Clause 16 is an essential part of their operation.
My noble friend asked whether penalties apply to businesses that are excluded from the Bill. If a given matter is out of scope of Parts 1 to 3, it is also by definition out of scope of the OIM’s functions and responsibilities.
My noble friend Lady McIntosh raised the four weeks’ consultation, as did a number of other noble Lords. The consultation followed the principles for a government consultation and represented an ambitious plan to engage businesses of all sizes across all four nations, as well as many academic experts and representatives of the devolved Administrations.
My noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe asked also about Schedule 2, which lists a number of services with the aim of reflecting those outside the scope of the Provision of Services Regulations 2009, which is the current services framework. The Government also recognise that it is appropriate for legal services to be excluded from the provisions on the mutual recognition of services to reflect the separate legal systems in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
The noble Lord, Lord Purvis, asked whether service providers from the Isle of Man were subject to the measures in Part 2. The answer is no. Part 2 applies only to businesses and individuals that a have a permanent establishment in the United Kingdom as defined by the Corporation Tax Act 2010, which does not include of the Isle of Man. It is also the case for all Crown dependencies.
The noble Lord also asked when the services principles apply and when the goods principles apply. The services principles apply only where the goods principles do not. Only one set of principles will apply as to a particular requirement.
I hope that I have answered the questions of noble Lords and of my noble friend. I hope that she feels able to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I thank noble Lords for an interesting debate and I am grateful for the support of my noble friend Lady McIntosh, the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, and, of course, my noble friend Lady Noakes, who rightly pointed out the probing nature of this amendment, which I obviously do not seek to press. She also said that it was right that we include the services sector in the internal market, which is obvious from its very scale—a point that she, the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, and the Minister emphasised—I think that it is about 80% of GDP. The Minister was also right to emphasise the value of mutual recognition and the loss of the EU-based services regulations of 2009, which to some extent we are trying to replace.
The single most important thing about the services element of the Bill, in Clause 16, is to understand the Government’s intentions, particularly in view of the minimal nature of consultation in framing it. My noble friend Lord Naseby was right to emphasise the importance and use of consultation. He also asked a question about the proposed registers which I am not sure we got a complete answer to.
The trouble is, we still do not know why these provisions are needed in individual cases—I gave some examples that I did not really get an answer to, such as hairdressers and other businesses—and why they vary from sector to sector. As the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, said, I am an optimist—I have been a strong supporter of the Government on this Bill against the advice of respected friends—but perhaps the Minister can kindly reflect on whether he can do anything further on services, with services now being so linked to goods as we have all agreed, to allay my fears. Some sectors, from property to restaurants, appear to face new regulations, possibly draconian, without much of awareness of it. The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, suggested a letter outlining what was covered within the services sector. Perhaps the Minister could reflect a little further on how we might communicate this and reassure people about the value of these provisions in creating a single market with mutual recognition, which I strongly support. But we need to make sure that people understand what their duties are and that such duties are not overly draconian and will be sensibly enforced. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
I should inform the House that, if Amendment 31 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendments 32 to 35.
Clause 17: Services: exclusions
Amendment 31
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
Amendments 32 and 33 have been pre-empted.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
Amendment 34 has also been pre-empted.
Amendment 34
“(3A) Before making regulations under subsection (3) the Secretary of State must obtain the consent of the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers, and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.(3B) But the Secretary of State may make regulations under subsection (3) without the consent required by subsection (3A) if that consent is not given within the period of one month beginning with the day on which the Secretary of State requests it.(3C) If the Secretary of State makes regulations without the consent required by subsection (3A), the Secretary of State must publish a statement explaining why the Secretary of State has proceeded with making the regulations.”
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
No, you cannot; it has been pre-empted by Amendment 31. I am sorry.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
I think the agreement is that it will stand in its place anyway.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
My advice was that, if Amendment 31 was agreed to, Amendments 32 to 35 would have been pre-empted. That was certainly the legal advice that I read out right at the beginning.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
The issue is that, although the regulations have been taken out—as with my Amendments 15 and 20 that have already gone before, and indeed Amendment 19 in the name of the Minister—the agreement was that the way we deal with them would nevertheless stand. That is why Amendments 15, 19, 20 and 27 were all allowed.
If it has been pre-empted, may I suggest that we vote on it? I gather that the Government will not resist, and I am sure that the clerks can then disallow it should they find that we should not have done it. I beg to move.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
Amendment 35 has been pre-empted.
Lord Callanan
“(5) Before making regulations under subsection (2) the Secretary of State must consult the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require the Secretary of State to consult the devolved administrations before making regulations amending Schedule 2 (which contains exceptions from the rules about market access for services).
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Henig) (Lab)
We come to the group beginning with Amendment 37. I remind noble Lords that Members other than the mover and the Minister may speak only once and that short questions of elucidation are discouraged. Anyone wishing to press this or any other amendment in this group to a Division should make that clear in debate.
Schedule 2: Services exclusions
“Teaching Services | provision of teaching services in schools or colleges” |
This amendment would add the profession of teacher and teaching services to the scope of the exclusions from the Bill, in the same way that the legal professions and legal services are excluded.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]
My Lords, I will also speak to Amendment 50 in my name, which is also signed by the noble Lord, Lord German, to whom I am grateful for his support. Also in this group is Amendment 51, tabled by the Government, for which I thank the Minister. It is clear that the Government were listening during the debate in Committee, and I note that in the letter that the noble Lord circulated this afternoon to interested Peers he acknowledges the representations made by stakeholders on this issue. I can only express my appreciation that we have seen movement from the Government on this. This is also a demonstration of the usefulness of having a House of review.
I wish to thank the General Teaching Council for Scotland, as I did in Committee, for assisting me in the analysis particularly of the differences between the government amendment and those I had tabled. I also note and thank the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, with whom I consulted about this matter, as a former chair of the education committee and a member of the General Teaching Council for Scotland. He empowered me to say that he supports the push to see that the full powers of the General Teaching Council for Scotland are retained. I wish, however, at the moment to retain the possibility of taking Amendments 37 and 50 to a vote, depending on the answers to two questions that I wish to put to the Minister, of which I have given him prior notice.
The first, and perhaps the most crucial one of all, is about the word “school” in the Government’s amendment. I remind noble Lords that government Amendment 51A says that the mutual recognition provisions do not apply to “school teaching”. Could the Government confirm that they intend that this will be interpreted in a broad sense, so that it encapsulates any educational institution in which teaching is delivered? The original amendments, Amendments 37 and 50, refer to the “teaching profession”, which obviously has a potentially broader scope.
I note also that the Minister’s letter circulated to Peers says that the Government have tabled an amendment to remove the teaching profession from the recognition provisions. Clearly, “the teaching profession” and “school teaching” are not necessarily the same thing, and I think it is crucial that we make this very clear. I am not a lawyer, but I doubt that a letter from the Minister to Members of your Lordships’ House has a huge amount of legal standing. I think we need to get on the record precisely what the government amendment means.
The second question is perhaps more technical, and that is a remaining question about the application of the mutual recognition principle and the scope of the exclusions in Schedule 2 Part 1. I seek confirmation from the Minister that the above exemption would not be restricted by the provision in Schedule 2 covering:
“Services provided by a person exercising functions of a public nature or by a person acting on behalf of such a person in connection with the exercise of functions of a public nature”.
Teaching in local authority schools, which would constitute a service provided by a person exercising a public function, would appear to be covered by that. But, obviously, education and teaching extend far beyond that. In particular, what about teaching in independent schools? Teaching is not solely carried out in a public service context, which casts doubt on how the exclusion applies in the context of teaching services as a whole.
Given that the General Teaching Council for Scotland register is not employment based and that the GTCS has no role whatsoever in where a registered teacher ultimately becomes employed—indeed, this often changes over the course of registration—it is important to know that the Government’s intention, and the effect of the law, is to cover all of these elements.
I have focused here particularly on the Scottish case, and I believe the noble Lord, Lord German, will address Welsh issues in particular, but I hope that the Government have also taken full account of the particular situation of Northern Ireland and the teaching profession there.
Finally, I would like to ask a somewhat broader question of the Minister. In Committee, I noted that it would appear that there are also issues potentially with other professions, particularly social work—but there may well be others. I ask the Minister to confirm that the Government have fully consulted with all the professions which may have different arrangements—sometimes long-term, continuing arrangements—in the devolved nations regarding registration or qualification requirements. If the Minister is not able to answer now, perhaps he could write to me about that question.
I note the comments made in the last group by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara. We are, at this stage of the Bill, still left with very considerable uncertainties and concerns and a real lack of clarity, which has to be a worry given the importance of the Bill and these issues and the pressing nature of the deadline approaching us. I beg to move.
Lord German (LD)
My Lords, I rise to support Amendments 37 and 50 and slightly to push the point that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, just mentioned, that the words “teaching profession” appear in a letter which was circulated to colleagues in the House of Lords today but the words “school teaching” are used in the amendment. People who teach in further education colleges are called teachers or lecturers, but teaching is what they do. In fact, sometimes they are called teachers in universities as well. That clarification is needed, but at the moment we clearly have two separate terms. I recognise that the Government have moved in this direction and are thinking about this issue following representations made to them, and I welcome that.
However, there is a problem with the words “school teaching” only. I consulted the Education Workforce Council, which has responsibility for the registration of teachers in Wales. It registers petitioners in seven workforce categories across four settings: schools, further education, work-based learning, and youth work. While there are no minimum qualifications for further education staff in Wales as part of EWC registration at present, that might change. In England, there is no registration system for further education staff or any minimum qualifications. It might therefore be that this is not future-proofed in this legislation, where further education might well become a regulated profession as in other forms of education.
The other issue that comes out of this is the four settings that the Welsh council regulates. I would like to ask the Minister about youth work. If you are a registered professional working in youth and it is requirement for you to be registered if you are to be in this area, is that included in the government amendment which refers to “school teaching”? The definition of “teaching” and “school” is quite wide.
I would like the Minister to have a look at the common framework in this area because there is already a mutual recognition of professional qualifications common framework. I would be grateful if she could update the House on how that common framework is progressing. If it is progressing and it is part of the common framework procedure on which we have already passed an amendment, clearly it will make a substantial change to this section of the Bill as well. The principle of automatic recognition imposed under the Bill may well prevent Welsh Ministers, for example, regulating in future on professionals qualified elsewhere in the UK who have lower qualifications or standards than those which would be required in Wales.
Finally, I turn to an issue which has come out of this discussion. Social care is also an area where there are professions. Social care regulation in Wales is also undertaken by a separate regulator. It is one of its primary functions. Under the Regulation and Inspection of Social Care (Wales) Act 2016, from 2022 a range of social care professions will be mandated by the Welsh Government. In other words, you will not be able to operate as, for example, an adoption service manager, a fostering service manager, a residential family centre manager or an adult care home worker unless you have had your registration approved by Social Care Wales.
Lord Naseby (Con)
My Lords, I have a couple of probing questions. I find the word “school” difficult to work out in terms of what happens on the ground. There are universities, many of which have teachers—some have professors, et cetera—and I do not quite see how you can exclude them, particularly the Open University, where some noble Lords may have taken courses. I have friends who have taken courses at it and, from the evidence of two people I spoke to at the weekend, there are teachers there. As someone who takes an interest in flying, having flown in the RAF, I thought also of flying schools. There are also driving schools. I am not sure whether the Government are anticipating that whole area. I look forward to my noble friend’s response; if she cannot respond this evening, perhaps I could have a note in writing.
Lord Flight (Con)
My Lords, I am not clear what being “excluded” means. I do not know whether other territories are excluded or how far they go up and down the range of teachers. More particularly, what is the reason for having excluded groups? Why should lawyers be excluded? Are any other groups excluded? This area wants a bit of tidying up and further explanation.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, I am grateful to those who have spoken in this debate, because we have all narrowed into one area on which we are seeking some clarification: the distinction between the language in the Minister’s email referring to the teaching profession and that in this amendment, which are not the same.
If the Government’s intention with the amendment is that they wish to exclude the teaching profession from the provisions, that will be universally welcomed. At this stage, therefore, from these Benches I thank the Government for listening to the debate in Committee and for acting, and also for engaging with the various stakeholders, primarily in Scotland and Wales. I am also grateful to the Ministers, the noble Lords, Lord Callanan and Lord True, for listening and acting on meetings that I and my noble friend Lord Fox had with them, at which we raised these matters, on which we had been in correspondence.
That said, some further clarification on specific points would be helpful. As my noble friend Lord German indicated, the reference in the government amendment to the profession of “school teaching” is not really language that is used. It is certainly not used by the General Teaching Council for Scotland in registering teachers, and clearly it is not used in England, although I thought that perhaps it was. I searched “school teaching” on legislation.gov.uk, but, to my knowledge, it is not used in any legislation, although I am sure that officials in the Box can clarify that for the Minister. It does not seem to be a term, so we might find ourselves inadvertently creating a new term or definition in this legislation. I am sure that this can be tidied up but, if we agree to this amendment, as we will, I will be grateful to know how the Minister intends to do so.
To give an illustration, the General Teaching Council for Scotland registers those who seek to be teachers in primary or secondary education, those who want to be registered as teachers for additional support needs or in named schools only, and, since 2017, college lecturers and those who teach in independent schools. Therefore, in the categories of teaching within the overall teaching profession, at no stage does the term “school teaching” apply.
I will give the Minister an example of why “school teaching” is problematic within the context of Scotland. Innovations that the Scottish Parliament brought in when I served on the Education Committee meant that there is now much more blended learning in Scottish secondary schools. Students who are nearing the end of their time in secondary school can now start to study for further education qualifications on practical courses provided by college lecturers within the school setting. That is very progressive and is working. An inadvertent difficulty might be that we create a false distinction between those who simply teach within a school setting and those who are in the profession of school teaching.
I hope that the Minister will be able to clarify the points that have been raised about the difference between the categories and that she will set out the intention behind the amendment. If it is the intention that the registry bodies—in their functions of carrying out the registration of teachers and in setting standards and qualifications—are excluded, that will be reassuring. I think that that is the intention behind the amendment. I hope that it is, and if the Minister is able to confirm it, that will be reassuring for many of us.
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab) [V]
My Lords, the key word of this debate has been “clarity” and the fact that clarity is required. I think that the Minister needs to get to the Dispatch Box and answer as many of the questions as she can, but I assume that government Amendment 51A is intended to answer the points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. But questions have been raised that do not seem to point in the same direction, so I look forward to hearing from the Dispatch Box that the amendment does what it is required to do. If not, perhaps the Minister will confirm that she will come back at Third Reading with a better version of it, to make sure that the doubt is removed.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
My Lords, I will start with some of those questions, particularly because there was a common theme from the noble Lords, Lord Purvis and Lord German, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, about the definition of teachers and why we have excluded them. By referring to “school teaching”, it is intended that primary and secondary school teachers, as well as teachers in maintained nurseries in England, will be within the scope of the amendment. Where further education teachers are employed to teach in a school, we suggest that they too are likely to be covered by this exclusion. However, it is not intended to cover further or higher education teachers in institutions that are not schools.
The exclusion is worded to refer specifically to school teachers rather than teachers more generally. In answer to my noble friend Lord Naseby, we do not intend to include pilates teachers or flying teachers in the scope of this. The latter is a much wider term that could be interpreted so broadly that it could be difficult to establish what would be within the scope of this exclusion.
In response to the noble Lord, Lord German, on care workers, social care workers are in scope of Part 3 as they are not included in the list of excluded professions. If the competent authority believes that the automatic principle is not appropriate, it can adopt an alternative recognition system.
I shall go back to my speaking notes. I begin by reassuring noble Lords that this Government are committed to maintaining excellent teaching standards across the UK. Given the attention dedicated to the issue in this House and representations from interested parties, we have given further consideration to the status of school teachers in Part 3 of the Bill. As part of this, it is important to note that, under the alternative recognition process in Clause 24, relevant authorities are able to assess individuals’ qualifications and experience on a case-by-case basis and can refuse access to the profession if they do not meet the required standards. This means that relevant authorities in each part of the UK will still be able to set and maintain professional standards, and are able effectively to hold professionals to those standards.
However, having taken into account the representations that have been made and the long history of differences in the regulation of teaching in schools across the UK, the Government have now decided to exclude school teachers from the scope of Clause 22. To this purpose, Amendment 51A seeks to add school teachers to the list of professions excluded from the recognition provisions in Part 3 of the Bill in the same way as legal professions are excluded. As government Amendment 51A meets the intended purposes of Amendment 50, I reassure noble Lords that Amendment 50 is now duplicative and unnecessary.
I shall explain why Amendment 37 is also unnecessary. The amendment would add “teaching services” to the list of services in Schedule 2 that are excluded from the mutual recognition principle in Part 2 of the Bill. However, the amendment does not address the noble Baroness’s concerns. I understand from Committee that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, is concerned that the Bill will allow individuals to teach in a part of the UK even if they do not meet the required standards in that part. However, the recognition of qualifications and the ability to practise a regulated profession such as teaching are wholly governed by Part 3 of the Bill.
Clause 16(5)(b) excludes from the scope of Part 2 provision that limits the ability to practise a profession by reference to qualifications or experience. Additionally, services provided in the exercise of a public function, including education services, are already excluded from the scope of Part 2 by virtue of the entries in Schedule 2 in respect of
“services provided by a person exercising functions of a public nature.”
Most aspects of teaching services are therefore already covered under this public function exclusion from the mutual recognition and non-discrimination principles in Part 2. For example, the exclusion covers most activity carried out within state-funded schools and further education colleges, so they would not be affected by the amendment either. The amendment would therefore have an effect on only a very limited number of service providers.
My noble friend Lord Flight asked, as did the noble Lord, Lord German, why other professions were not excluded. Legal professions, as we know, have been excluded from the Bill’s provisions because they carry out roles that rely on their expertise in the underpinning legal systems, which are different across the UK. School teachers have been excluded after considering the representations on the matter carefully and taking into account the long history of differences in their regulation across the UK, and to put beyond all doubt that teaching regulators will retain control over who can teach in a part of the UK.
So, in answer to the noble Lord, Lord German, the devolved Administrations will still have control over who can have access the profession in their jurisdiction. A relevant authority may consider that automatic recognition is not appropriate for that profession because of a difference in policy environment or specific regulatory needs in that part of the UK. If so, it is possible for it to disapply automatic recognition by putting in place an alternative process to recognition that complies with the principles set out in the Bill.
The noble Lord, Lord German, also asked about common frameworks. We continue to work constructively with the devolved Administrations on developing a common framework. We are working to make sure that any arrangements sit alongside the work to review the regulatory landscape for regulated professions, as set out in the call for evidence on the recognition of professional qualifications and the regulation of professions.
I do hope that I have managed to answer most of the questions, but I will look at Hansard and if there is anything else that I need to reply to I will of course do so in writing. I hope that the Government’s Amendment 51A will have allayed the noble Baroness’s concerns on this matter and that she will feel able to withdraw her amendment.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
My Lords, I have one request to ask a question of the Minister, from the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for her thorough response. When she comes to read Hansard, perhaps she could reflect on the point that the General Teaching Council for Scotland, the regulatory body, now also includes college lecturers. Perhaps she would reflect on the point that it is the regulatory body, rather than the type of teaching that the registers are responsible for. I am sure that there is no intention to have an anomaly, but I would be most grateful if she could look at this.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
I will of course be delighted to do that and I will take the point back to the department.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]
I thank the Minister for her answer and I apologise for not noting the changeover in Front Bench responsibilities.
To be honest, I am not entirely reassured, and I want to put a specific question to the Minister that follows on from what the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed, has just said about further education. The suggestion of Pilates teachers is something of a red herring, or perhaps a straw man or woman. I am not a lawyer, but perhaps a term like “registered teachers” would allow for an arrangement whereby those who are currently covered by the General Teaching Council for Scotland, or indeed those teachers who are covered by the Education Workforce Council in Wales, would be covered by such a term.
I do not think that we have gone into the detail of the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord German, about the common frameworks and how they work with the Bill, which is a question that noble Lords have been wrestling with right through this Bill. I will quote the noble Lord, Lord German, who said that we are trying to “bottom out the detail” of the Bill. I do not think that we are there yet, and the government amendments do not quite get us there.
Before I make a final call on this amendment, perhaps the Minister could say why a term like “registered teachers” would not do the job more clearly and fully than the term “school teachers”.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
We are talking about semantics here. We are trying to be clear that who we intend to exclude from this provision are school teachers working in a school environment, whether or not they come from a higher education college in order to work in that environment. I do not believe that I can go further than what I have said already.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]
I thank the Minister for her answer. I am still not sure that we are where we need to be or that we have dealt with the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord German, regarding youth work and the social care professions. However, I am not sure that pushing a vote on Amendments 37 and 50 would get us to where we need to be. I hope very much that, as the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, said, the Government will look at the lack of clarity and problems that have been exposed in this debate and seek to tidy up the Bill, as the noble Lord, Lord Purvis of Tweed, has said. For the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
We now come to the group beginning with Amendment 39. I remind noble Lords that Members, other than the mover and the Minister, may speak only once and that short questions of elucidation are discouraged. Anyone wishing to press this, or anything else in this group, to a Division should make that clear in debate.
Clause 19: Direct discrimination in the regulation of services
Amendment 39
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment clarifies the meaning of Clause 19(1) regarding the effect of a statutory requirement under Clause 16.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, in moving Amendment 39 I will speak also to Amendment 40, relating to Clauses 19 and 20. The amendments clarify the meaning of Clause 19(1) regarding the effect of a statutory requirement under Clause 16 and a similar provision in Clause 20 on indirect discrimination.
If I understood the Minister correctly, in summing up the debate on the amendment of my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe, he said that the service provider and regulatory requirement were, in his view, deemed limited enough in scope not to cause barriers to trade. I would like to probe and penetrate his thinking further.
The Law Society has drafted—and I am delighted to thank my noble friend Lord Foulkes of Cumnock for supporting these two amendments—the insertion, at the end, that no effect is only
“to the extent that it directly discriminates against the service provider”
in Clause 19, or indirectly in Clause 20.
When this was debated in Committee with earlier amendments, we expressed reservations about the meaning of “no effect” as it lacked clarity. In summing up the debate on Amendments 81 and 84, my noble friend Lord Callanan said:
“In Clause 21, a legislative requirement is one imposed ‘by, or by virtue of, legislation’.”
He went on to say:
“This extends beyond legislation to rules produced by bodies with powers delegated to them in respect of a particular field of regulation, and it may include licences or requirements contained therein. My noble friend’s Amendments 81 and 84 would appear to have the same effect. However, in my view, the term ‘of no effect’ is the more appropriate to apply in respect of a licence or a non-legislative rule.”—[Official Report, 28/10/20; col. 358.]
Having taken note of my noble friend Lord Callanan’s comments, I now seek to clarify that lack of effect would relate only to that element of the regulatory requirement that directly, or in the case of Clause 20, indirectly, discriminates against a service provider. It is hoped that the Government accept this amendment, as it is meant as a helpful clarification of Clause 19, and the related amendment to Clause 20. I beg to move.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op) [V]
My Lords, I hesitate to add to the excellent introduction that—if I may call her this—my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering gave, except for one thing. We are dealing here with, in one case, direct discrimination and, in another, indirect discrimination, and only in these circumstances. Noble Lords will recall that, in a debate last week, as we were vividly reminded by the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie of Downpatrick, the Minister got into a fankle—if I may be excused for using a Scottish word—on the question of discrimination. I hope that he will spell out these two areas carefully, so that the House is clear exactly what the Government think about this.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD) [V]
My Lords, I do not have a great deal to add to what has been said by the previous speakers. It is an unfortunate circumstance that the word “regulation” appears in multi-use in legislative and indeed non-legislative meaning; it can be a set of regulations or an individual regulation in a set. So I understand the concerns raised that it might be possible for regulation, or regulatory requirements, to span both a discriminatory measure and a non-discriminatory measure. Therefore, I think it would be helpful for the wording in Clauses 19(1) and 20(1), which use the slightly ambiguous term “regulatory requirement”, to refine it down, so as to disapply only the discriminatory part. There could be other ways to rework that wording to give the same effect, but it would be useful to put it beyond doubt because the word “regulation” is really rather confusing.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, I have only one element to ask the Minister about; it refers to some questions that were asked in Committee with regards to regulations that have no effect. Is it the entire regulation or the component part of that regulation that would be considered to have no effect? As my noble friend indicated, many regulations are fairly extensive and will have many component parts to them; the Government or the legislation may consider that the direct discrimination part could be only one part. Is it the Government’s intention that the entire regulation would have no effect? Indeed, how would the process be carried out to identify the specific element of that? The questions raised by the Law Society of Scotland and put forward so well by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, justify a very clear response. As we have said previously in Committee, the scope for those seeking legal redress within this legislation is huge, so ensuring as much clarification on this element as possible would be very helpful.
Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab) [V]
My Lords, the general theme here, I suggest, is that we need the Minister to respond very clearly and precisely on this matter. My noble friend Lord Foulkes used the rather nice and elegant Scottish word “fankle” to describe where we are at, suggesting that this needs to be undone. I was going to use the Gaelic word “bùrach”. I suddenly thought that Hansard might have difficulty with it, so I checked it on a handy electronic device close to me—and came up with a rather interesting extension, which I leave with the Minister. You can use the word “bùrach”, which in Gaelic means a “right mess”, but I think a more appropriate term in this case is a “clusterbùrach” which, as the article on my device goes on to say, is
“a Scottish term for a hopelessly intractable mess made by hapless politicians.”
Lord Callanan (Con)
The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, has been very helpful, adding to my knowledge of grammar. The north-east version of that would be “cluster”, followed by a word I cannot use in the House, which would not be “bùrach”. If only I had known, I would have brought my thesaurus along to aid noble Lords in their pursuit of these matters.
These amendments seek to ensure that the drafting of the non-discrimination clauses means that the discriminatory requirement is of no effect only to the extent that the requirement discriminates against the service provider in question. However, I am pleased to tell my noble friend Lady McIntosh that Amendment 39 is already addressed by this clause and is therefore unnecessary. In the case of Amendment 40, as this clause concerns indirect discrimination in the regulation of services, the amendment as drafted would make Clause 20 entirely inoperable and leave indirect discriminatory requirements to take effect.
I start with Amendment 39, which obviously concerns direct discrimination. Direct discrimination is where a regulatory requirement treats a service provider less favourably than other service providers; the reason for that is their connection, or lack of connection, to a certain part of the United Kingdom. Clause 19 already limits the application of these measures—this addresses the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Purvis—so that only the affected service provider may benefit from the requirements having no effect. While I understand my noble friend’s concern, the definition of a regulatory requirement already ensures that only the offending requirement is of no effect. This amendment therefore replicates what is already drafted in Clause 19, so I am sure she will understand that I am unable to accept it.
Turning to Amendment 40, the test for indirect discrimination requires that a requirement is not directly discriminatory, and the amendment would mean that indirectly discriminatory requirements are of no effect only to the extent that they directly discriminate. This would render Clause 20 entirely ineffective. Therefore, I am sure that my noble friend will accept that I cannot accept either of her amendments for the reasons I have set out, and I hope that she will agree to withdraw them.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
I am looking at Clause 19, and I must be being very dense this evening, but I do not see where it already lays out what I am seeking to achieve in Amendment 39. It would be helpful if my noble friend could point me in that direction separately.
I am grateful to all those who have spoken, especially the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, for supporting the arguments in favour of elucidation. I do not think the question of the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, was answered as to whether it relates to an entire regulation or only component parts of it. I am sure he is getting quite used to not having his questions answered on this Bill, so I will not elaborate that point further given the time.
I greatly enjoyed the interchange on various words that could be put in play. I am reminded of what we used to say during the time of a different leader, when we used to call it a right Eton mess, which has another connotation in that regard.
I still believe that there are strong arguments to bring into play the intention behind Amendments 39 and 40, and I may bring them back at a later stage but, for the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
We come to Amendment 42. I should inform the House that, if Amendment 42 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendments 43 or 44.
Amendment 42
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
Amendments 43 and 44 have been pre-empted.
Lord Callanan
“(9A) Before making regulations under subsection (8) the Secretary of State must consult the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require the Secretary of State to consult the devolved administrations before making regulations amending the “legitimate aims” in Clause 20 (which can mean that provision does not count as indirectly discriminatory against service providers).
“(9A) Before making regulations under subsection (8) the Secretary of State must obtain the consent of the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers, and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.(9B) But the Secretary of State may make regulations under subsection (8) without the consent required by subsection (9A) if that consent is not given within the period of one month beginning with the day on which the Secretary of State requests it.(9C) If the Secretary of State makes regulations without the consent required by subsection (9A), the Secretary of State must publish a statement explaining why the Secretary of State has proceeded with making the regulations.”
Lord Callanan
“Duty to review the use of Part 2 amendment powers
(1) In this section “the Part 2 amendment powers” are the powers conferred by sections 17(2) and 20(8) (powers to amend certain provisions of Part 2).(2) The Secretary of State must, during the permitted period—(a) carry out a review of any use that has been made of the Part 2 amendment powers,(b) prepare a report of the review, and(c) lay a copy of the report before Parliament.(3) In carrying out the review the Secretary of State must—(a) consult the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers and the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland; (b) consider any relevant reports made, or advice given, by the Competition and Markets Authority under Part 4; and(c) assess the impact and effectiveness of any changes made under the Part 2 amendment powers.(4) The permitted period is the period beginning with the third anniversary of the passing of this Act and ending with the fifth anniversary.(5) If either of the Part 2 amendment powers has not been used by the time the review is carried out, this section has effect—(a) as if the report required by subsection (2), so far as relating to that power, is a report containing—(i) a statement to the effect that the power has not been used since it came into force, and(ii) such other information relating to that statement as the Secretary of State considers it appropriate to give, and(b) as if the requirements of subsection (3) did not apply to that power.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause would require the Secretary of State to carry out a review of, and to lay a report to Parliament about, the use made of the amendment powers in Part 2. The review cannot start within three years of Royal Assent, and the steps required would need to be completed within five years.
“( ) Section 22(2) does not apply if the provision has been agreed through the common frameworks process.”
Lord Callanan
“(7) Section 22(2) does not apply in relation to provision that limits the ability to practise the profession, or any profession, of school teaching.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment adds school teaching to the professions the regulation of which is excluded from Clause 22.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
I remind noble Lords that Members other than the mover and the Minister may speak only once and that short questions of elucidation are discouraged. Anyone wishing to press this or anything else in this group to a Division should make that clear in the debate.
Clause 29: Objective and general functions
Amendment 52
Lord Callanan
“(2A) That objective includes, in particular, supporting the operation of the internal market—(a) in the interests of all parts of the United Kingdom, and(b) in the interests of consumers of goods and services as well as other classes of person with an interest in its operation.(2B) The CMA must also, in carrying out its functions under this Part, have regard to the need to act even-handedly as respects the relevant national authorities.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would set out in more detail the considerations that the CMA (including while acting through the Office for the Internal Market) must have regard to in exercising its functions under Part 4.
Lord Callanan (Con)
My Lords, noble Lords will have noticed that we have listened carefully to the many constructive points put forward in Committee as well as from the devolved Administrations on the provisions in the Bill to establish the office for the internal market, tasked with overseeing the smooth operation of the internal market. As set out in my recent letter to colleagues on government amendments for Report, we have made a number of important changes throughout Part 4 to make it clear in statute that the OIM will work in the interests of all parts of the United Kingdom and for all Administrations on an equal basis. I believe that these changes take into careful consideration the points raised in Committee and put beyond any doubt concerns around the consumer focus of the OIM—I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, will welcome this—and the devolved Administrations’ involvement in the OIM’s governance arrangements.
Amendments 56 and 57 ensure that there is an enhanced role for the devolved Administrations in OIM appointments, requiring Ministers to seek consent with all Administrations within a one-month timeframe. This builds on the model proposal developed by the Welsh Government and tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, previously. We believe that this strikes a delicate balance by ensuring that the OIM can operate independently and that all Administrations can have a meaningful input in the appointments process. At the same time, we have been clear that it is essential that the OIM operates independently and at arm’s length from Ministers from all Administrations. Therefore, we do not believe that reserving the right for each Administration to make appointments to the CMA board as set out in Amendment 54 is the correct way forward. Likewise, it is important that appointments are made through fair and open competition, which is what our amendments ensure.
We believe that Amendment 57 and our changes made to Schedule 3 ensure a fair, independent and equitable process for all Administrations. It will ensure that consensus is always a first preference, but recognises that, if it is not reached, appointments can still proceed after an appropriate time has elapsed. This represents a pragmatic way forward and avoids the risk of prolonged deadlock over appointments that would prevent the OIM fulfilling its duties under the Bill.
We agree with previous arguments in Committee that all OIM appointees should reflect a range of expertise from all parts of the United Kingdom. That is why we have tabled Amendment 55, which clarifies this in the Bill, making clear the desirability that panel members have a variety of skills, knowledge and expertise. It is important to remember that the OIM will be a neutral custodian of the UK internal market through its non-binding reporting, advisory and monitoring functions. If there are potential concerns in future about how the OIM conducts its duties, Amendment 61 ensures that the CMA’s annual plans, proposals and performance reports are laid before the devolved legislatures as well as Parliament, ensuring equal scrutiny and oversight of these developments, which can be discussed between Ministers from all Administrations where that is appropriate.
Finally, I am aware that there has been considerable interest in this House in ensuring that the OIM operates in the interests of consumers. We have listened carefully to these discussions and are confident that our amendments throughout Part 4 resolve the concerns expressed and put it beyond all doubt that the OIM will operate in the interests of UK consumers.
For all the reasons I have set out, I hope that noble Lords can accept the Government’s amendments and consequently will not press their own. I beg to move.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB) [V]
I shall speak to Amendment 54 but, before doing so, I thank the Minister for the substantial progress that has been made in relation to the office for the internal market, and for the recognition that it is necessary for the strength of the union and for equality and fairness between the people of the four nations of the United Kingdom that that office has representations from all four nations. However, the purpose of Amendment 54 is that that principle should be applied to the Competition and Markets Authority. This is a non-ministerial department with very substantial powers, which it has exercised since its creation in 2013, but Part 4 of the Bill gives it further and more substantial powers and a role in the operation of the internal market. What precise form those powers will take may ultimately depend on further changes to the Bill, but there can be no doubt that the powers are substantial.
Amendment 54 is therefore a modest amendment, seeking to build upon what the Government have agreed to in relation to the office for the internal market. At present, the Competition and Markets Authority has its chair and members appointed by the Secretary of State and the panels under the Act. But it seems that there is no reason at all why the principles that have been brought to bear for the office for the internal market should not be applied to the CMA itself. As I shall try to explain in a moment, it is essential that the CMA should have representatives of each of the four nations.
It was said at a previous sitting that this would be politicising the body. That is not so. First, the CMA is an independent, non-ministerial department, and people appointed by the Secretary of State, including its chair, are independent. The persons under this provision would be independent in exactly the same way. They are not going to be representatives of the devolved Governments in exactly the same way that the persons appointed by the Secretary of State are not representatives of Her Majesty’s Government but independent people.
Secondly, it is very important to ensure that now that the CMA will have an important role in the internal market, it will have at least one member from each of the nations who understands the issues in the internal market as it affects that nation. Thirdly, the amendment will not politicise the position in any way because the appointment will be by an independent public appointment process, in the same way that the chair and members appointed by the Secretary of State are appointed by an independent appointments process. That is the purpose of the first amendment.
Amendment 58, which is also in this group, is now covered by government Amendment 57 if Amendment 54 is agreed to. Amendment 59 is agreed to be consequential on Amendment 54. Before explaining briefly my reasons for tabling Amendment 54, I wish to make it clear that at the appropriate time this evening, unless the Minister is prepared to come forward with some alternative proposals, I propose to take this amendment to a Division.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB) [V]
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his letter and for explaining the Government’s thinking today. It is a privilege to follow my noble and learned friend Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, and I am of course delighted that the Welsh Government suggestion that I promoted has been picked up.
I will speak in support of Amendments 54, 58 and 59, to which I have added my name. They deal with the need for appropriate engagement of the devolved Governments in the constitution of the Competition and Markets Authority, if that body remains the long-term home of the office for the internal market. These amendments would give an appropriate role in the appointment of the CMA’s board to the devolved Governments. They require the devolved Governments to play ball, which is crucial for that important body to function.
These are very modest amendments. They recognise that the CMA was established to deal wholly with reserved matters but is now being asked to take on responsibility for matters of the utmost sensitivity relating to devolved competence. Not to accept such amendments would be like setting up an agency within HMRC, for example, with responsibility for advising all the Governments of the UK on the best methods of reforming local taxation—a fully devolved responsibility—without making any changes at all to HMRC’s constitution.
The only two objections the Government seem to have had are, first, that it is too difficult to change the CMA’s constitution to enlarge the board—but they are already fundamentally changing the role and remit of the organisation—and, secondly, that somehow involving the devolved Governments would risk making the CMA political. I strongly suggest otherwise. Involving the devolved Administrations creates inclusion and cohesiveness for the long term across the union and dilutes political agendas. That is why Amendment 54 is so important. I commend the Government Front Bench on their amendments to this part of the Bill, which reflect points raised in Committee. Their amendments represent progress and deserve to be fully supported. When combined with Amendments 54, 58 and 59, they solve a serious problem.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD) [V]
My Lords, I welcome the government amendments as I would welcome any improvement, but unfortunately they do not go far enough to compensate for all the implications of the OIM being within the CMA. I shall say more on that in later groups, and I do not need to rehearse all of it now, save to say that these amendments do not sufficiently change the nature of the CMA, its culture and what it was originally set up to do, so it is no longer—or it never was—the right home for a body that has to operate with the much more sensitive and different objective of the OIM.
I recognise that requiring the CMA to support the operation of the internal market in the interests of all parts of the UK, to act even-handedly with respect to the national authorities and to recognise consumers among the other classes of interested persons all featured in debate in Committee. Indeed, I rather recognise some of the wording. Amendment 55, reflecting the balance of the panel, is also welcome. Again, I seem to recall saying similar things. But I would like the Minister to clarify one thing. I am still concerned about what is controlled by this panel amendment. If the panel size in the amendment is a minimum of three, as it is for the CMA, how can you guarantee that all those interests are represented by three? In Committee, I introduced an amendment to say that the investigating panel should be a minimum of five because I thought that that was the number of people you would need to do an investigation. So both the pool from which the investigations can be drawn and the panel need to have all these characteristics. Is that how it is going to work going forward or are we restricted to the three individuals?
Amendment 56, requiring the consent of the devolved Administrations, looks good until you get to Amendment 57 and the override of one month. While I acknowledge that that can give time for discussions or whatever else may go on, absent any other conditions or explanations of why that override has been operated, it just looks like a convenient delay that you can put up with and then have your way in the end. So I do not think that that goes far enough. As I said, I do not object to the CMA having representatives of the devolved Administrations appointed to the board, but the OIM should not be in the CMA.
Lord Wigley (PC) [V]
My Lords, I am glad that the Government have moved a little on matters relating to the CMA and the IOM, but it is not quite far enough. I support Amendment 54. The Government have opted to give the CMA a central role. They could have opted to use not the CMA, but a whole new body created to cover this essential work that would have fully understood the world of devolved politics. They have chosen not to do so, although, to be fair, they have certainly moved on the IOM.
The consequence is that the Government lay the CMA open to criticism that it is simply unaware of the detailed issues that might concern devolved Governments. If the CMA had a nominee from each of the three devolved Governments it would avoid finding itself in a whole new world, as seen through the prism of Cardiff, Edinburgh and Belfast. This is an amendment to save the CMA from getting into an almighty and unnecessary tangle—or, as we would say in Welsh, since we are all quoting from Celtic languages tonight, into a smonach. I suspect that the CMA has not a clue what a smonach is; I rest my case. Amendment 59 is merely a consequential provision to deal with occasional vacancies on the CMA’s board, so I support that also.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has withdrawn from the debate, so the next speaker is the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Bennachie.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD) [V]
This is another group of amendments where the Government have made concessions, which is welcome because it demonstrates that they are listening in ways that, frankly, at early stages of the Bill did not appear to be the case. However, I think that all speakers so far made the point that we face a consequence of the Government’s proposal to locate the office for the internal market in the CMA. That is the fundamental issue.
I have signed the amendment from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, and I am grateful to him for introducing it in such systematic detail. Obviously, it is designed to take account of how the Government are changing the role of the Competition and Markets Authority. I detect from the mood of Ministers that there is a slight resentment in saying that we really should not be thinking of a UK-wide devolved composition for the CMA because that is not what it was set up to do—which was fair when it was set up, but it is no longer fair. It is now absolutely clear that the Government should recognise either that the office for the internal market should be a separate, stand-alone body—in which case it absolutely should have representation from the devolved Administrations, which the Government’s own amendments clearly acknowledge—or that they are fundamentally changing the character of the CMA, which requires its constitution to be fundamentally changed.
I have said repeatedly in contributions to the debate on the Bill that I am unconvinced of the case for it. Even where there is a case—I can see that some issues may require legislation—it is very much a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Indeed, it anticipates problems that might never arise but creates all kinds of problems and suspicions in the process.
If the Government go down this route, the CMA, operating with the OIM, could take decisions that will clearly have a direct effect on the effective powers of the devolved legislatures, allowing it to overrule laws that have been passed by local consent. Even if there was no suspicion of the Government’s intent—and I am sorry to say that there is intense suspicion—there is real concern about unintended negative consequences through a lack of understanding, or knowledge of sentiment or factual evidence, in any or all of the devolved areas.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I welcome government Amendment 52, in the name of my noble friend the Minister. In particular, I am looking at its proposed new subsection (2B), which states:
“The CMA must also, in carrying out its functions under this Part, have regard to the need to act even-handedly as respects the relevant national authorities.”
Would my noble friend the Minister not agree that this seems to dovetail completely with Amendment 54, in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd? This seems very attractive because this dovetails entirely with, and supports, the Government’s call for there to be one board member from each of the Administrations. I would like to hear from my noble friend a very good reason for why it would not be the case that those appointments would be made as set out in Amendment 54.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for the Government’s amendments in this group, which are very welcome. However, I will focus on Amendment 54, in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd. Any chairman of a board, whether it is a public or private company or a public body, will say that the most important thing about the board is getting a balance of skills and experience on it. In addition, nowadays, most boards feel the need to achieve a degree of diversity, generally expressed in terms of sex and race.
Putting together a balanced board is a complex task, and trade-offs often have to be made between the different characteristics that the different candidates can bring. The more that seats on the board are allocated to particular sources or interests, the more difficult it is to achieve balance. In something like the CMA, the board is not there to bring representative interests to bear; it is there to make sure that the CMA is run properly, so it should have people who can understand whether it is achieving its objectives or running itself effectively. Those are the most important characteristics.
If one has direct appointment to a public body such as the CMA, that can actually unbalance a board—you could end up with a lack of certain skills or experience, or an overrepresentation of certain commercial backgrounds, for example. When you have a single appointor, which in the case of the CMA is the Secretary of State, the challenge of getting a balance can be worked out between the Secretary of State, his department and the chairman of the relevant body. That is what happens in most public bodies. By taking away some of the appointments, you just make that process much more difficult to achieve.
I continue to believe, despite what noble Lords said earlier, that direct appointment by the devolved Administrations will inevitably be political, because they will be seen as representatives. Indeed, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, used the word “representatives” when he introduced this amendment earlier. A representative is never completely independent if he or she feels the need to represent.
One of the changes made by the Scotland Act 2016 was direct appointment to the board of Ofcom, and that was followed by similar legislation for Wales and Northern Ireland. I was deputy chairman of Ofcom at the time, so I understand the impact that that can have on board balance—but I do not want to talk about that beyond what I have already said about the difficulties in managing a board when direct appointments are made.
I would like to draw attention to Section 65 of the Scotland Act 2016, where the devolved Administrations were allowed to appoint a member directly. However, that appointment had to be made in consultation with the Secretary of State, which allowed one avenue for conversation to try to make sure that some degree of orderly balance was maintained in relation to the appointments. Amendment 54 does not even go so far as to recognise that precedent, and it is a very extreme action to be taken in relation to the CMA. I hope that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, will not press his amendment.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) (Lab)
The noble Lord, Lord Liddle, has withdrawn, so I call the next speaker, the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson.
Baroness Randerson (LD) [V]
My Lords, I am pleased to see some amendments from the Government in this group. It may be the start of a little bit of emotional intelligence on the Government’s part, to see the damage that has been done to trust and confidence between the UK Government and the devolved Administrations on this issue.
However, on its own, government Amendment 55, for example, is too weak, in saying that in order to be appointed to the OIM panel, all you need is knowledge of the internal market in the different countries of the UK. That implies to me that anyone who worked, for example, for Tesco—I am not picking on Tesco; other supermarkets are available—in its London head office would, of course, know that there are different markets in different parts of the UK. However, they would not have the depth of knowledge to understand, for example, the importance of signage in the Welsh language in different parts of Wales or the difference in marketing approach required in different parts of Northern Ireland, bearing in mind the history of those parts. It is a subtle business, and it needs strength and understanding in depth.
The truth is that the OIM is being shoehorned into the CMA simply because the Government have made a promise that they are not going to create any more such bodies. They can go ahead saying, hand on heart, that the CMA is the body and the OIM is simply an arm of it—no new body has been created. But, to be honest, it is not a neat and natural fit.
Amendment 56 goes a little way towards seeking the consent of the devolved Administrations to an appointment, but it still leaves all the cards in the Government’s hand. Taken alongside Amendment 57, it makes it clear that if the devolved Administrations withhold agreement, after one month the Government can go ahead anyway—yet they might be withholding agreement for a very good and clear reason. I urge the Minister to look again at the stronger amendments, Amendments 54 and 59, tabled in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd. If the Government mean what they say about genuinely wanting to respect the devolved Administrations and treat them with respect, what harm do the Government think it would do to allow them to appoint one board member each? The Government’s response is that it would make the CMA political. That in itself portrays the fact that the Government have a political approach of their own to this problem.
In conclusion, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, pointed out, UK government Ministers are in fact—[Inaudible]—and then they change hats to become Ministers of the UK. This is a problem, and if anyone does not understand that that is a problem, it underlines a lack of understanding and experience of devolution. Anyone who had that experience and understanding would realise that the Government must give a little bit more to satisfy trust among the different Governments of the UK.
Lord Naseby (Con)
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on the Front Bench. Once again we see the benefit of a good Committee stage, with someone listening and coming back with a series of amendments which all strengthen the Bill. I particularly like the clarification in Amendment 56, and I was delighted to read Amendment 61. However, regarding Amendment 54, I have had the privilege of chairing four different companies and sitting on other boards, some of which had certain dimensions to them as a business that any wise chairman would wish to make sure were covered.
I am also a political animal. Anybody who has sat for a marginal seat and kept it understands the sensitivity of varying wards, varying interests et cetera, and I ask my noble friend to reflect a little on Amendment 54. Certainly I do not believe that there is anything in Amendment 59 worth having, but Amendment 54 is crucial. Whether the wording is right or not, nevertheless, the devolved powers are a very important dimension of the whole of this internal market. Somehow, as other noble Lords have said, they must have ownership of it. The CMA board is in essence one of the absolutely key elements of that. I do not expect an answer tonight, but I suggest that the Minister and his colleagues should sit back and argue this through. I understand what my noble friend Lady Noakes said. In one sense she is right but, with my political hat on, I am not so sure. So I ask the Minister to reflect a little on Amendment 54, although I do not expect him to accept it tonight.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Callanan for his amendments, which, as many have said, represent a real readiness to listen. The changes all seem very sensible, especially the proposal for the CMA to lay an annual plan before Parliament and before the devolved legislatures. Perhaps a similar procedure could be derived in relation to the common frameworks, over which there has been so much grief and debate. In my experience, when things go well, such reports become routine and are not even debated, but they are a good way of keeping the Executive —public servants, any boards involved and the Ministers they serve—objective, efficient and thoughtful.
However, I am afraid that I do not support Amendment 54. Board members of the CMA should not be “representative” of a territorial interest in the way this would inevitably turn out. The interests of the four nations should be taken into account in coming up with a balanced, objective board, but this is not the right way to do it. My noble friend Lady Noakes summarised the balance issues very well from her own wide experience. The amendment would also jeopardise the very objectivity and pursuit of the public interest which is vital to a better CMA.
By the way, Tesco’s head office is not in London; that was a bad example for the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, to choose. At least in my time, we had a very high degree of sensitivity to Welsh issues, sold more Welsh food elsewhere in the UK than anybody else, and indeed from time to time had Welsh individuals of great independence sitting on the board.
Lord Fox (LD)
That is just proof that you can take the Peer out of Tesco but not Tesco out of the Peer.
My noble friend Lady Randerson hinted that she thought the Minister might be developing emotional intelligence—or perhaps we will see signs of that later. However, I think that most of your Lordships have welcomed the government amendments in this group. They are showing movement in the right direction and are an improvement on what you would expect those of us on these Benches to condemn as a deeply flawed Bill.
My noble friends Lady Bowles and Lord Bruce both made the point about where the OIM is and its presence in the CMA. We are not debating that in this group, although we will be some other time. However, Amendment 54 and consequential Amendment 59 should be seen as the safety belt in the event that the OIM remains within the CMA.
The noble Lord, Lord Naseby, made a powerful speech against Amendment 54. I did not see him in his seat when the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, was giving his strong endorsement of his amendment. He may have been oscillating somewhere between virtual and physical; if he was, I apologise. In his speech, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, put forward a very important point. The CMA is getting considerably more powers as a result of the Bill. The point he did not make but inferred is that those powers move from being reserved powers to those that step into the realm of devolved powers—there can be no doubt about that.
There is therefore a significant change in the nature of the task that the CMA is overseeing. The Government may say it is too much trouble to change the nature of the governance of the CMA, but its focus is changing from reserved issues to those which cover devolved matters, so that change should be reflected in its governance.
My noble friend Lord Bruce talked about unintended rather than intended consequences. The Government need to create a board that can reduce the number of unknown unknowns that it encounters. Amendment 54 is a perfectly reasonable amendment, which would make sure that there are people on the board who understand the nature of the markets in the devolved countries.
To take the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, one would hope that the careful construction of a board would understand the need for that. I have to tell your Lordships—and perhaps the principles of my noble friend Lady Bowles could be passed to some Cabinet members—that the construction of boards and organisations over the course of the last 12 months has been nothing like a careful assembly of the right people. It has been a gathering of friends and known people to do the bidding of the Secretary of State. Therefore, it is right for the opposition to be very suspicious about the future board of the CMA, which will have this extraordinarily bumped-up role. That is the reason for Amendment 54 and also for consequential Amendment 59.
The noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, is correct. In a sensible world, what she suggests would happen. However, we cannot trust that to go forward, and trust is going to be very important with regard to the devolved authorities and how they work with the CMA if, indeed, the office for the internal market is located within it.
The noble Lord, Lord Wigley, the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and my noble friend Lady Randerson gave wise advice: rather than politicise the CMA, this is helping to inoculate it from political suspicions. That is why, if the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, seeks to put it to the House, we Liberal Democrats will support Amendment 54.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
I join others in thanking the Minister for some significant moves in the amendments that he has introduced today. As others have said, it is testament to his having listened. He sometimes thinks that means “listened at length”, but he listened, considered and responded, and we welcome all the changes. I am particularly pleased about the acknowledgement in the amendments of the interests of consumers in the mapping out of the new internal market. The House will be pleased about the recognition of the need for experience across the kingdom in the appointment of the OIM panel and the need to seek the consent of the devolved authorities to such appointments.
Similarly, we welcome, perhaps unsurprisingly, the new requirement for the CMA to lay its key documents before all four legislatures. It is possible that they already do it, albeit perhaps as a courtesy rather than a legal requirement. We also strongly welcome Amendments 56 and 57, which require devolved authorities to give their consent within a month to appointments to the OIM panel. We like that—consent within a month; we have heard it before. We pinched the idea from the Minister’s words, but it is a good one. As we proposed in our amendments, if the Government proceed with an appointment despite consent not being forthcoming, they will have to explain why they are doing so. Therefore, we will not move Amendment 59.
However, the Minister will not be surprised to hear that, although we welcome these changes, we would like to nudge them a little further. On Wednesday, as others have said, we will seek to move the OIM out of the CMA. Just in case it remains in the CMA, it is vital, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, and others have said, that the CMA, in accepting this new role, amends its structure to accommodate the change. It is impossible to think of any other national organisation, when its remit changes, not revisiting its governance and appointments. It should not just continue with business as usual when taking on a whole new responsibility.
Indeed, although we welcome Amendments 56 and 57, we were surprised that they did not apply to the CMA as well as to the OIM panel. For an overarching body with a purview of the development of the new internal market architecture, not having to feel the pulse of, understand and have input from the constituent parts is a little odd, to say the least. For all its board members to be appointed by just one of the four Governments is particularly hard to understand, because it is a body covering the competences of all four Governments. If it was covering only the reserve competences, one could understand, but it will cover powers that affect the area of all four Governments.
As was said by, I think, the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, if you are appointed by one place you somehow feel like a representative from it. I must say something about other boards and committees that I have sat on. It may not be a board of this nature, but the National Consumer Council included someone from the Northern Ireland Consumer Council, as I think it was called, someone from the Welsh Consumer Council and someone from the Scottish Consumer Council, but once they got on the board, they had responsibility to it as a board member. Just because we brought in someone with different responsibilities, it did not suddenly make them a representative. Similarly, the chairs of the different sub-committees of the Financial Reporting Council sat on the board. They came with that experience but, once they sat on the whole-council board, their responsibilities included that.
It is slightly hard to say that just because people are appointed by different Governments, they are then answerable only to them. Given that they would be appointed by only one Government, and given that people are saying that if you are appointed by the Welsh Government, you are then a representative of the Welsh Government, surely if you are appointed by the UK Government you also are not independent. It does not quite make sense to me.
We will shortly vote on Amendment 54 in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas. The Opposition will be happy to support it, to ensure that the CMA really does act on behalf of the whole of the United Kingdom.
Lord Callanan (Con)
I can be brief, on the basis that I went through the amendments in detail in my opening remarks. I thank all noble Lords who took part in this debate very much.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, that the Bill is not a smonach at all. As I am from the north-east, I can say that, despite all this, I still consider them both marras and not at all workie tickets—I suspect that all this is driving our Hansard copywriters into a bit of a radgie.
I reiterate that my amendments to Part 4 will ensure beyond doubt that the OIM will operate in the interests of both UK consumers and all four Administrations on an equal basis. I thank my noble friend Lady Noakes in particular for her important observation that the CMA board appointments are there first and foremost to ensure that the organisation operates effectively.
I wish to emphasise strongly that changing the wider CMA structures would be wholly unnecessary and create a deeply unhelpful precedent in so far as DA appointees would have a say on reserved matters. In contrast, the OIM panel will undertake the work of the OIM. It is in that context that the government amendments have been brought forward. I believe that this directly addresses the points made in this House, ensuring that the devolved Administrations have greater involvement in OIM appointments. I therefore hope that the House will be able to accept these amendments.
There were a couple of questions. The noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, asked me to define the panel requirements. Amendment 55 makes clear the Government’s view that a balance of expertise in the round on the panel from which task groups are drawn is important. Schedule 3 makes it clear that such task groups must
“consist of at least three members”,
and therefore may contain more. We have argued consistently against a hard distinction between panel members and assigning specific members to specific parts of the UK. In my view, it would be a failure if there was seen to be an “English panel member” and a “Welsh panel member” who are then somehow adversarial.
Finally, I say in response to the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Bennachie, that I have consistently made it clear that the functions of the OIM cover advice, monitoring and reporting only and cannot force regulatory change of any kind.
With those remarks, I hope—though without much expectation—that noble Lords will not press their amendments and I commend those in my name.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Morris of Bolton) (Con)
My Lords, I have received a request from the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, to ask a short question of the Minister.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB) [V]
Does the Minister agree that good governance requires a balanced board but it also requires that each appointee fulfil the person specification as set out to ensure such balance, that they declare any interest in a relevant discussion and that they may have to withdraw during that discussion? That is all laid out for the running of an open and transparent process within a board as well as for an open and transparent appointments process. Does he further agree that it would be an incredibly narrow person specification that expected people to have only one skill, relating only to their devolved Administration experience, and that they would be coming forward with a broad range of skills to complement a balanced board?
Lord Callanan (Con)
There were a number of questions there, but of course I believe that there should be an open and transparent appointments process, and that individuals appointed should possess a broad range of skills—that seems self-evident.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd
“(2A) After sub-paragraph (1)(b) insert—“(c) one person appointed to membership of the CMA Board by each of— (i) the Scottish Ministers,(ii) the Welsh Ministers, and(iii) the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment provides for each of the devolved administrations to appoint a member to the CMA Board.
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Morris of Bolton) (Con)
I shall now put the Question on Amendment 54. We have heard a Member taking part remotely say that they wish to divide the House in support of the amendment, which I shall take into account.
Lord Callanan
““(2ZA) In making appointments under paragraphs (iv) and (v) of sub-paragraph (1)(b) the Secretary of State must have regard to the desirability of securing that— (a) a variety of skills, knowledge and experience is available among the members of the OIM panel, and(b) there is an appropriate balance among the members of that panel of persons who have skills, knowledge or experience relating to the operation of the United Kingdom internal market in different parts of the United Kingdom.”Member’s explanatory statement
The amendment would require the Secretary of State to have regard to the desirability of having a variety of skills, knowledge and experience in the Office for the Internal Market panel and for a balance between members with specific skills, knowledge or experience in the internal market as operating in different parts of the United Kingdom.
Member’s explanatory statement
The amendment would require the Secretary of State to seek the consent of the devolved administrations to any proposed appointment to the OIM panel.
“(2B) Sub-paragraph (2C) applies if consent to an appointment is not given by any of those authorities within the period of one month beginning with the day on which it is sought from that authority.(2C) In that event the Secretary of State—(a) may make the appointment without the consent of the authority or authorities concerned; and(b) must, if the appointment is made, inform each authority which did not give consent of the reasons for the decision to proceed with the appointment.””Member’s explanatory statement
The amendment relates to Lord Callanan’s proposed amendment at page 47, line 29 and would give the Secretary of State the option to proceed with an appointment to the OIM panel after an interval of at least one month, even if one or more of the devolved administrations have not given their consent.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd
“(2A) After sub-paragraph (2) insert—“(2A) Sub-paragraph (2) applies to a member of the CMA Board appointed under paragraph 1(1)(c) as if the reference to the Secretary of State were a reference to whichever of the Scottish Ministers, the Welsh Ministers or the Department for the Economy in Northern Ireland appointed the person.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment means that, if a CMA Board member appointed by one of the devolved administrations wishes to resign from membership, they must do so by giving notice to the devolved administration in question.
Lord Callanan
“Laying of annual documents before devolved legislatures
(1) Schedule 4 to the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 (the Competition and Markets Authority) is amended as follows.(2) In paragraph 12(3)(annual plan to be laid before Parliament), for “Parliament” substitute “—(a) Parliament,(b) the Scottish Parliament,(c) Senedd Cymru, and(d) the Northern Ireland Assembly”.(3) In paragraph 13(2)(proposals for annual plan to be laid before Parliament), for “Parliament” substitute “—(a) Parliament,(b) the Scottish Parliament,(c) Senedd Cymru, and(d) the Northern Ireland Assembly”.(4) In paragraph 14(3)(a)(performance report to be laid before Parliament), for “Parliament” substitute “—(i) Parliament,(ii) the Scottish Parliament,(iii) Senedd Cymru, and(iv) the Northern Ireland Assembly”.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause would require the CMA to lay its annual plan, proposals for its annual plan and its performance report before the devolved legislatures as well as Parliament.