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Oral Answers to Questions
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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Suzanne Webb (Stourbridge) (Con)
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con)
The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)
We are determined to work across Government to modernise the Mental Health Act 2007 so that it ensures that patients receive the right care in the right setting at the right time. Prison should be a place for rehabilitation, not a convenient holding pen for those people for whom mental health is the primary driver of their offending.
Suzanne Webb
What is the timetable for the Mental Health Act consultation and how can interested parties participate?
Robert Buckland
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her continuing interest in this important process. We are consulting widely on these proposed reforms, including service users, carers and professionals, to ensure that we get this once-in-a-generation opportunity right. The consultation is now available on the gov.UK website, and will close on 21 April.
Dr Davies [V]
Will the Secretary of State explain how reforms of the Mental Health Act will strengthen the role that the justice system plays in protecting society’s most vulnerable, both in north Wales and across the country?
Robert Buckland
I am very grateful to my hon. Friend who, from his professional experience, has a great deal of expertise and knowledge in this area. Among other reforms, we want, in particular, to increase patient access to the Mental Health Tribunal, which provides vital independent scrutiny of detention orders. We wish to expand its powers so that it plays a greater safeguarding role. Health policy is devolved to Wales, so it will be for the Welsh Government to decide whether they wish to join the UK Government on many of our reforms in the White Paper, and we will continue to work closely with them in order to secure that partnership.
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)
The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)
With regard to the legal aid sector during this crisis, we have expanded the scope of and relaxed the evidence requirements for hardship payments in Crown court cases, including reducing the threshold for work done; we have increased opportunities to claim payment on account in civil legal aid cases, as well as increasing the amounts; we have halted the pursuit of outstanding debts owed by providers of legal aid to the Legal Aid Agency; and we have suspended sanctions in relation to mixed deadlines. That is in addition to the range of measures that we have taken in order to support the sector through this crisis.
Sarah Olney [V]
The latest Ministry of Justice figures show that there are 56,544 outstanding Crown court cases at the end of January. Given that defence lawyers are paid for litigation when a case finishes, can the Secretary of State confirm what steps have been taken to assist legal aid lawyers with their cash flow at this time?
Robert Buckland
The hon. Lady will be glad to know that, as I referred to in my initial reply, we have already relaxed the evidence requirements for hardship payments and, importantly, reduced the threshold for work done by criminal lawyers to £450 from the current £5,000. It is absolutely essential that we maintain throughput, and as we move on through this year with the road map out of lockdown, I am confident that the court system will be able to list even more proactively, making sure that there is plenty of work for dedicated criminal legal aid lawyers.
Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab) [V]
The independent criminal legal aid review is a once-in-a-decade opportunity to fix a vital element of our criminal justice system. There are more than 400 fewer criminal legal aid firms today than in 2015. That means that more than one in four has left the system. When these firms fold, legal aid family law departments often go with them, leaving domestic abuse victims without representation. Does the Secretary of State agree that the Government cannot simply wait for the recommendations of CLAR before taking action and that we must make sure that the number of unrepresented domestic abuse victims does not increase yet further.
Robert Buckland
The hon. Gentleman is right to talk about the need for representation for domestic abuse victims. He knows, of course, that in criminal scenarios the Crown Prosecution Service will act with regard to the prosecution of offences. He will also note that, in phase 1 of the CLAR process, up to £51 million a year has already been injected into criminal legal aid fees. That is the most significant increase in investment in legal aid for a quarter of a century. We are working on the existing body of evidence with the new chair of the criminal legal aid review, Sir Christopher Bellamy QC, who is already engaging with the professions. I am confident that his work will deal not only with the situation with regard to fees in court, but, as he says, the “sustainability” of those criminal legal aid firms that are the lifeblood of representation in that sector.
Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con)
Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)
Cherilyn Mackrory (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Chris Philp)
In common with so much of the public sector, and life in general, courts have been profoundly affected by the coronavirus pandemic. The Government have taken decisive action to address this, investing a quarter of a billion pounds in covid recovery, which has paid for, among other things, 40 Nightingale courtrooms, soon to increase to 60 by the end of this month, and installing video technology enabling over 20,000 hearings a week across all jurisdictions to take place. As a result of that, for example, the outstanding caseload in the magistrates courts has dropped by about 50,000 cases over the past eight months.
Cat Smith
Three court buildings have now failed safety inspections by the Health and Safety Executive, yet the Government continue to say that courts are covid-secure. What evidence is there to support this claim, and what steps are Ministers going to take to ensure that no more court buildings fail safety inspections?
Chris Philp
We work very closely with Public Health England and follow the guidelines that it gives us. The number of coronavirus cases that have been detected among court users is no higher than among the general population. It is not true to say that there are any more coronavirus cases in courts than anywhere else. That is, in part, because we have invested so much in coronavirus measures like installing plexiglass screens, ensuring there is social distancing, and having overspill rooms so that people can space out when using courts. Where we have tested people in courts, we found extremely low levels of coronavirus cases.
Andrew Jones
I am encouraged by the measures my hon. Friend is taking to catch up on the backlog. Will he update me specifically on how many Nightingale courts are now open and in use for Crown court work?
Chris Philp
There are currently, as we speak, 49 Nightingale courtrooms open and available for work. There are five more opening this week, one of which is Croydon, the borough that I have the honour of representing in south London, and by the end of this month we will get up to a total of 60. Many of those courtrooms can be used for Crown court work, but even where they cannot—for example, because they do not have custodial facilities—they are very often able to do work that would otherwise be done in a Crown court centre that is then freed up for work where, for example, custody suites are required. This is making a real contribution and we intend to go further.
Chi Onwurah [V]
Justice delayed is justice denied. That is no cliché; it is the lived reality for the many, many victims who have not had their day in court during this pandemic. The Minister has said that he expects the number of cases to be brought back to acceptable levels before Easter 2023. Is this really acceptable, and what confidence can victims have that this late date will be met?
Chris Philp
I do agree that timely justice is essential. In the magistrates courts, the outstanding caseload has already come down by about 50,000 cases since last summer, which is very welcome progress. In Crown courts, we are now getting through about 2,000 cases a week, which is about the same as it was before the pandemic. But we do need to go faster: the hon. Lady is right. I think the judiciary eased off listing a little bit in January, February and the early part March owing to the more recent lockdown. Now we are moving out of those restrictions, in phases, our expectation is that listing levels will go up again. We have certainly created the capacity to do that, with 290 jury courtrooms available. As listing levels increase, using the capacity we have created I expect the outstanding caseloads to come down.
Mr Mohindra [V]
This is an issue that is very close to the heart of many of my residents in South West Hertfordshire. How is the Department increasing use of remote hearings to ensure the safety of the people involved during the covid-19 outbreak?
Chris Philp
I thank my hon. Friend for a very prescient question. We have made a huge investment in IT and technology. We have purchased getting on for 10,000 laptops to enable remote working and video working. We have rolled out the cloud video platform on an expedited basis. As a result of that work, more than 20,000 hearings per week across all jurisdictions are now being held remotely. That is orders of magnitude higher than was the case before, and that is why we have managed to keep getting work done across so many parts of the jurisdiction when in many other countries around the world work has considerably slowed down or even stopped.
Christian Matheson
An application for bail to Chester Crown court today will not be listed until February next year. This is not a problem of the pandemic, as there was already a backlog because of court closures and because the Government chose to reduce the number of sitting days at Chester Crown court and others. As my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) says, how can the Government claim to be the party of law and order when justice is being delayed and justice is being denied?
Chris Philp
The hon. Gentleman talks about sitting days, and the Lord Chancellor has confirmed that there will be no constraint on sitting days at present. The judiciary can list as many cases as they like, and we are anticipating a very considerable increase in sitting days for the next financial year. The hon. Gentleman talks about the justice system prior to the pandemic, and he may be aware that the outstanding Crown court caseload prior to the pandemic was 39,000—considerably lower than 47,000, as it was under the last Labour Administration. He talks about our record on law and order, and he may be aware that the only authoritative source of crime figures, the crime survey, shows a 41% reduction in crime since 2010, from 9.5 million to 5.6 million, so I will certainly be taking no lectures on law and order from the Labour party.
Mr Speaker
Well, let us see what you can do with the next question. I call Cherilyn Mackrory.
Cherilyn Mackrory [V]
Will my hon. Friend join me in recognising the efforts made by the police and crime commissioner in Devon and Cornwall, Alison Hernandez, in helping to ensure that our area was the first outside of London to set up virtual remand hearings in police custody during the pandemic? Can he assure me that Devon and Cornwall will continue to receive its fair share of resources and funding to continue dealing with the backlog in criminal cases?
Chris Philp
I pay tribute to police and crime commissioner Alison Hernandez and all those working in Devon and Cornwall and across the country. I congratulate them on being first out of the blocks on video remand hearings. We are continuing to do video remand hearing work, particularly during the recent lockdown, and we have in fact made some funding available to support some forces to do that. I am sure that Devon and Cornwall will be receiving its fair share of support as part of the Government’s commitment to recruit 23,000 extra police officers, underlining our commitment to law and order.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
As we have already heard, the Crown court backlog has reached nearly 57,000 cases. Many victims of rape and sexual violence face waits of three or four years until their case comes to trial, all the while unable to fully access the therapeutic support they desperately need. It is yet another example of this Government failing to support victims of male violence properly. Will the Minister finally listen to calls from the Victims’ Commissioner and urgently roll-out section 28 measures to all intimidated witnesses, so that victims of these horrific sexual crimes can give evidence as soon as possible, relieving some of the burden of stress and anxiety that they carry as they journey through our criminal justice system?
Chris Philp
I share the shadow Minister’s concern about rape prosecutions. There is a rape review currently under way. It is being worked on by the police Minister and the Lord Chancellor, and will be reporting very shortly. Much of the waits actually relate not to the court system but to the time taken to collect evidence, to disclosure issues and to the time taken to prosecute, which is why we are putting £85 million extra into the Crown Prosecution Service.
The shadow Minister asked about section 28. The application of section 28 has been considerably widened recently, and we want to make that available as widely as we can, as quickly as possible. We also want to support victims. That is why we will be spending £140 million in the next financial year—a significant increase—on supporting victims and witnesses.
Finally, on rape, perhaps the shadow Minister can explain to the country and his constituents why it is that this evening the Labour party will vote against—
Mr Speaker
Order. Minister, we need to calm down. [Interruption.] I am not being funny; you are taking advantage of a situation and I do not expect that. [Interruption.] It is no use looking at me in that way. Trying to score points at the end is not the way we need to do it. We need shorter answers to get through the questions as well.
Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Philp)
This question is about sentencing, and the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, which is before the House on Second Reading today, will see whole-life orders for premeditated child murder. It will see life sentences imposed for causing death by dangerous driving and causing death by careless driving when under the influence. It will also see longer prison sentences for rapists, which I believe the Labour party plans to vote against.
Ben Bradley [V]
This month, a Nottinghamshire removal man was convicted of possessing 8,000 indecent images and videos of children ranging from 15 to just one year old, with many classed as category A or extreme child pornography. This man was given a two-year suspended sentence and, as a result, is unlikely ever to see the inside of a prison cell. I welcome proposals to toughen sentencing and be tough on crime, but a sentence like that one seems to be inconsistent with that work. Will my hon. Friend look again at guidance that says that a suspended sentence is the same as a custodial one, because it is pretty clear that in practical terms that is not the case? Will he also ensure that people who commit serious crimes like that, where children have been exploited and abused, are given a punishment that fits the crime?
Chris Philp
Individual sentencing decisions are obviously for the judge who sentences the case, having regard to the facts of that case, but we do take very seriously the kind of offences that my hon. Friend has described. In fact, the maximum penalty for the offence of taking indecent photographs of children is 10 years’ imprisonment. Where an offence is sentenced at a lower level and somebody thinks that that is inappropriate, they can apply under the unduly lenient sentence scheme within 28 days. In 2019, the Government added those kinds of offence to the list of offences eligible under that scheme. If anyone feels that a sentence is too light, I strongly urge them to make an application to the Attorney General under the ULS scheme, and she will then look at that again.
Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow North East) (SNP) [V]
Reconviction rates in Scotland are at a 21-year low. That is because of the community justice approach of the SNP Government for less serious crimes. Even the Minister has admitted that harsher sentencing has
“limited or no general deterrent effect.”
It is not a competition; all countries can learn from each other. If he truly aspires to reduce reoffending—because that is what keeps people safe—will he at least consider a community justice approach, in the knowledge that it is working in Scotland?
Chris Philp
I understand that Scotland has the highest rate of imprisonment of any country in western Europe, so I find the question slightly surprising. However, we do accept that, particularly for less serious offences, community sentences have a role to play in rehabilitating. That is why we are keen to expedite the roll-out of community sentence treatment requirements, whereby if someone has a mental health problem, a drug addiction problem or an alcohol problem, we treat that as a health problem as an alternative to short custody. That is being rolled out.
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)
Robin Millar (Aberconwy) (Con)
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)
Stuart Anderson (Wolverhampton South West) (Con)
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
The Minister for Crime and Policing (Kit Malthouse) [V]
Probation, the police and other services are working together to address the drivers of reoffending, to cut crime and keep our neighbourhoods safe. We recently announced a £70 million investment in accommodation and rehabilitative support for prison leavers to reduce reoffending—part of a £220 million Government plan to cut crime and protect the public. I am pleased to say that, hopefully tomorrow morning, I will lay legislation to impose GPS tracking on offenders who have committed burglary and theft offences, who often have the highest rates of reoffending.
Damian Hinds [V]
What happens immediately upon release is fundamental. What progress has been made on ensuring that prison leavers have access to benefits and accommodation and can get on the road towards sustainable employment?
Kit Malthouse
With his usual wisdom, my right hon. Friend has put his finger on two of the three pillars of success after prison—a job, a house and a friend—and we are working hard to ensure that all those released from prison have exactly that. The majority of the £70 million investment that I referred to is being focused on providing accommodation for prison leavers. We are working closely with the New Futures Network, a specialist part of the Prison and Probation Service that brokers partnerships with employers to ensure that ex-offenders have access to jobs, which is critical to their success. There is lots of work being done at the moment and lots more to do, and I welcome his concern in this area.
Robin Millar
I thank the Minister for his reply. The Farmer review in 2017 concluded that family is the golden thread in reducing offending rates. It cited evidence including a 39% reduction in reoffending among those who had maintained family contact during incarceration. Does he agree that such effective measures should be at the heart of any effective strategy to reduce reoffending, and will he commit to refreshing the data to ensure that the best available evidence is informing the Government’s approach?
Kit Malthouse
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that maintaining strong family links has a significant impact on the likelihood of reoffending for people who have been in the secure estate. We are committed to trying to retain those links as much as we possibly can both to families and to the communities from which offenders are drawn. We have made good progress on the Farmer review in embedding that as part of our work, and we will be looking at innovative approaches to offender management in the future.
My hon. Friend may be interested to know that, any minute now, we will be rolling out sobriety tagging in the rest of England; it is already operational in Wales. The critical thing about this disposal is that it does not mean that somebody goes to prison. Nevertheless, it does mean that their offending is managed in a way that we know now sees enormous compliance—90% compliance. This means, critically, that they can maintain their job and maintain their connections with the family in the community, and that is the kind of innovative approach that we want to look at in the future.
Stephen Metcalfe [V]
I thank my hon. Friend for his previous answer. What are those innovative approaches, and how are he and his Department bringing them to the reducing offending challenge?
Kit Malthouse
It is no surprise that my hon. Friend, with his background and interest in science and technology, can see the potential for the use of technology in particular for managing offenders. As I say, alongside our sobriety tagging programme, we are going to be rolling out GPS tagging for those convicted of acquisitive crimes—burglary, robbery and theft—so that when they are released on licence, we can put a tag on their ankle meaning that, 24 hours a day for up to a year, they will know that we know where they are. We think that will be an enormous deterrent to reoffending and in particular, if there is any offending, it will allow the police to make much swifter detection. It is all part of our plan to revolutionise the management of offenders in the future, and I would welcome my hon. Friend’s ongoing interest and input.
Stuart Anderson
What is my hon. Friend doing to help the young people of Wolverhampton who have previously offended to turn their lives around and build a better, brighter future?
Kit Malthouse
My hon. Friend is a strong voice for Wolverhampton and in particular for the young people of that town. I know that he will commend the brilliant work of probation, police and other partners in Wolverhampton to support young people to, as he says, turn their backs on crime. There is a very proactive community safety partnership in the area, which is committed to making those communities safer. We have been putting pressure on the local services to make sure that they are focused particularly on driving down violence in the town and turning people away from crime. There is fantastic intervention in Wolverhampton, as I say, and I know he will be very supportive of it in the future.
Bob Blackman [V]
Four years on from my landmark Homelessness Reduction Act 2017, which required prison governors to ensure that ex-offenders had secure accommodation on leaving prison, we are still letting people go from prison with £46 in their pockets, two bags of clothes, no accommodation to go to and no job. I welcome the money the Minister is providing for new accommodation, but what action is he taking to make sure that prison governors carry out their statutory duty to ensure that ex-offenders are started off, on leaving prison, in the right way?
Kit Malthouse
My hon. Friend has done fantastic work over the last few years on the issue of homelessness, and it is to his great credit that he has focused on this particular cohort. As he knows, I hope, we are spending £50 million to expand our approved premises, providing temporary accommodation for prison leavers at risk of homelessness and ensuring that there is a proper rehabilitative approach to reintroducing them into society. However, he makes a good challenge on prison governors, and I will go away and make sure that we are seeing maximum compliance in the way that he intends.
Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab)
Some 20% of sex offenders already have a previous conviction for sexual assault. The latest figures show that, in the last year, 37 convicted rapists already have convictions for the same crime and 14 have been convicted for rape three times previously. When will protecting women drive policy? The Minister cannot say it is now—just look at the numbers.
Kit Malthouse [V]
The protection of women is at the forefront of much of the work we do. The hon. Gentleman will know that the Bill, which I gather he is going to oppose tonight, contains a number of measures that would help us in that fight, not least the serious violence duty, which will bring all partners in an area together to diagnose the problems related to violence in that area and promote a strategy to address it. I am surprised that he raised those particular points, given that the Bill currently going through the House contains the notion of longer sentences for those convicted of serious sexual offences. We think that that will be an enormous deterrent for those who are thinking about offending, and such measures will protect women in the future.
Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab)
The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)
The Legal Aid Agency is currently acting to fill any gaps in the market, and it frequently renews capacity, to ensure adequate provision. We are currently considering civil legal aid market sustainability, and I have provided £5.4 million in emergency funding for not-for-profit legal advice providers during covid-19.
Imran Hussain [V]
Bradford’s community advice centres that provide legal support have been devastated by the Government’s funding cuts and preference for bigger providers. As a result, some of our excellent, hard-working, local grassroot community advice centres have been run into the ground, creating legal aid and advice deserts in some of our most vulnerable communities that need the greatest support. Will the Justice Secretary commit to a “local first” policy, to ensure that community advice centres get the funding they need to help some of society’s most vulnerable people, who cannot afford help elsewhere? Will he commit to ensuring an increase in the number of grassroot community advice centres in Bradford?
Robert Buckland
The hon. Gentleman is right to talk about the importance of community provision. Indeed, among those sectors that were helped by the £5.4 million funding during covid was the Law Centres Network, which plays an invaluable role. He will be glad to know that the Legal Aid Agency has launched a procurement process to identify new providers in the areas of housing and debt, where there is currently little or no provision, to help citizens get that advice. It will shortly announce a positive outcome to that process.
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)
At the beginning of the pandemic, we were guided by public health advice, and we took immediate and decisive action across prison, probation, youth justice and courts services, to implement a range of measures to respond. Our protection of those in prisons, through compartmentalisation, testing, the use of exceptional delivery models and probation services and the creation of Nightingale courts, alongside physical changes to courtrooms and increased video technology, helped to mitigate the severe impact of the pandemic.
Ruth Jones [V]
I am grateful for the Lord Chancellor’s response. We all know the impact that the pandemic has had on life in our country, and I have seen for myself its impact on many communities who live, learn and work across Newport West. What discussions has he had with the Welsh Government about ensuring that those who need justice are able to get it in a timely manner?
Robert Buckland
The hon. Lady will be glad to know that I regularly engage with the Welsh Government, Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service, and Her Majesty’s Prisons and Probation Service in Wales to ensure that the prison estate is safe, and the probation service is delivering. We have heard about the sobriety tags that have been piloted in Wales, and our courts are working well. I am glad that in Wales the management of cases has demonstrated that, now that there is no backlog. In particular, Newport Crown court was home to a multi-handed murder trial, which was dealt with successfully in recent weeks. A lot of good work is going on in Wales. Wales is leading the way, and I am proud of that.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Alex Chalk)
Education helps prisoners to boost their employability, build their self-esteem, and make a law-abiding contribution to society post release. Since April 2019, we have invested more than £20 million in improving technology in prisons, including investing in infrastructure that will support educational delivery.
Kerry McCarthy [V]
I thank the Minister for that answer. As he says, prison education programmes can be hugely beneficial, in terms of rehabilitation and preventing reoffending; future employability, life skills and literacy; or simply, as he says, boosting self-esteem. However, despite the figures that he mentions, there has been a dire lack of investment over the years. Can he tell us why the Government’s promised prison education service, which was in last year’s sentencing White Paper and, indeed, the Government’s 2019 manifesto, is completely absent from the Bill that we will vote on later today?
Alex Chalk
We do not need to legislate for that. We are absolutely committed to an enhanced prison education service, and I am pleased to be able to say that, in a prison close to the hon. Lady’s constituency, we are rolling out additional curriculum and neurodiversity specialists to drive reform. We absolutely believe in education and we are putting in the resources to ensure that it gets better every day.
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)
The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)
Last week, we introduced the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. This landmark piece of legislation will deliver on the commitments that I made in the White Paper to make punishments tougher for the most serious offenders and those who commit crimes against women and girls, and to introduce more effective community sentences. We are working on those non-legislative reforms in the White Paper that aim to tackle the underlying causes of criminal behaviour and to improve the rehabilitation of offenders in our community.
Rob Butler [V]
I thank the Lord Chancellor for that answer. Over the years that I have been involved in the criminal justice system, I have often been struck by the potential for technology to play a greater role in keeping the public safe, punishing criminals and helping to reduce reoffending. I wonder whether my right hon. and learned Friend can tell the House how measures in the White Paper will enable the courts, prisons and probation services to exploit new technology.
Robert Buckland
As ever, I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s continued commitment to this issue. We are expanding the use of electronic monitoring to support robust and responsive community supervision. Following its well-received launch in Wales, as I mentioned, courts in England will shortly be able to impose the alcohol abstinence and monitoring requirement—the sobriety tag—to help tackle offending. We will shortly lay legislation to impose GPS tracking on offenders released from custody who have committed burglary and theft offences. The Bill will extend the maximum length of a curfew from 12 months to two years, making the use of those powers more flexible, and we will use those powers to test the house detention order concept outlined in the White Paper to see how that can contribute to reducing reoffending.
Ms Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab) [V]
The Secretary of State’s own strategy says that short prison sentences for women do not work because they fail to tackle the reasons women are there, which is often due to the abuse and trauma caused by the men in their lives. His own strategy says that. When the Government’s neglect of crimes against women is under the spotlight, why is he still insisting on spending another £150 million on ineffective prison places when that money could be spent on action to break the cycle of abuse and reoffending?
Robert Buckland
The hon. Lady is absolutely right to refer to the female offender strategy, which is at the heart of our approach to women offenders—the trauma-informed approach that she knows is so important. I can reassure her that the prison places that we are building will improve and enhance the existing female estate, some of which, frankly, is not fit for purpose. This will replace and revivify the estate and allow women to be in a secure environment where they can do purposeful activity, support each other and, indeed, benefit—[Interruption.] I do not know why Labour Front Benchers think it is so funny, Mr Speaker. I have certainly supported the female offender strategy, and I will repeat the point that what we are doing is improving and enhancing the custodial experience while delivering the strategy and, of course, residential centres such as the one in Wales that will be opening very shortly indeed. [Interruption.] I really fail to see why women offenders are so funny, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker
Can I just reassure you, Secretary of State, that they were not laughing at you? I think it was the expressions of the shadow Minister that they were laughing at—and people might think that those on the Government side were, too. I just want to reassure you that nobody was laughing at that situation.
Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)
Amy Callaghan (East Dunbartonshire) (SNP)
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Chris Philp)
The UK has a long-standing tradition of securing human rights. Indeed, the United Kingdom, for many decades and centuries, has been a beacon around the world for the protection of human rights. The operation of the Human Rights Act, now over 20 years old, is being reviewed. The review is being led by Sir Peter Gross, a retired Court of Appeal judge, supported by, among others, two QCs and two professors.
Allan Dorans [V]
The pandemic has seen necessary but drastic restrictions on human rights, including the right to assembly and protest. There are fears that not all of those restrictions will be fully rolled back. The campaign group Liberty has said that the United Kingdom Government’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will undermine protest, stifle dissent and make it harder for us to hold the powerful to account. Does the Minister agree that as the Bill moves through Parliament it should be guided by the principle of the right to peaceful assembly and protest, as fundamental human rights must be protected at all costs?
Chris Philp
I agree that fundamental human rights should be protected at all costs. The Bill we are debating does protect the right to peaceful protest, while at the same time respecting the rights of other people to get to their work and the need of emergency vehicles to secure safe passage down the highway, for example. On human rights, I was concerned by the passage through the Scottish Parliament last week of a law that had a chilling effect on free speech.
Amy Callaghan [V]
[Inaudible.]—of the Human Rights Act, in which it is made clear that it would robustly oppose any attempt to undermine the UK’s commitment to the European convention on human rights or distance the UK from membership of the Council of Europe. Does the Minister agree it is crucial that those assurances are given to Scotland and will he be working to ensure that the views of Scotland’s Government are heard and respected?
Chris Philp
Yes, most certainly. There is no plan to repudiate our obligations under the European convention on human rights and there is certainly no plan to leave the Council of Europe, so I can absolutely give the hon. Lady the assurance she asks for. On working closely with the Scottish Government, yes we are doing that and I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Scottish Government for the response to the review’s call for evidence, which I believe has already been received.
Gavin Newlands [V]
[Inaudible.]—my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Amy Callaghan) has just referred to, and both this Government’s desire for power grabs in many other areas of Scottish Parliament competence and the fact that Scotland’s legal system is separate and distinct, does the Minister agree that when published the review should include a commitment that they cannot and must not impinge on the integrity of Scottish law?
Chris Philp
The review is into human rights. As I said, the United Kingdom has been a beacon of human rights for many centuries now and we intend to honour our ECHR obligations. There is no intention to interfere with the Scottish legal system, although I am rather concerned by the remarks Lord Hope made about the apparent problems with the independence of Scotland’s prosecutors.
Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Alex Chalk)
Prison safety and security is a key priority. The Government are investing £100 million to introduce robust measures such as x-ray body scanners and phone blocking technology, as well as tools such as body-worn cameras and PAVA spray. On pay, in July 2020 the Government accepted in full six out of seven recommendations made by the Prison Service pay review body, delivering an increase in pay of at least 2.5% for all Prison Service staff, from those working on the gate through to those on the landings.
Mary Kelly Foy [V]
We heard at last month’s Justice questions that rejecting this expert advice will undermine prison safety and is, in fact, a false economy, because once tax receipts and staff retention are taken into consideration this pay rise practically pays for itself, so what is the real reason for denying prison officers pay justice? Is it because the Treasury is worried it will encourage other public sector workers to demand a decent pay rise too?
Alex Chalk
It is important to note that six out of the seven recommendations were accepted in full. The freeze will not apply to those people earning under £24,000. When it comes to safety, which was the central premise of the hon. Lady’s question, we have to consider the conditions that make a difference to those valuable and professional officers on the landings. Do they feel safe? Do they have a body-worn camera? Do they have SPEAR—spontaneous protection enabling accelerated response—personal safety training? That is what we want to focus on, so they can get the protection they deserve.
Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Philp)
Deductions from benefit orders are made by the court, and when the court makes them, the judge will take into account the affordability and the means of the person who is having the deduction order made. Someone can, of course, make an application later to remit part or all of the deduction, if their personal circumstances have changed.
Shabana Mahmood [V]
I am grateful to the Minister for that answer, but he will know that the Government have ordered jobcentre staff to apply the maximum 30% deduction from universal credit for claimants who have to pay a court fine, regardless of their circumstances. This approach is failing on two fronts. It pushes vulnerable claimants further into poverty and recoups less money. The Ministry’s own data shows that the amount of money recouped in respect of court fines fell by over 13% between June and August last year, when the arbitrary 30% deduction was applied to all claimants. Does the Minister accept that this is the worst of all worlds, and will he begin urgent discussions with his counterparts in the Department for Work and Pensions to follow the data and allow local decision makers a greater degree of discretion as to how much is deducted from each individual claimant to pay a court fine?
Chris Philp
I ask the House to be aware that these deductions pay not only for fines, but for compensation to victims, and we should be mindful of that. These orders are ultimately made by a judge, who, in making the order, has discretion and will take someone’s circumstances into account. I repeat the point that I made previously: if someone is experiencing difficulty, it is always open to them to go back to the court to have the order remitted, either in part or in whole.
Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)
The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)
The entire country has been shocked and appalled by the disappearance of Sarah Everard and the discovery of her body last week, and I know the thoughts of the whole House are with Sarah’s family and friends. Our minds are also on our constituents—the women who have shared their own stories of harassment and harm over the last week. After a quarter of a century of working with victims as a criminal practitioner and sitting as a part-time judge, and as someone who has worked with Members of all parties to successfully include stalking offences in our criminal law, and having taken groundbreaking legislation through this House on coercive control, these stories were all too depressingly familiar to me. Our country today should be a place where no woman has to live in fear of men, and I will continue to work tirelessly to build a criminal justice system that is better able to protect women and girls and that, most notably through our landmark Domestic Abuse Bill and the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, delivers more protection. The Government will work across this House to achieve that end.
Stuart C. McDonald [V]
I thank the Justice Secretary and echo the sentiments that he expressed.
It was the Justice Secretary who made the required statutory statement that the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill is compatible with convention rights, but given the many voices expressing grave concerns about the impact of that Bill on our human rights —especially rights relating to protest—did he have second thoughts about making that statement and, most importantly, will he listen to those concerns and act on them?
Robert Buckland
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments, but no, I do not have any second thoughts. The particular provisions on protests are a reflection of the Law Commission’s 2015 report and of the common law in England and Wales on public nuisance, which refers to, among other things, “annoyance”, “serious annoyance” and other terms that are well known to law. The maximum penalty in common law for public nuisance was life imprisonment. That is being reduced to 10 years. Frankly, I really do not see what the fuss is about. I rather think it is a confection designed to assist an Opposition in difficulty.
Mr Speaker
Let us go to Sir Robert Neill, the Chair of the Justice Committee.
Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con) [V]
I, and I am sure all the members of the Justice Committee, will also want to associate ourselves with the Secretary of State’s comments. Does he agree that protection of the public is served not only by deterrent sentencing where necessary, but by a much a broader and more nuanced suite of alternatives for less serious offenders? Can he help us, in particular, on the timescale for the roll out of problem-solving courts, which have been called for by the Select Committee and by many other commentators over a number of years, but which, until now, have perhaps not always had the ministerial or governmental impetus behind them that is required to make them succeed as part of that smarter sentencing package?
Robert Buckland
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Chair of the Justice Committee for raising the important issue of problem-solving courts. This will be an opportunity to bring together not just the courts system but other agencies around the issue in order to deal with the particular challenge being faced by a family or by somebody who has been accused of a criminal offence. The work on this is ongoing, and I want to launch the pilots later this year. This is very much at the heart of the sentencing White Paper that I published last September. It is all about getting smart on sentencing and making sure that we reflect the reality of the challenges that are often faced by our courts.
Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)
A study by UN Women UK has shown that 97% of young adult women in the UK have experienced sexual harassment in public places. One in five women will suffer sexual assault in their lifetime. Under the Lord Chancellor’s watch, rape convictions have fallen to an all-time low of just 1.4%. What does he have to say to the 96% of abuse victims who feel it is no longer worth making a complaint? What does he have to say to the 45% who said complaining would make no difference? What does he have to say to all women who have suffered abuse and who have given up hope of this Government’s ability to deliver justice?
Robert Buckland
The right hon. Gentleman is right to raise the worrying statistics about the gap that exists between the system and the confidence of women, in particular, who feel that the system does not work for them. I would remind him that this Government have pioneered important legislation in areas such as coercive control, stalking reform, and the changes in the Domestic Abuse Bill that I know he and his party support and that have been further refined in their lordships’ House to include offences such as non-fatal strangulation, an extension to coercive control, and threats to inflict revenge porn. We are able, in the Bill that we are debating today, to go even further and impose longer sentences for those who commit crimes predominantly against women and girls. He and his party have an opportunity tonight to help the very women that he talks about, but they choose to vote against the Bill and not to support the Government in their fight against crime and in their support for victims such as women and girls.
Mr Lammy
The Secretary of State has got to watch it, because I think he is getting annoyed, and he has made that something that you can go to prison for in the Bill that we are voting on a bit later.
Some 80% in prison of women are there for non-violent offences, serving short sentences that the Government know do not work. Most are themselves victims of crime—often much more serious crimes than those they have been convicted of. Separated from their families, they lose their children, their jobs and their hope. They make up 5% of the prison population, but they account for almost 20% of the self-harm, which has gone up under the Secretary of State’s watch. While he works to save statues and gag protesters, more and more women become victims. When will he admit that his Government just do not care?
Robert Buckland
I think I am entitled to be more than a little annoyed by the refusal of the Opposition to come together to work to achieve a better society for women and girls—[Interruption.] No, they have chosen the path of party politicking, and in an attempt to cover the deep divisions that exist on their side, they are politicising an issue that should rise above politics. I am deeply disappointed and, yes, I am annoyed on behalf of the thousands of women and girls who see this as an opportunity for change. The right hon. Gentleman is rejecting that, he is voting against tougher sentences, and he will have to answer to his constituents and the country.
Laura Trott (Sevenoaks) (Con) [V]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Philp)
My hon. Friend has been a tireless and energetic advocate for a Nightingale court in Kent, and the options are being studied carefully by officials, who will continue to work with her and her colleagues. We have got 49 courtrooms open for Nightingale courts, and that will shortly increase to 60. On the terrible problem of domestic abuse and violence against women, which she mentions, the Domestic Abuse Bill is, of course, going through Parliament; we will be spending £140 million next year supporting women and victims; and we have been prioritising domestic violence protection orders throughout the pandemic. I look forward to continuing our conversation about that Nightingale court in Kent.
Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow North East) (SNP) [V]
Will the Cabinet Secretary or a Minister welcome the announcement from the Scottish National party Government that while the UK Government seem intent on rolling back human rights in the UK, Scotland will aim to strengthen them in a truly groundbreaking human rights Bill? That Bill will incorporate four United Nations treaties, to further enhance the rights of women, people with disabilities, older people and minority ethnic communities. Does the Minister agree that independence is the only way for the people of Scotland to truly safeguard their fundamental human rights?
Robert Buckland
If the answer to the hon. Lady’s question is separation, it is entirely misconceived. The jurisdictions of England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland should be standing shoulder to shoulder in that fine tradition of the rule of law and respect for human rights. She correctly refers to the Holyrood Parliament’s decisions, and of course we respect that, but across the UK we have world-leading, world-beating laws and provisions relating to the rights of vulnerable people, which she talks about. The job is to make sure that that becomes more of a reality for more and more people, and that is what we should all be working together to achieve.
Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con) [V]
Robert Buckland
I will be making announcements on the independent review and the next steps very shortly. Judicial review plays a vital review in upholding the rule of law, and the reason we established the review was that we wanted to look carefully at whether it was running as it needs to or whether changes will be needed. I will make announcements to this House very shortly.
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
Robert Buckland
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for raising that question. The primary responsibility for the superintendence of the CPS rests with my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney General, but the hon. Lady does make an important point about the reputation of the rule of law, and I know that these matters are being looked at carefully. I commend the existing coronavirus legislation to her; it has been carefully sunsetted with review provisions, and I assure her that Ministers, including me, take that responsibility very seriously and will not hesitate to remove provisions that either have not been used or are just not proportionate to deal with the problems we face.
Darren Henry (Broxtowe) (Con) [V]
Robert Buckland
I am delighted to let me hon. Friend know that, as a result of the campaigning that he and other Nottinghamshire colleagues have undertaken, we will be opening a Nightingale court in Nottingham before the end of this month. I agree that adding additional capacity through opening up Nightingales is the key to tackling the higher level of outstanding cases caused by the pandemic. We have now opened Nightingales in every Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service region, and we are on track to have a total of 60 additional courtrooms by the end of March.
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)
Robert Buckland
I greatly respect the hon. Gentleman, and I am more than happy to have a longer discussion with him in real time about the evolution of the legal aid system, which evolved under Governments of both colours. Civil legal aid was slashed considerably by the Labour Government in 1999. This Government still spend £1.7 billion on legal aid. We are already dealing with criminal legal aid, and have a big review into it. With regard to civil legal aid providers, I have already answered questions about the way we are seeking to procure more housing and debt advice. I assure him that the challenges are great, but my personal commitment to legal aid, having been a practitioner in legal aid in my professional career, is real, sincere and will yield proper results.
Dr Jamie Wallis (Bridgend) (Con)
Robert Buckland
My hon. Friend is a doughty representative of his constituency. Rightly, he has consistently raised those issues with me on behalf of concerned local residents. The Department has already written to residents living near the proposed locations in the options listed. We have advised them of the proposal, and are seeking their views. We also want the views of Senedd Members, local Members of Parliament such as my hon. Friend, and councillors before any final decision is made.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Robert Buckland
The hon. Gentleman—I nearly said my hon. Friend—makes a very important point. I am looking very carefully at those provisions. It is important to remember that the magistrates have the power to commit for sentence to the Crown court where they consider their powers to be inadequate. I urge that they do that with regard to particular—[Interruption.] Well, I am listening to him, and I do not want to get into a debate with him, but it is important that that point is strongly made in the guidance issued to legal advisers in magistrates courts. I will look into that point to ensure that the maximum sentence that should be imposed, consistent with the facts in a case, is imposed to meet the justice that this House wanted to achieve for blue light emergency workers.
Mr Speaker
Order. I am suspending the House for three minutes in order for the necessary arrangements to be made for the next business.
Integrated Review
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I will make a statement on the Government’s integrated review of security, defence, development and foreign policy, which we are publishing today.
The overriding purpose of this review, the most comprehensive since the cold war, is to make the United Kingdom stronger, safer and more prosperous, while standing up for our values. Our international policy is a vital instrument for fulfilling this Government’s vision of uniting and levelling up across our country, reinforcing the Union, and securing Britain’s place as a science superpower and a hub of innovation and research. The review describes how we will bolster our alliances, strengthen our capabilities, find new ways of reaching solutions, and relearn the art of competing against states with opposing values. We will be more dynamic abroad and more focused on delivering for our citizens at home.
I begin with the essential fact that the fortunes of the British people are, almost uniquely, interlinked with events on the far side of the world. With limited natural resources, we have always earned our living as a maritime trading nation. In 2019, the UK sold goods and services overseas worth £690 billion—fully a third of our gross domestic product—sustaining millions of jobs and livelihoods everywhere from Stranraer to St Ives, and making our country the fifth biggest exporter in the world. Between 5 million and 6 million Britons—nearly one in 10 of us—live permanently overseas, including 175,000 in the Gulf and nearly 2 million in Asia and Australasia, so a crisis in any of those regions or in the trade routes connecting them would be a crisis for us from the very beginning.
The truth is that even if we wished it, and of course we do not, the UK could never turn inward or be content with the cramped horizons of a regional foreign policy. For us, there are no far away countries of which we know little. Global Britain is not a reflection of old obligations, still less a vainglorious gesture, but is a necessity for the safety and prosperity of the British people in the decades ahead.
I am determined that the UK will join our friends to ensure that free societies flourish after the pandemic, sharing the risks and burdens of addressing the world’s toughest problems. The UK’s presidency of the G7 has already produced agreement to explore a global treaty on pandemic preparedness, working through the World Health Organisation to enshrine the steps that countries will need to take to prevent another covid. We will host COP26 in Glasgow in November and rally as many nations as possible behind the target of net zero by 2050, leading by example since the UK was the first major economy to accept this obligation in law. Britain will remain unswervingly committed to NATO and preserving peace and security in Europe.
From this secure basis, we will seek out friends and partners wherever they can be found, building a coalition for openness and innovation and engaging more deeply in the Indo-Pacific. I have invited the leaders of Australia, South Korea and India to attend the G7 summit in Carbis Bay in June, and I am delighted to announce that I will visit India next month to strengthen our friendship with the world’s biggest democracy. Our approach will place diplomacy first. The UK has applied to become a dialogue partner of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, and we will seek to join the trans-Pacific free trade agreement.
But all our international goals rest upon keeping our people safe at home and deterring those who would do us harm, so we will create a counter-terrorism operations centre, bringing together our ability to thwart the designs of terrorists, while also dealing with the actions of hostile states—it is almost exactly three years since the Russian state used a chemical weapon in Salisbury, killing an innocent mother, Dawn Sturgess, and bringing fear to a tranquil city. I can announce that the National Cyber Force, which conducts offensive cyber-operations against terrorists, hostile states and criminal gangs, will in future be located in a cyber-corridor in the north-west of England.
The Prime Minister
Close, Mr Speaker.
We will also establish a cross-Government situation centre in the Cabinet Office, learning the lessons of the pandemic and improving our use of data to anticipate and respond to future crises.
The first outcome of the integrated review was the Government’s decision to invest an extra £24 billion in defence, allowing the wholesale modernisation of our armed forces and taking forward the renewal of our nuclear deterrent. The new money will be focused on mastering the emerging technologies that are transforming warfare, reflecting the premium placed on speed of deployment and technical skill, and my right hon. Friend the Defence Secretary will set out the details next week.
Later this year, HMS Queen Elizabeth will embark on her maiden deployment, leading a carrier strike group on a 20,000-mile voyage to the Indo-Pacific and back, exercising with Britain’s allies and partners along the way and demonstrating the importance that we attach to freedom of the seas.
By strengthening our armed forces, we will extend British influence, while simultaneously creating jobs across the United Kingdom, reinforcing the Union and maximising our advantage in science and technology. This Government will invest more in research and development than any of our predecessors because innovation is the key to our success at home and abroad, from speeding our economic recovery, to shaping emerging technologies in accordance with freedom and openness. We will better protect ourselves against threats to our economic security.
Our newly independent trade policy will be an instrument for ensuring that the rules and standards in future trade agreements reflect our values. Our newly independent sanctions policy already allows the UK to act swiftly and robustly wherever necessary, and we were the first European country to sanction the generals in Myanmar after the coup last month.
In all our endeavours, the United States will be our greatest ally and a uniquely close partner in defence, intelligence and security. Britain’s commitment to the security of our European home will remain unconditional and immoveable, incarnated by our leadership of NATO’s deployment in Estonia.
We shall stand up for our values, as well as for our interests, and here I commend the vigilance and dedication of hon. Members from all parties, because the UK, with the wholehearted support of this whole House, has led the international community in expressing our deep concern over China’s mass detention of the Uyghur people in Xinjiang province, and in giving nearly three million of Hong Kong’s people a route to British citizenship.
There is no question that China will pose a great challenge for an open society such as ours, but we will also work with China where that is consistent with our values and interests, including in building a stronger and positive economic relationship and in addressing climate change.
The greater our unity at home, the stronger our influence abroad, which will, in turn, open up new markets and create jobs in every corner of the UK, not only maximising opportunities for the British people, but, I hope, inspiring a sense of pride that their country is willing to follow in its finest traditions and stand up for what is right. With the extra investment and new capabilities of the integrated review, the United Kingdom can thrive in an ever more competitive world and fulfil our historic mission as a force for good. I commend this statement to the House.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
We want the integrated review to work. Threats to our national security are increasing; they are becoming more complex and less predictable. The Government must get this review right, but it is built on foundations that have been weakened over the past decade. The Prime Minister has spoken of an era of retreat; he is right. In the last decade of Conservative Government, defence spending and pay for the armed forces both fell in real terms. Our armed forces’ numbers have been cut by 45,000, and there is still a black hole of £17 billion in the defence equipment plan. Although we welcome the long-overdue increase in capital funding, the creation of a counter-terrorism operations centre and new investment in cyber, the Prime Minister cannot avoid the question that everyone in our armed forces and their families will be asking today: will there be further cuts to the strength of our Army and our armed forces? The British Army is already 6,000 below the minimal level set out in the last review. It has been cut every year for the past decade, and it is being reported that the Army will see a further reduction of 10,000, alongside fewer tanks, fewer jets for the RAF and fewer frigates for the Royal Navy.
Prime Minister, if those reports are untrue, can that be said today? Successive Conservative Prime Ministers have cut the armed forces, but at least they have had the courage to come to this House and say so. This statement was silent on the issue. After everything that the armed forces have done for us, the Prime Minister has a duty to be straight with them today.
Turning to foreign policy, Britain needs to be a moral force for good in the world once again, leading the fight against climate change; strengthening multinational alliances, including NATO; championing human rights; valuing international development; and ensuring that trade deals protect high standards and public services. But there is a huge gap between that and the Government’s actions. The review rightly concludes that Russia remains the most acute threat to our security. That is not new. Eighteen months ago, the Russia review concluded that the threat was “urgent and immediate”, so why has none of its recommendations been implemented?
The integrated review talks about the importance of upholding international law, I agree, but from Europe to the Indian Ocean, this Government now have a reputation for breaking international law, not defending it. We welcome the deepening of engagement in the Indo-Pacific region, but that comes on the back of an inconsistent policy towards China for a decade. Conservative Governments have spent 10 years turning a blind eye to human rights abuses while inviting China to help build our infrastructure. That basic inconsistency is now catching up with them.
The review also talks of conflict resolution, yet there is nothing about updating our arms export regime, and in particular suspending arms sales to Saudi Arabia. The Prime Minister’s statement did not mention international development, and I wonder why—because he is cutting development spending for the first time in decades and denying the House a vote on it. If global Britain is to mean anything, it cannot mean selling arms to Saudi Arabia and cutting aid to Yemen.
I voted for the renewal of Trident, and the Labour party’s support for nuclear deterrence is non-negotiable, but this review breaks the goal of successive Prime Ministers and cross-party efforts to reduce our nuclear stockpile. It does not explain when, why or for what strategic purpose, so the Prime Minister needs to answer that question today.
On trade, we recognise the need for new and ambitious trade deals. There needs to be a major boost in UK exports over the next decade, but that has to start with making a success of the Brexit deal, and that will not happen unless we remove the new red tape that is now holding British businesses back.
Britain should and could be a moral force for good in the world. After a decade of neglect, this review was the chance to turn a corner, but there is now a very real risk that our armed forces will be stripped back even further, and that this review will not end the era of retreat—in fact, it will extend it.
The Prime Minister
First, we have one of the toughest arms export regimes in the world under the consolidated guidance. Anybody listening to the right hon. and learned Gentleman would not realise that we are the second biggest international donor of aid in the G7.
It is absolutely preposterous to hear the Labour leader calling for more investment in our armed forces when this is the biggest investment in our armed forces since the cold war—£24 billion—and when it was not so long ago that he was campaigning very hard, without dissent, to install a leader of the Labour party as Prime Minister who wanted to withdraw from NATO and disband our armed forces. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) heckles me from the shadow Front Bench, but it is ridiculous for the right hon. and learned Gentleman to talk about our nuclear defences when the reality is that Labour is all over the place. The last time the House voted on protecting our nuclear defences, the shadow Foreign Secretary voted against it, and so did the current Labour deputy leader. They want to talk about standing up for our armed forces. Just in the last year, the Labour party has been given the opportunity to back our armed services, our armed forces, our troops and our soldiers in the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill. They had the chance to stand up for veterans. They voted against it on a three-line Whip. Those are the instincts of the Labour party—weak on supporting our troops, weak on backing Britain when it matters, and weak on defence.
Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)
My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has pointed out that the present Labour leadership is more on the side of Ernest Bevin, who was against fascism and against the left wing both at home and abroad, and that is a sign of some kind of unity.
The Prime Minister did not mention development much in his statement, and I ask him to meet us to have a discussion on it. The question of meeting the 0.7%—70p in every £100 of our income—has been agreed; the Government said that that would be maintained. They now say that there will be a gap and it will be restored. We want that gap to be evaporated—to go away and not to happen. The aid goes down with our income; it should go up with our income, and we should meet the commitment we made in successive manifestos. I leave it to the Prime Minister to say when those who are concerned for aid for Yemen, the Voluntary Service Overseas and others will get an answer as to whether they will be cut as well. I want to stand beside the Prime Minister as well as behind him, and we want to do what he wrote in our 2019 manifesto and proudly meet that commitment.
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his points. People listening to this debate might not grasp that this country is actually the biggest European donor to Yemen; we have given £1 billion over the past six years and £87 million this year. I do not think people grasp that we are giving £10 billion in international aid. We can be very proud of what we are doing. Of course, we will return to the 0.7% target when fiscal circumstances allow.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP) [V]
I thank the Prime Minister for advance copy of his statement, and I thank my Scottish National party colleagues, led by my hon. Friends the Members for Glasgow South (Stewart Malcolm McDonald) and for Stirling (Alyn Smith), who compiled on behalf of the SNP a substantial and constructive submission to the consultation on the review.
This statement is one more insight into just how hollow the brand of global Britain actually is. The Prime Minister’s rhetoric always fails to come close to reality. Today, the Prime Minister preaches about international obligations, but only yesterday we saw that our closest partners in the EU are bringing his Government to court for breaking international law.
The Prime Minister talks about partnership with nations around the world in the very week that the most senior figures in the US, including the Speaker of Congress, warned against the UK’s increasingly unilateralist approach. The chasm between the Prime Minister’s rhetoric and the reality of his Government’s actions is deeply damaging. Just because the Prime Minister wastes £2.6 million on desperately trying to copy the White House’s press briefing room, that does not hide the reality of the UK’s weakening global influence.
Given the limited time available, let me ask a number of specific questions to which we demand answers. On cuts to Army personnel, we were promised that 12,500 personnel would be stationed permanently in Scotland; not only does the current number remain well below 10,000, but overall cuts to the Army of 10,000 are expected. Is the Prime Minister prepared to admit that this is one more broken Tory promise to our armed forces and to the people of Scotland?
On international aid cuts, the review fails to reinstate immediately our moral obligation and the Conservative party’s manifesto commitment to spending 0.7% of gross national income on aid and development. Under the Prime Minister’s plan, countries devastated by war and famine—Yemen, Syria and South Sudan—will have their humanitarian aid slashed. Only this morning, it has emerged that the UK Government also plan to cut their human rights support and anti-corruption measures by a staggering 80%. If the Prime Minister is prepared to stand up for such callous cuts, is he also prepared to guarantee that he will allow for a straight vote on them in the House of Commons?
Finally, on Trident nuclear weapons, the review disgracefully endorses the attainment of 80 more of these weapons of mass destruction. Will the Prime Minister tell us who gave his Government the democratic right to renege on the UK’s obligations under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty?
The Prime Minister
This Government continue to invest massively in projects that will bring benefit to the whole of the UK, including Scotland. I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that there will be further investments in Lossiemouth, and that there is no threat to the Black Watch, which he and his colleagues sometimes like to raise in order to alarm people.
We will continue to invest massively in overseas development aid, which the right hon. Gentleman rightly mentioned. We are very proud of what we are doing—and by the way, it delivers 500 jobs in East Kilbride. We will continue to invest in shipbuilding, which drives jobs across the whole of the UK, and particularly in Scotland. It is fantastic to see ships being built by apprentices in Govan, as I am sure the right hon. Gentleman has. The only thing that endangers those investments and our working together as one UK—working with all the fantastic people in the armed services in Scotland—is the reckless referendum that his party insists on calling at the most inapposite time possible for this country.
Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con)
I very much welcome the comprehensive ambitions set out in this important integrated review paper. There is a 1930s feel to the scale of challenges that we face today, with rising authoritarian powers, weak global institutions, and an absence of western leadership and collective resolve. I was hoping for a Fulton, Missouri moment when we finally call out China for the geo-strategic threat that it is, and a commitment to our aid budget. I do hope that the Prime Minister will summon that Atlantic charter spirit of working together with our closest ally, the United States, to strengthen the rules-based order, such as advancing the G7 to the G10, which could form the backbone for revising the trade and security standards that our ever-dangerous world so desperately needs.
The Prime Minister
I must say that I think there is a balance to be struck, because, after all, we have a strong trading relationship with China worth about £81 billion. China is the second largest economy in the world and a fact of our lives, and we must accept that fact in a clear-eyed way. But we also have to be tough where we see risk. That is why this Government have brought in the National Security and Investment Bill to protect our intellectual property. That is why we are protecting our critical national infrastructure. That is why my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has done more than virtually any other Foreign Secretary around the world to call out what China is doing in Xinjiang. That is why this Government have offered a place—a refuge and abode—to 3 million Hong Kong Chinese who may be in fear of persecution as a result of what is happening in Hong Kong. This Government take a very, very clear-eyed approach to what is happening in China. It is a balanced approach and one that I think the British people understand.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
We have heard a lot of words like “ambition” and “innovation”, so let me bring the Prime Minister a little bit back down to earth, and sea. We have an aircraft carrier strike group with not enough aircraft and not enough ships to support it. We have rotting nuclear submarines, not a single one of which has been decommissioned. We have living accommodation for single personnel and families that is woefully inadequate and needing investment. Quite simply, the maths does not add up. The gap in what is needed to just deliver what is in-plan now is huge, even with the additional investment, so perhaps the Prime Minister could level with the House, the country and our armed forces and tell us now what is going to be cut so that this can be afforded.
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady should recognise that this is the biggest commitment in spending on our armed forces since the cold war. Labour left a black hole in our defence money of £38 billion. [Interruption.] Yes, they did. This is a massive investment and it is designed to deal with the chronic problems that previous Governments have failed to address—modernising our forces with AI, with the future combat air system, and finally moving into cyber. I think that is the hard-edged investment this country needs to modernise our forces and take them forward. Labour consistently failed to do that.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
As the Prime Minister just mentioned the National Security and Investment Bill, I hope I can rely on him to help the Intelligence and Security Committee to remove the obstacles that are being placed in our way in wishing to scrutinise the work of the Investment Security Unit.
Although there are strong analytical aspects to this review, it is suggested on pages 62 to 63 that our adversary, communist China,
“is an increasingly important partner in tackling global challenges like pandemic preparedness”—
if you please—and that we want
“deeper trade links and more Chinese investment in the UK.”
Does not that unfortunately demonstrate that the grasping naivety of the Cameron-Osborne years still lingers on in some Departments of State?
The Prime Minister
Those who call for a new cold war on China or for us to sequester our economy entirely from China, which would seem to be the new policy of the Opposition, weaving, as they generally do, from one position to the next, are, I think, mistaken. We have a balance to strike and we need to have a clear-eyed relationship with China. Of course we are protecting our critical national infrastructure, and we will continue to do that, and we will make sure that through the National Security and Investment Bill we protect our intellectual property. We will take tough measures, as I have said, to call out China for what it is doing in Xinjiang. There is no one around the world who has done more on that matter than my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary or this Government, and we will continue to do that. Companies that profit from trade in forced labour will not be allowed to do so in this country. I think the whole House should be very proud of what we are doing.
Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab) [V]
I am really shocked that development is barely mentioned in the integrated review. When will the Prime Minister understand that full tummies, economic opportunity and stable Governments create the stronger, safer and more prosperous world that he wants, not more nuclear weapons? Looking at the cuts that we know of so far— cuts to the conflict, stability and security fund and 80% cuts in aid corruption work—how do they make sense to create this stable world? When do the Government plan to publish their development strategy, and will they actually consult the non-governmental organisations, the global south and, indeed, Parliament and the International Development Committee on this review? Please, tell us—we need to know the details.
The Prime Minister
As I have just explained, development remains an absolutely critical part of the UK’s foreign and overseas policy, and £10 billion is being spent this year alone. Given what this country has been going through and given that we have been obliged to spend £280 billion to prop up jobs and livelihoods, another £63 billion to support the NHS and £37 billion on supporting local councils, I think it is up to Members opposite to say which of that support for the NHS they would cut and what they would reduce to spend more on overseas aid. Of course we want the percentage to go back up again when fiscal circumstances allow, but I think people of common sense understand that £10 billion is a huge sum in the current circumstances, and they will appreciate that it is right to wait until fiscal circumstances have improved.
Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)
I very much welcome the integrated review as it is set out, and I welcome its aspiration to coherence. I also welcome the fact that many of the ideas, not just the author, have been stolen from the Foreign Affairs Committee, and for that I am very grateful. But may I ask that some of the aspects we have touched on in the past few years are addressed in the strategies that have not been clarified in today’s paper—strategies on artificial intelligence and, indeed, on different forms of financial threats? Where we need to see the UK setting up for ourselves is not just in aid and sticking to the 0.7%, which the Prime Minister has already touched on, but also in platforms, making sure that we do not just reallocate aid to defence, but actually increase the number of ships so that our presence in the east is real, not digital. We also need to look hard at the new threats—from cryptocurrency to the financial mis-dealings in the city of London—that threaten our national security so obviously, whether that is dirty Russian money or, increasingly, dirty Chinese money. We need to stand up for Britain’s interests and bring these tools together. This is a very welcome start, but will the Prime Minister please put some meat on those bones and make sure, when we hear the Command Paper next week, that we do not find that this is a snowstorm without the pounds attached?
The Prime Minister
It is a pretty big blizzard of a snowstorm when we consider that there is £24 billion and the biggest investment since the cold war. We cover every aspect of the subjects that my hon. Friend has just raised, from artificial intelligence to the threat of cryptocurrencies, and it remains the case that the UK, under these proposals, will continue to be able to project—one of the few countries in the world to be able to project—force 8,000 miles, thanks to our carrier strike force, and we are making the investments now. We are making the investments now that are grasping the nettle that previous Governments have failed to grasp for decades.
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD) [V]
Reneging on the commitment to retain 0.7% of GNI on development spending is a short-sighted mistake, and the Prime Minister’s promise that it will be just temporary is not good enough. After all, he said in his own party’s manifesto he would not cut it. Weasel words on aid will not wash. The Prime Minister has said a number of times during this statement so far that aid spending will be restored “when fiscal circumstances allow”, but we all know that the fallout from this pandemic is going to last years, if not decades, so will the Prime Minister promise the House today that this unlawful development cut will be for one year, and if it might be for longer, why does he not just seek a vote on it?
The Prime Minister
The habit of reading out questions that have been prepared means that I am obliged to return the hon. Lady the answer I gave just a little while ago. We will of course return to the 0.7% when fiscal circumstances allow, but I think that, in the meantime, most people in this country will be amazed, proud and pleased that, in spite of the difficulties we face, we are spending £10 billion on the poorest and neediest around the world.
Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)
There is much to be welcomed in my right hon. Friend’s statement today, but is he not concerned that our position as chair of the G7 is undermined by Britain being the only country in the G7 that is cutting its development budget, in breach of our clear party manifesto commitment? If he is determined to pursue this aspect of his policy—I know my right hon. Friend; he is a democrat—when will he bring it to the House for a vote? Otherwise, he may be in danger, as from the start of the new financial year, of creating an unlawful Budget.
The Prime Minister
I have great respect and admiration for my right hon. Friend, who has campaigned for many years on international development and done much good, but I have to say, listening to contributions from around the Chamber, that we are in danger of talking Britain down. The investments we are making are colossal—absolutely colossal—by any international standards. We are the second-biggest contributor of aid in the G7 already, and in spite of all the difficulties occasioned by the pandemic, we are contributing £10 billion this year to support the poorest and neediest in the world. Yes, I can reassure my right hon. Friend that we will return to the 0.7% when the fiscal circumstances allow, but the law makes it very clear that when we have exceptional circumstances—I do not think anybody in this House or around the world would contest that we have had exceptional circumstances—we are entitled to vary that 0.7% commitment, and that is what we are doing.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) [V]
Given that the Prime Minister said the climate crisis is his No. 1 international priority, it is disappointing that there is a climate-shaped hole at the heart of the Prime Minister’s review, with resources dangerously diverted to nuclear weapons. Earlier today, the Foreign Secretary justified breaking our nuclear non-proliferation treaty obligations on the grounds that nuclear weapons are
“the ultimate insurance policy against the worst threat from hostile states.”
The logical consequence of that position is surely that every country should be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons on the same insurance policy grounds. If such nuclear proliferation happens, and since we are increasing our nuclear warheads by more than 40%, how could we possibly have any moral authority to speak out against it? If that nuclear proliferation happens, does the Prime Minister think the world as a whole will be more safe or less safe?
The Prime Minister
It is entertaining to see the shadow Foreign Secretary nodding along to the hon. Lady’s denunciation of nuclear weapons after what we heard from the Labour leader—quite extraordinary. I really do not think the hon. Lady can have been reading the integrated review at all, because it sets out very clearly that we will be investing £11.6 billion internationally on tackling climate change. It develops the 10-point plan that the UK is advancing for tackling the emission of greenhouse gases. It stresses that this is the major western economy to go for a net zero target by 2050. She should be applauding the document, but I have to assume that she has not yet properly read it.
Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)
I very much welcome this integrated review, although I think there will be challenges in re-engineering Whitehall for this common purpose. How does my right hon. Friend assess the threat from Iran to the Gulf region and the UK’s strategic interests? What does he believe the opportunities are for increased peace and prosperity as a result of the signing of the Abraham accords between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain?
The Prime Minister
I thank my right hon. Friend, who knows whereof he speaks and has done much to advance the cause of peace in the middle east. It was an unexpected breakthrough for many in the foreign policy establishment to see the Abraham accords, and I think a significant and positive step forward. As for Iran, I must tell him—I am sure he knows—that we remain extremely concerned by Iran’s influence and disruptive behaviour in the region. In particular, of course, we are concerned by the risk of Iran developing a viable nuclear weapon. That is why we think it right that Iran should be in compliance with the joint comprehensive plan of action not just for the benefit of the region, but for the benefit and security of the people of Iran.
Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC) [V]
This integrated review looks like a desperate, confused and self-important search for purpose, far, far removed from the concerns of the people of Wales. With Welsh trade with our most important trading partner, the EU, collapsing as a result of the fundamental political and strategic error of our exit, is it not increasingly clear that the best interests of my country would be served not by squandering billions and more on literally useless nuclear weapons, but by our ability to pursue our own course in the world?
The Prime Minister
I remind the hon. Gentleman that the people of Wales voted to leave the EU. I think they did the right thing, for all sorts of reasons. Not that I think he supports them, but it is the Welsh Labour Government who continue to squander money hand over fist on all sorts of projects that I do not believe are in the interests of the people of Wales, including £144 million on a study for a bypass alone.
Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con) [V]
I welcome this integrated review. I recognise how difficult it is to do one during a pandemic. I am worried about designating China simply as a systemic challenge, given the terrible events in Hong Kong and Xinjiang. Will the Prime Minister keep that under review? Does he agree that because the 0.7% cut is strictly temporary, relating to the pandemic, there is no need to amend legislation? Finally is not one of the most important reasons to build up Britain’s might to stand squarely behind individual British citizens in peril, such as Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, so that there are no more victims of Iran’s vile hostage diplomacy?
The Prime Minister
Yes indeed, my right hon. Friend is right in what he says about the ODA commitment and right in what he says about China. Of course we will keep that under review, although, as I said, the balance has to be struck. He is also right that the UK Government should stick up for British citizens, and I thank him for everything he did during his tenure as Foreign Secretary to secure the release of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. It is a disgrace that she remains effectively in captivity in Tehran, and on 10 March I raised that very matter with President Rouhani myself.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Prime Minister for his statement. Will he outline the strategy to bring back into line recruitment of foot soldiers post covid, as well as recruitment of cyber-soldiers? May I highlight that the centre for cyber security in Europe is Belfast in Northern Ireland, with trained staff and low rates? Will he consider basing security in Northern Ireland as an integral part of the United Kingdom?
The Prime Minister
The first point to make about the armed forces is that there will be no redundancies under this plan. There will be massive investment in our land forces and particularly in cyber-forces. We are taking the tough decisions needed to modernise and improve our armed forces. Yes, it is expensive—it requires £24 billion to do it—but it means taking historic and difficult decisions now, and that is what we are doing.
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con) [V]
As someone who is proud to represent a constituency with tens of thousands of defence and aerospace jobs, I am delighted that at the heart of the review is investment in domestic industries. Does the Prime Minister think that increasing our sovereign defence manufacturing capability will assist us strategically in projecting power and sustaining operations across the globe?
The Prime Minister
Yes, and one of the things that our defence investments can do is help to entrench our Union and build jobs and growth across the whole of the United Kingdom. There is now a steady stream of shipbuilding contracts and many other defence contracts that will drive high-quality jobs for a generation to come.
Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab) [V]
Will the Prime Minister explain how building national resilience will include the digital transformation of the security and intelligence agencies, where the resources will come from, and whether it will include industry and international partners?
The Prime Minister
As I just said to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), we are investing massively in cyber and in upgrading the cyber-skills of our troops.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con) [V]
The late and respected American Senator John McCain said in a 2008 speech:
“We have to strengthen our global alliances as the core of a new global compact—a League of Democracies—that can harness the vast influence of the more than 100 democratic nations around the world to advance our values and defend our shared interests.”
Can my right hon. Friend’s welcome vision, set out today, be aligned with smaller nations around the world such as Kurdistan, in northern Iraq, and Israel, which are vanguards of religious pluralism, democracy, a free society, the rule of law and security against terrorism? Can Great Britain lead a new alliance of democracies around the world, as proposed by the late Senator John McCain?
The Prime Minister
Yes. Our commitment to Israeli security is unwavering, and we continue to work closely with our partners in the Kurdish region of Iraq.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
Will the Prime Minister level with the country and tell us exactly how he plans to reduce the armed forces by 10,000 in the years ahead?
The Prime Minister
I have already explained that this is the biggest investment in our armed forces since the cold war, and there will be no redundancies across the armed forces.
Jane Stevenson (Wolverhampton North East) (Con) [V]
I have been absolutely honoured this year to spend time with the Royal Navy, as part of the armed forces parliamentary scheme. In a world where new powers are using new tools to redefine the international order, does my right hon. Friend agree that it is vital that we now invest in new technologies such as cyber so that our fantastic armed forces personnel are fully equipped to face 21st-century challenges to our nation’s defence?
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed, and that is why we are investing in cyber and in shipbuilding. By the end of this decade, we will have 24 frigates, as opposed to the 15 today.
Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab)
The Prime Minister says that he is tough on illegal migration at home, but withdrawing and reducing aid, development and military support in areas of conflict, famine, war and instability will drive a new wave of international migration. Does he not accept that he cannot be tough, and claim to be tough, on illegal migration at home if his policies are driving it to start with?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman is not right; in fact, I think he is talking total nonsense. The most effective thing we can do to ensure that we protect ourselves against illegal migration is to do what we have done, which is take back control of our borders—a measure that he and the Labour party opposed, and that the Labour party would repudiate.
Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con) [V]
I strongly welcome and support my right hon. Friend’s statement today on our post-Brexit strategy, which is set out in the integrated review. Does he agree that global Britain needs to maximise and co-ordinate its opportunities to promote and protect British industry and interests across the world, including those of our overseas territories?
The Prime Minister
I thank my right hon. Friend. He is quite right because this integrated review supports our overseas territories and our Crown dependencies, and our armed forces will continue to deter challenges to Gibraltar. We will maintain a permanent presence on the Falkland Islands, Ascension Island and the British Indian ocean territories. We will use our increased maritime presence around the world to protect the very territories and dependencies that he mentions.
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP) [V]
Today we heard the PM speak about a premium based on speed. However, Scotland’s waters make up over 60% of UK waters, while the Royal Navy’s most northern surface warship base is on the UK’s southern coast. Can he confirm that this review means that, despite regular territorial incursions from Russia’s navy and air force, Scotland still hosts no major surface warships—a fact that means that scrambling the fleet ready escort to Scottish waters takes 24 hours? How on earth is that a premium based on speed?
The Prime Minister
I am interested to hear the hon. Gentleman’s emphatic desire, as a Scottish nationalist—a member of the SNP—for a UK defence role. I think he is absolutely right. But I can tell him that the salient point is that all our nuclear deterrent—all our submarines, I should say, are based on the Clyde.
Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con) [V]
I strongly welcome the much greater coherence that this review will deliver to our national security strategy, both for our nation’s immediate defence and so that all its elements are working together towards an open international order and being a force for good in the world, supporting open societies, human rights and good governance. As part of this, can I continue to assume that we will honour our commitment to be the country that leads the world in helping hundreds of millions of LGBT people to have the freedom to be themselves, with all the benefits that come from that for the prosperity of those states and the wealth of the spirit of the individuals involved?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is totally right. This is one of the areas that I know that every embassy and consulate in the Foreign Office campaigns on. I believe that we make a huge difference around the world. There are countries that have changed their policies on marriage and their approach to LGBT issues in response to British lobbying. The latest Magnitsky sanctions that we have implemented are in respect of Chechnya for its policy on LGBT issues. We will continue to campaign and evangelise for our values and our beliefs around the world.
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD) [V]
I draw the House’s attention to the fact that I am a member of the board of governors of the Westminster Foundation for Democracy. In that capacity, I am aware of the importance of the work that it and other organisations do in protecting open, democratic societies across the globe. Not being a Scottish nationalist, I am also aware how important that is to the UK’s own national interest. Can the Prime Minister assure us that that work will continue despite the difficulties we face following the current financial year?
The Prime Minister
Yes, I can. I have seen the excellent work that the Westminster Foundation for Democracy does around the world. I have personally attended debates that it has championed in countries where democracy is precarious, and I thank the hon. Lady very much for what she is doing.
Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con) [V]
Our international ambitions must start at home, and through the integrated review we will drive investment back into our communities. It is essential that we ensure that the UK is on the cutting edge of innovation and create an entire country that is match-fit for a more competitive world. In my constituency of Stoke-on-Trent Central, advanced ceramics from local firm Lucideon recently landed on Mars. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the sky is not the limit when it comes to innovation?
The Prime Minister
I am thrilled and amazed to hear that ceramics from my hon. Friend’s constituency have landed on Mars. That is not the limit of our ambitions, as she knows, because the National Space Council has recently approved all sorts of missions and ambitions for the UK. But the point of what we are doing is not just to push back the frontiers of science and knowledge across the universe, but to drive jobs and growth in her constituency and around the whole UK. That is the point of the global Britain agenda, because we believe that by exerting British influence in the world in the way that we are, we can drive the UK economy and drive prosperity here at home.
Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab) [V]
I declare my interest as set out in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
I welcome the recognition in the integrated review of threats to our democracy and the role that technology, disinformation and other forms of hybrid warfare play in those threats. On that basis, can the Prime Minister confirm that the online safety Bill that will be presented to the House this year will contain sufficient powers to tackle collective online harms, including threats to our democracy?
Marco Longhi (Dudley North) (Con) [V]
The integrated review is clearly extremely welcome. Does my right hon. Friend agree that a vigorous approach to foreign policy that recognises the importance of the Indo-Pacific region is key? Does he also agree that a truly global Britain that forges strategic ties with future superpowers, such as Brazil, which partnered with us in the development of the Oxford vaccine, is also of crucial importance?
The Prime Minister
I know that I speak for my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary and, indeed, for my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley North himself when I say that we understand the importance of Brazil. I share his analysis about the future of Brazil. Together with the Canning of our times, the Foreign Secretary, we intend to build closer relationships not just with Brazil and the rest of the Mercosur countries, but with the Pacific Alliance countries too.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind) [V]
With hostile states, non-state actors, terror and crime groups all posing a threat to the UK and our allies, it is important to be prepared to adapt and develop our cyber-technology and capabilities. However, increasing our nuclear weapons arsenal is something I cannot condone. Both President Biden and Putin renewed their bilateral New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty on nuclear weapons reductions just last month, so why is the Prime Minister going against the flow by increasing our arsenal?
The Prime Minister
Of course we are committed to nuclear arms reduction. Indeed, we believe that China should be brought into strategic nuclear arms reduction, but one of the most important things about having a credible deterrent for friend and foe alike is setting out what we have, and that is what this integrated review does.
Katherine Fletcher (South Ribble) (Con) [V]
I thank the PM for an important statement about the future security of our proud nation. Addressing both the challenges and opportunities the UK faces in a more competitive world is needed, especially when those who seek to harm us are using all the tools of modern technology at their disposal. Lancashire has a proud history of engineering technology solutions, so does the Prime Minister agree that in the future more investment in our technologies, such as cyber, will be key to our defence? Will he take account of Lancashire’s skills and ability to deliver?
The Prime Minister
I know that my hon. Friend was listening very carefully to the statement, and she will have spotted that there is a commitment to the north-west and to cyber in Lancashire. [Interruption.] I have heard your representations, Mr Speaker. You will have to wait for the Defence Secretary to explain exactly where it is going to be. To boost those skills and jobs for the long term and to make that transformation in defence technology that Lancashire is undoubtedly going to lead, we are investing £6.6 billion in defence research and development over the next four years.
Mr Speaker
We will certainly take Lancashire, even if the Prime Minister cannot say whereabouts.
Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab) [V]
The review and the Prime Minister’s statement are typically big on words, but scant on detail or strategy. It was a mass of contradictions steeped in a lack of realism when it comes to affordability and scope, and there was zero acknowledgement of the harm that years of underinvestment in our nation’s defence have caused. Ultimately, the world will judge him and his Government on their actions, so can he explain how breaching article 6 of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty fits with his commitment to international law?
The Prime Minister
I never saw such a seething mass of contradictions as the Opposition Front Bench, because we only have to go a few yards from the Leader of the Opposition to the shadow Foreign Secretary to find a complete gulf in their view on the very matter that the hon. Lady raises. The Leader of the Opposition claims to be in favour of the nuclear deterrent, and the shadow Foreign Secretary voted against it. The most consistent thing that our friends and allies, as well as our foes around the world need to know is that the UK is committed to the defence of this country and to our nuclear defence.
Mr Speaker
We do have to make sure that when we say how people voted, we are correct.
Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con) [V]
There is much to commend in this statement from the Prime Minister, but I am saddened to hear that we will be balancing the books on the backs of the poor. We are devastating the amount of money going to Yemen and Sudan, to mention just two countries where children, mothers and whole families are devastated by what they have to face. We are also aware that although funding is being decided, VSO currently does not know when that funding is coming. If it does not have funding by the end of this month, it will have to end its covid-19 response programme in 18 countries, leaving 4.5 million people without support. That decision cannot easily be reversed, so will the Prime Minister tell the House whether VSO will have some money to continue, and if not, when that funding decision will be taken?
The Prime Minister
I have much enjoyed working with my hon. Friend over the years, and I understand what she says about Yemen. I repeat: most people in this country will be reassured to know that the UK Government continue to be one of the biggest providers for the people of Yemen—the biggest in Europe. I strongly support VSO, which some of my family have done. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary will be setting out the position shortly.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab) [V]
Despite 20 years of bloodshed, the integrated review makes only two glancing references to Afghanistan. Given that 150,000 people, including 457 British servicemen and women, have lost their lives in that conflict, will the Prime Minister say how the UK will help to establish a lasting peace in the region?
The Prime Minister
As I have repeatedly told President Ghani of Afghanistan, our commitment is for the long term. He knows the difficulties of the current situation, and the decisions that the US Government have to take. The UK is working hard to ensure that there is a viable process, and that we do not see a return to the kind of civil war that I am afraid has bedevilled Afghanistan. I believe that the legacy of this Government and this country in Afghanistan—and the commitment of British troops, as well as the loss of life to which the hon. Gentleman rightly draws attention—is a proud one. We must ensure that it is not betrayed, and that we leave a legacy in the education of women and the security of the people of Afghanistan that is lasting and that endures.
James Sunderland (Bracknell) (Con)
As a former soldier, may I reassure the Prime Minister that taking the review back to first principles, and assessing the future capability requirements against the threat, is absolutely the right thing to do? Will he reassure me that where restructuring is needed—notably perhaps in my own service—our people will be looked after?
The Prime Minister
We are determined to look after all the wonderful men and women of our armed services, not just by protecting them after they have served, and by protecting veterans who may be at risk of vexatious litigation in the way I have described; we also have to ensure that we look after people during their service. In particular, we must look after families, who often bear the brunt of the commitments and sacrifices that our armed services make. That is why we have committed to wraparound childcare for those involved in our armed services.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con) [V]
May I welcome the Prime Minister’s putting diplomacy at the very heart of the integrated review? With new resources going into the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, do we not have an independent Britain which still needs to be at the heart of multilateral democracy, multilateral institutions and multilateral diplomacy around the world? That includes conflict prevention and conflict resolution.
The Prime Minister
We continue to support all the sustainable development goals that my right hon. Friend rightly mentions, and we believe passionately in diplomacy. The flag is going up around the world in embassies, legations and continents. The UK flag is going up, I am proud to say, in Australasia, Africa—around the world.
Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP) [V]
Why on earth slash budgets used to tackle corruption and promote good governance around the world? Why slash support for the research that our universities do to help the poorest countries to combat disease? Are not these exactly the sort of soft-power policies that deliver positive results and earn respect, rather than extortionate, grotesque and provocative nuclear weapons spending?
The Prime Minister
This is the country that spends the most on the global vaccine alliance. This is the country that spends £548 million on COVAX and £1.6 billion on Gavi. We lead the world in health protection, in tackling conflict and poverty, in championing female education around the world. I really think international observers who come across Britons around the world working in these fields would simply not recognise the discussion and debate that they are hearing today in the House of Commons. They know that this is a country that is massively committed to the welfare of the poorest and neediest in the world and will remain so.
Florence Eshalomi [V]
Many of my constituents are concerned that much of this review seems to have prioritised the global projection of hard power. The Government have chosen to cut our aid budget to countries in need, such as Syria and Yemen, and this will have serious knock-on effects. My constituent wrote to me and said:
“Britain has a good track record in recognising the crucial role that aid has in alleviating poverty and enhancing health equity.”
Does the Prime Minister agree that this Government’s cuts to aid will not just let the world’s poorest down, but make it more difficult for the Government to achieve their foreign policy objectives and maintain Britain’s global moral authority?
Sir Roger Gale (North Thanet) (Con) [V]
I share the view expressed by the Father of the House, my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley), at the start. I am proud to be a member of a party which, in its last manifesto, said that it would spend 0.7% of gross national income on overseas aid, but we all know that because of the fall in GNI, the 0.7% represents less money than it did a year ago. Now is not the time to cut our aid to Yemen or to withdraw our support for voluntary services overseas, so will my right hon. Friend consider bridging the gap by additionally donating extra supplies of the world’s finest, safest covid vaccine—the Oxford vaccine—to developing countries?
The Prime Minister
I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend for his suggestion. I remind him of what I said about the commitment of this country to overseas aid, which is enormous by any objective view. On the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, this is the only vaccine in the world, under the terms of the deal struck between the UK Government, the Oxford scientists and AstraZeneca, that is sold at cost around the world. I thank him for raising that, because it is another reason for people in this country to be proud of the outward-looking, engaging, fundamentally compassionate attitude of the British Government and people.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Dealing with authoritarian regimes around the world, especially those that do not want to play by the rules, is always complicated and difficult. I understand that, but we have to be consistent, coherent, determined and brutally tough when we need to be. What I do not understand, in relation to Russia and to China, is why the Government still refuse to declare what is happening in the Xinjiang province as genocide, why they have used every power to try to prevent Parliament from coming to a determination on that, why we will still not use the Magnitsky sanctions—which I applaud the Foreign Secretary for having introduced in the first place—against Carrie Lam for what is happening in Hong Kong, and why we still refuse to do enough about the dirty Russian money that is imperilling our financial transparency in the City of London and in our overseas territories.
The Prime Minister
As the House has heard many times, it is up to a competent court to determine whether genocide has taken place. We have consistently called out what has happened in Xinjiang, and what continues to happen. As for the use of Magnitsky sanctions, actually they have been used by this Government against Russia for what it did, and by the way, at that time, Labour Front Benchers, including the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras, were sitting like great squatting Buddhas, immobile, while the then Labour leader was effectively endorsing the line from the Kremlin.
Mr Speaker
I think we need to be careful about what allegations we are making.
Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con) [V]
“Global Britain” remains the buzzword, and our armed forces have a key role to play with the integrated review. With that in mind, and given the many responsibilities that my right hon. Friend has committed to, can he reassure me that he will expand the Army to 100,000 as our chief ally, the US, has recommended, rather than see it wither on the vine to 72,000 by cutting recruiting, thereby avoiding redundancies?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that the Army, including reserves, will be over 100,000, but it is the duty of this Government to take the tough decisions that are necessary to modernise our armed forces as well. That is why we are investing £24 billion and undoing some of the mistakes that I am afraid were made by the previous Labour Government.
Mr Speaker
I will now suspend the House for two minutes in order for the necessary arrangements to be made for the next business.
Levelling Up
(3 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Eddie Hughes)
With permission, Mr Deputy Speaker, I will make a statement on levelling up. Levelling up is central to the Government’s agenda, and we are working with local areas to ensure that every region, every city and every town will recover from covid-19 and level up. Investing in our local areas has the potential to improve lives, give people pride in their communities, bring more places across the UK closer to opportunity, and ensure that everywhere can build back better.
Economic differences remain between places across the UK, and those economic differences have real implications. They affect people’s lives through their pay, their work opportunities, their health and their life chances. Tackling them, and driving prosperity as part of levelling up the UK, remains a priority for the Government. As set out in the spending review, the Government’s capital spending plans for the coming financial year, 2021-22, will total £100 billion—a £30 billion cash increase compared with 2019-20. That is part of the Government’s plans to deliver more than £600 billion in gross public sector investment over the next five years, delivering the highest sustained level of public sector net investment as a proportion of GDP since the late 1970s. In the Budget, we published the prospectus for the new £4.8 billion levelling-up fund. The fund will operate UK-wide, extending the benefits of funding for priority local infrastructure across all regions and nations. This cross-departmental fund represents a new approach to local investment and will end silos in Whitehall that make it difficult to take a holistic approach to the infrastructure needs in local areas.
The fund will invest in the infrastructure that matters to local areas, creating economic benefits and bringing communities together as we recover from the economic impact of the pandemic. The levelling-up fund will invest in regenerating our town centres and high streets, upgrading local transport and investing in our cultural and heritage assets across the UK. That could be repairing a bridge, investing in new or existing cycling provision, upgrading an eyesore building, regenerating key leisure and retail sites to encourage new businesses, or even maintaining museums, galleries and community spaces that are important to the local area.
The fund will create opportunity across the country, prioritising bids from those places in need of economic recovery and growth, improved transport connectivity and regeneration. In order to target those places in need, an index has put places in categories 1, 2 or 3, with category 1 representing places with the highest levels of identified need. However, it is important to stress that the bandings do not represent eligibility criteria, nor the bid amount or number of bids that a place can submit. Bids from categories 2 and 3 will be considered for funding on the merits of their deliverability, value for money and strategic fit.
We published the index, and the methodology used to develop the index, to help the fund to deliver its core objective of improving local communities by investing in local infrastructure that has a visible impact on people. The Government recognise the important role of Members in championing the interests of their constituents, and we expect them to be consulted as part of wider local stakeholder engagement on bids, although it is not a necessary condition for a successful bid. Members can have a positive role in prioritising bids and helping to broker local consultation. When considering the weighting given to bids, the expectation is that an MP will back one bid that they see as a priority, and any bid may have priority backing from multiple MPs and local stakeholders. Members may also want to support any bid that will benefit their constituencies in the usual way.
Where appropriate, the UK Government will seek advice from the devolved Administrations as part of bid assessments in their geographical areas on shortlisted projects regarding alignment with existing provision. The fund is part of a broad package of complementary UK-wide interventions. Along with the levelling-up fund, the UK shared prosperity fund will create a package of UK Government support, which invests in skills, infrastructure and innovation at local, regional and national levels, enabling the Government to provide the same support to communities in all nations as we build back from covid-19. To help local areas prepare for the introduction of the UK shared prosperity fund, the UK Government are also providing an additional £220 million of funding through the UK community renewal fund. This fund aims to support people and communities most in need across the UK to pilot programmes and new approaches. Through these funds, we will establish new ways of working between the UK Government and places right across the UK.
The UK Government will work more directly with local partners and communities across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, which are best placed to understand the needs of their local area and more closely aligned to the local economic geographies to deliver quickly on the ground.
In the Budget we also announced the eight successful locations in England, which will move to the next stage of freeport designation. Teesside, Liverpool City Region, Humber region, Plymouth, Solent, Thames, Felixstowe and Harwich and East Midlands Airport will benefit from this investment. Freeports will bring together ports, local authorities, businesses and key local stakeholders to achieve a common goal of shared prosperity and opportunity for their regions, and they will allow the UK to take advantage of the benefits of leaving the EU.
As part of the towns fund, 101 towns were selected to develop proposals for town deals. All towns have now submitted their proposals, and 52 towns have so far been offered town deals, meaning that we now have committed £1.28 billion to the programme. Assessment continues for the remaining towns, with further announcements expected in due course. Through the towns fund, we will invest up to £25 million in each town, or more in exceptional cases, to drive the economic regeneration of towns to deliver long-term economic and productivity growth. We are also creating a new £150 million community ownership fund to ensure that communities across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland can support and continue benefiting from the local facilities, community assets and amenities that are most important to them.
From summer 2021, community groups will be able to bid for up to £250,000 match funding to help them buy or take over local community assets that are at risk of being lost and run them as community-owned businesses. In exceptional cases, up to £1 million match funding will be available to help establish a community-owned sports club or to help buy a sports ground that is at risk of being lost without that valuable community intervention.
Working with Mayors and local enterprise partnerships, the £900 million Getting Building Fund will also deliver jobs, skills and infrastructure across the country, targeting investment at those areas that are facing the biggest economic challenges as a result of the pandemic.
We want to devolve and decentralise to give more power to local communities, providing an opportunity for all places to level up. Through an ambitious programme of nine devolution deals, £7.49 billion-worth of investment is being unlocked over 30 years. The recently implemented West Yorkshire devolution deal will give the newly elected Mayor control over an annual £38 million investment fund, as well as new powers over transport, education, housing and planning.
The Department has also recently announced plans for more homes in urban areas and on brownfield land, as well as changes to our funding rules to ensure that we level up all parts of England as we progress towards 300,000 new homes every year. The Prime Minister announced that seven mayoral combined authorities were each receiving a share of the £400 million brownfield housing fund. That will help unlock 26,000 homes by bringing under-utilised brownfield land back into use and contribute to levelling up our country.
I hope that hon. Members will agree that this demonstrates the importance that this Government attach to the levelling-up agenda and the many ways in which we are addressing the causes of inequality. I am confident that the measures that I have set out today will make a real difference to people and places across the whole of the United Kingdom. I commend this statement to the House.
Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op)
I welcome the Minister to his new role and thank him for advance sight of his statement. The Labour party welcomes funding for every town and region, especially after the Conservatives have held them back with unfair cuts and deliberate disinvestment over the past decade, but this funding is only a fraction of the money the Conservatives took away in the first place. Despite all the Minister’s claims about the levelling-up fund, regions will still be getting less than they got before the crisis. It is a bit like a burglar who sneaks into your house in the dead of night, strips it bare and then expects gratitude for handing back your TV set.
Every region should get the funding it needs to recover, but instead the Government are pitting regions and towns against one another and forcing them to fight one another for funding. Council leaders are furious that millions of pounds are being wasted on consultancy fees for putting bids together. All that money could have been spent on actually levelling up areas that the Conservatives have held back.
Ministers have deprioritised areas that desperately need funding, such as Barnsley, Salford, Bolsover and Ashfield, in favour of wealthier areas such as Richmondshire that just happen to be represented by Cabinet Ministers. It looks very much as if the Government are fiddling the formula to funnel money into wealthier areas and away from the areas that need it most, and the methodology confirms that fear. Despite the Prime Minister’s promise that funding would be allocated to tackle poverty, the Conservatives have removed deprivation levels from the funding formula. That is how 14 areas that are wealthier than average appear in the highest priority category, while areas that need investment the most have been blocked. The Government will not fix regional inequalities by ignoring deprivation when they allocate funding. They are not levelling the country up; they are pulling it further apart and deepening the inequalities that they created in the first place.
I would be grateful if the Minister could tell us why the index of multiple deprivation was excluded from the funding formula, and why Barnsley, Salford, Ashfield and Bolsover were deprioritised in favour of Richmondshire in North Yorkshire. How much is being spent in total on red tape and consultants in the bidding process for these funds? How much of the levelling-up fund is recycled money that the Government have announced before from the local growth fund, the towns fund or other pre-existing funds? The Government only published the methodology after the Good Law Project threatened them with court action, so will the Minister come clean and publish all the data that underlies the methodology, so that taxpayers can see exactly what the Government are doing with their money?
Eddie Hughes
Where do I start? I would like to trade analogies with the shadow Secretary of State. He reminds me of a man who has been out for an evening with friends, and at the end of the night, when it comes to splitting the restaurant bill, he is the guy who complains about the division of the bill because he did not have a pudding. [Interruption.] I am here setting out an incredibly bold future for the country in a post-pandemic environment, with a very optimistic and enthusiastic Prime Minister who sees ambitious things for the future of our country, and the shadow Secretary of State is talking about methodologies and whether this constituency or that constituency did not get the funding. I am talking about levelling up across all four nations of the United Kingdom. He is talking about whether individual constituencies get their pudding today. Really, we need to move on. We are talking about significant investment over an extended period and a bright future for this country.
The shadow Secretary of State says that some councils are unhappy about the amount of money that has been spent on consultants. Many councils do not have the capacity to build up a bid of the standard required for this funding, which is why we are providing £125,000 each for those in category 1, so that they can develop those bids.
The shadow Secretary of State says that the methodology has been twisted in some way to benefit one constituency over another; I say tell that to Oldham and Gateshead, which I strongly suspect are very grateful for the funding they are getting and the opportunity to develop bids.
The shadow Secretary of State asked why we excluded deprivation as one of the factors; I say that we decided to leave the criteria to civil servants. We set out the expectation—what we hoped to achieve—and left it to civil servants to decide the criteria so that we did not have any of the political influence that he suggests.
The shadow Secretary of State also asked us to publish all the data associated with the methodology; I am not going to do his homework for him. All that information is freely available. He might be able to get some of his research team to get to work on that.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
For the record, the shadow Secretary of State said, “I always have a pudding.” Very wise.
Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con) [V]
I welcome my hon. Friend the Minister to his place on the Front Bench. He has made a great start.
Will my hon. Friend confirm that the levelling-up fund will welcome applications from rural areas, such as Ryedale in my constituency, which may look prosperous from the outside but whose average earnings are below the regional average, partly because of a past lack of infrastructure investment? The situation could be reversed if funds were provided to important projects such as the improvement of railway stations in Malton and in Thirsk.
Eddie Hughes
I thank my hon. Friend for his kind words and his question. I encourage him to work with his local council to develop bids along the lines that he has just set out. Those bids will be assessed based on deliverability, strategic fit and value for money. We hope that that strategic fit element will be partly determined by the good work of local MPs who engage with local councils to determine priorities for their area.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP) [V]
I welcome the Minister to his place and thank him for his statement.
Although additional funding for communities is always welcome, I am sure the Minister will understand that it is greeted with a degree of scepticism. Indeed, the much-vaunted towns fund continues to be mired in controversy and allegations of pork barrel politics that just will not go away. According to the Financial Times, with this new announcement we are seeing more of the same today and the bias in favour of Tory-held seats in respect of so-called levelling-up funding is “pretty blatant”.
The Minister does not want to talk about methodologies—and no wonder. The Tory priority list ignores additional poverty-related criteria based on sparse rural populations, meaning that rural populations and islands are bumped down the list. However, Tory-held seats in Scotland have been ranked among the most in need of help from the Government fund, while coincidentally the seats in Scotland that the Tories do not hold have been given a lower funding priority that is not borne out by deprivation levels. Perhaps the Minister could explain that.
It is also clear that the Tory priority list ignores additional poverty-related criteria. We in Scotland can see that this is yet another step on the road towards this Tory Government completely bypassing and disrespecting the Scottish Parliament as they seek to impose their Tory priorities on Scotland’s democratically elected Government in devolved policy areas, which they already intend to do through the shared prosperity fund.
If the real criteria for benefiting from levelling up are not simply to have a Tory MP or live in a Tory target seat, will the Minister set out clearly what the criteria for the fund are and how the awarding of funds will be made completely transparent? The awarding of funds does not seem to be related to areas of deprivation in Scotland, so how can we believe that it is truly about levelling up and not just more old-fashioned pork barrel politics?
Eddie Hughes
I am slightly embarrassed, because the information that I have suggests that North Ayrshire in the hon. Lady’s constituency was in category 1 for the levelling-up fund, which seems counterintuitive given the speech she just made about the Conservative party prioritising Conservative areas. I imagine that that council, which I believe is Labour-run, will embrace with alacrity the idea of being provided with £125,000 of funding by the UK Government to help it to develop its bid. It is important that we are taking this opportunity to reach out to all corners of the United Kingdom; I hope that in future the hon. Lady is simply pleased about that.
Matt Vickers (Stockton South) (Con)
Thornaby has just landed a whopping £23.9 million through its town deal, but that is not going to stop me asking for more. May I welcome the more than £4 billion set aside for this levelling-up fund and invite the Minister to come to join me to look at some projects across Stockton, Ingleby Barwick and Yarm that would be perfect for this game-changing Government investment?
Eddie Hughes
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I am very much a fan of the “can I have some more?” approach, so I think it is completely appropriate that he should ask for more funding, even though, as he says, he has already secured nearly £24 million. I will convey his invite to the Secretary of State and the Minister for Regional Growth and Local Government, and I have no doubt that both or either of them will soon be up to visit.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab) [V]
May I say to the Minister that it is one thing to announce lots of policies and lots of money, but another to make sure the policies and the spending are successful in delivering the achievements that he obviously want so make? What indicators are going to be used to demonstrate the success of levelling up? Are the Government going to set targets so that we can all decide at the end of this Parliament whether those indicators have been achieved? If he cannot set them out for us today, I would be more than happy if he wanted to put that list in the House of Commons Library so that we can judge them in due course.
Eddie Hughes
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. With regard to the Government providing funding and the impact or success of it, I understand that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has allocated more than £40 million to the Sheffield city region through the brownfield fund, so it will be up to local people there to determine whether that money has been spent wisely. I hope he will contribute to ensuring that it is. The criteria for allocations of the funding, or applying for the funding, include
“need for economic recovery and growth, need for improved transport connectivity and need for regeneration.”
I know that this is not quite what he asked, but I suggest to him that if we are going to determine the success of these projects, the British electorate will probably do that at the next general election. I look forward to seeing how that turns out.
Sarah Atherton (Wrexham) (Con) [V]
One of the many reasons why the Conservatives won seven out of the nine north Wales seats at the last general election was the two decades of financial neglect by the Welsh Labour Government in Cardiff. Does my hon. Friend agree that the levelling up fund is the opportunity for the UK Government to answer the call of the people and use true devolution, via local authorities, to directly improve areas such as north Wales and Wrexham, which has been starved of infrastructure funding and therefore progression?
Eddie Hughes
I thank my hon. Friend for her question. I think we should just repeat part of it: seven out of the nine north Wales seats are now held by Conservatives.
Eddie Hughes
Well, we can argue about that—it is still seven. When we make very good use of the £125,000 that will be given to Wrexham County Borough Council to help it work up its bid for the levelling up fund, I have no doubt that the enthusiasm for voting Conservative will spread to the remaining seats in north Wales.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab) [V]
If the Government’s formula says that the Chancellor’s Richmondshire constituency is in greater need of investment than Barnsley, the Government’s formula is wrong. But it is not too late to do the right thing, so will the Minister commit to urgently reviewing how money is to be allocated from the levelling up fund?
Eddie Hughes
We have no intention of reviewing how the money is allocated. The criteria were determined by civil servants. There was no political influence, so we are still comfortable with the basis on which funds are being allocated. However, the hon. Gentleman will probably not be short of cash. Like you, Mr Deputy Speaker, I am a keen reader of The Yorkshire Post and I understand that it is the hon. Gentleman’s intention to borrow £500 million to spend in the local region, so that area, for one, will not be short of money.
Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) (Con) [V]
Can my hon. Friend assure the House that areas such as the districts of Arun, Chichester, Horsham and Mid Sussex, which all fall into my constituency but which are not in category 1, will still be able to succeed if we submit compelling bids?
Eddie Hughes
I can absolutely offer my hon. Friend that assurance. What is important is that those bids will be assessed on deliverability, value for money and strategic fit. As I said, that strategic fit element will include the support of an excellent local MP, such as my hon. Friend.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]
Despite having higher rates of child poverty and unemployment, Salford has been categorised as priority 2 for investment, behind the constituencies represented by the Communities Secretary and the Chancellor. We now know that the single biggest factor in prioritisation was the length of commute by car. Can the Minister explain why funding is being diverted to relatively affluent commuter towns, rather than being used to create jobs in areas that need them, such as Salford?
Eddie Hughes
I suspect that like me, Mr Deputy Speaker, you are a keen reader of the Salford Star, where I read the hon. Lady’s comments about pork-barrel politics and accusations of Conservative party political influence on the allocation of funding, which is peculiar given that Oldham, 12 miles away across Greater Manchester, has been placed in category 1, as have Leicester and Gateshead. It is difficult to argue that the Conservative party is manipulating money when it is ending up in a large number of Labour seats.
Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con) [V]
Crewe struggles with railway bridges and congestion, which risk holding it back. This fund gives us the chance to tackle that once and for all and to help level up the town and surrounding area. Can my hon. Friend confirm that the fund will support such local transport infrastructure projects?
Eddie Hughes
I can absolutely offer my hon. Friend that assurance, but I urge him to work with the local council to identify a priority bid for his area and assess that against deliverability, strategic fit and value for money to ensure he is supporting the bid in his area that is most likely to succeed.
Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab) [V]
The cat is out of the bag. I am amazed that the Minister is being quite as brazen as he is. A moment ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) asked the Minister how we will know whether levelling up has been a success. The Minister’s response—I am paraphrasing—was, “Well, we’ll see if the Conservative Government get re-elected.” It is absolutely shameless. There is no attempt to pretend that this is a genuine process that has been properly worked through. It is purely about getting re-elected.
We in Chesterfield were recently successful in the town deals fund and I know how important it is for councils to put in quality bids for support. Can the Minister assure us that anyone who wants to make a bid will get support from consultants to ensure that they can get a bid in front of the Minister?
Eddie Hughes
Who ultimately decides whether we continue to sit here? I thought we were beholden to the public. I thought it was our job to serve them. The hon. Gentleman seems a bit confused as to whose job it is to serve who. I am very clear, and this Conservative Government are very clear, that it is our job to serve the British public and we are doing that. They will determine whether our decisions and priorities for funding or policy development have been a success, and they will determine who forms the next Government on that basis.
Peter Gibson (Darlington) (Con) [V]
I welcome my hon. Friend to his place and thank him for all he is doing on levelling up. Whether it is investing £105 million in Darlington station, £23.3 million invested through the towns fund, or establishing “Treasury North” in my constituency, we are seeing the benefits of this Conservative Government, and I welcome the opportunity that the levelling-up fund will bring. Does he agree that delivering jobs and opportunity in Darlington is not giving up but truly levelling up, and does he have a levelling-up message for the voters of Hartlepool?
Eddie Hughes
I have been a bit tired of seeing my hon. Friend’s face in my social media feeds over the past weeks and months showing him celebrating the various successes as funding and opportunity flows towards his constituency. I am delighted to say that I am a similar beneficiary in the Black Country, because HCLG has decided to move one of its offices to Wolverhampton. It is great to see that this Government are deploying staff around the country to ensure that we level up right across the country. Under no circumstances is that giving up; we are levelling up everywhere.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD) [V]
During this pandemic South Lakeland has had the biggest increase in unemployment and has the highest proportion of its workforce on furlough of any community in the country, and yet the Government have our community in the bottom priority for levelling-up funding because they are using old pre-pandemic data. The Lake district is Britain’s biggest visitor destination outside London, and so if the Government rethink, using accurate data, and choose to invest in the Lakes line, in rural bus routes, in cycling, and in culture and our visitor economy here, they will not just be preventing hardship in our South Lakeland communities but boosting the whole British economy. So will the Minister rethink?
Eddie Hughes
As I said in answer to a previous question, the Government will not be rethinking the data or the methodology that they apply to distributing their funding, but given the circumstances that the hon. Gentleman has set out, I strongly urge that he engages with Ministers in the Department, because, as I have explained, a significant number of funding streams are available, and I would like to think that one of them is a good fit for his constituency.
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con) [V]
I welcome my hon. Friend to his place. High streets across Rother Valley have been ignored and neglected for decades. The levelling-up fund presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rejuvenate our high streets, providing up to £20 million of funding to bring them back to life. Here in Rother Valley we cannot allow any more dither and delay for economic recovery of our communities. What encouragement can he give to Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council, my council, which is a priority 1 area, to fully grasp this amazing opportunity to get a bid in for the first round of funding for Rother Valley, so that we can start the necessary work of regenerating our high streets as quickly as possible?
Eddie Hughes
I would suggest two things: first, that the council engages quickly with its excellent local MP to identify appropriate projects for this funding; and secondly, that it fully utilises the £125,000 that will be given to help it work up an impressive and commercially appropriate bid.
Ben Lake (Ceredigion) (PC)
I, too, welcome the Minister to his place. He made reference in his statement to devolution and bringing economic decision making closer to the communities that it affects, but the levelling-up fund seems to do the opposite as far as Wales is concerned by excluding the Senedd from decisions that would be taken in Whitehall. It does, however, tie the success of community projects to representations made by MPs in this place. Can he give us any reassurances that Wales will not lose out now that his Government are cutting the number of Welsh MPs by a fifth?
Eddie Hughes
I think the thrust of the statement I have made today is that we fully intend to reach out to all four nations to ensure that everybody joins in our attempt to level up right across the United Kingdom. As Ceredigion is in category 1 of the levelling up fund, I hope the hon. Gentleman will be identifying suitable projects to support and endorse to ensure that further funding comes to his constituency.
Derek Thomas (St Ives) (Con) [V]
I am pleased that the Isles of Scilly were included in the recent Budget for category 1 capacity funding for the levelling up fund. The transport link to Scilly is the most important issue for everyone on Scilly. They rely on it for everything—literally—that they need. Will the Minister confirm that finding a solution for a resilient and affordable transport system is the kind of levelling up this fund could deliver?
Eddie Hughes
Absolutely. One key aim of the fund is connectivity and transport in local need, so that is absolutely at the heart of what this fund is about. I encourage my hon. Friend to work with local councils to identify a priority bid for his area to ensure the maximum opportunity for success.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab) [V]
This Government have devastated the finances of local authorities, such as Newcastle City Council, cutting their funding year after year, breaking their promise to pay their covid costs and forcing them to raise council tax, which itself raises more in some areas than in others and takes money out of the pockets of those who need it most. This fund pits councils against each other to compete for meagre and recycled pots of money, with Government Departments taking all the decisions. Why does levelling up mean putting Whitehall in charge?
Eddie Hughes
I thank the hon. Lady for her question, but I am slightly confused. This process will allow local MPs to work with their local councils to identify priority projects for their area and will provide those councils with funding—£125,000 in the case of Newcastle upon Tyne, which is a category 1 authority—so that they have the funds available and they have the opportunity, working collaboratively, to identify a good project. I ask the hon. Lady to work with the council to get on and identify a project and bring money to her constituency.
Simon Fell (Barrow and Furness) (Con) [V]
I was delighted when Barrow-in-Furness was awarded a £25 million town deal in October. It will make a huge difference to revitalising our town centre, bring a university campus to Barrow and improve our cycling and walking provision. Can my hon. Friend confirm that places that have benefited from a town deal will also be able to secure backing from the levelling up fund for other schemes that will support our communities?
Eddie Hughes
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the funding that he has already secured for his local area, and I completely encourage him to continue to bid for the levelling up fund. These are not mutually exclusive opportunities. If he has a high-quality bid, then it has a good chance of success. Once a priority bid is identified, I look forward to its being submitted.
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
If we are truly going to level up, much more radical and cross-departmental work and funding will be needed to address structural inequalities. I will be working with Gateshead Council to put in a bid to the levelling-up fund, but why have the Government not come forward with a plan to tackle child and family poverty and social care, as well as this levelling-up fund?
Eddie Hughes
The hon. Lady has identified very important funding needs. The fund will tackle one element of the problems that we are seeking to address. As I set out, there will be about £600 billion of public sector investment funding over the next five years; through other funding opportunities, I am sure there will be the chance to tackle the concerns that she raised. I am delighted that she will be working with her local council to identify a priority bid for the levelling-up fund.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
The last award of funds to my constituency, from the Getting Building Fund last year, has already been worked on and constructed; a fantastic construction industry training centre will admit its first students next January. Therefore I welcome my constituency’s being a priority 1 area for the levelling-up fund. I am already working with my local authority—we had our first kick-off meeting last week—so will he confirm that bids that reflect genuine local need, supported by the local authority and the Member of Parliament, have the best chance of success in getting that funding to turn into real opportunities for our constituents?
Eddie Hughes
I thank my right hon. Friend for his question, and for being an exemplar of how an excellent local MP can not only bring funding to his constituency but see the project through to completion—a great example for us all to follow. I endorse the idea that through this scheme we need to identify quality local projects that will make a visible difference to local people in the constituency. That is why it is so important that MPs work with their local councils to prioritise such schemes and ensure maximum opportunity for success.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP) [V]
I welcome the Minister to his place. I assure him that I am looking not for a pudding or a slap-up meal, but simply to ensure that Northern Ireland receives its fair share of the levelling-up cake. He will be aware that Northern Ireland is still one of the poorest regions of the United Kingdom, and that our economic advantage has been deteriorating. The Northern Ireland protocol has disrupted trade, which has added to costs and created uncertainty. In what practical ways will the levelling-up fund benefit Northern Ireland? Can the Minister assure the House that, although under the Northern Ireland protocol we are still subject to EU state aid rules and interference in how the Government can spend money, the Northern Ireland protocol will not interrupt the Government’s ability to spend money to level up the economic disparities between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom?
Eddie Hughes
I had the opportunity to visit Northern Ireland with the Secretary of State fairly recently, to see for myself the difficult conditions that the right hon. Gentleman has explained. We absolutely will work with Northern Ireland to ensure that we continue to provide funding and continue to level up, as we aim to do across all four nations of the United Kingdom. A different approach is being taken in Northern Ireland, and the UK Government will accept bids at the most local level from a range of local applicants, including but not limited to businesses, voluntary and community sector organisations, district councils, the Northern Ireland Executive, and other public sector bodies. Local councils in Northern Ireland should indicate whether they support bids in their geographical area.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con) [V]
I welcome the Minister to his place. At the last election, people voted Conservative, some for the first time, because they believed in levelling up, and in our vision of spreading prosperity to areas neglected by Labour. Does my hon. Friend agree that by ensuring that every part of the country can bid and benefit from the levelling-up fund, we are accelerating our transformational levelling-up agenda?
Eddie Hughes
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the £37.5 million that he has already secured for his constituency. He demonstrates that an active and able constituency MP can bring funding to their area. It is important that everybody looks for bids they can support and submit in their constituency. Regardless of the prioritisation category, those bids will be assessed, based on deliverability and value for money, as well as strategic fit, which is the bit to which an MP will be able to contribute.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab) [V]
May I also welcome the Minister to Stockton, to visit Billingham, which was told not even to bother to bid for town centre funds? We have lost 12,500 jobs across the Tees Valley in the past 11 months, yet Stockton local authority has to bid for levelling-up funds to carry out relatively minor road projects that should have been covered by the other road funds that were stripped away by the Government. Surely the Minister will agree that the £4 billion fund for the entire north of England—incidentally, it is a small fraction of the cash spent on Crossrail in London—needs to be increased considerably so that our areas can have a starter, a main course and a pudding, as well as big structural and support projects, rather than just a bit of tarmac here and there.
Eddie Hughes
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question, but this is quite a significant pie—if we are going to continue to use the food analogy—that we are talking about splitting up. As I mentioned in my statement, £600 billion will be invested over the coming years. I completely understand that when you have a successful Government providing funding across all regions, people see that and want more. That is no surprise. I am glad that hon. Members are ambitious for their region. Stockton-on-Tees is a category 1 in the levelling-up fund, and I hope the hon. Gentleman will support a bid for his area.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I do not know what it is about this statement, but I am absolutely hungry now.
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con) [V]
In Lowestoft and Waveney, there are significant areas of poverty, and yet, as part of the wider East Suffolk Council area, we are in the priority 2 category. I would be most grateful if my hon. Friend could provide an assurance that applications from the Waveney area that support the creation of much-needed new jobs will be given full and fair consideration and will not be disadvantaged by our being in a lower category area.
Eddie Hughes
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. He gives me the opportunity to say again that it is incredibly important that those who are not in category 1 do not feel in any way discouraged from submitting a good-quality bid. I hope that local Members will identify a good-quality bid in their area that they can support. That bid will be assessed against deliverability, value for money and strategic fit.
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab) [V]
Halton is 23rd in the index of multiple deprivation but does not meet the criteria to be a priority 1 area in the levelling-up fund or a priority area for the community renewal fund. The Government’s criteria seriously disadvantage my constituents, who live in one of the most deprived communities in England, but not those in leafy Richmondshire, which is 256th in the index of multiple deprivation and which, remarkably, is in the priority 1 category. Can the Minister explain how that can by any stretch be levelling up, and can he share publicly the datasets used by the Government to perpetuate this gross inequality?
Eddie Hughes
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. As I said earlier, the datasets are all publicly available information. With regard to the criteria that we are using to determine where funding is targeted, there is the need for economic recovery and growth, the need to improve transport connectivity, and the need for regeneration. I appreciate that some places will be disappointed that they are not a priority 1 area, but I would still encourage the hon. Gentleman to work with his local council to identify a high-quality bid that they can submit for this funding, because it will be considered.
Siobhan Baillie (Stroud) (Con)
I really welcome the range of opportunities we are being given by the Government to get investment into Stroud. The ideas are already flowing as part of a 20-year campaign to reopen Bristol Road/Stroudwater station. We also have high-street regeneration schemes, and cycling and walking schemes such as the greenway, and we are going to need that sustainable, environmentally friendly transport. Large rural constituencies such as mine have pockets of deprivation across them, so will my hon. Friend clarify whether the Government will consider a strategy bid that includes a series of connected projects to truly benefit and level up more lives across Stroud?
Eddie Hughes
I thank my hon. Friend for her question. County councils with transport powers are eligible to submit one transport bid, but—this is perhaps more pertinent to her question—local authorities may wish to consider pooling funding from their bids to improve the chances of taking forward a larger transport scheme.
Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab) [V]
I welcome the Minister to his new position; we were sparring partners in the Whips Offices. I wonder whether he can clarify something. The levelling-up fund means £50 million per year for Wales over the four years for which the fund has been set out, yet according to all the statistics, Wales should have been receiving £375 million in structural funding each year. The Prime Minister has promised very many times that Wales will not receive a penny less, so can the Minister tell us when he will allocate the shortfall of £325 million for Wales—or is that just another broken promise from the Prime Minister and the Conservatives, who continually let the people of Wales down?
Eddie Hughes
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his kind words, although perhaps they evaporated when we got to the question. Clearly, as I set out in my statement, it is the ambition of this Government to level up across all four nations of the United Kingdom. I fully appreciate that he might have some reservations with regard to the allocation of funding from the levelling-up fund, but there are a number of other funds, which I mentioned in my statement, and, taken together, I imagine that will represent significant investment for Wales.
Kate Griffiths (Burton) (Con) [V]
I am very proud of the work that this Government have undertaken to drive the regeneration of many of our town centres and attract people back to them. Burton in my constituency recently benefited from town deal funding. Can my hon. Friend confirm that, as well as that £22.7 million investment, Burton and Uttoxeter will be able to secure backing from the levelling-up fund for other schemes, such as those offering local road improvements or creating safe community spaces in our town centres?
Eddie Hughes
It is fantastic to see colleagues who have been here just over a year already securing substantial funding for their constituencies. Given the success that my hon. Friend has had so far, I would in no way discourage her from continuing to work with her local council to identify a high-quality bid that she can support in her constituency, so that she can continue her success in securing that ongoing funding.
Alyn Smith (Stirling) (SNP) [V]
Can the Minister tell us how much less money will come to Scotland under this scheme than we would have received under the EU funding scheme? If he will not commit to sending this lesser sum of money to Holyrood and leaving it at that, how can we view this as anything other than a power grab from Scotland, for less money than we would get if we were independent in Europe?
Eddie Hughes
I hope that the hon. Gentleman will understand that I mean him no ill when I say that I suspect the good people of Stirling will soon come to realise that they were better represented by their previous MP, my dear friend Stephen Kerr. However, I would imagine that the hon. Gentleman’s local authority will be delighted that this Government are providing £125,000 to help it work up a high-quality bid so that it can draw more funding to Stirling.
Simon Baynes (Clwyd South) (Con) [V]
I, too, welcome my hon. Friend to his place. Will he meet me to discuss possible projects in Clwyd South that fulfil the requirements of the levelling-up fund, such as Wrexham Council’s bold regeneration plans and the reopening of Corwen station on the Llangollen steam railway in Denbighshire?
Eddie Hughes
What a great finish—questions from England, Scotland and Wales, and good news for those areas, as we explain the funding that this Government will provide to them. I hope that my hon. Friend works with his local council to develop a priority bid that he can support, and I will ensure that the Minister for Regional Growth and Local Government and the Secretary of State are aware of the invitation to visit the area, so they can see the excellent bids on offer in Llangollen.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I thank the Minister for his statement, and for responding to 30 questions. Before I suspend the House for three minutes, I want to say that when we go on to the main business after the ten-minute rule motion we will start with a three-minute limit, in continuation of the debate from yesterday. I will remind everybody about that later. Everybody should leave the Chamber in a covid-friendly manner in order for us to sanitise the Dispatch Boxes.
Goods and Services of UK Origin
Tuesday 16th March 2021
(3 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Goods and Services of UK Origin Bill 2019-21 View all Goods and Services of UK Origin Bill 2019-21 Debates Read Hansard Text
A Ten Minute Rule Bill is a First Reading of a Private Members Bill, but with the sponsor permitted to make a ten minute speech outlining the reasons for the proposed legislation.
There is little chance of the Bill proceeding further unless there is unanimous consent for the Bill or the Government elects to support the Bill directly.
For more information see: Ten Minute Bills
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)
I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to establish a presumption in public sector procurement in favour of purchasing goods and services from businesses based in the UK; to require the Secretary of State to publish data on the value of Government contracts awarded to such businesses, and estimates of jobs created as a result, by region and nation; to make provision for a kitemark scheme for goods of predominantly UK origin; and for connected purposes.
Ministers could and should do more to help British firms win British Government contracts. After more than 10 years of this Government in power, too often the best British companies are ignored when Ministers give out contracts. This is about jobs, and how quickly Britain emerges from recession. It is about the huge social value that Government can create for our constituents, and the stability for families and new career opportunities when procurement is done with imagination.
The Conservative party’s handling of covid and lockdown has made the economic damage, never mind the cost in lives and health, so much worse. One extra measure that Ministers could take to speed the recovery is to encourage consumers to buy local, to buy British, and they should start with Whitehall.
The PPE scandal law year saw British firm after British firm that was offering to make personal protection equipment ignored. Only those who had the mobile number of a Minister or two had the chance to win a lucrative contract. Time after time, British manufacturers, often on the doorstep of the very hospitals and care homes where staff were crying out for more PPE, struggled to get doors in Whitehall to open for them. Many were firms that because of covid were having to look for new products and new markets to keep staff employed. As the National Audit Office has set out, Ministers spent £12.5 billion on PPE that one year earlier would have cost just £2.5 billion. There was, without doubt, a huge scramble to secure PPE, but our country ended up buying equipment that was five times, or £10 billion, more expensive than the year before. If more British manufacturers had been helped to win PPE contracts, Ministers might have got better value and now have the money to spend on proper pay rises for NHS staff.
Contracts with overseas firms led to the extraordinary situation of much hailed deliveries of PPE from China and Turkey ending up being paid for, but not all used. Huge contracts were given to overseas firms such as the Miami-based Saiger jewellery company, and who can forget the Spanish businessman paid vast sums to be the middleman, ultimately by British taxpayers? All the while, local firms employing our constituents were missing out. As Make UK, Britain’s lead manufacturing body, made clear at the time, lots of firms that work with textiles and are used to working with plastics were extremely keen to help, registered on the relevant Government website and, all too often, then heard very little. Thirty-six British companies went as far as contacting Labour Members to make it clear that they had offered to help and had been ignored.
What is striking too is that many of these firms were based outside London and the south-east—for example, the Birmingham firm that offered to supply a quarter of a million aprons and masks, or the company further north, in Ripon, that could have provided 100,000 face visors per week. Some British firms that offered to help and revealed the source of their supplies discovered deals were done directly with their overseas supplier rather than with them. Indeed, in a scathing report last year on the PPE scandal, the National Audit Office found that just 12% of all PPE ordered by the Government supply chain between February and July came from UK manufacturers. If even at a time of national crisis, when the need for basic supplies was on the front page of every newspaper and running on every news bulletin, British companies’ offers of help were not getting through, it is difficult not to wonder what on earth it must be like for British businesses that want to offer their products and services to Government when there is not a national crisis happening.
Ministers made a series of claims that they were building up the UK supply of PPE, going so far as to claim that 70% of PPE was now from British sources. Sadly, this was not true; no such data was being kept. My Bill would put that right. Data would be kept and could be scrutinised. There has recently been a review of Government procurement, but despite its spirit, there is nothing in that review that will shift the dial, no great new move to help British firms to find favour in Whitehall, and no move either to help those outside London and the south-east. Many will remember the contract that Ministers gave a French firm to make our British passports. Today, when Russia is declared enemy No. 1 by the Prime Minister, we find out that a Russian company got £2.5 million to build his new briefing room.
Without question, tough rules that force civil servants to secure the best prices and the best value must be maintained. Taxpayers should not pay over the odds, certainly not after the scandal of the billions spent on Test and Trace, which those who have investigated think made little difference. The rules in international treaties on procurement that we have signed up to must be respected. But once those rules are met, British firms creating jobs in the United Kingdom should have a better chance of winning the contract than an overseas rival. British firms in general work to high standards, and while our markets are far from perfect, effective unions and a robust media all help to reinforce higher standards in our high street shops than in some overseas markets.
The suspicion in many boardrooms is that it helps to be close to London to win Government contracts. Indeed, what limited figures there are confirms that London and the south-east do disproportionately better for firms winning big Government contracts. If a business is based in the north-east, the east of England, the midlands or Yorkshire and Humber, there is a lower chance of it winning a large Government contract. Ministers have no plans to do anything about that. At the very least, and after recent court cases, figures should have to be published as part of the levelling-up and recovery agendas in which the Conservative party claims to believe. There should be debate about whether every region is getting a fair chance of its businesses landing a big job-creating deal from Government.
Lastly, for those of us who want to buy British whenever we can, why is there not a national kitemark, the flag of the United Kingdom, on every good and service provided in Britain, which British businesses can use to demonstrate to British consumers that a product is at least 50% made in the UK? The British Standards Institute could provide this service and promote it alongside the other kitemarks it operates for us.
The last thing that Britain should do is to close its mind to the world outside our shores. It would be madness to turn our backs on expertise from overseas, on the imagination and enterprise in the great goods and services that we can purchase from our friends in Europe, across the Commonwealth, in Asia, Africa and, of course, in the Americas and Australasia, but just as many of our allies overseas seek to buy local when they can, so should we. The Conservative party has been in power for a decade, yet it has never backed a serious “Buy British” campaign. My Bill would change the landscape for British businesses across the UK and not just those in our capital city. Never again will our own businesses’ expertise be ignored in a national emergency. Ministers should get on board. I commend my Bill to the House.
Question put and agreed to.
Ordered,
That Gareth Thomas, Yvonne Fovargue, Rosie Cooper, Graham Stringer, Dan Jarvis, Mrs Sharon Hodgson, Christina Rees, Mr Kevan Jones, Mr Barry Sheerman, Steve McCabe, Mr Virendra Sharma and Sarah Champion present the Bill.
Gareth Thomas accordingly presented the Bill.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time tomorrow, and to be printed (Bill 275).
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill
Tuesday 16th March 2021
(3 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 View all Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
19:00 - The House divided: - Ayes: 225 / Noes: 359 - Question accordingly negatived.
19:10 - The House divided: - Ayes: 359 / Noes: 263 - Question accordingly agreed to.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Before we resume the debate, I want to remind the House of what was said yesterday regarding the Sarah Everard case. Charges have now been brought in that case. The sub judice resolution does not apply formally when the House is legislating. However, I would urge all Members to exercise caution and not say anything about the detail of the case or of the identity of those against whom charges have been brought that might affect any subsequent court case.
I have decided to select the reasoned amendment in the name of the Official Opposition and I will call David Lammy to move their reasoned amendment when he comes to speak later in the debate.
I remind all hon. Members, whether they are participating remotely or otherwise, that there is a three-minute limit on all contributions. For those participating remotely, there is a timer on the bottom righthand corner of the device that you are utilising. If, for whatever reason, you cannot see that, please ensure that you have another timing device because we have to be very strict. Not everyone will get in today, quite clearly, so please do not push the limit beyond three minutes. For those participating physically, the timer will be demonstrated in the usual manner.
Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab) [V]
How often have we heard the notion that somehow liberty is an integral part of the English character, and that we fortunate few in this country are somehow different from the rest of humanity? Not for us authoritarianism, autocracy or, God forbid, the dark slide into fascism. No, no, no—that is for other people and other countries, not us. Yet here we stand, yet again with yet another Bill from this Government stripping the people of this country of yet more liberty and more of their democratic rights.
English exceptionalism is a dangerous fallacy, none more so than when it comes to the constant vigilance required of any democracy. It is hubris of the first order—one I fear has infected those on the Government Benches. The potential for the slide into authoritarianism and worse is, as history has clearly demonstrated, part of the human condition. That is the painful and bloody lesson from the 20th century. Yet here we are, with this Bill before us. It is the tip of an authoritarian iceberg—one that is on a collision course with public defiance.
Democracy is being swept away in a calculated programme to leave the public muted and powerless. We have the demonisation of the Gypsy, Traveller and Roma community, a planned voter suppression Bill to strip the right to vote from black and other disadvantaged communities, and the limiting of judicial review to stop the public challenging the Government’s decisions in court and shifting yet more power to the Executive. We have the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill, which creates a two-tier, “them and us” system of human rights. Now, having passed that, the Government are coming for our rights with a review of UK human rights legislation.
Those on the Government Benches are fast moving from becoming a Government to becoming a regime. They want to stifle dissent, so that they are not accountable to the public. Our country—our economy, our politics and our media—is controlled by a small clique of individuals. Over the past 40 years, they have taken more power for themselves at the expense of our democracy. Now they are not even happy with us clinging on to the scraps we currently have.
I have directed this speech at Government Members, but to those on my own Front Bench who have finally been brought to the right position of opposition, I say this: it should not have taken the police assault on people gathered peacefully in memory of Sarah Everard to see the assault on democracy that this Bill is. It is writ large, so let this be a wake-up call. We have never seen anything like this Government before.
If the Bill goes through, anyone who values their democratic rights must get organised and fight back. I will stand with protesters, irrelevant of the laws passed by this place. I say to anyone in this place and outside who values democracy that we must create a democracy that is fit for purpose for the challenges we face—climate and ecological breakdown, the epidemic of inequality—
Sajid Javid (Bromsgrove) (Con)
May I start by joining colleagues in expressing my condolences to the friends and family of Sarah Everard?
I rise to support the Second Reading of this Bill. I am particularly pleased that it delivers on three promises that I made in two Departments: stronger police powers and a new criminal offence around unauthorised Traveller camps; putting the police covenant on the statute book and completing the public health approach to serious violence.
Given the short time I have, I will focus my remarks on child sexual abuse and exploitation. I want to leave Members in no doubt that we are facing an epidemic in child sexual abuse, the severity of which has left me crushed at times. Although the Government are doing outstanding work, it is clear that there are still inadequacies and blind spots enabling predators to operate undetected for decades. That is why for the best part of a year, I have been leading an inquiry into child sexual abuse and exploitation with the Centre for Social Justice. Although the findings will not be published until later this month, I am grateful that the Home Secretary and the Justice Secretary have taken an interest in this work and have included some of the initial recommendations in the Bill.
I am particularly pleased that the Bill will close a loophole in the law that allows sports coaches and other people in positions of trust to have sex with 16 and 17-year-olds who are in their care. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) for the excellent work she did to bring that about.
I also welcome the fact that those serving an SOPC—sentence for offenders of particular concern—for a child sex offence will be made to serve two thirds of their sentence before they are eligible for parole.
These changes will make a difference, but we need to go further. It is difficult to believe that only 4% of child sexual abuse offences result in a charge or summons—to put that another way, when the police record a child sexual abuse offence, more than nine times out of 10, the perpetrator is not brought to justice—or that sentencing guidelines recommend the same punishment for stealing a bicycle worth £500 and viewing the rape of a child.
Lenient sentences make poor deterrents, and they say to victims that society does not take the damage that is done to them seriously enough. That is why I urge the Government to consider three further measures: first, including online offences in the SOPC scheme; secondly, moving to a presumption of cumulative sentencing; and thirdly, asking the Sentencing Council to undertake a full review. It is only when we take the scourge of child sexual abuse seriously that we will start to make sure that the punishment truly fits the crime.
Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP) [V]
I join others across the House in extending my sincere condolences to the family and friends and all affected by the horrific murder of Sarah Everard last week.
The House has heard many passionate speeches objecting to certain aspects of the Bill that impose disproportionate restrictions on our freedom of expression and right to protest. Those are fundamental human rights and a cornerstone of our democracy, and they must be protected. I totally support those objections to the restriction of our liberties. The right to peacefully protest on any issue must not be interfered with by the Government.
Part 2, chapter 1 of the Bill deals with duties to collaborate and plan to prevent and reduce serious violence. Specifically, it places a legal duty on local authorities, police, criminal justice agencies, health authorities, fire and rescue services and others to collaborate through sharing data and intelligence with one another to prevent and reduce serious violence and a duty to plan together to prevent and reduce such violence. In particular, they must identify the kinds of serious violence that occur, identify the causes of that violence and prepare and implement a strategy to prevent and reduce violence. Without any doubt, it is imperative that the impact of violence by men against women, the prevalence of that violence—particularly domestic violence and sexual violence—controlling and coercive behaviour by men and the impact on the community are included in that strategy to reduce violence against women and girls.
I want to highlight the outstanding work of the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit, funded by the Scottish Government. It has reduced homicides in Scotland from 137 over a number of years to 64 last year, using an innovative, proactive public health partnership approach to violence reduction, driven by the conviction that violence is preventable and not inevitable. A number of police services across England and Wales have sought advice from the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit and are at varying stages of setting up similar schemes.
It is therefore very welcome that the Bill will pave the way for the police service and other agencies to adopt schemes and strategies based on that model, which has proven to be highly successful. That approach must be included in the formal strategy mentioned by the Home Secretary yesterday for the reduction of all forms of violence by men against women and girls. This will, of course, come at a significant cost, but whatever that cost is, we simply cannot afford not to take this action, as by not doing so, we will continue to fail to protect women and girls now and in the future. We must act, and we must act now.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
The clock has not been started, because I did not want to eat into your time, Tracey, but I want to say that it is fantastic to see you back in the House of Commons where you belong.
Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con)
Thank you for your kind words, Mr Deputy Speaker. Time is exceptionally limited, so I shall keep my remarks short, but like others, I wish to extend my condolences to the family and friends of Sarah Everard.
I welcome this Bill, which draws on our manifesto commitment to make the country safer by equipping the police with the powers needed to protect themselves and the public, while strengthening sentencing laws to keep serious sexual and violent offenders in prison for longer. It is unfortunate that recent events have overshadowed the good intentions of the copious measures in this Bill, and I share the views of those in the House and outside it that we need to do more to protect women and girls. Why should we be afraid to walk somewhere or even exercise after dark? But, rather than trying to kill off the Bill, we should be working cross-party to strengthen it to that end.
I am a supporter of the police and I am afraid that I do not think we stand up for them often enough in this place. We read about the occasions when they misjudge or mishandle things, but we do not read about the 99% of the time where they silently get on with keeping us safe. Like all other key workers, our police officers have continued to work throughout the pandemic on the frontline, often being spat at and assaulted. I have many police officers living in my constituency and I am a proud aunt of a policeman. The measures in the Bill will better protect them and other emergency workers, not least by doubling the maximum sentence for assault on emergency workers, which is much overdue.
I am delighted that the Bill includes measures to extend the positions of trust provisions to include those who coach, teach, train or supervise in sport or religion. This has been a long process, but I am exceptionally grateful that this Home Secretary and Justice Secretary have listened to me, the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson, the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children and, most importantly, the brave victims who spoke out about the abuse that they suffered at the hands of their coach or religious leader. The need for change has finally been accepted.
There is so much that I could speak about in this 296-page Bill, but I just want to mention two things. First, my local council very much welcomes the Bill’s provisions that deal with illegal encampments, but Medway Council has requested that an amendment is added that gives local authorities the powers to seek recovery costs for the damage caused. As challenging as this may be in practice, concerting the power that enables them to do so is something that I am willing to table, and I hope that the Government will seek to support it. The second point, which was raised eloquently yesterday by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith), is the need for a specific offence and stronger punishment for pet theft. There has been an extraordinary and worrying rise in the theft of dogs, and many of my constituents are fearful for their beloved pets, so using this Bill as an opportunity to strengthen protections is essential.
Given the time, let me conclude by saying that there is so much more that I could add, but this is a good Bill, albeit with plenty of scope for improvement and for new things to be added to it. First and foremost, I look forward to supporting it in the Lobby tonight.
Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab)
I join others in expressing my condolences. This Bill continues the authoritarian drift of this Government. First, we had the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill, which basically gives immunity to people abroad serving our country who committed torture. Then we had immunity given to state agents breaking the law in our country, including the crime of rape. Now we have clause 59 of the Bill, which proposes a 10-year jail sentence for causing the risk of “serious annoyance”—those are the words in the Bill. Note that is not even for causing “annoyance”, but for causing the risk that there may be annoyance. There are many things with which we might risk causing annoyance every day, but it is only in dictatorships or repressive regimes that such actions are subject to drastic sentencing.
This Government claim to have their roots in libertarianism and, of course, they are champions of liberty, but it is liberty only for the powerful and the wealthy, the “get rich quick” merchants and the spivs, those whose freedoms allow them to cause all kinds of annoyance—firing decent, hard-working employees and then rehiring them on worse conditions and paying poverty wages. Now we have a new freedom—the freedom to bung multimillion-pound taxpayer contracts to mates in the private sector. They have set their sights on our tradition of dissent, because their legislation is designed to crack down on our rights to take action against injustice. Black Lives Matter activists, workers who take industrial action, environmentalists and the women’s movement are all in their sights.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
My hon. Friend and I have organised and been on many peaceful protests together. The measures in this Bill are so regressive that, under them, surely some of those protests that we have been on would have ended up in scenes like those we saw on Clapham common, with us and others being arrested. This shows that peaceful protest is not safe under the remit of the Bill.
Jon Trickett
I have indeed worked many times with my hon. Friend on all kinds of activities. What the Government have in their sights are the ancient rights of assembly and freedom of association, which are now threatened by clause 59. The fundamental right to free speech means nothing if these other freedoms come under attack. We may end up with a situation in which we are free to shout at the telly in the privacy of our own homes but not free to organise ourselves collectively in public.
It is not as if our country has done away with all forms of injustice and inequality, is it? Yet instead of standing against injustice alongside, for example, the women on Clapham common the other night, the Government appear to be more interested in empowering the police force to arrest people who the state judges to have risked causing annoyance. It is interesting that many police officers have said that they do not wish that power to be bestowed upon them.
This House of Commons should be a beacon of liberty—a protector of our rights to speak, associate freely and assemble in public to express our reservations about how the country is going. Repressive legislation will never eliminate the thirst and hunger for justice that remains so powerful in our country today. It is the duty of the Commons to stand up this evening and reject this Bill.
Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con) [V]
The first duty of any Government is to protect members of the public from harm, and I welcome the swift progress that the Government have made on that. Despite the challenges posed by the pandemic, the Government have beaten the target of recruiting 6,000 extra officers by March 2021 and are ahead of schedule to recruit, as promised, 20,000 more police officers by 2023. With a new cohort of police officers protecting our communities, we should give them the protection that they need to do the job to the best of their ability.
At a time when we are battling an invisible enemy—the coronavirus—our exceptional frontline workers should not be at risk of violence from the very people they are trying to protect. I am glad that the Government have shown that they will not tolerate such attacks and are legislating to double the maximum penalty for assaults on emergency workers from 12 months to two years in prison—the penalty that fits such an abhorrent and selfish crime.
At a time when we have been tragically reminded of the senseless violence perpetrated against women and girls, it is important that our communities are protected from the most serious offenders. A previous Labour Government introduced automatic early release at the halfway point; we are legislating to ensure that that stops and that those convicted of the most serious violent and sexual offences must serve at least two thirds of their sentence before parole is considered.
I welcome the fact that more robust sentences for the worst offenders will be combined with greater efforts to rehabilitate. For offenders stuck in the revolving door of crime there will be things such as electronic monitoring tags to ensure that long and restrictive curfews are adhered to. Sobriety tags, which were first piloted here in Lincolnshire, will ensure that individuals comply with alcohol abstinence orders. Such measures will ensure that once criminals have left custody, robust monitoring is still in place both to stop further harm and to break the cycle of reoffending.
I am pleased to see that those who use their car as a weapon will receive longer sentences, but as we increase sentences for careless driving I look to the Minister for reassurance that we will not criminalise those who have a momentary lapse in concentration—something most of us experience at some point.
Burglary is a particularly invasive crime that many of my constituents fear, and it leaves people feeling unsafe in their home. Will the Minister consider increasing sentences for those who commit this particularly invasive crime?
The Bill represents a significant strengthening of our judicial system, with the flexibility to tackle both serious crime and the causes of crime. I am proud to see this Government delivering on their manifesto commitment to empower our judicial system and make our country safer, and I will support the Bill today.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
This monster of a Bill includes the word “women” zero times in 295 pages, yet statutes, war memorials and monuments are mentioned multiple times.
The Bill is likely to go into Committee, so it is then that I will seek to improve it by tabling an amendment to prohibit the long-standing and continual, daily harassment and intimidation of women at abortion facilities. Every year, 100,000 women across England and Wales who try to exercise their right to a termination are told that they are going to hell, filmed, followed and given propaganda that is inevitably medically wrong and unwanted. That is not healthy, noisy protest but the shaming of individual vulnerable women for decisions taken perhaps as a result of rape or similar. It is gendered harassment, which is not included in the Bill but overlaps with part 3—the explanatory notes talk about
“disruption to the life of the community”
when
“the purpose of the organiser is to intimidate others into doing or not doing something that they have a right to do”.
Many women will have recognised what the Home Secretary said yesterday about how we all too often quicken our pace or grab our keys or phone in uncomfortable street encounters. Factor in being booked for a time-sensitive medical operation and there is no easy escape. This intimidatory activity is calculated to make women cancel their appointment or, at the very best, rebook it for when those people are not there. There is unpredictability and inconsistency: only three local authorities have gone down the byelaw route of local public space protection orders. This cannot continue; it is unequal access to justice, if nothing else.
When I asked the Health Secretary in this Chamber for his opinion on anti-vaxxers, he told me that no one’s access to legal medicine should be barred or prevented. By lumping such a measure in with prosecuting sports coaches who groom teams, criminalising already-persecuted Traveller lifestyles and introducing excessive sentences for toppling statues, the Government are inevitably going to accuse those who oppose the Bill of being soft on sex offenders, which is really disappointing.
Harassment of women is objectively wrong; it is surely not party political. Indeed, the cross-party will of the House is behind such a measure. The last time my private Member’s Bill was put to a vote in June, the House voted for it by 213 to 47. I even had Government Members on the payroll coming up to me all day saying, “Good on you, I wish we could have voted for this too.” So it is high time we updated what is being done in common law and put into statute, followed Canada—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Order. I am terribly sorry; we have to move on.
Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con) [V]
Given the recent focus on violence against women and the fact that the coronavirus pandemic has increased physical and sexual violence, the Bill represents an opportunity to fix oversights in the law regarding child safeguarding. It contains some welcome provisions that will protect women in the UK. However, child marriage remains an oversight, and a new clause criminalising the practice would protect vulnerable girls in this country and around the world.
Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, adults commit a criminal offence if they have sex with a child—defined as a person under the age of 18—with whom they are in a position of trust. Clause 45 of this Bill would extend the list of positions of trust to include sports coaches and religious figures, thanks to my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch). The explanatory notes state that the logic is that children are susceptible to abuse, exploitation and manipulation. If a child’s will can so easily be manipulated by those in a position of trust, with abusive consequences, why does the law allowed them to marry at the age of 16 or 17 with their parents’ consent?
In 2018, the Forced Marriage Unit recorded 1,500 cases of suspected forced marriage, 35% of which involved children under the age of 18, and since 2017, Karma Nirvana has responded to 375 calls involving child marriage. However, the true prevalence of child marriage is likely to be much greater as it often occurs in unofficial customary ceremonies. The crime of forced marriage, introduced in 2014, does not adequately protect children. The Forced Marriage Unit reports feeling unable to intervene in cases involving children because coercion is difficult to prove and vulnerable children have been groomed to appear willing. Children being groomed into child marriages often cannot understand what is happening to them and feel unable to challenge their parents. The current law effectively places the reporting obligation of a serious crime on young and vulnerable victims. For that reason, many contact charities such as Karma Nirvana only later in life when the damage has been done, so could Ministers please include a new clause in the Bill to enable us to stop child marriage in this country?
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I should just like to remind those who are on the call list but who, for whatever reason, are unable to take part in the debate, please to get in touch with the Speaker’s Office as usual. That message will then get through to us. The sooner the better, please.
Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab) [V]
This Bill has provisions that I support, including whole-life orders for premeditated child murder and ending automatic early release of dangerous prisoners and sex offenders. However, the Bill also attacks, on a permanent basis, the fundamental human right of peaceful assembly. Banning gatherings, or a single person protest, on the grounds of noise or annoyance is deeply troubling. Noting the disgraceful events at Clapham Common on Saturday, I will vote against the Bill tonight.
The Bill also needs to do much more on tackling violence against all women and girls. The Government’s announcement on a council bidding process for lighting and CCTV funding does not cut the mustard. The Opposition’s reasoned amendment points out that the Bill fails to introduce a single new measure specifically designed to tackle the epidemic of violence against women. Indeed, anyone damaging a statue would receive a heavier sentence than many rapists.
I want to raise three issues that the Bill should cover. First, if Ministers are serious about protecting women, they must recognise that exchanging money, food and accommodation for sex is a form of violence. Scotland’s Government, the Crown Prosecution Service and the London Mayor recognise prostitution as violence against women. Why not this Government? Our current laws on prostitution are unfit for purpose. The UK today is a low-risk, high-profit destination for sex traffickers and pimps. Pimping websites operate openly and legally. Women are subjected to sexual exploitation by men, who face no criminal sanction. We must bust the business model of this modern slavery, cracking down on online pimping, deterring sex-buyers and supporting victims. I will be tabling cross-party amendments to introduce laws that support women and hold men accountable.
Secondly, pornography websites currently profit from exposing children to misogynistic violent pornography, fostering attitudes that underpin violence against women. We need the Government to take action on that.
Finally, we must join the dots. Individual incidents of violence against women are often not random, one-off or unconnected. Effective prevention of violence requires early intervention. We need a way to flag up where low-level sexual offences are often the gateway to potential serious escalation. Libby Squire was raped and murdered in Hull by a man who had, for 18 months prior to attacking Libby, wandered the streets committing sexual acts of indecent exposure, voyeurism and burglary of underwear and sex toys. Many offences were not reported, but even if they had been, the current law would not have dealt with the underlying problem.
In conclusion, violence against women is endemic, but also preventable. In remembering Libby Squire, Sarah Everard and many others, we need deeds from this Government, not words.
Craig Mackinlay (South Thanet) (Con)
What a rare treat to be able to speak in the Chamber.
One of my colleagues said earlier that the primary role of Government is to keep people safe: to keep those who are the law-abiding majority safe, those who want to do the right thing and those who simply just want to get on with their lives. We made commitments in our 2019 manifesto on law and order. This substantial Bill fills many holes and codifies some loose ends of common law interpretations, but mainly it protects the public whom we are here to serve. There are a number of features in the Bill and I just want to highlight a few in the time available.
Whole-life orders, as the starting point for premeditated child murder, has to be right. The prevention of automatic early release of serious, violent and sexual offenders has to be right. The public, for too many years, have wondered of what madness we have had that that was not so.
The doubling of the maximum sentence to two years for assaulting emergency workers, again, has to be right. These people have worked hard for us over the past year. Too often, we hear stories of them being spat at and abused during the covid period. We have spoken about the protection of victims and witnesses over many years, but finally Kay’s law, as it has been called, will mean that victims will be able to play a part in the bail conditions that the police impose.
Strengthening powers to tackle protests that cause significant disruption to the public is the area that seems to have got a lot of people exercised over the past few days. What we saw at Clapham Common was an unedifying scene, but it was not a result of this Bill or where we are at the moment. It was a result of the draconian covid legislation that I have not supported throughout but, strangely, Labour has. This Bill does not attempt to stop protest—far from it, and I would not be supporting it if it were, because I quite enjoy a good protest.
Very importantly, the Bill criminalises trespass to tackle unauthorised encampments. I can imagine that hardly any, if any, hon. Members or right hon. Members in this House have not had communities that have had to bear the cost of such unauthorised damage, cost to the local taxpayer, and often a “couldn’t care less” attitude by those who conduct it. The Bill also backs up our significant commitment to deliver 20,000 new police officers, and some of the excellent work in disrupting county lines and action against drugs in general.
I will support the Bill this evening, and I am somewhat intrigued that Her Majesty’s Opposition are opposed to it at this stage, but there seem to be more flip-flops than on a summer holiday.
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con) [V]
This is a broad and significant Bill. There are many areas that I would like to discuss, but I have only three minutes, so I will concentrate on the long overdue changes relating to illegal Traveller camping.
My constituency has a number of legitimate Traveller sites. The relationship between the settled communities and the so-called Travellers on official sites is generally harmonious. Surrey County Council and Surrey District and Borough Councils are in the process of setting up a transit site, with facilities, for Travellers. All this is very different from the frequent illegal Traveller invasions. Surrey has had hundreds of these incidents, and my constituency has more than its fair share. Over recent years, the numbers of these illegal land-squatting camps have increased. If access is inhibited by barriers, gates or any form of obstruction, they are broken down or removed, and generally damaged. The Travellers then squat on-site regardless of the ownership, be it common land, parkland, farmland, private land or even a school playground. I note that a number of Members are opposed to change and would prefer that this remained a civil matter. That approach has been an absolute, abysmal failure, with considerable financial loss to the local community or the landowners. The legislative change criminalising this type of illegal camping is exceptionally welcome and has been long awaited. It is for the protection of local people—my constituents.
I note that in certain circumstances a fine can be imposed. Considering the phenomenal mess of human detritus and general waste, often including hardcore, that is almost without exception left behind when the illegal occupiers are removed, it would be helpful if some form of recompense for the cost of returning the site to its pre-invasion state could be available. I realise that that would be technically possible using the Compensation Act 2006, but this would need civil action requiring identification and service of notice on individuals who will have already moved and be able to claim that the mess was no fault of theirs. Hence, I wonder if it would be possible to require the site that has been occupied illegally to be returned to its previous state or to apply an appropriate cost to those who are abusing the site.
There is much in this Bill that I like, but this particular change will be overwhelmingly welcomed by an enormous number of my constituents who have been abused by these people over many years.
Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP) [V]
I am grateful to be called in this debate. I wish to place on record my thanks to the Under-Secretary, the hon. Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), for meeting me to discuss this Bill. The scale of the Bill, the wide-ranging import of its provisions and indeed the two days set aside for the Second Reading debate all indicate the magnitude of what is contained within it.
First, I wish to indicate my support for the provisions that directly apply to Northern Ireland. The ability to access information from encrypted devices, the ability to take samples from human remains, changes to the Sexual Offences Act 2003 and mutual recognition across our United Kingdom are all welcome provisions that will assist in the fight against serious crime. Ministers are aware that I have raised my concern that, although they are not part of this Bill, unexplained wealth orders, provided for in the Criminal Finances Act 2017, have not yet commenced in Northern Ireland, despite our Department of Justice seeking a commencement order.
With paramilitarism and organised crime still having a significant impact in Northern Ireland generally, and in my constituency of East Belfast particularly, we need immediate progress on this issue. I am prepared to table amendments to the Bill if necessary, though I am somewhat assuaged to hear that progress may come in the next week or two. I would therefore be extremely grateful if confirmation of that could be given from the Dispatch Box this evening.
Separately, the House is well aware of the strength of feeling following the abhorrent murder of Sarah Everard so I am pleased that the Bill will increase the time served in prison from half to two-thirds of the sentence as a minimum for the most serious sexual offences. It will bring in provisions on abuse of positions of trust and enact Kay’s law with greater protections linked to pre-charge bail.
Finally, and regretfully, I rail against in the strongest possible terms the overarching sweeping and draconian provisions on protests. I have heard what the Government’s intention is, but the loose and lazy way the legislation is drafted would make a dictator blush. Protests will be noisy. Protests will disrupt. No matter how offensive we may find the issue at their heart, the right to protest should be protected.
Unless we wish to proceed with societal constraints that permit only graceful, genteel and humble protest, I urge the Government to indicate that they accept the strength of feeling on this issue, that they will work with colleagues across the House to amend the provisions significantly, and that they will not proceed without publishing guidance underpinned by statute on the operative implications.
I wish you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and all colleagues a happy St Patrick’s Day for tomorrow.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
Thank you. We now go by video link to Dame Angela Eagle.
Dame Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab) [V]
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. This is a huge portmanteau Bill. It contains proposals that I would sum up as the good, the bad and the ugly. The good includes measures that give particular protection to emergency service workers from assault, the problem-solving courts pilot, and long overdue reform of the criminal records disclosure regime. The bad is the Government’s appalling assault on the right to protest and free assembly, which is causing concern and alarm across the House, including from the former Conservative Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), who expressed her misgivings about this in no uncertain terms yesterday.
The ugly is the complete absence from the Bill of any coherent attempt to protect the freedom of women and girls to live their lives free of harassment and violence. Clause 46 further criminalises assaults on statues by increasing the maximum penalty for such vandalism to a scarcely believable 10 years in jail. The Government’s obsession with using the law to stoke a culture war by giving more protection to inanimate statutes than to living people is an abuse.
Clauses 54 to 60 are a premeditated attack on the right to assemble and protest, which is the cornerstone of our democracy. While Ministers purport to be the defenders of our rights and freedoms, the Bill diminishes both. It extends already wide powers to police demonstrations much further, by creating new offences and new criteria that can be used to close down protest. The Bill seeks to place draconian limits on the method, location and even the noise demonstrators will in future be allowed to make if they are to remain lawful.
Apparently demonstrators are henceforth to be seen but not heard, like children in a particularly reactionary Victorian novel; yet the whole point of demonstrations is precisely to draw attention to injustice and give voice to issues that have been ignored. Democracy can be loud and messy sometimes—that is the point of it—so the Bill must be amended to preserve the freedom of assembly and the right to protest.
The real issue that the Bill should address is the mess that the Government have made of the justice and courts system. There is currently a backlog of 56,000 cases in the Crown courts, which means four years to wait for a trial. Justice delayed is surely justice denied. Since 2015, the percentage of recorded crime that reaches the court has halved. Rape convictions are down to just 2% of cases reported, and while domestic violence has soared in lockdown, convictions have fallen off a cliff. The Government would do better to run the existing court system efficiently and effectively before they come to the House with the new laws contained in the Bill.
Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con) [V]
I will be supporting this important piece of legislation, which delivers on our manifesto pledge. It covers many important elements, and during my contribution I will have time to address only some of them. First, may I associate myself with the comments about Sarah Everard? My thoughts are with her loved ones.
I am not a lawyer, but there are many learned hon. Members of this House, and it is worth noting that the Law Society supports the overall ambition of this substantial Bill to tackle crime, support the police and build safer communities. Going into detail, one of the bits I particularly want to highlight is clause 46. Following an excellent campaign by my hon. Friends the Members for Bracknell (James Sunderland) and for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis), with the private Member’s Bill on the desecration of war memorials, it is good to see this measure included in the Bill. It is not just about war memorials; it includes roadside memorials and gravestones as well.
On part 3 on public order and the right to protest, it is worth reiterating that the police response does need to be proportionate. I would cast the House’s memory back to six months ago when we all saw images on social media of an ambulance trying to access St Thomas’s and not being able to do so. The other theme worth highlighting on this particular issue is that there have been effects on freedom of the press with print media not being able to print.
Part 4 on unauthorised encampments—clause 61 onwards—is a really important piece of legislation. I know of many colleagues who have campaigned on this particular provision for many years. It will make trespass a criminal offence, and it has a significant effect on law-abiding communities. I would echo the comments made by others in the House that civil actions have not been a suitable avenue of discouraging poor behaviour. Clause 62, which changes the period of no return from three months to 12 months, targets the bad apples, and I think it is a welcome addition.
Finally, part 7 on sentencing and release is a really important piece of legislation that gives the law-abiding citizens of our country the confidence that those found guilty of heinous crimes will have a proportionate sentence. Clause 108 on referring to the Parole Board in place of automatic release is another aspect that is well worth mentioning.
In summing up, this Bill will be warmly welcomed by law-abiding citizens. It offers increased protection to those who protect us, it increases the options available to the courts to ensure that sentences are in line with the offence and it ensures that disruptive behaviour is actively discouraged.
Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP) [V]
On the day the Parliament of Scotland seeks to place the United Nations convention on the rights of the child at the heart of our nation’s legal system, the British Parliament seeks to criminalise thousands of Gypsy and Traveller children for daring with their families, in the 21st century, to live their traditional and historic way of life. Imprinted on vellum, this archaic legislation will enshrine centuries of resentment, bigotry and racism, entrenching inequalities and proscribing specific ethnic groups, even against the advice of the police forces of England. It is a law that facilitates the narrative of exclusion, well exposed in recent weeks when Dochertys like me, merely for being from the Traveller community, are excluded from the life of the state.
As a Scottish constituency MP, I see this is a direct attack on the Scottish Traveller community, which this Parliament refuses to recognise as a distinct ethnic group—Scots who will be at the mercy of Dickensian attitudes, and exposed to imprisonment and financial ruin by the mother of Parliaments. As the co-chair of the all-party group on Gypsies, Travellers and Roma, I see this as a misguided, reprehensible attack on the ancient and historic rights of the nomadic peoples of these islands. It is clear that England’s green and pleasant lands are not for the likes of us, and the Conservative and Unionist party does not give a damn who knows it.
Mr Simon Clarke (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Con)
It is a pleasure to speak in this important debate and to support this vital legislation. At the outset of my remarks, I too would like to set on record my deep sympathy for the family and friends of Sarah Everard—what happened last week was the most appalling story, and it will cast a lasting shadow for many of us as we reflect on these issues today and, indeed, in the years ahead.
This legislation matters because it is about the Conservative party delivering on our promise to the public to cut crime and ensure that we have tougher sentencing for some of the most violent criminals in our society, and I find myself genuinely astonished at the attitude of Opposition parties in opposing it.
I want to address the two main grounds being relied on by the official Opposition to justify its stance. First, there are the provisions to stop some of the most extreme tactics of protest groups such as Extinction Rebellion, which go too far. I well remember the tactics of Extinction Rebellion and the misery they brought to hundreds of thousands of people across the capital and elsewhere. Blocking roads so that ambulances cannot pass, because people are glued to the ground, is not a legitimate tactic for protest. The right to protest is fundamental, but it is not unqualified. We have to balance all rights and responsibilities in our society against the rights and liberties of our fellow citizens, and the tactics that have been deployed have clearly gone too far.
The second ground that Labour relies on is that the Bill is not ambitious enough in its protection of women and girls, and some of the remarks by the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) sum up the damaging things that are being said about this legislation, which will undermine public confidence and are, in fact, simply wrong. She spoke about statutes being attacked, as though they were some kind of worthless thing to defend. I would defend our heritage on its own terms, but, of course, the relevant provision is also about protecting gravestones, for example, from being desecrated; it is not just about statues.
The hon. Lady also said that we had not taken action on protecting people from harassment. Well, the Government have taken action on stalking, and they introduced a 10-year sentence for it recently. That is something I am very proud of, and it should not be forgotten. It has added to a very strong record on the protection of women’s rights, on issues from forced marriage to strangulation to coercive control. We should be proud of all of that, because this Government care deeply. The Bill strengthens those provisions further, from ending early release for serious sex offenders, to stricter pre-charge bail conditions, to measures on the abuse of positions of trust and on arranging or facilitating child sex abuse. This is really important legislation, and that should not be forgotten.
That all goes to show how far the Labour party has drifted from the values of its traditional heartlands. In places such as Middlesbrough and Hartlepool, it is not just that local people feel ignored and taken for granted by the Opposition, but that they now feel actively betrayed by them. This legislation is a litmus test about values, and it deserves the full support of the House today.
Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
In any legislation, any of us on any of these Benches can always find some good, and this legislation is no different. For example, there are the measures on providing protection from being abused by adults in positions of trust and the measures on dangerous driving, as well as the increase in sentences for those who assault our emergency workers. However, this legislation is a curate’s egg, and what little good there is in it is overwhelmed and infected by the bad. It breaches the covenant between us in Parliament and the public about the consent that is part of a free, fair and equal society.
All of us recognise that it is time for some reform of how public order is managed in this country. The scenes of chaos that we saw on Saturday are a clear embodiment of that. The trust between the police and women, particularly in London, has been broken—trust that many communities have not had in the police for some time—but this legislation will do little to heal those relationships.
I will be honest: I have a long list of things that cause me “severe annoyance”. Some, Members may agree with; many, they probably would not. However, I pity the commanding officer trying to enforce this legislation if it becomes law and trying to explain decisions around severe annoyance. The legislation is simply unworkable. I am also ashamed to be part of a Parliament that is seeking to demonise a minority community in the measures being brought forward around Gypsy and Traveller communities—measures, indeed, that the police themselves have said they do not wish to see.
The public have to be able to tell us when we are getting something wrong. Sometimes that message is noisy and messy, but it is important that we do not seek to silence it no matter how uncomfortable it might make us feel. This legislation seeks to do that.
The Bill also breaches that covenant between us and the public by what it does not contain. The hon. Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Mr Clarke) does not quite understand the concern that there is no mention of women, but plenty of mention of statues. At a time when we are all concerned about the lack of action over tackling violence against women, this legislation could have been the perfect vehicle for the Government to implement the Law Commission’s recommendations on making misogyny a hate crime, but those are measures are absent. It could also have been an opportunity for the Government to recognise when they are at fault in the courts. Let me give just two examples. For the past three years, the Government have been found at fault by the courts on how they treat bereaved parents in this country and on how they treat victims of domestic violence who have a sanctuary room—they charge them the bedroom tax—but no measures have been brought forward. What respect for the courts does that show from a Government who are now seeking to reform those areas?
Human rights mean little if they cannot be actioned and if they are not upheld, even when it goes against what appears to be the Government’s interests. I urge the Government to use this legislative time for something more constructive, to work across the House, to recognise the concerns over violence against women and to uphold all our rights. We shall all regret it if they do not.
Cherilyn Mackrory (Truro and Falmouth) (Con) [V]
There is so much to say in such a short time. First and foremost, I wish to thank the brilliant officers of Devon and Cornwall police for their unshakeable commitment, as well as our fantastic police and crime commissioner, Alison Hernandez, who has done a huge amount of work, particularly around combating domestic violence and modern slavery in our region.
I am afraid that I have to take issue with some Opposition voices that have described the new measures around policing protests as dangerous and draconian. Ensuring that a protest cannot prevent an ambulance from reaching a hospital in an emergency is the exact opposite of dangerous. Ensuring that police can impose conditions on protests that are noisy enough to cause intimidation, alarm and distress to innocent bystanders is the exact opposite of draconian. As the Home Secretary said yesterday, the right to peaceful protest is the cornerstone of our democracy, and all of us in this Chamber understand and cherish that fundamental right. It does not, however, extend to causing damage to property or injury to others.
I am pleased that the Bill introduces maximum life sentences for drivers who cause death by dangerous driving or by driving under the influence of drink and drugs. I want to thank my constituents in Truro and Falmouth who, throughout my time as their Member of Parliament, have consistently highlighted the need for proper punishment of hit-and-run drivers. Unfortunately, they will be familiar with the tragic death of Ryan Saltern, a postman from Probus, a husband and a dad of young children. The man responsible for Ryan’s death left the scene and was sentenced to just four months, which was suspended for a year. He was disqualified from driving for just 12 months. Needless to say, Ryan’s family have been left devastated. My hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann) has been working closely with Ryan’s parents, and I join him in asking Ministers to consider a new criminal offence of leaving the scene of an accident that later resulted in death. We would welcome further meetings with Ministers about this matter.
Finally, I pay tribute to the Bill for the changes that will bring about better protection for women. I am proud to sit on the Benches of a Government who have already introduced, or who are progressing the introduction of, the following measures specifically aimed at the protection of women: outlawing upskirting; creating an offence of coercive control; strengthening the ban on a rough sex defence; outlawing non-fatal strangulation; creating the offence of stalking and then doubling the maximum sentence; criminalising the sending of revenge porn images or threats to do so; introducing measures to make it easier for victims to give evidence in court; the passing of the Modern Slavery Act 2015; the increased funding for rape support centres by 50%—the list goes on. In addition, Cornwall Council is receiving £1.1 million of funding, which was announced last month, to ensure that domestic abuse victims and their children are able to access life-saving support.
As always, I welcome the Prime Minister’s further announcements this week of the doubling of the investment for our safer streets. There is more to do, but the Bill is a great start, and I will happily back it this evening.
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab) [V]
This 300-page incoherent mish-mash of a Bill contains some truly odious measures, and I have time to deal with only one of them: the dangerous and unjustifiable crackdown on the freedom to protest in clauses 54 to 60. Those clauses alone are enough for me to vote against Second Reading tonight, despite the Bill containing some good measures.
This populist Government have swiftly developed a penchant for authoritarianism, born of their approach to getting the vast amount of Brexit legislation necessary through Parliament. They have got into the habit of writing framework Bills with extensive Henry VIII powers, leaving vast scope for Ministers to change primary legislation by personal fiat, without adequate parliamentary scrutiny. This trend has been made worse by the necessity to legislate swiftly for public health reasons because of covid, again with no scrutiny ahead of laws being brought into force. The coronavirus crisis has led to a draconian removal of basic liberties that is necessary temporarily for health reasons, but not for a minute to be thought of as desirable. The Government now want to make this emergency way of doing things the norm, to enable police officers to have far too much power effectively to silence any protest.
We have a Government who attack judges who decide cases in ways they do not approve of; some Law Officers who will not defend the independence of the judiciary; a Government who legislate to enable themselves to break a treaty that they have only just signed; Ministers, including the Home Secretary, who break the ministerial code with impunity, while senior civil servants they disagree with are hounded out of their jobs; and a Government who now want to take the power to ban demonstrations or vigils if they are too noisy—they are literally silencing any protest they do not like.
This legislation allows for convictions for breach of conditions that the police have imposed, even where the person on trial has no knowledge of what that condition was; it increases the punishment for such a breach from 12 weeks to 51 weeks in prison. The Home Secretary seems to have hijacked what was a worthy enough sentencing Bill to insert her divisive and polarising measures on protests. The original timetable for the Bill gave the game away. It was due to be completed in time for the police and crime commissioner elections in May. This is being done to enable the Government to claim that their political opponents are not supporting the police enough—indeed, we have already heard speeches from some Government Back Benchers claiming just that.
There has been no real focus on how the law should be changed for the good of society. For example, we have just seen how much it fails to meet the needs of women, who just want to be safe. This Bill just does not tackle any of those issues. Clauses 54 to 60 are intended to destroy the fundamental rights of citizens in our democracy to protest, and just for some cheap headlines ahead of an election. The Bill is draconian and undesirable, and the Government should not get away with enacting it.
Laura Trott (Sevenoaks) (Con) [V]
First, I want to join in the sympathies and prayers expressed by Members from across the House to the family and friends of Sarah Everard.
I rise, virtually, to support this welcome Bill, and in the limited time I have I wish to focus on the aspects that concern violence against women, girls and children. I have been disappointed by the approach that Opposition Members have taken to this Bill, which stands in marked contrast to the constructive tone taken to the Domestic Abuse Bill. It is clear that today’s Bill takes a stride forward in protecting women and girls. The hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) describes the “little good” the Bill is doing. I would not describe ending the automatic halfway release of those convicted of offences such as rape, extending the law on abusing positions of trust to better protect children, better protecting victims of domestic violence and introducing tougher sentences for sex offenders as “little good”. Indeed, when this is paired with the Domestic Abuse Bill and the upcoming violence against women strategy, we see that the Government are taking concrete steps to address the many challenges we still face to make women safe in their homes and on the streets.
I also take serious issue with the conflation of maximum and minimum sentences that we have heard in the course of this debate. The maximum sentence for rape is life. That message should ring out from this Chamber. The conflation of the minimum and maximum sentences is simply a demonstration of the Opposition playing party politics on an issue that goes far beyond any point scoring in this Chamber today.
However, it is always important to look at what more we can do. I have spoken before about my long-standing concerns about the use of standard determinate sentences, particularly for rape. I welcome the action that the Government are taking to end the use of standard determinate sentences for terrorist offenders, and the power to refer high-risk offenders to the Parole Board in place of automatic release. However, the reoffending rate for sexual offenders is 14%, and we know that 84% of rape convictions are dealt with by standard determinate sentences. That means that the Parole Board is not involved at all in the release of those criminals. I think we should look at that further, to add to the already significantly increased protections that we are giving women and children as a result of this Bill—and any accusation that we are doing otherwise is false.
Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab) [V]
This is a dangerous Bill in many ways, both in what it contains and in what it omits, including in its stark failure to really tackle violence against women. I want to concentrate, in my three minutes, on the draconian threat to the right to protest.
Under this Government’s plans, protests will still be allowed, just as long as the police say so, just as long as the protests are not too noisy, just as long as they do not cause too much of a nuisance, just as long as they do not seriously annoy anyone, and just as long as they are not too near Parliament. So protests can go ahead, just as long as they do not do what protests are meant to do. And those who do not abide by the new rules could get 10 years in prison—longer than the sentences most men convicted of rape ever get.
Let us be clear: this is a political attack—an attack on people’s ability to exercise of one of their key democratic rights, an attack on one of the ways people have to speak out against Government policies they oppose, an attack on free speech. The Government have already made it much more difficult for people to go on strike, and now they want the police to make it much harder for people to protest.
Even without this new law, we have seen the state, under this Government, clamping down on democratic rights: last week, a nurse fined £10,000 after protesting against pay cuts; women at the Clapham common vigil attacked. And it goes way back: students kettled for opposing higher tuition fees; fracking activists jailed.
This Bill, written in direct response to the growth of Black Lives Matter and Extinction Rebellion, is aimed at suppressing further political opposition and dissent. Instead of tackling the underlying grievances, the state is responding by attacking those challenging injustice. It is a form of state intimidation, designed to stop people organising and attending protests, but people will not be stopped.
Throughout our history, significant gains have been won through demonstrations: eight-hour days won by the trade unions; votes for women won by the suffragettes. Such movements were always denounced at the time as violent by politicians standing on the wrong side of history. If the Government proceed, this law will be broken repeatedly, and trust between the state and its citizens further shattered.
Edward Timpson (Eddisbury) (Con) [V]
On a sunny spring morning early on a Saturday in 2017, weeks away from the general election, I was at home, where I am now, with my then nine-year-old daughter, my wife having just left to go out with my then 11-year-old and three-month-old daughters. I looked out of the window and saw a car parked outside, with a man holding a ladder walking towards the house. We were not expecting anyone, so I went out to ask if I could help.
Things then took a sinister turn. What unfolded was an orchestrated, organised mass takeover around and on our private home, with two men forcing their way up on to our roof while others appeared with camera phones and a loudhailer as they circled our house, taking photos and video footage through the windows and broadcasting unsavoury and baseless claims about me. My nine-year-old hid upstairs while I called the police for help.
The guise of this protest was to rail against cases of children being taken into care and adopted. As the then Minister for Children, I knew that strong views on this sensitive subject came with the territory, but never in my wildest dreams believed this would ever be literal. We were forced to vacate our family home under police escort and were unable to return for three days as our roof remained occupied, save for my wife recovering some personal belongings for her and our baby with the police in attendance.
As this trespass was, in law, a civil matter, my only recourse at that stage was to apply for an injunction, unless it could be shown that a criminal offence had subsequently been committed on site. We were all left feeling helpless, intimidated, frightened and let down by the current construct of trespass and public order law. The children were confused and worried, and I ended up having to relive the whole experience in court, after which, thankfully, convictions were secured. For many months afterwards, I would still jump when a vehicle I did not recognise parked outside our house. We can all subscribe to physical non-violent protests on public land, but the mental and emotional impact on those caught up in it, especially where trespass is involved, cannot be overlooked. That is one of a number of reasons why I am very supportive of the provisions in parts 3 and 4 of the Bill.
As a former children’s Minister, I am pleased to see measures to extend definitions in relation to those who abuse positions of trust by engaging in sexual activity with minors, as well as measures establishing secure schools, preventing knife crime, promoting and improving the use of youth rehabilitation orders and others. I know that many parishes in Eddisbury will welcome the Bill’s proposals to protect our war memorials from desecration.
As the Bill goes through Committee and Report stages, there is a chance to consider what more we can do to tackle the growing and devastating scourge of pet theft, which is an emotive issue among many of my constituents. Finally, it would be remiss of me not to mention my private Member’s Bill to raise the retirement age of magistrates to 75, which I am delighted is now official Government policy. Is this not the perfect Bill in which to make that law?
Ms Marie Rimmer (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab) [V]
First, may I pay my respects to the loved ones of Sarah Everard? My thoughts and prayers are with them.
Causing death by dangerous driving deserves a life sentence. That is the justice that Violet-Grace Youens’s parents deserved. Their angelic four-year-old daughter Violet-Grace was so cruelly taken from them. The family continue to tirelessly campaign and help others through the Violet’s Gift charity. Last year I was proud to co-sign the private Member’s Bill promoted by the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) on this very issue. Since then, the Government have indicated that they will not support that Bill. Instead, they have included the dangerous driving changes in this far-reaching Bill before us. Unfortunately, this means that I will not be able to support the changes this time, for this Bill infringes on our very freedom and democratic rights.
Like many, I agree that protests can sometimes cause some personal annoyance. Protests can make us late for work. Protests can cause a little harm to our finances. Protests can force us to listen to views we do not agree with. But should protests be a criminal act because they cause the risk of some “serious annoyance”? I do not think so, and I am sure that most Members agree. Perhaps worse still, the Bill empowers a judge to imprison someone convicted of causing the risk of serious annoyance for 10 years.
The freedom and right to protest is the cornerstone of everything we believe in. It is the bedrock of liberal democracy. Across the world to this day, we see people taking to the streets to protest for their rights. Throughout my life, I have seen how protests have brought about change—the fall of the Berlin wall, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and more recently in Belarus and Myanmar. We have also seen where putting down protests can lead us. The Tiananmen Square protests live on in our memory. Every adult alive that day remembers that brave man walking in front of those tanks. Giving up our freedoms simply so that the Home Secretary can appear to be tough on crime is not justifiable. Doing so would be a betrayal of everything this Chamber represents.
Virginia Crosbie (Ynys Môn) (Con) [V]
It is a privilege to speak in this important debate. I, too, would like to extend my deepest condolences to Sarah Everard’s family and friends. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Edward Timpson) for sharing his powerful personal experience to bring to life how important the changes in the Bill are.
A couple of weeks ago, a young female in my constituency started working as a police officer. On just her second shift, she was assaulted when someone spat at her. Spitting and coughing on police officers has become more common since covid-19 came into our lives. North Wales police alone recorded 100 attacks on officers including coughing and spitting or biting between February and November last year. This is part of an unacceptable trend of increased assaults against police and other emergency service workers. Of respondents to the Police Federation demand, capacity and welfare survey last year, 55% said they had been the victim of an unarmed physical attack in the previous 12 months, and in some frontline roles the figure was as high as 83%.
Since 2020, at least 30 officers have been killed while performing their duties, despite massive improvements in protective and defensive equipment. The data shows that we are living in a more violent society, and the threats to our police officers are increasing, but those who attack or assault police officers are often let off with little more than a slap on the wrist. What an offence that is to our police. I speak regularly with the police on Anglesey; I have been out with them on patrol and I helped to man the Britannia bridge with them during the first lockdown. I know how seriously they take protecting people on the island, but they tell me of the difficult and often threatening situations they handle every single day. John Apter, the national chair of the Police Federation, said:
“We need officers to have the very best protection, and there must be a strong deterrent—that deterrent should be time in prison, no ifs, no buts.”
The Bill doubles the maximum sentence for those who assault police and other emergency workers.
I end by saying that I will back the Bill tonight. I applaud this Government for using the Bill to follow through on their manifesto commitment to take serious action on sentencing of those who assault our police, as part of their raft of measures to improve provision for those who serve our communities daily.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
The Government admit that there is a crisis in policing, the criminal justice system and courts, and the publication of such an interminably long Bill speaks to that. Members of the public may be left wondering, given that the Conservative party has been in office for well over 10 years now, who is responsible for the multiple crises. In that time, we have had innumerable pieces of legislation on these matters—on policing, criminal justice and courts—including statutory instruments. Logically, we can conclude that none of that legislation has dealt with the admitted problems, and may even have exacerbated them.
We should not expect the outcome of this Bill to be different, because it is designed not to address fundamental problems but to infringe on our civil liberties and prosecute culture wars, with more protection for a statue than for a woman and a longer sentence for damaging public property than for sexual assault. The Bill does not even attempt to address the crisis of plummeting conviction rates for some of the most serious crimes, including rape. Reported rapes are soaring; they almost reached 60,000 last year, but barely 2,000 resulted in prosecution. The Victims’ Commissioner has spoken of the effective decriminalisation of rape in this country.
Ministers are fooling no one when their default response is to talk about tougher sentences and more police. Tougher sentences are useless if the perpetrators can reasonably expect never to be convicted. More police on the streets are a waste of time if they are instructed to prioritise guarding statues. The Bill seeks to make that style of policing commonplace, with the major focus on powers to prevent non-violent protests, such as Saturday’s vigil in memory of Sarah Everard, whose family we continue to hold in our thoughts and prayers. It follows in rapid succession legislation that provides legal immunity for members of the armed forces and the police, even in cases of rape, torture and murder.
Historically, we have had policing by consent in this country. This Government seem to be intent on ending that, with more armed police and more random stop-and-search, despite the evidence of racist discrimination, ploughing on with the failed Prevent programme and the obvious demonisation and disproportionate impact on the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, and now the suppression of peaceful gatherings and protests. This is draconian legislation. It will not make us safer. It should be opposed by everybody who believes in democracy.
Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)
In the last three years, there have been 1,329 assaults against emergency services workers in Nottinghamshire, and I will share some of their stories.
On 1 February last year, police were called to assist paramedics at a reported insulin overdose. As they reassured the patient, Lance Morgan, that there was no sign of an overdose, he became abusive, kicking out at officers and paramedics, shouting racist abuse. Emergency workers Paul Pointon and Michael Phipps were injured, as Lance Morgan punched Michael in the groin and Paul in the abdomen. He was sentenced to 20 weeks in prison after pleading guilty to four counts of assaulting an emergency worker.
On 16 August, a female police officer was punched in the face and shoved in the chest after she stopped a driver who had been speeding, lost control and crashed into another car. The offender, Andrew Robbins, got 14 months in prison for assaulting an emergency services worker and a string of driving offences.
I have been speaking about violent assaults, but 64% of the 1,329 assaults were non-physical, such as spitting, coughing on, or threatening officers. The majority of those assaults were carried out by people who claimed to have coronavirus—covid assaults. In Nottinghamshire, Omar Osman spat in the mouth of the police officer arresting him, while claiming he was covid-positive. In custody that evening, he spat in the face of a detention officer, splashed water and urine at another, and hit the custody sergeant over the head while spitting in his face. As one officer said to me when I accompanied him on patrol, these things happen over and over, and people live with that constant, nagging fear: “Have I got covid? What if I pass it on to my family?”.
The Bill will double the maximum sentence for assaults on all emergency service workers. This issue has too often been overlooked in debates of the past 24 hours, because Labour Members do not want their constituents to know that they are voting against it. So that we all know where we stand, tonight Conservative Members will vote for tougher sentences for child murderers; Labour Members will be voting against. We are voting to keep rapists in jail longer; Labour is voting against. We are voting for tougher penalties for those who desecrate the memory of the fallen; Labour is voting against. We are voting to keep our streets safer and to tackle violent crime; Labour is voting against. Labour Members are soft on crime, and soft on the causes of crime. They are failing to protect their constituents, and failing to back our police.
Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
Our hearts are with the family and friends of Sarah Everard, and our thoughts with those who gathered in peace and solidarity to mourn her death, in a vigil that was so badly and aggressively handled, and into which we need an immediate inquiry. In its aftermath, this Bill is our opportunity to help women to reclaim the streets for good, turn back the tide of rapes, and replace fear with confidence. Instead, however, the Bill curtails our rights to peaceful protest and assembly. It gives harsher punishments for attacks on slave-owner monuments than for sexual violence against women. It persecutes our Roma and Gypsy communities, and it attacks our right to roam the countryside while giving rapists freedom to roam our streets; rape is up by 35%, and 99% of recorded rapes never go to court.
We need investment at scale in Nightingale courts, equipped with the latest DNA forensic testing technology, so that rapists can be charged, prosecuted and convicted in weeks, instead of victims living in fear for years, as this Bill allows. The Government should empower our citizens and communities, but instead they attack the rights of all of us to peaceful assembly and protest—trade unionists, EU remainers, climate change activists, anti-war protesters, and vote-at-16 enthusiasts. They are curtailing the freedom of expression that feeds a healthy, responsive democracy. That will drive protest underground, generating heat in place of light.
This Trojan horse Bill may display popular measures on dangerous driving, protecting protectors and Lammy reforms, and I am sure that in Committee, Labour will support those few crumbs of goodness beside the poison chalice that this Bill represents. This thoroughly rotten Bill needs to be rejected and recast in the next Queen’s Speech. It fails to reclaim our streets from the grip of fear; and amid a pandemic, a recession, and the serial abuse of women on our streets, it constitutes an attack on our fundamental values, our democracy, our freedom, and the very laws that protect those things. We should reject the Bill.
James Wild (North West Norfolk) (Con)
The Bill delivers on our manifesto commitments to tackle crime. Let me start with protection for those on the frontline. The new police covenant will bring increased focus to the issues of physical protection, help and support for the families of officers. I know from my time in the Ministry of Defence the galvanising effect that the reporting duty in the Bill will have, just as the duty introduced for the armed forces covenant had.
There has been an unacceptable increase in assaults on emergency workers. In Norfolk alone, 659 police officers were assaulted last year. Doubling the sentence for such attacks will better reflect the risk that the police, firefighters, paramedics, prison workers and others face.
Protecting young people is an important part of the Bill. I support including faith leaders and sports coaches in the provisions relating to sexual activity and positions of trust. Extending the offence of arranging a child sex crime will close a gap in criminal law. I take this opportunity to acknowledge the role that Facebook played in providing information that was crucial to securing a 25-year sentence for a serial paedophile in my constituency. However, with the National Crime Agency and senior police officers warning that Facebook’s plans for encryption risk serious child abuse offenders going undetected, I urge Facebook to rethink.
If we are to increase confidence in the justice system, it is important that sentencing reflects the severity of crimes, and I welcome minimum terms for repeat offences, including burglary, drug and knife crimes, unless exceptional circumstances apply. Very serious violent and sexual offenders should rightly serve longer sentences.
There has been much focus on the clauses relating to public order, and rightly so; the right to protest is an essential part of our democracy. I share concerns about the policing in Clapham, and I welcome the independent review. However, the powers in the Bill are not about that; nor are they about the temporary covid restrictions. They are there to deal with deliberate tactics that have led to disproportionate disruption. Some call the blocking of ambulances, closing of bridges and people gluing themselves to trains legitimate protest. My view is that those actions undermine the careful balance between the rights of protesters and the rights of people to go about their daily lives. I recognise that there are concerns, and those provisions will be considered further in Committee.
Finally, there is strong concern about dog theft in North West Norfolk, as elsewhere. Pets are part of our families, and the emotional hurt that the loss of a pet can cause is immense. I hope that during the passage of the Bill, the Government will bring forward measures to increase penalties for that crime.
Tonight, I will back these measures in the Bill, and others to support rehabilitation and more effective community sentences to tackle serious violence. Anyone who votes against this Bill is voting against measures to make our streets safer.
Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab) [V]
What a shame that the Government have chosen to turn a piece of legislation that we could have all got behind into a divisive attempt at a culture war. In this House, we all support the police covenant. We all want better protections for our emergency workers. We all want the right sentences for people who cause death by dangerous driving, and we all want to protect vulnerable young people from abuse by people in a position of trust. I am pleased those measures are in the Bill, and I am grateful to my hon. Friends the Members for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), for Halifax (Holly Lynch), for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) and for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), and the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch), for their campaigning on those issues.
There is more the Government could have done that we would have supported, such as introduce better protection for shop workers, as well as emergency workers. I refer to the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, as I am a member of the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers. Its survey of shop workers last year showed that 60% were threatened by a customer, and 9% were assaulted. We have been trying to tackle the intimidation of shop workers in Didsbury in my constituency, and it is time for real action to deter that kind of behaviour.
We could have seen real measures to tackle violence against women and girls. On sentences, we agree on whole life orders for the premeditated murder of a child, but why not whole life sentences for the abduction, assault and murder of a woman? Why not make street harassment a crime? We could even have seen measures to seriously tackle drug policy and sentencing. In my view, it is counterproductive to criminalise people for the possession of drugs for personal use. It runs the risk of ruining their future life chances, wastes the time of the police and courts, and does not reduce the harm that drugs cause to individuals or society. A serious debate on drug policy is long overdue.
Even without those measures that the Government could have introduced, we could have supported the Bill on the basis of the good things it proposes if it did not have measures that are disproportionate, divisive and dangerous—and that, most importantly, put our fundamental right to protest in jeopardy. The right to protest is one of the most important rights we have, because it helps us to stand up for all other rights. Even the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) said yesterday that
“freedom of speech is an important right…however annoying…that might sometimes be.”—[Official Report, 15 March 2021; Vol. 691, c. 78.]
The Home Secretary would do well to listen to her predecessor.
This is a big Bill with very significant measures on complex issues, and it needs serious scrutiny. I hope the Government will extend time on it to the time that it needs, and will rethink the measures that we do not need, and that the police often do not want. I support the Labour party’s reasoned amendment, and will vote against a Bill that puts our fundamental right to protest at risk. I ask the Government to rethink and withdraw those measures as the Bill progresses. As the shadow Home Secretary said yesterday, we should press pause on the Bill and bring the whole House together. This is too important an issue for us not to.
Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab)
There is so much wrong with the Bill that three minutes could not possibly cover it. It marks a descent into authoritarianism.
We are debating the Bill today because the Home Secretary despises Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter, having described them as hooligans, thugs and criminals. The Bill is designed to make it more difficult for working people to hold the powerful to account by expanding police powers to a level that should not be seen in any modern democracy. In fact, if this proposed legislation was being debating in another country, I am sure Members of this House would be condemning that country as an authoritarian regime. Make no mistake, this is the biggest assault on our rights and freedom to protest in recent history. It moves to criminalise Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities.
I attended the Black Lives Matter demonstrations in Nottingham East, and the protests and vigils at Scotland Yard and Parliament on Sunday and yesterday. We took to the streets because people are angry. We are hurting. We are sick of male violence, whether it is at the hands of the state, our partners, our family members or strangers. We march because some people do not survive male violence: Sarah Everard, Bibaa Henry, Christina Abbotts, Naomi Hersi and many more. The public realm belongs to women too, and women should have the right to go wherever we choose without men harassing us, assaulting us and raping us. We have a right to walk home.
This Bill does nothing to protect women. In fact, the Bill protects statues of dead men—slave owners, even—more than living women. It hands unaccountable power to the police—the same police who were forcing women to the ground at Clapham common on Saturday night. I will be voting against the Bill.
Matt Vickers (Stockton South) (Con)
I was elected to represent the people of Stockton South on a manifesto that pledged to get tough on crime, protect our emergency service workers and give real justice to the victims of some of the most heinous crimes. I am therefore delighted to support the Bill, which will do exactly that. It will ensure that we are on the side of the victims, not the criminals; it has tougher sentences for those who vandalise our memorials, those who prey on children, sex offenders, killer drivers and child murderers. The victims of those awful crimes are often left scarred by them for the rest of their life, and I am glad that the Bill will go some way to delivering real justice for them.
The Bill contains fundamental, wide-ranging improve-ments to our justice system, and it is impossible to cover its breadth in just three minutes, so I will focus on what it does for our emergency service workers across the country. The pandemic has been awful for us all, but many of our emergency service workers have borne the brunt of it. While we retreated to the safety of our homes, our emergency service workers rolled up their sleeves and got on with it, running towards danger when so many of us would run away. It is therefore unbelievable that during this most terrible year, assaults against our emergency service workers have increased substantially. Yes, our policemen and policewomen who do so much to protect us, and our doctors and nurses who help us when we need them most, have faced record numbers of assaults this year. In Cleveland, that has meant 662 assaults on emergency service workers; that is up more than 50% on the previous year.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
I am grateful to my next-door neighbour in Stockton for giving way. We have the third-most serious level of serious crime in Cleveland, yet the hon. Gentleman’s Government refused us additional funding time and again. Why?
Matt Vickers
Today the hon. Gentleman has the chance to be on the side of the emergency workers, those brave men and women who put themselves out on the frontline to keep our communities safe. We are putting more police on the streets and giving them the powers and equipment that they need to do the job, and I am very happy that there are more than 150 more police officers on the streets of Cleveland, thanks to this Government.
I welcome the fact that the Bill will increase the maximum sentence imposed on those who assault our emergency service workers. It is much overdue and there must be no further delay in protecting our protectors, doing justice for those who put themselves in harm’s way to uphold the law or who are there to help us when we need them most. I am hopeful that a tougher approach to sentencing will send a signal and go some way to ensuring that our emergency service workers get the respect that they so rightfully deserve. The Bill enshrines the police covenant into law, ensuring that our police officers—retired or serving—and their families get the additional support that they have rightly earned through their service to our communities.
We have put more police officers on the streets. We have provided more equipment and more funding, and now, whether it is by tackling unauthorised encampments or persistent violent offenders, we are giving the police the powers that they need to do the job. This legislation is long overdue and, tonight, I will be on the side of the victims and the emergency service workers across this country.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
There is much in the Bill to be welcomed, but there is an attempt to mislead the public—to accuse Labour MPs of wanting to be soft on those guilty of assaulting or murdering children, emergency workers, police or anyone else convicted of such crimes. Tory MP after Tory MP has done exactly that while, all the time, ignoring the sinister measures in this Bill that hit at the foundations of our democracy—the right to assemble and to protest. No matter how loud the faux anger and indignation of Tory MPs, Labour is right to oppose this Bill and stand up for people’s democratic rights. Protest is awkward, inconvenient and noisy, but it does bring about change. The Bill will give the police powers to determine which protests are acceptable, which should be allowed and which should not. It opens the police up to political pressure and to erring on the side of caution for fear of retribution if trouble occurs.
We are witnessing a Tory-led coup without guns. There has been a consistent pattern to this Tory Government’s abuse of power. To avoid dissent in this House, including dissent from their own side, they closed Parliament. We have seen Tories appointed to public bodies allocating millions in covid contracts to Tory friends for personal protective equipment, goods and services. The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care was found to be acting unlawfully for failing to divulge details of contracts. The National Audit Office concluded that applicants with political contacts were 10 times more likely to be successful in bids for these contracts. We have seen £22 billion wasted on track and trace. Our Home Secretary has paid hundreds of thousands of pounds out from public funds in damages because of her bullying. We had a Budget that blatantly favoured Tory seats, even indulging the Chancellor’s seat.
This Bill is another example of the Tories’ determination to avoid democratic scrutiny. Now, they want to close down public dissent. This hits at the heart of democracy in this country. If we do not stand up and defend people’s right to show dissent, as MPs in this House, we are in dereliction of our duty. We must oppose this Bill.
Rob Roberts (Delyn) (Con)
I will do my best to contain my remarks to the actual content of the Bill. The Government were elected on a clear mandate to tackle serious crime, support our police and keep communities across the UK safe. The Bill is a clear commitment from the Government that they are following through on those promises, and I commend them for it.
Throughout the pandemic, our local police forces have continued to work through extremely difficult circumstances, often risking their safety to ensure the safety of others—of ourselves and our loved ones—just as they do in normal times, running towards danger as we run away. I personally thank the North Wales police force for its hard work in keeping all of us in Delyn and across north Wales safe.
There is a particular challenge for the police in Wales, as responsibility for health regulations is devolved while responsibility for policing is not. I am proud that, despite our local police force often being pulled in disparate directions by some of the interestingly questionable political decisions that are made in Wales, they have carried on with their duties by keeping communities safe and tackling crime.
Just as our police have protected us, it is now time that we help to protect them and their work. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Dehenna Davison) said in her contribution yesterday, it is important that we protect the protectors and give them the support they need through appropriate powers and sentencing. We will protect our police forces and frontline workers, who sacrifice so much to keep us safe, by increasing the maximum sentence for assaulting an emergency worker and enshrining the police covenant into law.
We will protect our communities by ensuring that the most dangerous criminals will be properly punished through the introduction of life sentences for killer drivers, the ending of the automatic early release of serious offenders, and the extension of whole-life orders for the worst—those guilty of killing children.
The Bill will make a real difference and help to keep us safe. It will protect our police and strengthen our justice system, thereby preventing further families from going through the pain of not getting the justice they deserve. I do not pretend that the Bill is perfect, and I sympathise with some of the concerns expressed about the provisions on protest. Although I welcome the Bill for the good that it will bring to our society and our justice system, I am sure that those provisions will be carefully considered and scrutinised in Committee.
In closing, I remind all Members that on Second Reading we consider and vote on the general aims and principles of a Bill, so to throw the whole thing out at this stage would just be irresponsible. As the Bill works towards a safer and more just society, I will be deeply saddened if Opposition Members vote against its Second Reading, which they could do only to score a political point or, more worryingly, because they do not wish to see a society that protects its people and its police force.
Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP) [V]
I commend all those who have been involved in bringing the Bill before the House. It has much merit, not least in relation to the penalty for those who cause death by dangerous driving. I know of families who have suffered such loss, and it is so tragic. Their pain and grief is compounded by the lenient sentencing of those who have taken away a loved one too soon.
I welcome the increase in penalties for the assault of an emergency worker. We ought never need to be reminded of the contribution that emergency workers make in our society, but if we did, the past 12 months have done just that. Our nurses, doctors, ambulance drivers, paramedics, firefighters, police and others have been very much on the frontline. The least we can do is to protect them when they are attacked by mindless individuals when they are doing their job. I concur with the remarks of the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) in yesterday’s debate: similar protective provisions for retail workers and others would be very welcome.
There are many other welcome provisions in the Bill, such as the change to the provisions on early release, which can cause so much hurt to victims. The provisions on attacks on war memorials are welcome and badly needed in Northern Ireland where, sadly, such memorials have become a focus of attack for some time.
I also have concerns that I hope the Government can address. It will come as no surprise to the House to hear that, as someone who represents the party of the late, great Ian Paisley, I believe that the right to protest must be protected. That right was hard won, and in a democracy it must be protected. The hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) rightly highlighted the potential pitfalls of clauses 54 to 56 and 59 and 60, which would make significant changes to police powers to respond to protest. This issue must be approached with careful consideration and caution. What is “serious disruption”? Who defines it? What is the definition of “serious annoyance”? We need these matters to be clarified.
Anthony Mangnall (Totnes) (Con)
It is a pleasure to speak in this debate. Of course, it is somewhat disappointing to hear the Opposition change their position from one of abstaining to one of voting against the Bill, but then again we have come to be unsurprised by their machinations and changes of heart throughout this Parliament.
There is a great deal to welcome in the Bill, from the ending of unauthorised encampments, to the changes to sentencing for minors, dangerous driving—I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) for her work on that—the desecration of monuments, and serious violence and assaults against frontline workers, which so many Members have mentioned. The Government are updating the law to a position that ensures that sentencing fits the crime, and confidence can be restored in our justice system.
Those are worthy steps that make a difference and restore the faith that people have in our Parliament, our police and the way in which we conduct ourselves in this Parliament; yet tonight’s vote has already been misconstrued to the public as anti-freedom, anti-protests and with little impact on women’s rights, despite the fact that Parliament is this week debating the Domestic Abuse Bill in the House of Lords, covering many of the issues that have been raised by the Opposition and that the Minister has already worked on so tirelessly.
The hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) may well stand up and not even speak to the Bill, but there is no restriction on people being able to protest. There is no restriction on freedom of speech. Speech after speech has seen Opposition Members provide examples of positive elements to the Bill, and discuss what does work in it. To say that they will not vote for it is to throw the baby out with the bathwater, and to give the Bill no chance of success, no scrutiny, and, as my colleagues have said, no right to be improved in Committee.
I believe passionately in freedom of speech. It is the cornerstone of our democracy. It is sacrosanct. The right to protest and to speak is no more reduced by the Bill than by the existing laws on libel, sedition or public order. As was said yesterday, in the words of John Stuart Mill,
“we should all be free to do exactly as we like, provided that we are not impeding someone else’s freedom to do exactly as they like.”—[Official Report, 15 March 2021; Vol. 691, c. 99.]
The measures in the Bill are not some governmental power grab or conspiratorial coup, which is what we have heard from some, but an overdue recommendation of the Law Commission from 2015. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) pointed out yesterday, if this House worries about the content of the Bill, it can scrutinise it in Committee and improve it, and we will be able to return something that will do justice to its intent. I will vote for the Bill tonight.
Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab) [V]
Much of what has been said about the Bill goes to show just how divisive it is. Rather than seeking to make people feel safer, to work with communities, and to bring peace and cohesion to neighbourhoods, the Bill has been designed to divide us. We know that this mess of a Bill has some good things in it, such as strengthening the work done by my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch) on protecting the protectors, and I declare an interest as a former GMB officer, previously working with the brave ambulance worker Sarah Kelly to protect emergency workers such as her from assault.
The Bill also includes dangerously discriminatory measures for Traveller communities, and silencing our right to protest in support of causes that we hold dear. Labour was born out of the trade union movement—out of the working classes protesting for better pay and rights. We should never forget the power of protest, but with all the will in the world, and with all the opposition to it, the Bill will sadly pass. I did not come to Parliament to sit in opposition; I came to Parliament to put Labour values into action. A Labour Government would be making very different choices, but for now the Tories have free rein for their politics of division.
Just as disturbing as what is in the Bill is what is not included. Taking all politics out of it, fundamentally the Bill should be about making people safer. When 97% of women have been sexually harassed, and there are 233 rapes a day and 80,000 a year, with prosecution rates at an all-time low—about 1,000 this year—we have to ask who is made safer by the Bill. There is not one mention of women in it.
If the Government’s answer to making the country safer is delivering tougher sentences for attacking a statue than for raping a person, they have entirely the wrong priorities. If the Home Secretary really wants to make people safer, she should fund refuges, clear the court backlog, support victims throughout the entire process, and rid our streets and institutions of the misogyny that is a breeding ground for violence against women and girls.
I welcome the amendments from the Labour Front Bench on street harassment and seeking to bring much-needed measures to include the safety of women and girls in the Bill. Any woman will say that sexual harassment is not just something that she worries about in the dark; it is something that she risk-assesses in every part of her life, including at work. That is why I intend to table an amendment that criminalises sexual harassment in the workplace. What we have currently are workplaces across industries and sectors effectively policing themselves, and this is failing. It fails victims of sexual harassment every single day. If I were robbed on the street and the robber was caught, he would end up behind bars, but if I were robbed of my earnings, forced out of my job by a man who sexually harassed me, he would do that without fear of any time behind bars. That is not right. Other countries have made sexual harassment a criminal act and it is time for the UK to do the same. In the names of Sarah Everard, Shukri Abdi, Blessing Olusegun, Bibaa Henry, Nicole Smallman and all the thousands of women who have suffered at the hands of male violence: enough. We deserve better than this. We deserve to be safe.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
I am delighted to speak in support of this Bill. I particularly welcome the balance it strikes on sentencing, with longer sentences for the most serious offenders but smarter justice, including more community punishments, for young offenders. Having worked for 10 years with prisoners and young offenders, I know that this is the right balance, and that the Bill will be welcomed by my constituents and across the country.
That is why I am so disappointed by the stance taken by the Labour party. It is understandable to object to aspects of the Bill, it is right for the Opposition to challenge the Government on civil liberties and police powers, and it is understandable to see whether this Bill can be amended to include more protections for women and girls, but for the Opposition to say that they will vote against the whole Bill at this early stage—to vote against the aims and principles of the Bill—is to try to make such amendments impossible. It is also blatantly opportunistic. They had no such in-principle objections last week; there was no sense that the clauses on protests or street safety, or the relative number of mentions of women and statues, were so bad that the whole Bill had to be rejected. Last week, the Opposition were just planning to abstain on Second Reading. That in itself was pretty craven and showed Labour’s weak commitment to law and order, but now they have been blown off the fence and blown into voting against the whole Bill. They faced a test this week: would the party, under its new leader, stand for law and order, or would it stand for gestures? It faced that test and failed it, and the public will notice.
Of course it is right that we use this occasion to discuss the abuse and misogyny that women suffer every day in this country. Some of this abuse is already illegal, but all of it must be deprecated in the strongest terms, because all of it has its root in male disrespect of women. This is not a modern phenomenon. I am afraid to say that it is as old as time and it is written on almost every page of human history. But something else is written in our history too: the attempts by society to contain male violence and male disrespect.
Our culture historically taught men that they had a duty to honour and protect women. It is a difficult thing to say, because it may appear that I want to turn back the clock to a time when men chivalrously protected the weaker sex, but of course, as I have said, that is not how it always was in the old days, and even if it had been, we do not accept the idea that women need protection by men; they just need men to behave themselves. So let me say emphatically that I do not want to turn back the clock; however, we do need to face the fact that our modern culture has not delivered all the progress it was supposed to. I wonder whether that is because our modern culture has a problem with telling people how to behave—it has a problem with society having a moral framework at all.
It is right that we are having this debate, and I hope we get to a better place because of it, because the key thing is that all the laws in the world will not stop violence against women and will not stop sexism if our culture is not right. We need boys to grow up secure in themselves, with good role models and an innate sense of respect for other people. That means stronger families and more supportive communities.
Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab) [V]
As we have heard through this debate, the right to demonstrate peacefully underpins democracy; people have an inalienable right to be heard. The explicit aim of this Bill seems to minimise that right. Clearly, the new definition of “nuisance” could apply to almost any protest around Parliament, where the whole purpose is to get the attention of politicians such as us. I, for one, have always felt that Steve Bray, the “Stop Brexit” man, served to remind us that we live in a thriving democracy. Protest gives the public a way to reach parliamentarians which should make us proud of the country we live in. Let us not hide away from the fact that this Bill is just a knee-jerk reaction to the Extinction Rebellion protests last year, and it appears to be a deliberate curb on free speech and the right to protest peacefully.
I enjoy a very good relationship with South Wales police, and I would like to pay tribute to the officers from the neighbourhood teams across Gower, the new chief constable and the Labour police and crime commissioner. One of my biggest concerns about the new proposal is that its measures pit the public against the police, creating a wedge at a time when we should be building up trust. We all know where the buck stops, from the disgusting images we saw on Clapham Common at the weekend: it is firmly with the Home Secretary and this Government. Until the Government disclose the minutes of the Home Secretary’s meetings with the Met on Friday, we can only judge from her own social media, and it does not take a genius to work out where the blame lies.
I am sure we have all had distressing casework around the difficult issue of rape. The derisory conviction rate of 3% stems in part from the burden that is put on the police to pull together enough evidence to take to the Crown Prosecution Service. Cut after cut means that they do not have the time or the resources to do that successfully, and this has created a system that is failing women and that fails to recognise the significance to society of all aspects of violence against women. We all know that institutional misogyny exists in many organisations, but misogyny is a societal problem, and society is now at a crossroads.
Last week on the Armed Forces Bill Committee, we heard evidence about prosecuting crimes, including rape, through the military courts. Yesterday I asked the Home Secretary about the attitude of some of the armed forces towards victims of male violence and, frankly, it really is worth taking the time to read the transcript of the evidence session, because in 2021, for men with fancy titles to have such ignorant views is really distressing. I have a huge amount of respect and admiration for those who serve in the police force and the armed forces, but we must make sure that they are not part of the problem and instead part of the solution. As politicians, it is our responsibility to ensure that the full force of the law is always used to protect our citizens and keep them safe.
Nickie Aiken (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)
There is much to welcome in this far-reaching Bill, with tougher sentences for violent crime, for child murderers and for sex offenders, with greater efforts to remove knives and weapons from our streets, and with the inclusion of Kay’s law to provide greater protection for those who find the bravery to speak up against violence and sexual offences in their own homes. I could go on, but in the time I have, I will focus on an issue that greatly affects my constituency—namely, the right to protest outside this place, in the heart of my constituency.
The recent history of legislating on protests outside Parliament makes for interesting reading. Labour Members who question the Bill’s impact on the freedom to engage in democratic protest may wish to cast their minds back to sections 132 to 138 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005, in which a Labour Government prohibited protest within a kilometre of Parliament without prior agreement with the Metropolitan police. Fortunately, the Conservative Government repealed those restrictive sections in 2011.
If this weekend has taught us anything, it is that there is a huge difference between a peaceful vigil where people come together to express shared grief and outrage, and protests that take place day after day for weeks on end and that can occasionally bring unpleasant disruption to those living and working locally. Central London has seen changes in the way that protests are organised and in their longevity. They are not always organised by specific groups. They are movements, often with different aims and objectives. Some come to protest peacefully, but others may have the aim of causing disruption and even destruction. I believe passionately in the right to protest; it is one of the values we hold so dear in this country. The clauses in the Bill do not restrict the right to lawful protest. What they do is bring static protests into line with the provisions that already exist.
I accept that some of the language in the Bill could benefit from tightening up, and I am sure that that will be done as the Bill progresses. Much has been highlighted about the democratic and human right to protest, and I agree, but let us not forget the human rights of my constituents who live with over 500 protests or marches a year. I see a huge spike in my mailbag when Westminster plays host to a major protest, with constituents highlighting that a few cause them distress and loss of amenity. They do not question the right to protest, but they do not accept becoming prisoners in their own home and the distress that they often feel as a result of a small minority of protesters. Criminality is what the Bill aims to prevent, and that is surely something that everyone in this place wants to achieve.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab) [V]
I will be voting against this Bill: it is a pernicious piece of legislation and it must be stopped in its tracks today.
Yesterday the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) mentioned “unintended consequences”. I respectfully disagree with the “unintended”. The Government have brought forward a Bill knowing that it will criminalise people who want to make their voices and opinions heard on the future of this nation. It is a huge Bill that this Government are determined to bust through the House of Commons at the same time as the unacceptable state tactics used at Clapham Common at the weekend and at the Black Lives Matter protests last year. Despite this, and despite a shameful history of callous injustices such as the events of Orgreave and Hillsborough, and the spy cops and blacklisting scandals, this Government have doubled down and brought in the Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Act 2021 and now this Bill.
The Bill attacks civil liberties; threatens already limited rights to protest, march and demonstrate; risks worsening the racial and gender disparities in the criminal justice system; expands stop-and-search powers; and further criminalises Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. It extends powers to police protests so that those causing what it calls “serious annoyance” could be faced with the prospect of 10 years in prison. As a former trade union organiser for Unite, and someone who has marched and protested against injustices all my life, I am certain that had this legislation existed then, it would have risked criminalising every single person I marched alongside. It represents a real and serious danger to those speaking out about injustices going forward. Within this Bill are measures that excessively impact Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. The director of Liberty has said:
“If enacted, these proposals would expose already marginalised communities to profiling and disproportionate police powers …and…communities may face increased police enforcement through the criminalisation of trespass.”
This Bill must be voted down. As my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy) said, this is draconian legislation. I make a plea to all the parliamentarians who sit in this House and talk about civil liberties to step up to the plate, reject the politics of division, and reject a Bill that shames this House and everything it is supposed to stand for.
Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con) [V]
Despite events in London over the weekend, I would like to thank our police forces throughout the country for all their hard work in carrying out their duties, in a somewhat tricky balancing act at times, throughout the pandemic. Mistakes have clearly been made by some, but this cannot detract from the good work done by most forces throughout the country.
Sussex police, led by Chief Constable Jo Shiner and police and crime commissioner Katy Bourne, have consistently exercised a calm and consent-based approach throughout the pandemic, engaging with the public, explaining Government advice to help prevent the spread of coronavirus in our communities, encouraging compliance, and using enforcement only as a last resort where people refuse to comply. We must not forget that the police are the public and the public are the police. We all have a duty in community safety and welfare.
Much has been said over the past few days about the right to protest: a new crackdown on protest, curbing civil liberties, and putting rights fundamental to our democracy at risk. This Bill does not do that. It is indeed our fundamental right to protest: to gather and to have a voice. No one is stopping that. But for some protestors, peaceful protest is just not enough. Last year in London, for example, we saw extreme disruptive tactics in the Extinction Rebellion march that reportedly cost the Metropolitan police £16 million. That is not police money; it is taxpayers’ money that would be better spent on, say, nature-based solutions to climate change. This fundamental right does not come with a right to act in a criminal way—to be violent or disruptive. There is no freedom without justice.
The actions of perpetrators in committing criminal damage and Public Order Acts offences and assaulting members of the public or police officers executing their duty are unlawful and unacceptable. There is no reason for peaceful demonstrations to turn disruptive or violent. Unfortunately, even good causes often attract a malign element hellbent on using such a cause as a platform to showcase their own agendas, undermining the aims and message of the protest or demonstration that they have attached themselves to on that particular day.
We have all witnessed the extreme disruption that some protests have caused, stopping people getting on with their daily lives, hampering the free press and blocking access to roads, bridges and businesses, including Parliament, and even hospitals. We cannot confuse current coronavirus regulations with a new Bill that introduces sensible measures to deal with disruptive behaviours while maintaining a right to peaceful protest. Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. I welcome and support the Bill, because as a Conservative, I stand for justice and for law and order.
Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab) [V]
I would like to begin by echoing the comments of my hon. and right hon. Friends yesterday and today who have registered our concerns about the Bill, our disbelief that this Government are seeking to treat attacks on statues as more important than attacks on women, our opposition to disproportionate restrictions on the right to protest and the missed opportunity to protect women and girls from violence and the hatred that underpins it. Nottinghamshire police and our police and crime commissioner, Paddy Tipping, have shown the way by treating misogyny as a hate crime, and the Government need to follow.
I remind the House that the Crown court backlog is failing victims and witnesses. I welcome today’s announcement of a Nightingale court for Nottingham. It has taken too long, but I am glad that the Government have finally responded. There are some welcome measures in the Bill that reflect the hard work of many colleagues who have campaigned for change, but I would like to raise two specific issues.
First, clause 164 paves the way for deaf people to sit as jurors in England and Wales. Previously, language service professionals have not been allowed to enter the deliberation room, so anyone requiring in-person communication support has been barred from jury service. However, I ask the Minister to consider whether it is drafted too narrowly. The clause allows for a British Sign Language interpreter to support a deaf juror, but of the 900,000 UK residents with profound or severe hearing loss, only around 100,000 use BSL as their first language. As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on deafness, I know that a large number of deaf people can only participate when they are supported by a speech-to-text reporter, so will the Minister clarify how this affects them? Will a speech-to-text reporter also be provided in the deliberation room? Will the Minister consider amending the clause to use a catch-all term, to give the Courts Service more flexibility to meet the needs of all deaf jurors?
Secondly, I would like to raise concerns about the effectiveness of measures in the Bill to tackle dangerous driving. The increase in the maximum penalty is welcome, but we must review the definition of dangerous and careless driving and formalise the role of driving bans as a sentencing option for those whose actions have clearly caused danger but who are not dangerous drivers who need to be imprisoned. I would also like to see stronger penalties for hit-and-run offences or where death or serious injury is caused by opening a car door unsafely. Cyclists deserve better protection. Finally, the Government need to close the loophole that allows convicted drivers to evade driving bans by claiming exceptional hardship. I hope the Minister will consider amendments on those matters.
James Murray (Ealing North) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
The need to protect women and girls from violence and the importance of protecting our fundamental right to protest are both long-standing issues that have been brought into sharp focus by what has happened in recent days. We should be using the Bill before us to put in place long overdue protections for women against violence, including domestic homicides, rape and street harassment. We should be doing something about the fact that fewer people are prosecuted and convicted for rape now than at any time since records began, at a time when the number of reported rapes is increasing. We should be tackling the misogynistic attitudes that underpin the abuse women face. Those at the vigil for Sarah Everard in Clapham on Saturday, like my constituents who got in touch with me last year about what happened to Nicole Smallman and Bibaa Henry in Wembley, want us to change as a society. Like so many others who have spoken out for such a long time, they want us as MPs, and as men in particular, to listen and to act. But rather than use the Bill as an opportunity to act in support of women demanding to be able to walk the streets without fear, it is instead being used to attack our fundamental rights as citizens by limiting the right to protest. Those assembled on Saturday were part of a vigil, yet they have drawn attention to the Government’s plans to restrict our right to protest with this Bill.
Protest is the foundation of our democracy. Like many Members of Parliament, I have protested outside of this place for far longer than I have been within it. The right to protest must be protected for us all, and I will use my position in here to do all that I can to defend it. The attempt to restrict our right to protest is not a sign of a Government who are confident with the country that they seek to represent. The right to protest is a long and deeply held part of British democracy. The Bill’s attempt to allow the police to restrict protest because of
“the noise generated by persons taking part”
would make a mockery of our rights.
It is shameful that, rather than attack the injustices that people are protesting about, this Government seek to attack the very right to protest itself. There are measures in the Bill that I and other Labour Members welcome, but the way it targets Gypsies, Travellers and Roma, fails to address violence against women and girls, and seeks to attack our right to protest mean that it is something that we must oppose. As MPs we can use our votes today to voice our opposition to this Bill. It would be inexcusable to use those votes to silence the voices of protest outside.
Sir David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
The Second Reading of a Bill is, for me, about the principle of the legislation. As a candidate at the last general election, I stood on the Government’s manifesto to make this country safer by taking more effective action against crime. Colleagues have the opportunity both in Committee and on Report to amend the Bill if they so wish. I say to my hon. Friend the Minister that I was slightly disappointed that the issue of “released under investigation” was not included in this particular Bill, but I am very glad that the Home Office has announced today that we will be looking again at the role of police and crime commissioners.
Local residents in my constituency have been shocked about a murder in Old Leigh and violent activities in Chalkwell Park. I raised the issue of knife crime in the Chamber earlier this month and was told by the Prime Minister that we have more than 6,000
“of our target extra 20,000 police already recruited.”—[Official Report, 3 March 2021; Vol. 690, c. 247.]
I hope that Essex police recruit enough police officers to stop any more violent crime.
This debate is taking place against a background of an horrendous murder. It appears that the management of the Metropolitan police needs to give a far better and fuller explanation of how it handled recent events. There should also be an external independent investigation, or a public inquiry, into the Metropolitan police’s handling of Operation Midland. My former colleague and parliamentary neighbour, Harvey Proctor, and my former colleague, the late Home Secretary, Leon Brittan, among others, have been denied justice for far too long. The Metropolitan police must not act as judge and jury on its own failings. There should be a full-scale debate in Parliament on Operation Midland and on who should be held to account.
My office looks over Parliament Square. I have long complained about the endless demonstrations that take place on this very busy roundabout. It is absolutely ridiculous. It is very difficult to work because of the noise—the drums, horns and loudspeakers. Policing these so-called events costs a huge amount of money and, with Parliament being the seat of democracy, our work should not be disrupted.
Finally, I am delighted that the campaign of my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois), which he started in 2018 to make deliberate acts of trespass a criminal rather than a civil offence, has been successful. After a large number of Travellers set up encampments on Snakes Lane in Eastwood, many of my constituents complained about an increase in vandalism, crime and antisocial behaviour. I fully support the Home Secretary in her decision to amend the existing powers to remove trespassers, and I wish this Bill well.
Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab) [V]
I draw the attention of the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
It is a matter of deep regret that, after the deeply tragic events of the last week, the Government have decided to move forward with this Bill, which does far too little to protect women and goes too far in restricting the right to peaceful protest. I am immensely grateful to all my hon. Friends who have spoken so movingly in opposition to this Bill over the last two days.
As a lifelong trade unionist and a veteran of countless picket lines and demonstrations, I want to speak specifically to the implications of this Bill for our right to peacefully protest. This is a matter of huge significance to my constituents. In the last few days alone, I have been inundated with messages urging me to speak up against this Bill from teenage climate strikers, anti-racist campaigners and health workers opposed to the privatisation of the national health service.
We must not forget that without protest, agitation and industrial action, the freedoms we most cherish today would never have been won. People protest remains a vital democratic freedom and the very lifeblood of any healthy democracy. Now the Government plan to impose unprecedented new restrictions on the ability of citizens to make their voices heard, and I urge all Members to vote against them. The additional restrictions that this Bill looks likely to impose on the right to public assembly are far too broad. They will do little to improve public safety, but much to deter people from exercising their democratic right to the streets. The introduction of an exclusion zone around Parliament means that the voices of protestors simply will not reach those who need to hear them most—us.
We should also all be concerned by the potential impact of this Bill on Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. These are some of the most marginalised and discriminated against people in our country, and they are all too often the victims of social exclusion, racial profiling and police brutality. Instead of using this Bill as an opportunity to honour their commitments to rooting out racial prejudice in all its forms, the Government have instead launched an attack on the very way of life of many Roma and Travellers by criminalising trespass. The Home Office says that this Bill is about making communities safer, but this Bill will in fact leave GRT communities far less safe, more at risk of criminal prosecution and even of having their homes and property confiscated. Will the Home Secretary now listen to the voices of police officers, who overwhelmingly oppose these hard-line measures, and favour adequate site provision as a means of dealing with unauthorised encampments? I will be voting against the Bill.
Jerome Mayhew (Broadland) (Con)
This Bill works to ensure that the criminal justice system continues to reflect the views of society, delivering on our manifesto commitments, and I welcome it.
I welcome the requirement for serious offenders sentenced to four years and more to serve two thirds of their sentences before release on licence, rather than just 50%. Automatically releasing serious criminals on licence well before their sentence is due to expire brings the criminal justice system into disrepute with ordinary people and, more importantly, with the reasonable expectations of the victims of crime. While I recognise that early release and sentence are an important management tool for the prison population, the message needs to be clear that their sentence is what they serve.
Labour is wrong to argue that police powers to search a person who has already been convicted of knife crime without additional suspicion is somehow an unjustifiable attack on their freedoms. My view is that if they do not want to be considered a risk of carrying a knife, then they should not be convicted of carrying one in the first place. These court orders will help ordinary, law-abiding people to be protected. This is where our focus should be, and it is.
Labour is also against powers to help the police to manage the new wave of protest direct action, where the aim is not so much to protest as to cause chaos and inconvenience to as many people as possible. We all have a right to protest and to make sure that our voices are heard, but it is a right to protest, not to prevent. Why should one section of the public have an unfettered right to impose massive disruption on the rest of society? What about their right to get on with life? Where competing rights clash, the law must maintain a balance. Modern protest movements, such as XR, game the system, and disruption, not peaceful protest, is their objective. The law needs to adjust to maintain the balance of competing rights, and I think this Bill helps to achieve that.
Is this new power open to abuse? Yes it is, like every power that the police have, but there is no difference between this power and every other power that we loan to the police. It is open to challenge and review through the press and the courts. As a democracy, we are well used to holding those in power to account. Every single member of the public has the power to become a citizen journalist immediately through their phone. As a result, the police are subject to review and oversight like never before.
This Bill has ordinary people at its heart, sticking up for their priorities. It delivers on manifesto promises. As such, it is democracy in action, and I will be supporting it.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP) [V]
During the pandemic, our civil liberties have been curtailed in a way that was previously unimaginable. Most of us have accepted that in order to protect life and public health, but along the way injustices have occurred.
Black Lives Matter protesters in London were kettled and photographed and asked to provide their names as a condition of their liberty, with no legal basis, yet police allowed football fans to party on the streets of Glasgow and even gave them a police escort to their destination of choice. Then, last weekend, police officers manhandled and detained women protesting the alleged abduction and murder of a woman, with which a police officer is charged. It is hard to imagine a more egregious misuse of police powers.
All this has occurred because the law on protest in a pandemic is not clear, but the provisions in this Bill to curtail the right to protest beyond the pandemic are even worse. The Bill affords significantly expanded powers to the police to stop protests that would cause “serious unease” and creates criminal penalties for people causing “serious annoyance”. But causing annoyance is part of our freedom of speech. If a protest can be prevented for being annoying, any protest can be prevented.
All movements for change involve an element of peaceful protest. Think of the suffragettes. I am sure many of us did when we saw the photographs from Clapham common on Saturday night. If women cannot speak up to protest their rights, what is our society coming to? Yes, the Extinction Rebellion protests may have been very annoying to those of us going about our business on London’s streets and public transport, but those protesters were protesting the biggest problem of our age—climate change—and I think that gives them the right to be a bit annoying.
We have now seen what can happen when the law governing our right to protest is unclear. The same problems will occur if the margin of discretion granted to the police and the Home Secretary is left as wide as it currently is in this Bill. Although these legal changes will have force only in England and Wales, they will impact people living in Scotland. There is a long tradition of Scots travelling to London to protest. We saw that most recently with the huge demonstrations against Brexit, and past examples include the fight against section 28 and the fight of the anti-war movement.
Parliamentarians, whether of left or right, should never be in the business of giving Governments and police forces powers to stifle dissent, particularly where there is a risk that those powers will be used against those whose beliefs make the Government and the establishment of the day uncomfortable. I would say the same if I were worried that the Scottish Government were in danger of curtailing freedom of expression—and indeed I have, which is part of the reason I am making this speech from the Back Benches.
Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con) [V]
This is a thorough, ambitious and necessary Bill. Ministers know that the public expect those in positions of authority to be subject to scrutiny and actively prevented from abusing their power. Those who seek power in order to do bad things must not be tolerated. That is true of those in sports and religious settings, as it is of those in education, medical, care and justice settings. I welcome the extension of position of trust measures to protect more young people.
Staffordshire police and our local emergency services have shown the dedication to duty that the public expect and have done us proud in Stoke-on-Trent during the pandemic. The Home Secretary knows how important it is to support emergency workers, including police officers, who dedicate their working lives to keeping us safe. She knows they must be protected by the force of law, within the rule of law.
I therefore welcome the provisions for longer maximum sentences for those who assault emergency workers. Too often we read comments from judges that they would have imposed more substantial punishment if they had been able to do so. It is right that we in this House enable justice to be done, and that includes against those who desecrate war memorials.
It is also right that we seek to prevent crime from being committed in the first place and that, where it has been committed, we rehabilitate those who commit it, as well as punishing them. Effective community safety partnerships are key to reducing serious violent crime, and I am glad the Bill provides for their remit to do so.
Too often we see the twisted morality of gangs and extremist allegiances leading to violence. It is right that those who commit such crimes should not be able to walk free from prison after just half their sentence and that Ministers should be able to refer to the Parole Board the expected automatic release of individuals who pose a serious threat, including those who pose a terrorist threat.
In Stoke-on-Trent, sadly, we know that the danger posed by a small number of individual extremists is very real indeed. We also know that almost everyone else is law-abiding, or redeemable if they are ex- offenders. Therefore, just as I welcome tougher sentences, meaningful cautions and stricter parole for those from whom we need protection, I also welcome the provisions for the rehabilitation of ex-offenders who have corrected their behaviour.
I judge this Bill on how it delivers for Stoke-on-Trent. It provides for tackling the threat of radicalisation and for tackling serious violence, public nuisance and the rehabilitation of ex-offenders. I am proud to vote for this wide-ranging Bill, which delivers on our manifesto commitment.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab) [V]
I want to start by remembering Sarah Everard and all women who have died at the hands of violent men. Like all women, I have known what it is like to be scared when you are wondering whether you will make it home—taking the long way round to avoid dark places, moving carriages on the train to avoid men, and hearing footsteps behind you and then being hugely relieved when they pass by. I have also known what it is like to be subjected to abuse and assaults and to not bother reporting them, because those things are so much part of the everyday experience of being a woman. I also know what it is like not to be taken seriously when you do report them.
This Bill does not take violence against women and girls seriously either. I simply cannot imagine any scenario where an attack on a statue could be more serious than a rape, no matter how important the man it commemorates —and let’s face it: it will be a man. Yet that is exactly what this Bill suggests, with a 10-year maximum sentence for harming statues and a five-year minimum sentence for rape. Rape and sexual violence prosecutions are at their lowest ever level in England and Wales, and domestic abuse prosecutions are down 19%, yet the Government are worried about statues.
In Bristol, of course, we know all about statues. When Colston fell, I called out the Home Secretary for her completely unwarranted attack on Avon and Somerset police over their policing of the protests. Now, the independent report that the Home Secretary herself commissioned has praised the decisions that the police made at the time and said that her criticisms of them were misguided. Last summer, we showed how protests could and should be policed. The city and our Mayor responded with dignity and maturity in the aftermath, setting up the We Are Bristol history commission and starting a city-wide conversation. We used that moment to bring the city together.
The Government are now doing the exact opposite. The Communities Secretary wrote an op-ed for The Telegraph, saying:
“We will save Britain's statues from the woke militants who want to censor our past”.
We know what that is about: stoking social and cultural anxieties to win votes, seeking out not what we have in common but what divides us, and fanning the flames. Now, whether it is Black Lives Matter, Reclaim the Streets, the school climate strikes or just someone who wants to pay tribute to a murdered woman by lighting a candle and holding a vigil, people are all collateral damage in the Government’s trumped-up war on woke. That is why I will be voting against the Bill tonight.
It is not just what is in the Bill; it is also what is missing. Labour’s proposals to increase minimum sentences for rapists and stalkers, to make misogyny a hate crime and to create a new street harassment law are not in the Bill. Nor is our proposal that someone convicted of the abduction, sexual assault and murder of a stranger should be eligible for a whole-life order. The Bill could have sent out a strong signal that the Government do take women’s safety seriously. It could have been so much better. I urge the Government to stop playing politics and to start protecting women.
Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance) [V]
This legislation marks an undermining of human rights and civil liberties. It represents a slide toward authoritarianism. We have seen other legislative restrictions on human rights in the Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill and the Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Act 2021. A fresh look at the Human Rights Act and the right to judicial review are looming. It must be seen in the wider context of manufacturing wedge issues and creating arbitrary divisions within society as part of the politics of distraction from genuine social, economic and environmental challenges. We should focus instead on reinforcing the norms and foundations of liberal society, including democracy, human rights and shared public space.
The Bill is so flawed that it should be rejected outright on Second Reading. Events of the past weekend relating to the vigil for Sarah Everard only reinforce that view. This is a major test for all MPs, and I am pleased that many colleagues across a range of parties understand that, but there is a major challenge tonight facing the so-called and self-styled Conservative libertarians. Liberal principles, human rights and civil liberties are not some form of pick and mix, to be selected only when they suit a particular political agenda. Any necessary element of the Bill, including those applying to Northern Ireland, can readily be presented again by the Government via a different piece of legislation.
Of many dangerous aspects of the Bill, the most dangerous is the attack on the right to protest—a cornerstone of democracy and a critical mechanism for holding power to account. It reminds me of the ill-advised and ill-fated proposed Public Assemblies, Parades and Protests Bill in Northern Ireland. which went out to public consultation in 2010. Thankfully, better sense prevailed and it was dropped. Protests have become seminal moments in the UK’s history, with the protests against the Iraq war and against Brexit standing out in recent memory. Protests have been a source of empowerment for the politically marginalised and a powerful tool for securing rights for minorities. Recently, protests have been central to challenging institutional racism and misogyny. It is why protests work, and the Government know that.
Protests invariably involve a degree of nuisance and inconvenience—it goes with the territory. Nuisance and excessive noise are not the same as illegality; they are not the same as violence. These are not even powers the police themselves are seeking; rather, they will put the police in a much more challenging and invidious position.
It is staggering that less than a month after the Pontins blacklist brought to light just some of the discrimination faced by Gypsy, Roma and Traveller people, the Government’s response is to propose legislation to further erode the rights of those communities.
Jacob Young (Redcar) (Con)
My constituents have waited a long time for the justice system to feel like it is putting victims before criminals, and this Bill will deliver that, with tougher sentences for assaulting emergency workers, stricter conditions on bail in high-harm cases, including domestic abuse, increased jail time for sex offenders and child abusers, and extra funding for violence reduction, including knife crime. This Government are making our communities safer.
In 2020, someone was more likely to be a victim of violent crime in the Cleveland force area than anywhere else in the country, yet we missed out on violence reduction funding because of the criteria being based on the number of hospital admissions. When Ministers revisit the fund, I urge them to review the criteria so that Cleveland can benefit from the additional funding and bring a special violence unit to Teesside—something championed by Theresa Cave and the Chris Cave Foundation.
Outside violent crime, when it comes to tackling petty crime and antisocial behaviour, the role of neighbourhood policing—better known as common-sense policing—must not be underestimated. For that reason, I congratulate the Government on their recruitment of 146 extra police officers for Cleveland, which will help to keep people safe in our town centres and elsewhere.
Antisocial behaviour is not limited to town centres, and residents in TS6 have been experiencing it for far too long. TS6 is a regular meeting place for illegal off-road bikers, who cause great nuisance to local residents and put themselves and other people in danger by riding their off-road bikes around the streets and on Eston Hills. I know from those who live in the area that this causes great concern, so I welcome the new resources in the Bill that will help to fix that dreadful situation for them.
The Bill also introduces new measures to crack down on repeat offenders. In Redcar and Cleveland, we have had a recurring problem of low-value thefts from cars and garages, due largely to the system’s inability to enforce proper sentences for repeat offenders. The Bill will help to change that, but new resources and measures can only go so far. What we need in Redcar and Cleveland is leadership and a police and crime commissioner my constituents can be proud of. We have had six chief constables in eight years, and a damning verdict from Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs in 2019, which described Cleveland police as the “worst force” in the country.
Our officers are not at fault. They are being failed by the force’s leadership and by Labour’s police and crime commissioner. I have full confidence in Chief Constable Richard Lewis to turn the fate of our force around, but we need an effective police and crime commissioner to hold the force’s leadership to account. I urge people across Teesside to vote for better policing, and to vote Conservative and for Steve Turner on 6 May.
Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab) [V]
Many of the rights we enjoy today were won not because of politicians with great ideas, but because people came together and demanded that their voices be heard. The Peterloo massacre caused politicians to pass the Great Reform Act 1832, the suffragist movement forced politicians to grant women the right to vote, and the striking Ford machinists and campaign for women’s equal rights inspired the Equal Pay Act 1970.
Our right to be heard is about to be eroded by one of the most pernicious pieces of legislation I have ever seen. Provisions in the Bill enable restrictions to be placed on freedom of assembly and association, which arguably contravenes article 11 of the Human Rights Act. Alarmingly, the Home Secretary will have the power to define what constitutes a “serious disruption” with regard to protests, allowing the Government to effectively determine what protests can and cannot take place. More insidious is the principle whereby protestors who
“intentionally or recklessly cause a public nuisance”,
by causing what is termed “a serious annoyance” can be subject to jail sentences of up to 10 years. A “serious annoyance” is purposely not defined, which should send chills down the spine of anyone who believes in democracy.
The Bill also fails to address the bias and discrimination that persists within our justice system. Indeed, the newly created serious violence reduction orders, which would allow the power to stop and search a person at any time, in any place, and even when completely free of suspicion, is at risk of being applied disproportionately to black and minority ethnic communities. The proposals to criminalise “unauthorised encampments” and establish trespass as a criminal offence, effectively criminalise the way of life for Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. The Bill does not include any specific measures to prevent male violence against women, and it does nothing to address decades of underfunding for the sector tackling violence against women and girls.
What of the right to speak out against such injustices when the Bill is enacted? The Bill fundamentally erodes those rights, and consigns them to the history books, only to be told to our children, like a fairy tale of freedoms gone by.
“When people are free to choose, they choose freedom.”
Those are not my words; they are the words of Margaret Thatcher. The reality of her tenure was very different, but frighteningly, her successors are now writing an even darker dystopian tale of their own, and it seems our freedoms play no part in that at all.
Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con) [V]
I welcome measures in the Bill that will help to ensure that our justice system better reflects what the silent, law-abiding majority rightly expect of it. There has never been public support for letting people out halfway through their sentences. Most of the public would always have wanted child murderers to spend the rest of their lives in prison, and the majority would feel that justice was done if people who murder, rape and sexually abuse others spent much longer in prison than they currently do. We are addressing those issues.
The Conservative party is making changes to ensure a justice system that does a better job of delivering justice. The tragic loss of Sarah Everard, and the women victims who have spoken out, remind us how important that is. Although the measures in the Bill are much welcomed, and the Government can be proud of bringing them forward, I hope that over time we do more. I still do not understand how someone can rape a child and not, as a default, expect to spend the rest of their life in prison. I do not understand how someone could murder someone, robbing decades from them and their families, and come out of jail fewer than 20 years later. Even the term “life sentence” is an insult to victims and their families. It is as if the threat of someone being recalled to prison if they commit another offence is in any way akin to being locked up.
There remains, I am afraid, an intellectual snobbery around law and order in too many parts of the judicial establishment, which has decided for a long time now that people who think that justice is served by criminals being locked up for longer are unsophisticated, do not understand crime or reoffending, and are acting on some kind of unworthy baser instincts. We have, importantly, made a start today and I am very glad to support these measures.
Of course, nothing I have said stops our justice system doing much more to rehabilitate offenders who commit less serious offences, diverting people away from a life of crime. Not only is that the right thing to do, but it will free up prison spaces so that we can go further in locking up hardened criminals who should be locked up. I know the Justice Secretary is passionate about delivering a range of measures within and accompanying the Bill to do just that, and I welcome those equally.
As for the Opposition, I humbly suggest that yesterday really was a new low for the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer). We all recognise that any change in the laws around protest should be carefully scrutinised, as opposed to the confected outrage we have heard today, and of course the Committee stage will provide for that. For a former Director of Public Prosecutions to use a few bullet points on social media to contrast the maximum sentence for one offence with the starting point for another offence is beneath the standards of both the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s current and former office, and, I suspect, is something that will, on reflection, be regretted. Ten years has long been the maximum penalty for criminal damage. Forgive me, but I must have missed the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s previous campaign for sentencing starting points to be calibrated around that.
This is a serious Bill dealing with serious issues and it deserves proper scrutiny. We should expect more from the Leader of the Opposition.
Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab) [V]
The Secretary of State no doubt thought that she could rush this Bill through Parliament, grouping mundane and relatively positive changes with sweeping attacks on our civil liberties, and thought no one would notice. Last night, thousands protested against the Bill and against the use of excessive force by the police, and many more attended vigils over the weekend in memory of Sarah Everard, Wenjing Lin and all women affected by and lost to violence. I am greatly saddened and angry that the vigil in Clapham descended into violence due to heavy-handed policing. That contrasts with how demonstrations are managed in Wales, where policing has been, in the words of First Minister Mark Drakeford, sensitive and proportionate. I also share his concerns about the Bill.
Democracy is so much more than just ticking a box once every five years. It is a continuous process which involves protests, rallies, picket lines and outpourings of grief, as we all saw and experienced this weekend. It means being able to uphold our hard-fought fundamental democratic rights. The Bill introduces worrying new restrictions on the ability to protest, allowing the police to make highly subjective judgements on what may result in the “intimidation or harassment” of bystanders or cause them “annoyance” or
“serious unease, alarm or distress.”
It also allows the Secretary of State to curtail protests through secondary legislation if she judges them to be disruptive—an incredibly concerning development.
By limiting the type of protests that can take place outside Parliament, this Parliament risks becoming even more detached, even more of a bubble than it already is, divorced from the very real concerns of the people we are elected to represent. Since becoming an MP, I have joined protests outside Parliament alongside people from my constituency in Cynon Valley, to save jobs in Wales and demonstrate about climate change.
I would also like to speak out against this Bill for criminalising the way of life for many in the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller community, who already experience some of the starkest inequalities of any ethnic group in the United Kingdom. Having worked with people in this community, I can bear witness to the inequalities and hardships they suffer daily. In addition, the legislation introduces new measures likely to further criminalise young black men, who are already disproportionately targeted by stop and search.
The Bill takes completely the wrong approach to policing and justice. We need proactive and preventative solutions that address the underlying causes and inequalities that exist in our society. Investment is needed in measures such as early intervention and rehabilitation, and community-based solutions, not reactive measures such as those contained in the Bill that punish and criminalise often the most vulnerable and our most marginalised in society.
The crisis in our police and justice system has been created by a decade of cuts and failed Tory ideology. The Bill fails to address that at the same time as it curtails our civil liberties. That is why I could never have voted for this Bill and I urge everyone to stand with me in opposing it. Diolch yn fawr.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
Thank you for calling me to speak in this debate, Madam Deputy Speaker. Anyone listening outside might imagine that Members were talking in different debates. On the one hand, we hear Opposition Members echoing Unite the union’s calling this Bill “dangerous, totalitarian legislation”, and on the other, we have colleagues such as my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid) and my hon. Friends the Members for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) and for Rushcliffe (Ruth Edwards) praising the Bill’s extra protections for children from sex offenders, and for emergency workers from attacks in our hospitals, ambulances and police stations. What is going on?
The confusion comes, I believe, from a conflation after the ghastly death of Sarah Everard between the policing of the peaceful vigil on Clapham common under emergency pandemic laws to maintain social distancing, and measures in the Bill to legislate on public order, which are in part 3 of this vast Bill. The point is that they are separate issues. Let us not forget the core aim of the Bill, which is laid out on page 1. It is not domestic abuse, which is covered in a separate Bill that is also live at the moment, but safety and protection, as the introduction makes clear.
It is over three years since I raised, after meeting constituents’ parents, the issue of the grooming of young people by a driving instructor and a sports coach. Any Member who has read the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children’s case studies would not oppose the core principle of the Bill, which is the changes in the position of trust clauses. They are a major step forward that every parent and teacher should not just welcome, but applaud. Will the Lord Chancellor, either when he is on his feet later or on Third Reading, confirm that driving instructors are covered by clause 45(2)?
When Opposition Members complain that there is not enough to help women and girls in this Bill, I urge them to realise that the vast majority of those better protected through clauses 44 and 45 and, indeed, through parts 2, 7, 8, 9 and 10—and much else—are in fact women and girls.
Nor should anyone be misled by part 4 and clause 61, which concern unauthorised encampments. They take action against Travellers camping on land without permission of the owner, if they fail to comply with a request to leave
“as soon as reasonably practicable”.
Those in my constituency who have seen such encampments over the last decade—time and again they smash through fences in parks, sports grounds and dog walking fields—have seen their access and rights infringed and their children intimidated, while some, although by no means all, Travellers lift two fingers to the injunction processes.
The Bill also doubles the sentence for assaults on emergency workers and includes Kay’s law. That is why I will be supporting the Bill, and I am frankly astonished that everyone in this House is not doing so, with the details to be discussed on Third Reading.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) [V]
This Bill is a disgrace. It is dangerous, undemocratic and disproportionate.
It is dangerous, because it is trying to neuter protests and undermine our most precious rights, including freedom of assembly, freedom of expression and the right to peaceful protest. The Government are seeking to impose far-reaching conditions that would have the effect of shielding those in power from criticism. They would make Greta Thunberg sitting alone with a placard a potential criminal, and likewise all the brave and passionate young people who know that the future of humanity and our planet depend on peaceful protest exposing just how inadequate Government action is given the scale of the climate and nature emergencies, yet the Home Secretary wants the power to decide whether these protests are necessary, too noisy or causing too much disruption, so that she can silence any criticism that does not meet her approval. By increasing the maximum penalty for exercising the right to protest, the Government are creating new restrictions on where they can take place, eliminating important aspects of human rights law that require the state to facilitate protests. She wants to deter any dissent yet further.
The Bill is undemocratic, too. The Government are rushing it through Parliament, with just a week between publication and Second Reading. It is a knee-jerk reaction to last year’s Black Lives Matter and Extinction Rebellion protests, because some right-wing MPs did not like them.
In particular, the process is silencing the voices of marginalised communities who should be heard, as well as the MPs who seek to represent them. Just this weekend, we have seen who else is in the Government’s sights. Women attending peaceful vigils in memory of Sarah Everard were pinned to the ground simply for exercising their rights, which brings me on to disproportionality.
Having seen the response from police on Clapham common on Saturday night, it beggars belief that the Government are giving more powers and discretion to them via this legislation. As one of the few MPs to have been arrested during a peaceful protest—in my case, against fracking—and subsequently after a week’s court case acquitted of any wrongdoing, I can tell the Home Secretary that I have first-hand experience of the disproportionate action of the police. I was therefore proud to co-sponsor a cross-party amendment that sought to deny the Bill a Second Reading. The legislation will perpetuate the systemic risk that infects our criminal justice system, including by expanding stop and search, which sees black men targeted, and by creating a new trespass offence that criminalises the life of nomadic Gypsy and Traveller communities.
Women like Sarah Everard, Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman need more than extra street lighting. They, and countless other women, deserve a legislative framework that upholds and defends their fundamental rights. Every UK citizen will be affected by what is a dangerous attack on our universal rights. I urge every MP who believes in free speech and democracy to oppose this Bill.
Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)
I have a very different view from the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas), my near neighbour in Sussex, on this Bill. I wish to focus on its positives regarding not just perpetrators of violence, but victims. I am amazed that any Opposition party would vote against the Bill on Second Reading. They should rather engage with making it better if they feel that there is more road to travel.
First, I pay my respects to the family of Sarah Everard, a fellow graduate of Durham University, as is the Lord Chancellor. Our thoughts are with all her family following this abhorrent crime. This morning, I paid my respects at the shrine that has been created at the bandstand in Clapham common.
There are 24 Members of this House who can say that they objected to the Coronavirus Act 2020 extension in September, which gave the police the powers to act in the way that they did on Saturday evening. I have heard right hon. and hon. Members criticising the police for carrying out actions under legislation that they did not oppose. I do not think it reflects well on this House when we create powers for the police and then criticise them for using them. When we look to give the police more powers, and when they look at the Acts on demonstrations and say that they do not work, they must quiver at the thought that they will be hung out to dry by the very Members who did not oppose the legislation, and I ask all hon. Members to bear that in mind.
In the minute I have left, I will focus on a much smaller shrine, a few hundred metres from the one I mentioned, for another victim of knife crime. I welcome the serious violence reduction orders in the Bill that will be placed on known knife-crime offenders and give the police further powers to act. Some 275 lives were lost in the last year to knife-related homicide. We do not hear enough in the House about how we can help. Those victims lost their life merely for being on the streets.
As vice-chair of the all-party group on knife crime and violence reduction, I have worked cross-party on the introduction of a serious violence duty. We have talked about the health strategy going across agencies, and making sure that there is a duty to report and act. This type of carrot, which is being brought in as well as the stick that I just mentioned, will allow us to tackle knife crime and hopefully reduce the number of lives tragically lost.
Time does not allow me to say more. There is much more in the Bill that I really support but look to the Government do more on, including on the protection of shop workers. That is why the Opposition should vote for this Bill and make it better.
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab) [V]
Harold Laski, professor at the London School of Economics and chair of the Labour party in the Attlee period, said that in this country, we will not see the arrival of fascism with some dictator strutting in his uniform, bedecked in medals. Instead, the risk to our freedom will come from the creeping, incremental erosion of our civil liberties, leading to harsh Conservative authoritarianism. This Bill is a step in that direction. It is a step in undermining the constitutional safeguards of our liberty, secured over generations of protest and struggle. It threatens the very basic human freedom of assembly and association.
The Bill is aimed not just at the traditional progressive campaigners and trade unions; its target is the young—the younger generation that rejects the racism, sexism and misogyny that permeate our society and understands that its future is being placed at risk by the existential threat of climate change. Through their participation in mobilisations such as Black Lives Matter and Extinction Rebellion, the young have discovered their power; so, too, have this Government recognised the power of the young. The Bill is about ensuring that the younger generation are prevented from exercising that power.
I caution the Government to learn from the past. For centuries, our history has shown that when the Governments have imposed legislation that strikes at the heart of our liberties, our people simply refuse to accept and comply with unjust laws. If a Government persist, division and conflict are always the result, so I warn the Government that they provoke our younger people at their peril.
If anything defines the disgraceful depths to which this Government have sunk, it is the attack in this Bill on the last group in our society against whom it appears that for some it is still acceptable to openly racially discriminate: the Traveller community. Under this Bill, they will suffer the threat of not only action by the police but even the loss of the homes in which they live. I urge colleagues to wake up to the threat of this Bill, and to vote against and defeat it at every stage of its passage. That is what I commit to doing.
Ben Everitt (Milton Keynes North) (Con)
I associate myself with the heartfelt and genuine comments from Members of all parties about the tragic circumstances around Sarah Everard’s death. My thoughts are with her family, her friends and her community. It is a terrible time. Opposition Members have sought to equate the policing of Saturday’s vigil with measures in the Bill that are intended to protect the public from disruptive protests, but those measures make up only a small part of the Bill. It is a knee-jerk reaction. It is populist. I think the Labour party will regret taking the decision to oppose the Bill and will find itself on the wrong side of history.
Let us have a look at what the Labour party proposes to vote against tonight. Labour Members will be voting against protecting women and children from sexual abuse; against tougher punishment for perpetrators of serious sexual and violent crimes; against tougher community sentences, which would ensure that offenders give back to society; and against measures giving police the tools that they need to deal with the harms caused by unauthorised encampments—something that is very important to the people of Milton Keynes.
Labour Members will be voting against the introduction of a serious violence duty on specified authorities that will require them to work together to prevent and reduce serious violence; against extending whole-life orders for the premeditated murder of a child; against ending the automatic early release of dangerous criminals; and against life sentences for killer drivers.
The Bill will ensure that those who commit the most heinous of crimes will spend the rest of their lives behind bars. It will ensure that the police will have the powers and support that they need to make our communities safer. As we vote on the Bill tonight, we need to look ourselves in the mirror. We need to be able to look our constituents in the eye. I know that I will be able to look my constituents in the eye; will Labour Members be able to do the same?
Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Milton Keynes North (Ben Everitt), although I am a bit disappointed that he doubled down so hard on the most discriminated against group in Europe, the Gypsy and Traveller group.
I wish to speak about a group who do not receive a mention in this Bill—women. The killings of Sarah Everard, Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman, and the fallout from the policing of vigils or events to remember these terrible occasions, give us an opportunity in this debate to bring about a new conversation. Unfortunately, this Bill just seeks to take away people’s right to protest and to freedom of speech. The Bill is packed with measures to limit our democratic freedoms and to protect statues, rather than address the glaring failures of the system.
Let us look at some facts. Data from the Prison Officers Association shows that the highest number of women in prison are there for the non-payment of TV licences, and that 80% of women in detention are in prison for non-violent offences. A majority of women in prison commit crime as a result of abuse, whether that be childhood trauma, abusive relationships, financial abuse or drug use as a result of some sort of trauma. Women are much more likely, even when in prison, to have been a victim of violent crime, yet this Bill does so little to deal with that. Ministers could have used this legislation to address that, and to defend women and girls. Instead, they have packed this Bill, which lacks focus, with draconian measures to try to divide the country and create yet another culture war.
Ministers could have increased minimum sentences for the most serious crimes, such as rape and stalking, and shown that they really care about the dreadfully low rates of conviction for sexual violence. The Victims’ Commissioner Dame Vera Baird, QC, is right to say that “urgent and sustained action” is needed to
“redress the confidence in the police and criminal justice system—and really, frankly, half the population”.
Labour has done some homework for the Government, and proposes a victims’ Bill and a survivor’s support plan for victims of rape. I hope that the Minister will give due regard to that excellent work, which was prepared through good consultation with many, many women.
I have been clear with my constituents that I will vote against this Bill, not because there are not some good elements to it, but because I seek to defend the right of my constituents not to be silenced. Labour wants changes that will protect women and girls; changes that will target violent crime; and changes that will provide the treatment and addiction support that are so often overlooked in the criminal justice system.
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
I will not support the Bill tonight. I have been contacted by many constituents over the past few weeks who have serious concerns about both what it does and does not contain, and not least about the lack of measures to protect women from violence and abuse. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West) was just explaining, there are aspects of the Bill we would welcome or support, not least those drawing on initiatives by Labour Members, such as measures on protecting emergency workers from assault and on tackling sexual abuse, and others from the Lammy review, but this Bill is sadly deficient in so many other respects.
The Government could have worked with Members across this House to bring forward measures that adequately tackle serious crime, improve the policing and justice systems, tackle the violence against and abuse of women, and protect our democratic rights to liberties, but they did not. The provisions on protest are deeply concerning and disturbing—I would describe them as draconian. Having organised and taken part in many entirely peaceful protests, sometimes involving millions of people, I fear that this is yet another attempt by this Government to clamp down on legitimate dissent and democratic disagreement.
However, the Bill’s greatest deficiency, as my hon. Friend has pointed out, is that despite being 296 pages long, the word “woman” does not appear once. That is a staggering feat, given that more than 50% of victims of violent crime in the past three years have been women, that there was a 23% drop in rape convictions last year, and that domestic abuse prosecutions fell by 24% in 2019. We must take serious action, including by making misogyny a hate crime. The Bill does not increase minimum sentences for rapists and stalkers, it does not make street harassment a crime and it does not fast-track rape or serious sexual assault cases. All women and girls deserve better.
On domestic violence, may I thank my South Wales PCC colleague, my predecessor in this place, Alun Michael, for his work, and colleagues in South Wales police, whose work on tackling domestic violence I have viewed? I am thinking in particular of the pilot project Drive, an initiative tackling perpetrators of domestic violence. An independent evaluation has shown that that is making a significant impact, and I am pleased to see that it now covers all seven local authority areas covered by South Wales police. Unfortunately, like all forces, South Wales police has had to struggle with substantial cuts and the austerity of years of UK Tory rule, including cuts to policing. It was thanks to the Welsh Government that funding was made available for additional police community support officers. I thank the community policing teams for the work that they do. I might also mention that policing in Wales is disadvantaged this year to the tune of £6 million because of the way the apprenticeship levy system works. Will the UK Government fully fund the cost of police graduate training in Wales, as they do in England?
I end by raising serious and legitimate concerns raised by my constituents, especially young people, about the experiences of black constituents and other people of colour in relation to the criminal justice system and policing in Wales and across the UK. I have had a number of frank and open conversations about that in recent weeks. Deeply concerning disparities continue. While 16% of the general population in England and Wales are from a black and minority ethnic background, the disparity in the numbers of people arrested, convicted of a crime and in prison from those communities is stark and has to be dealt with. We need to implement the recommendations of the 2017 report by my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy).
David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con) [V]
All Governments come to power seeking to reduce crime and antisocial behaviour, and it is clear that most succeed to some extent, but the challenges that face our society change, and the weaknesses in laws that have been brought in with good intent are exposed by experience, as we know. That is why I welcome the Bill. It addresses several issues of great concern to my constituents, and, by improving the way in which we conduct cases and sentence those convicted, will benefit our society as a whole. There is no doubt about that.
Among many things, the Bill addresses the unacceptable disruption caused to my constituents and many other people’s lives by protests that have caused enormous trouble but have remained within the bounds of the law as it stands. We have learned from protests in the last couple of years that the police clearly need powers to ensure that, while lawful process is facilitated, it is not at the expense of thousands of people who are simply seeking to go about their daily business.
Secondly, I welcome the steps to improve the handling of cases of sexual abuse. Having spent many years working in local government on those matters, including meeting with the Leader of the Opposition during his days as Director of Public Prosecutions, the measures seem to me to be a proportionate and sensible culmination of the experience that we have gained in cases brought in recent years that have demonstrated some of the weaknesses in the present legal system. Many victims and complainants across the country will have waited a long time for the Government to take action to ensure that their circumstances are taken seriously and offenders are prosecuted effectively.
Thirdly, I strongly welcome the measures to tackle illegal encampments. Like many of my constituents and other people across the country, I have witnessed the setting up of such an encampment within direct sight of home, so I know just how awful the consequences can be for that community and for that place—as well as having, in my time as a councillor, to set aside hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money to clean up the consequences. Communities should not have to suffer that any longer, and these robust measures are well merited.
For those reasons and many others, I strongly support the Bill and I look forward to the benefits that it will bring to my constituents in Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner and to the whole country.
Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)
I rise to deal with the absolute brass neck that we have heard from the Government Benches during the course of the debate—interestingly standing up to laud what is in the Bill, which I can only describe as the “Government attempting to look busy on crime” Bill, because they do not want to talk about their miserable record over the last 11 years. It is a record that has left fewer police on our streets, fewer courts open for judgment, and fewer police staff to investigate crimes.
We have seen the impact: longer delays to investigations, longer waiting times for criminals to be brought to justice, and indeed criminals getting off scot-free because often victims lose total faith in the criminal justice system. That is the Government’s record. We are asked on Second Reading to support or oppose a Bill on the basis of principle, and I am opposing the Bill on the principle that it fails women, it fails children, and it fails to face up to the serious evolving nature of crime in our country.
Since the appalling murder of Sarah Everard we have seen, in our family, an outpouring not just of grief, but of a demand for change. That is why it so appalling that there is no mention of women in this Bill and no new sentences. Indeed, there is the ludicrous and offensive position that someone can be given a longer prison sentence for throwing a lump of iron into the river than for throwing in a woman. That is the miserable experience.
We also see the experience in case law. I would like the Lord Chancellor to stand up and explain in his summation how it was that a deputy children’s care manager in my borough could be involved in trafficking children to sell crack cocaine and heroin in Devon and Cornwall, and receive the paltry sentence of four years—four years—for trafficking children across the country. What does his Bill do to deal with that? What does he say to those children and victims of crime when, 11 years into his Government, with county lines becoming a feature of crime in a way that it never was before, his Government—[Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. We have not had heckling here for a very long time. Now, behave!
Wes Streeting
They do not like it: Government Members do not like being confronted with their record. That is why, with this Bill, they are chasing headlines, instead of chasing serious criminals. They have the audacity to stand up and laud loads of provisions in this Bill that they have taken from Labour Members and their private Members’ Bills. I congratulate them on that, but it is still the case that they are not facing up to the serious nature of crime that affects women and children in my community. They have thrown in loads of measures to look busy, but they are running from their record.
I am voting against this Bill, because it is perfectly right for Members to say, “We demand better and we expect better of this Government”, and unlike Members elected at the 2019 general election, we do not just read scripts from central casting, we demand better. We demand better for our constituents, and so should they.
Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)
When the Home Secretary said that she wanted criminals to “feel terror” at the thought of committing offences, she reflected the heartfelt sentiments of those who live on the frontline of crime, starkly contrasting the small clique of bourgeois liberals who use wealth to segregate and insulate themselves from the reality of disorder and have sought to amplify time and again, as the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) did tonight, the rights of thugs and villains and the civil liberties of the violent mob.
This week, Members of Parliament have rightly resolved to redouble our efforts to prevent violence against women. It is strange then that just months ago 70 Labour parliamentarians sought to block the deportation of 50 violent criminals, including those convicted of murder and rape, and that they will vote against a Bill tonight that cracks down on crime. It does seem that the Labour party is more motivated by the political posturing associated with what the hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting), whom I greatly admire by the way, typically described as headline grabbing, than it is with protecting the safety of the innocent.
As figures show, our police forces are continually challenged by increasing demands. Hard-working officers are frequently derailed by the malign advocates of the rights of criminals and distracted by the politically correct delusions of the ideologically motivated elite. Imagine the demoralising disappointment they must feel when, after working tirelessly to solve a crime, an unelected judge insists on awarding a derisory sentence, inhibiting the incentive to prosecute, weakening deterrence and undermining public trust.
Typically, custodial sentences are drastically reduced, and even the most ruthless criminals are released early. Many killers are released after a dozen or so years, while naive utopians in gated communities plead for even greater leniency. How the liberal left misunderstands the criminal mind, for deviant individuals who have chosen crime as a career weigh up the balance between risk and reward, cost and benefit. It is a measure of their trade.
The misassumption that crime is an illness to be treated has become so pervasive that it is barely questioned in the broadcast media, yet to see those who choose to profit from the misfortune of others in the same way that we regard the sick and infirm is to demean the latter and elevate the former to a status they do not deserve. This assumption that wickedness is a misfortune of less significance than the suffering it causes means relegating such acts and the victims of them. In this way, justice is neither seen to be done, nor done at all.
This Bill goes some way to regaining public faith by strengthening law and order and regaining that mantle for the Secretary of State and our party. All Members of this House who care about the innocent should vote for it, for our task is to be fierce in defence of the gentle.
Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab) [V]
First, I would like to offer my condolences to Sarah Everard’s family and friends. My thoughts are with them and all those who have lost a mother, daughter, sister or friend to violence at the hands of men.
Like many of my constituents, I was shocked by the images that came out of Clapham common over the weekend. There is something very ugly about a group of women being manhandled, pushed to the ground and pinned for mourning yet another victim of male violence against women. The Home Secretary says that the legislation will make us safer, but after this weekend, I do not feel safer. The events on Saturday night show us the opposite of what the Home Secretary has concluded—far from the police not having enough powers, the sad truth is that the powers they do have are already open to abuse. That truth is not only demonstrated by the women who came to mourn and lay flowers over the weekend; it is written in the headlines about the women who survived the horrors of the spy cops scandal, the headlines about black, Asian and minority ethnic people being killed in police custody and the headlines about the Alfie Meadows and the Ian Tomlinsons who are struck down by police just for being in the presence of a demonstration.
This Bill is the latest in a series that, rather than safeguarding our right to protest, grant even more powers to crack down on dissent. Rather than addressing the real problems in our courts—just look at the gigantic backlog of cases waiting to go to trial, many of which will be domestic abuse, violent crime and rape cases—this Government want to hand out harsher punishments for damaging a statue than harassing a woman in the street.
So I do not feel safer, and there is one group of people who will feel significantly less safe and secure because of the Bill: the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller community. If the Government were serious about addressing the issue of unauthorised encampments, they would tackle the real problem: the shortage of places where it is permitted to stop and reside. All this legislation will do is strip people of their homes, push them into the criminal justice system and criminalise the way of life of an already persecuted community.
What we needed today was a Bill that dealt with the very real problems in our criminal justice system, respecting our rights to protest and to live our lives how we choose. That is what makes people safer, and we got the opposite of that.
James Daly (Bury North) (Con) [V]
The right to protest peacefully in this country is enshrined in article 11 of the European convention on human rights. Those provisions were put into domestic law and protect the freedom of assembly and the freedom of association with others. I suspect that every Member of this House, together with millions of our fellow citizens, has taken part in such protest events. Such expressions of community feeling are central to our way of life and part of each citizen’s interaction with the democratic process, and that should be protected at all costs.
However, it is an established legal principle that article 11 rights can never be unfettered, for if that were the case, rampant criminality could be justified, providing a defence to those who indulge in such behaviour under the guise of legitimate protest. These are qualified rights, and interference with them may only be justified in certain specific circumstances, including for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others and the prevention of crime and disorder. In my view, this Bill—specifically, parts 3 and 4—does not impact on article 11 principles but provides reasonable powers to ensure that the police can improve the effectiveness of protest policing in certain limited circumstances, as long as those powers are applied proportionately and in line with human rights law.
Labour appears to be arguing that the police should not have powers to address the most extreme antisocial behaviour during protests, therefore ignoring the rights of our fellow citizens who may be caused intimidation, harassment, serious unease, alarm or distress in certain circumstances outlined in the Bill. There were clearly mistakes in the policing of the vigil at the weekend in memory of Sarah Everard, but that single example should not be used as overwhelming evidence to suggest that the police will not use the powers in the Bill proportionately, reasonably and in line with existing human rights legislation.
If the choice presented to hon. Members is between voting against the Bill due to the definition of the controlled area outside Parliament and voting in favour of it to ensure the longer imprisonment of rapists, I know which way my constituents would expect me to vote. By voting in favour of this legislation, I am voting in favour of tougher sentences for child murderers, ending early release for sex offenders, the imposition of strict conditions on bail, tougher sentences for assaults on emergency service workers, various measures to crack down on knife and violent crime, and the enshrining of the police covenant in law, together with many other important provisions. I am astounded that the Labour party cannot bring itself to support legislation that will protect all our constituents.
Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Con)
I stand proud to support this Bill today. There are many good measures in it; in fact, we have even heard from Opposition Members that there are many good measures in it. However, they still cannot bring themselves to support it.
Traveller encampments, especially the unauthorised ones, cause distress to residents such as those on Kingston Road in Radcliffe in my constituency, who often thought that the encampment had more rights than they did. They saw extreme antisocial behaviour such as their fences being used as a toilet or being stolen for fires, and they actually feared for themselves. I went and met them several times during the summer, because there was not just one encampment; there were two. It is about time we supported our residents and said that we are not against Travellers, we are just against unauthorised Traveller encampments.
On the sentencing measures in the Bill, I am pleased to see greater sentencing for attacks on shop workers and emergency workers and for the kind of desecration of our memorials that we saw during the Black Lives Matter movement last year. The Bill provides greater sentencing powers for the most serious and violent of crimes. It also introduces Kay’s law, which will provide better protection for the victims and witnesses of violent and sexual offences. That is a measure that we should all welcome. In hand with the Domestic Abuse Bill, it really does go the distance to protect our victims. I would love to quote several of the figures on violent and sexual assaults in my constituency and, indeed, in Greater Manchester. However, with the failure of Greater Manchester police’s data system and the political leadership by Andy Burnham in regard to this, we do not have any of those figures because they got lost, for some reason.
On introducing life sentences for killer drivers, I want to start by thanking my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) for bringing forward her ten-minute rule Bill on this issue. Her Bill started the process; this one goes much further in ensuring that those who are reckless, careless and selfish will face the full force of the law for depriving us of our loved ones.
The linking of this Bill to the poor decisions of the Met over the weekend shows the true worst of the Opposition. I think it is absolutely disgusting, and they should be truly ashamed. Changing their mind at the last minute because they think there are votes in it is not opposition; it is opportunism, and the public will see through them.
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab) [V]
My hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) summarised the Bill perfectly: it contains the good, the bad and the ugly. There is some good in it, and I pay tribute to Labour colleagues who have campaigned to protect the protectors and for increased sentences for dangerous driving, which are in the Bill among some other stuff. However, I find some aspects of it deeply worrying for the future of our democracy, particularly clauses 54 to 60. I cannot comprehend how a Government who, on 16 February, declared that they were so concerned about free speech that they were introducing a duty for universities to
“stamp out unlawful ‘silencing’ on campuses”,
can then introduce a Bill that will damage the right to protest, because freedom to protest is part of our freedom of speech. The Government need to make up their mind: they either support free speech or they do not. Fully free speech does not mean just supporting the newspaper columnists and outspoken TV presenters that they agree with; it means supporting it for all.
I do not agree with every protest I see, and, yes, some are really annoying and some are really noisy, but I support the right for people to have that protest. I supported the coach industry with its noisy, inconvenient “Honk for Hope” protest. It is crucial that everyone understands that when someone loses the right to protest, everyone loses it; we cannot pick and choose. There have been people protesting outside Parliament for centuries. What makes this Government so precious that they are the Government who suddenly cannot cope with it? I will not support the silencing of people, for the Labour party stands for freedom for everybody, and that freedom includes, yes, even the Members on the Government Benches.
I will quickly turn to what else is missing. On 22 September 2020, I raised directly with the Lord Chancellor the increased abuse that shop workers were facing during the pandemic. He replied that it was
“incumbent on all of us to make sure that sentencing guidelines properly reflect the role that they play.”—[Official Report, 22 September 2020; Vol. 680, c. 793.]
I hope everybody can therefore understand why I was disappointed to see no specific reference to retail staff in the Bill. On 10 March, retail trade union USDAW renewed a call for legislation to protect retail staff after it released new statistics showing that 79% of shop workers said that abuse was worse than last year. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris), who tried to bring in a private Member’s Bill on assaults on retail workers, but unfortunately the Government objected to it. One shop worker living in Hull West and Hessle stated some of the issues that they had faced, including bad language, spitting, throwing items at staff and verbal abuse, which had caused anxiety and depression. Unlike some Conservative MPs, I care about people more than I care about statues. People come first, and no one should face abuse for just doing their job.
David Johnston (Wantage) (Con) [V]
There is lots to welcome in this Bill, but I want to focus on the issue that it covers on which I have had more casework than any other—unauthorised Traveller encampments. Unfortunately, these are a common feature in my constituency. Since last July, I have been copied into a weekly report on where there are unauthorised camps. In 20 of the 34 weeks since I have been getting that report, there has been at least one other unauthorised camp in one of the two districts that my constituency goes across, and in 32 of the 34 weeks there has been at least one camp somewhere in Oxfordshire.
When my constituents, who I think respect the right of Travellers to live their lives in the way that they do, write to me about unauthorised camps, they typically describe the same things: abuse, mess, noise throughout the night, and vandalism. The clean-up costs of these things are considerable for local authorities. The vast majority of Travellers do not behave in this way, so it is wrong for the Opposition to say that the Bill is criminalising their lifestyle, but for the minority who do behave in that way, it is right that we change the law to be able to tackle that.
These unauthorised camps cause distress, disruption and damage, as the Bill acknowledges. It is common for the police to say that they do not have the power to act, so it is right that we should lower the threshold to enable them to do so. They are commonly set up on highways, which in my constituency typically means the slip road on the A34 at Drayton, so it is right that we should clear them from such roads. The Bill also acknowledges the cat-and-mouse game that often goes on whereby after a long time trying to get these camps removed, they then reappear in the same place within days or weeks, as they have been doing at Great Western park. I therefore support the Government’s measures involving possible prison sentences, fines or confiscation of vehicles.
We all recognise the right of Travellers to be able to set up camps inside sites that are designated—caravan camp data suggests that those sites have increased by 41% in the past decade—but we should also recognise the right of our constituents to live their lives peacefully in their own homes and neighbourhoods, and we should vote for this Bill tonight to help them to do so.
Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)
I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:
“this House declines to give a Second Reading to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, notwithstanding the need for a police covenant and for tougher sentences for serious crimes, including child murder, terrorism and dangerous driving, and for assaults on emergency service workers, because the Bill rushes changes to protest law and fails to introduce a single new measure specifically designed to tackle the epidemic of violence against women and is therefore an abusers’ charter since domestic abuse rates have spiked and victims of rape are facing the lowest prosecution rates on record, and because the Bill fails to criminalise street harassment, fails to make misogyny a hate crime, fails to raise minimum sentences for rape or stalking, and fails to give whole life orders to those found guilty of abduction and sexual assault and murder of a stranger.”
It is an honour to close this debate on behalf of the Opposition and to move the reasoned amendment standing in my name and that of the Leader of the Opposition. It is a debate that has involved the lion’s share of Members across this House, and of course we meet at a time of a national cry to tackle violence against women and girls.
It was in June last year, on one warm evening, amid the deep concerns about the pandemic at that time, that my wife and I, on learning and reading the news, wept together as a friend of mine, Mina Smallman, and her husband Chris lost their two beautiful daughters, Bibaa and Nicole, to terrible violence on a horrendous night in west London. We wept again just a few weeks ago because, on the evening of 3 March 2021, Sarah Everard, after visiting a friend in south London and walking across Clapham common, was spotted on CCTV at 9.30 pm and then she disappeared. The whole country and both sides of this House are mourning Sarah’s disappearance, kidnap and murder.
No story is more telling of the fact that we need tough sentences on the most serious crimes to deter criminals and protect the public, but we must not make the mistake of thinking that this horrific incident of violence against a woman is a one-off. The press may not report it, but women of all backgrounds, from all parts of the country and of all ages are killed every week. In 2016, 125 women in the UK were killed by men. In 2017, the number was 147. It was 147 again in 2018. Over the past decade, 1,425 women have been murdered in the UK. That is roughly one woman every three days.
It is not only murder; all kinds of violence against women are endemic in our country. In one year alone, 3.1% of women—510,000—experienced a sexual assault. Domestic violence has skyrocketed during the pandemic, with 260,000 domestic abuse offences between March and June. The Government knew about the crisis of violence against women and girls before this week, but when they were drafting the 20 schedules, 176 clauses and 296 pages of this Bill, they chose not to mention women once.
Maybe this Government do not like to talk about women because they know they have failed them. A decade of cuts, court closures and failed ideology is letting women down. Half the courts in England and Wales closed between 2010 and 2019. There are 27,000 fewer sitting days than in 2016. Under this Government, just 1.4% of rapes end in conviction. That is a record low and should shame us all.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Hove (Peter Kyle) rightly asked, why are the Government not fast-tracking rape victims through the CPS and the courts? The Crown court backlog is now a record high of more than 56,000 cases. The Government like to pretend that is only because of the pandemic, but they have no answer to why they let the backlog grow to 39,000 before covid even hit. The result is that victims of crime are being asked to wait up to four years to get to court. Many witnesses are dropping out of the justice system entirely because of delays. Violent criminals are being spared prison because of it. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) rightly pointed out, discussions on the justice system must always start with delays in the system and the inadequacy of legal aid. Instead of tackling violence against women, the Government have prioritised giving the police the power to prohibit the fundamental freedoms of protest that the British public hold dear. By giving the police this discretion to use these powers some of the time, it takes away our freedom all of the time. The Government’s Bill targets protesters causing too much noise and says that those who cause annoyance could be jailed for up to 10 years. I am thankful that the draconian limits on the power to protest were not in place during the great protests of the 20th century that led to real change.
Mr Lammy
I will not give way for the moment.
When the suffragettes marched for the right to vote, some of them were prepared to break the law to make their point just outside the House of Commons. Does the Secretary of State believe that those women who shouted noisily should have been arrested, too? Protesters marched from Jarrow in Tyneside all the way to London to demand the right to work in 1936. Does the Secretary of State think that the police should have had the power to stop them before they had even passed York? The anti-apartheid movement, of which I was part, marched continuously on Trafalgar Square for black and white people to be treated as equal. Does the Secretary of State seriously believe that they should have been arrested because they caused an annoyance?
Throughout Britain’s history, protest has been a fundamental method for the public to voice dissent. Pandemic aside, what is it about society that has changed exactly that means that the police need more powers to control protesters today than they did yesterday? What is it about the images of police tackling a mourning woman to the floor last weekend that makes the Secretary of State think that the police do not have enough as it stands? The truth, as has been briefed to his favourite newspapers, is that the Government are introducing these measures because they dislike Black Lives Matter, because they hate Extinction Rebellion and because both tell too many hard truths.
Shaun Bailey
When the Opposition vote against this Bill tonight, does the right hon. Gentleman not think that the Labour party’s position will have finally changed to: weak on crime and weak on the causes of crime?
Mr Lammy
I know that the hon. Gentleman is just getting started, but the party that introduced whole life orders—the Labour party—will not, I am afraid, take any lessons from him.
The former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), was right in this debate when she said that there was a fine line between “popular and populist” and that our freedoms depend on it. The Conservative party’s principles are rooted in liberty and against the overreach of the state. I call on every member of the governing party who still believes in freedom to join the Opposition and vote against this Bill tonight.
According to the Government, not only those who cause annoyance but those who damage statues of slave owners should be locked up for a decade. Unlike the Government, the Opposition will never condone criminal behaviour, but this Government’s priorities are backwards; they are upside down. Unlike women, memorials are mentioned in the Bill eight times. The Government think that people who damage statutes should spend up to 10 years in prison because of their emotional value, but it is fine to give five-year sentences for rape. This is not hypothetical: Anthony Williams strangled his wife to death, but received only a five-year sentence; John Patrick raped a 13-year-old girl, but got only seven years in jail; Ferdinando Orlando and Lorenzo Costanzo were jailed for seven and a half years for raping a woman in a Soho nightclub; James Reeve raped a seven-year-old disabled girl, but got only nine years; and David Nicholson raped an 11 year-old, but was given a sentence of nine years and four months. What does this Bill do to address those injustices that many people feel?
The Government would rather blow a dog whistle against minorities than make women safe. Measures in the Bill will further compound the inequalities experienced by Gypsies and Travellers who are already the most disproportionately represented group in the justice system. Those found guilty of trespass in the Bill could receive a higher sentence than someone convicted of stalking. Once again, this Government’s priorities are skewed. Even police forces do not support the Government’s criminalisation of trespass. The National Police Chiefs’ Council and the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners said:
“Trespass is a civil offence and our view is that it should remain so.”
Why are the Government determined to lock up Gypsies and Travellers, even against the advice of their own police?
Many of the other measures in the Bill will compound the biases that the Secretary of State knows exist in the justice system. The Prime Minister likes to boast of following my review and recommendations, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi) argued so convincingly, too often young people are still considered to be perpetrators, when in fact they are victims. Earlier this year we heard the roar “black lives matter”, and it is clear by the fact that no full equalities impact assessment accompanies the Bill that the Secretary of State simply does not agree.
The Bill contains some important proposals that Labour supports. Most of the best measures come from campaigns by Labour MPs, many of whom have spoken eloquently about those campaigns in this debate. Labour supports my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) on dangerous driving, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (John Spellar) on reform of the disclosure and barring service. Labour supports my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) regarding sexual abuse by people in positions of trust, and my hon. Friends the Members for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and for Halifax (Holly Lynch) on protecting the protectors. As the shadow Home Secretary so powerfully said, why can those protections not be extended to shopworkers, social care workers, and other front-line heroes? The Opposition are behind those measures, alongside others to keep the public safe from terrorists, child murderers, and other dangerous offenders.
However, Labour cannot vote for a Policing, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that ignores the intimidation, violence and abuse that women face. We cannot vote for this Bill when it fails to increase sentencing for rape and stalking. We cannot vote for this Bill when it fails to criminalise street harassment, or to make misogyny a hate crime. We cannot vote for this Bill when it fails, on the watch of the Secretary of State, to give whole life orders to those found guilty of abduction, serious assault, and murder of a stranger. We cannot vote for a Bill that fails to outline a strategy to tackle the culture of misogyny that underpins it.
Richard Graham
The right hon. Gentleman mentioned stalking twice. It is worth remembering that in the Government in which he served, stalking was not a criminal offence. It became a criminal offence in 2012, and we then doubled the maximum sentence for stalking a few years later. I hope he will recognise that that was achieved under this Government.
Mr Lammy
Given all that has been said by women over the past few days, with the street harassment and stalking that they face, there is a simple question for the hon. Gentleman, who has tremendous experience in this House: have we done enough? Given that this is an omnibus Bill of a size we have not seen in a long time, could we have done more, and could the Secretary of State have done more? The simple answer to that question is, most obviously, yes, we could.
This is a missed opportunity. The murder of Sarah Everard has led to a national outcry, and the Government must finally take action to tackle violence against women and girls. The Government have responded with yet another meeting. Instead of uniting the country around a mission finally to address that violence, they are bringing forward divisive legislation that pits people against one another and takes away our freedom.
Some time this week, another woman will be killed. After around three more days, another woman’s life will be taken. Both those murders are likely to be committed by a man. For far too long, we in this country have had a problem of men killing women. If we stand for nothing, we fall for everything. Today, Labour is standing up for women by voting against this Bill. I ask Members on both sides of the House to do the same.
The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)
As the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) said, it is an honour to close this debate and to follow other right hon. and hon. Members. This two-day debate has been an opportunity, first of all, for all of us to pay tribute to the memory of Sarah Everard, her loved ones and the wider community, who have expressed their shock, revulsion and anger at what has happened and at the wider issues, too.
When we talk about safety, each and every one of us has a responsibility. When women all too often feel unsafe, it is the wrong response to say to them, “Stay indoors. Don’t go out alone.” Instead of questioning the victim, we have to deal with the perpetrator. When I think about how far we have come, I sharply remind myself of how far we still have to go. I look around this House and think of colleagues from all parties—some of whom are no longer here—with whom I have had the honour to work on a cross-party basis on issues such as stalking, child abuse and coercive control. I am proud of that work, and I know that they are, too. The Domestic Abuse Bill, which is coming to the end of its progress through both Houses, has in many ways been Parliament at its very best.
The events of last week have no doubt acted as a catalyst. Society is speaking. The response to the reopened call for evidence on the Home Office’s violence against women and girls strategy has now received more than 120,000 submissions in just three days. Society is speaking, and it is for all of us to be up to the level of events.
The Bill, on which I have worked for many months—from well before the sentencing White Paper that I published in September last year—is not just the fulfilment of a manifesto commitment, important though that is; it lies at the very heart of the mission of this Government. It is another milestone along the road to creating a higher degree of public protection for victims of crime—and that very much includes women and girls. I had hoped—in fact, I believed—that we were going to be able to work with Members across this House not on the principle of the Bill but perhaps on the detail. Imagine my disappointment to hear that the Labour party has decided to oppose the Bill on Second Reading.
Let us remind ourselves of what Second Reading is all about: it is not about the detail of the Bill—whether it can be amended, improved, honed, polished or added to, as we have seen with the Domestic Abuse Bill—but about the principle. With the greatest of respect to Opposition Members, what beggars belief is that they think that now is the time to turn unity into bitterness and partnership into strife—[Interruption.] I can tell the right hon. Member for Tottenham that I am afraid that is what I have been hearing across the House. It is as if, somehow, we have descended into two nations once again, speaking past each other and not engaging in the way that we did on the Domestic Abuse Bill. To say that I am perplexed and disappointed is an understatement.
But then I read today’s Order Paper, and sadly all seems to be revealed, because we have not one reasoned amendment—we will vote on the one moved by the right hon. Member for Tottenham—but two from the Labour party. The Front-Bench amendment, which has a few names attached to it, makes a brief reference to the law on protest but, on analysis, does not really offer any solid reasons that are differences in principle in respect of Second Reading. The other reasoned amendment, which has been signed by 42 Labour party Members, offers much more direct resistance. It is clear that in principle those signatories are very much opposed to the Bill. There, frankly, lies the heart of the dilemma for the right hon. Gentleman and the Labour party: they are trapped between parts of their party that oppose, in principle, sensible, reasoned, proportionate measures that develop the law in a mature way, and the vast majority of the public, who want us to work together in the national interest. I am afraid that it looks as if party interests are being put before the national interest. It gives me no pleasure at all to say that, but I am afraid that that is what it looks like—not just to those on the Government side of the House, but to the country.
Let us look at what we did on the Domestic Abuse Bill. By working together, we moved mountains.
Robert Buckland
No, I will not give way to the right hon. Gentleman. I do not think I can do justice to the number of inaccuracies, generalisations and false assertions—inadvertent assertions, I will concede—that were made by him and, I am afraid, by other Opposition Members. They are concocting—
Robert Buckland
No, I will not give way.
Opposition Members are concocting synthetic arguments in objection that just do not stand the closest scrutiny. They are inadvertently—I will say “inadvertently”, because I will give them, of course, that courtesy—misstating some of the key provisions of this Bill.
Let us start with the juxtaposition pf sentencing for rape and criminal damage. The starting point for the lowest category of the offence of rape, as set out by the Independent Sentencing Council, is five years. With aggravating factors and different categories of offending, rape offenders will receive, and very often do receive, substantially longer sentences, leading up to those for campaigns of rape, where sentences of in excess of 20 years, or even life sentences, will be imposed, because the maximum penalty for rape is life imprisonment.
Robert Buckland
No, I will not give way.
In this Bill, we are making sure that those who commit offences such as rape spend more of their time in prison. We are ending Labour’s automatic halfway release provisions for people who receive sentences of over four years for offences such as rape and section 18 grievous bodily harm, and we are making sure that they serve two thirds of their term of imprisonment.
Turning to criminal damage, the relevant Act is now 50 years old, and for those 50 years the statutory maximum has been 10 years where the value of the damage is over £5,000. The changes in relation to criminal damage of memorials simply remove the previous restriction on the mode of trial and allow the full range of those powers to be used up to that maximum. We are simply giving the courts greater discretion as to how they sentence such offenders, taking into account the emotional and community impact of those offences.
We had, I thought, cross-party support on these measures. Indeed, back in the summer, the right hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) publicly backed our proposals. He said that he would work to support such efforts in Parliament. Now he is opposed. Why? Why the change? What is going on here? I will tell Members what is going on.
Robert Buckland
No, I will not give way. I will explain what is going on, and then I will let the right hon. Gentleman in.
I would suggest that what has happened here is the result of a conflation with the covid regulations and their interaction with the right to protest, which the Labour party did not oppose—it voted in favour of those on occasions or did not oppose them. They have conflated those arguments with measures in the Bill that long predate what happened on the weekend—those regrettable scenes that we all saw and were upset and appalled by. They are now conflating those issues with the issues relating to this Bill. There is no relation between the two, and I would love to hear an explanation from the right hon. Gentleman.
Nick Thomas-Symonds
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for giving way. Last year, the Government spoke about additional protection for war memorials. We all understand the value of war memorials. What we did not agree to, and I have never agreed to, is locking up people for 10 years for damaging all memorials, including those of slave traders. That just sums up everything that is wrong with the Government’s approach. They could have worked with us. They did not. They have created division.
Robert Buckland
It is a very nice try from the right hon. Gentleman, for whom I have the utmost respect, but it does not cut the ice. We know what has happened here. It is a party in panic that is weaving, twisting and wobbling because its internal management problems are far more important than the public interest. That is the truth. Here we are, at the end of a two-day debate, with the Labour party, which I concede has a proud record in supporting the police and maintaining law and order, now voting against measures to strengthen sentencing for rapists, burglars, drug dealers, sex abusers, killer drivers. All of that is being opposed by the Labour party. Let me tell Labour Members the price of that for their party.
Robert Buckland
No, I am not going to give way.
Much has been said about the excellent campaigns run by Labour Members. I pay tribute to the hon. Members for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock), for St Helens South and Whiston (Ms Rimmer) and for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), with whom I have worked very well over the years on issues relating to child abuse. Imagine the impossible position that those doughty campaigners have been put in by their Front Benchers. They are now having to vote against the very measures that they campaigned for so assiduously. That is a terrible predicament for them to be put in. It is a disgrace, and the Labour Front Benchers should hang their heads in shame.
There have been in this debate many constructive and important contributions, and I want to in the minutes that I have left—
Robert Buckland
They don’t like it when the truth is explained to them. They think that they have the moral high ground on all these issues. Well, I can tell you that there is no monopoly on morality in this place.
Before I deal with the excellent contributions from Members across the House, may I deal with the canard about “annoyance”? Much has been made about the somehow strange use of a word that is seen as a massive infringement on the civil liberties of men and women across this country, yet a brief perusal of the Law Commission’s report of 2015 tells us that the law has developed for centuries with phrases like “annoyance”. It is a part of the common law on public nuisance. The members of the Law Commission—they were all very good members; there was Lord Justice Lloyd Jones as he then was, and Professor David Ormerod, who is well known as an excellent academic in these fields—recommended that the law needed to be codified. The law had been restated with reference to the use of the word “annoyance” by none other than the late and noble Lord Bingham when he was in the House of Lords. He set out the law very clearly. Clause 59 amounts to no more than a reiteration of the excellent work of the Law Commission. To say anything else is, frankly, once again a confection, a concoction and a twisting of the reality.
I want to deal with the question of abuse in a position of trust. I pay particular tribute—I think all hon. Members will agree with me—to the outstanding work of my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch). It has been a pleasure to see her back here. She spoke earlier. I think she has now gone home, but we all wish her well. She has, with great tenacity, campaigned to make sure that we make these provisions a reality.
I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham). He asked a particular question about driving instructors. He will see in the Bill that there will be provision, by way of statutory instrument, to allow an amendment of the law to extend to further categories of occupation. It is important that there is a clear evidence base. We are dealing with young people who are transitioning to adulthood—they are 16 and 17 years of age—and it is quite clear that the evidence on sports coaches and religious leaders, sadly, did point to a need to change the law. I pay tribute to my hon. Friends and to my noble Friend Baroness Grey-Thompson for their excellent work.
On causing death by dangerous driving and causing death by careless driving while under the influence of drink or drugs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) deserves our thanks and praise for pressing her Bill. I know she has welcomed the provisions. In the context of memorials, I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Bracknell (James Sunderland) and for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) for pressing their case with extreme prejudice and alacrity and for succeeding on the provision.
The Home Office parts of the Bill were outlined very well by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary yesterday. In summary, I would say that important public health duties are being extended in relation to serious violence. I have long held the view that it is only by bringing together the local agencies that we truly get ahead of the trends in serious violence and in prevention, which is of course nine tenths of what we need to be doing.
The Chair of the Justice Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill), made a weighty contribution to the debate, rightly pointing to the extra investment in alternatives to custody. At the heart of the approach I am taking as Lord Chancellor is enhancing and improving community sentencing. It has long been clear to me that we need to make sure that sentencers have a proper choice of robust community alternatives.
Wes Streeting
I asked whether the Lord Chancellor could explain to my community why someone who was in a position of trust—deputy manager of a care home—who peddled kids to deal drugs across the country got a prison sentence of only four years. What is he going to do about that?
Robert Buckland
The hon. Gentleman knows that matters dealt with in court are matters for the independent judiciary, but I will look at the case, because it is vital that we make sure that those who are involved in organised crime and abuse—that is what that case sounds like to me—are properly dealt with, and that the wider issues are addressed. I share his concern.
Robert Buckland
Not at the moment.
I am particularly pleased to thank my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (James Gray), who represented the family of Ellie Gould, the murder victim of whose case I think everyone in this House is fully aware. It is important to take on board the points he made about domestic homicide. I have spoken elsewhere about the importance of getting the balance right when it comes to the categories of murder. I committed to a review—I did that last week—and I will bring before the House further information on the content of that important review.
In the minutes left, I am pleased to commend to the House a radical new approach to the way in which we deal with young people—children—who are incarcerated in the secure estate. The days of locking them up and forgetting about them absolutely have to end; we all agree on that. That is why the measures to clarify the legal framework surrounding new secure schools will allow a complete change in the way in which we deal with, support, rehabilitate and educate children in our care. Schools with security will have education, wellbeing and purposeful activity at their very heart. As ever, I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Rob Butler) for his constructive suggestions and his work as a member of the Justice Committee.
Let me outline on the record the important provisions in the Bill relating to unauthorised encampments. Many right hon. and hon. Members have raised the issue. It is a real concern for many of our constituents.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
The pages of the Bucks Free Press attest to the sheer scale of the costs to our green spaces and our communities of unauthorised encampments. Does my right hon. and learned Friend agree that on this issue and on protests, the Opposition are refusing to engage with legitimate limits on both freedoms?
Robert Buckland
My hon. Friend puts it very well. This is all about balancing the rights of Traveller communities to use authorised encampments and to enjoy the lifestyle that they have chosen, and the rights of householders not to have their local communities despoiled. That is what we are seeking to do. The Bill, in my strong submission, allows that balance to be maintained and enhanced.
The Bill is part of our wider approach to making the criminal justice system smarter, and to keeping our streets safe from the worst criminals, while giving offenders opportunities to turn their life around. We can rebalance the justice system. We can restore faith in it, which has sadly been in decline for too long. The Bill is a welcome step forward, and I commend it to the House.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. We require social distancing in the Chamber at all times, please.
Question put, That the amendment be made.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I will now briefly suspend the House for three minutes so that arrangements can be made and people can leave and enter the Chamber with proper social distancing.
Scotland Act 1998: Scottish Civil Service
(3 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden) (Con)
For the past few months, Scotland has been transfixed by the Holyrood inquiry seeking the truth of what went wrong with the investigations into the former First Minister, Alex Salmond. The inquiry is investigating matters of the most serious kind—serious for the proper handling of sexual harassment complaints in Scotland; serious for the accountability of those in positions of power, including the Scottish Government’s permanent secretary and Lord Advocate; and serious, if the former First Minister’s claims hold any water, for the future of the present First Minister’s administration of Scotland.
These matters are unquestionably something that should properly be dealt with in Holyrood, but Holyrood has great difficulties exposing what went on. The inquiry has come up against endless impediments in its efforts to fulfil its remit. Those difficulties can be traced back to the Scotland Act 1998, in which the British Government of the day and this House decided to devolve power to the Scottish Parliament but failed to do it properly.
Those failures were broadly on three fronts. First, this House failed to guarantee separation of powers to Scotland. We have known for centuries that separation of powers is fundamental to a functioning democracy, yet in Scotland, the Lord Advocate both leads the prosecution service and serves in the Scottish Cabinet. That leaves him conflicted and compromised, with his Department’s independence undermined.
Secondly, the Scottish civil service was left as a part of the wider UK civil service. It therefore does not have its own mechanisms of control and accountability in place, but it is only loosely controlled by Whitehall, as we shall see in a moment. The result has been tolerance of failings that ordinarily would have led to resignations.
Thirdly and most importantly, Scottish parliamentarians were not given the same powers and privileges that Members of this House enjoy. That means that evidence relevant to the Holyrood inquiry can be freely discussed here today using parliamentary privilege, but if an MSP in Holyrood were to do the same, they would likely find themselves facing down prosecution.
Indeed, the Crown Office has been making such threats to Mr Salmond’s lawyers, various journalists and even the Holyrood inquiry itself. It made it clear that it would deem disclosure of evidence to a Committee of elected representatives to be a criminal offence. We have, in effect, given the Holyrood inquiry the right to summon evidence but not to use it.
It is because of these failings that I have brought this debate today. We need to reinforce the ability of the Scottish Parliament to hold its own Government to account. I am here to strengthen the Scottish Parliament, not to bury it.
A few weeks ago, I was passed some papers from an anonymous whistleblower. The information in those papers consisted of a download of text messages from the telephone of Sue Ruddick, the chief operating officer of the Scottish National party. This download—
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Obviously, I appreciate the points that the right hon. Gentleman is making. However, there are court orders in place around the identities of individuals involved in that case. I do appreciate the points that he is making, but I would appreciate your guidance on how we can ensure that these court orders can in fact be adhered to in this place.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his very serious point of order. I can assure him that I am listening very carefully to what the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) is saying. I think that he, being a very experienced parliamentarian, understands the side of the line on which he must stay, as far as mentioning sensitive matters and matters connected with courts, and so on.
Mr Davis
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. I have, I think, brought whistleblower views to the attention of this House on about a dozen occasions in the last 20 or 30 years and, on every single occasion, I have protected the innocent people involved.
The download that I am talking about—Sue Ruddick’s telephone download—is held by the Scottish police, so the accuracy of this account can be checked if they need to. Alex Salmond has asserted that there has been, and I quote,
“a malicious and concerted attempt to….remove me from public life in Scotland”
by
“a range of individuals within the Scottish Government and the SNP”,
who set out to “damage” his
“reputation, even to the extent of having”
him “imprisoned.”
These are incredibly grave charges. The whistleblower clearly agrees with those charges. He or she starts their communication with the assertion that the evidence provided, and I quote,
“point to collusion, perjury, up to criminal conspiracy.”
Since I received the data, it looks as though the Committee has received at least some of it themselves, and some has also been put in the public domain by the hon. Member for East Lothian (Kenny MacAskill), a previous Justice Secretary in the Scottish Government. It was described anonymously by one of the Committee members as
“just private conversations that we had no business intruding on”.
Well, I will let the House be the judge of that.
No single sequence of texts is going to provide conclusive proof of what the whistleblower described as a “criminal conspiracy”, but it does show a very strong prima facie case, which demands further serious investigation, by which I mean, at the very least, a thorough review of all the emails and other electronic records for the relevant personnel at all relevant times.
For example, these texts show that there is a concerted effort by senior members of the SNP to encourage complaints. The messages suggest that SNP chief executive Peter Murrell co-ordinated Ruddick and Ian McCann, the SNP’s compliance officer, in the handling of specific complainants. On 28 September, a month after the police had started their investigation of the criminal case, McCann expressed great disappointment to Ruddick that someone who had promised to deliver five complainants to him by the end of that week had come up empty, or “overreached”, as he put it. One of the complainants said to Ruddick that she was
“feeling pressurised by the whole thing rather than supported”.
The day following the Scottish Government’s collapse in a judicial review in January 2019, Ruddick expressed to McCann the hope that one of the complainants would be
“sickened enough to get back in the game.”
Later that month, she confirmed to Murrell that the complainant was now “up for the fight” and
“keen to see him go to jail”.
Ruddick herself, in one of her texts, expressed nervousness about
“what happens when my name comes out as [redacted] fishing for others to come forward”.
Note, again, that this was after the criminal investigation into Salmond had commenced. This is improper, to say the least. Contact with, and influence of, potential witnesses is totally inappropriate once a criminal investigation is under way. That was known inside the SNP itself.
Text messages reveal that at an SNP national executive committee meeting early in January 2019, the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry) raised concerns among staff at Westminster that SNP headquarters were engaged in “suborning” of witnesses, while on 28 August 2018, a senior member of SNP staff in this building described in an email the SNP headquarters move against Salmond as a “witch-hunt”.
Shortly after charges were brought against Salmond, Peter Murrell sent messages saying that it was a
“good time to be pressurising”
detectives working on the case, and that the more fronts Salmond was having to “firefight” on,
“the better for all complainers.”
When the inquiry put those messages to Mr Murrell, he said that they were “quite out of character”. That is no defence even were it true, but, having seen the evidence of other messages, it seems to me that they were all too much in character for Mr Murrell. In a Committee evidence session on 8 December last year, Mr Murrell replied under questioning that there were no more messages of the type already in the public domain from January 2019.
That statement, delivered under oath, is hard to reconcile with the dozens of messages stretching over a period of months from September 2018 that I have now seen. There is more, but it would take the whole debate to read them out. The Committee needs to gain access to all this information. The anonymous Committee member who described them as “just private conversations” should understand that meddling in an ongoing police inquiry is at best improper, and at worst criminal, so it requires proper investigation. If the Committee does not feel it can do the job, perhaps it should ask the police to do it instead.
That brings us to the complaints process that Mr Salmond was subjected to. This process was new. Created in late 2017, it was different from existing Scottish Government complaints procedures in a number of ways, including being retrospective, lacking a mediation procedure and, extraordinarily, applying to previous Ministers but not to previous civil servants. The procedure was shared with the head of propriety and ethics in Whitehall, who expressed discomfort with the proposals and specifically asked whether they were only to apply to Ministers, not civil servants. As far as I can tell, she did not get a reply. It is hard to imagine a Department in Whitehall essentially ignoring concerns expressed by the head of propriety and ethics, which is one of the reasons that I want Whitehall to review the checks and balances built into the Scottish civil service.
The Scottish Government also ignored their own new policy and appointed an investigating officer who, it emerged, had had prior contact with the complainants, and not just any contact—a potential complainant was asked for their input on the draft procedure before they had formally made their complaint. They did not consult women’s advocacy groups, which would have been proper. They did consult trade unions, but not in a proper or timely fashion. Instead, input was sought from the very first complainant whose case would be investigated. Mr Salmond sought judicial review of the process, and in due course, this complaints procedure and process was judged by Lord Pentland in the highest civil court in Scotland to be “unlawful”, “unfair” and “tainted with apparent bias”—an astonishing judgment, backed up by the maximum possible punitive award of costs.
The judicial review of 2018 led to further extraordinary behaviour by the Scottish Government. In her evidence before the Holyrood inquiry, the First Minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, said that her Government’s external counsel were “confident” at the outset of the civil case that they would be successful. That is a significant mischaracterisation of the advice. The Government’s external counsel had identified a central vulnerability in the Scottish Government’s case. The complaints procedure under which Salmond was investigated had a real risk of being found to be unfair. Counsel stated:
“the vulnerability arises from the Procedure itself, and not from its implementation in this particular case.”
We now know that counsel came to that conclusion without being given the full facts of the case—facts that, in due course, took it from being an arguable case to a completely unarguable one.
External counsel Roddy Dunlop QC gave that first assessment of their chances in late September. By the end of October, he is clearly worried that the Government had not disclosed important facts about their operation of the process and says that at that point:
“it makes little sense to continue to defend the indefensible.”
Within a few days, he is advising that the “least worst” option is to concede the case. By 14 December, the obvious failure of the Government to meet their duty of candour leads to a commission and diligence committee being appointed to establish the real facts.
On 19 December, after the first meeting of that commission, the Government’s external counsel tells the Government:
“With regret, our dismay at this case deepens even further...Suffice to say that we have each experienced extreme professional embarrassment as a result of assurances which we have given, both to our opponents and the court, which assurances have been given on instruction, turning out to be false as a result of the revelation of further documents.”
The Scottish Government pressed on despite the counsel’s continued concerns about their “untenable position”. Most remarkably, the counsel told the Scottish Government that they were “personally horrified”, and that they could
“no longer rest on pleadings that they knew to be untrue.”
The defence had collapsed because of the Government’s lack of candour. Mr Salmond was very fortunate that the Government’s counsel, Mr Roddy Dunlop, now Scotland’s leading QC, behaved with impeccable honour and honesty throughout. Let us be clear: this is not just a case of a Government who failed to provide information because they could not manage their own filing systems. This was a Government who actively withheld important, relevant information. In one case, a critically relevant email was actively removed from an information bundle that was going to the court and that had already been approved by the Government counsel. I do not know who took that email out—I have it here. I do not know who gave the instruction, but in my view the removal of that document would be a summary dismissal offence and possibly a criminal offence. At the very least, it would be a contempt of court. Yet over his three evidence sessions, the Lord Advocate, the Chief Law Officer of Scotland, did not see fit to mention this crucial incident to a parliamentary Committee trying to get to the truth. It came to light just 10 days ago, when the Government were forced to publish their legal advice.
It was only in January 2019, after months of increasingly damning advice, that the Scottish Government faced the inevitable and conceded the judicial review. Costs were awarded against the Scottish Government at a punitive level reserved for defences conducted “incompetently or unreasonably”. The Scottish public will now pay the bill for their Government’s dogged pursuit of a doomed case.
More than that, the Scottish Government behaved in a way that was misleading to the court in a case that had serious implications for the criminal case that was to follow. The charges in that case were very serious. Had Mr Salmond been guilty of them, he would, quite rightly, have gone to prison, and his reputation would have been destroyed forever. Yet the Government were willing to play fast and loose with the facts in a way that, if they had succeeded, would have jeopardised the whole process of justice. For me, that is even bigger than the grotesque waste of £1 million. As it was, of course, he was exonerated on all charges by a predominantly female jury in a criminal court presided over by a female judge.
The Scottish Government had committed abuses of process in the initial investigation. They had failed to live up to their duty of candour in court with an indefensible case. At this point, we might have expected some contrition. Instead, the Scottish Government have now set their sights on impeding the Committee tasked with investigating the whole affair. The Members of the Holyrood inquiry are valiantly struggling to do their job, or at least some of them are, but time and again they have been frustrated. The inquiry has had to cope with evasiveness from the Scottish Government and the constant threat of legal action by the Crown Office, the Scottish equivalent of our Crown Prosecution Service.
First, the Crown Office intervened by barring the publication of the evidence of Geoff Aberdein, Mr Salmond’s former chief of staff. This evidence is critical in determining whether Nicola Sturgeon breached the ministerial code. It is clearly in the public interest to see this evidence. However, it is not allowed to be published, so I have a suggestion for the Committee. I have it on good authority that there exists from 6 February 2018 an exchange of messages between civil servants Judith McKinnon and Barbara Allison suggesting that the First Minister’s chief of staff is interfering in the complaints process against Alex Salmond. The investigating officer complained, “Liz interference v. bad”. I assume that that means very bad. If true, this suggests that the chief of staff had knowledge of the Salmond case in February, not in April, as she has claimed on oath. The First Minister also tied herself to that April date in both parliamentary and legal statements. She was, of course, aware earlier than that. The question is just how aware and how much earlier.
Secondly, the Crown Office intervened to see that the evidence of the former First Minister was redacted, supposedly to protect the identity of complainants, which is the point that the hon. Member for Midlothian (Owen Thompson) made quite properly earlier. Again, that redacted evidence focused on whether or not the First Minister breached the ministerial code, but The Spectator magazine had already published online Mr Salmond’s entire evidence with only a single paragraph redaction.
When The Spectator went to court to secure the publication of that evidence, the Crown Office made no objection whatsoever to the paragraphs that it bullied the Holyrood inquiry to redact. That leaves an absurd situation where the inquiry cannot speak about evidence that is freely available to anyone with an internet connection. The redactions are therefore clearly not designed to protect the complainants; they are designed to protect the First Minister from accountability to the inquiry.
Thirdly, the Scottish Government withheld the damning legal advice given in the civil case. It was only with the threat of a no confidence vote in the Deputy First Minister that the Committee could see part, and I emphasise part, of that advice. However, what we do know is that across November and December 2018 there were a series of meetings where it was decided to persist with the judicial review. That was against clear advice from counsel.
Rather extraordinarily, those meetings appear to have been largely unminuted. I recommend that they ask for the junior counsel’s notes. It was only at the last possible minute that the Government conceded the case, and only after counsel had threatened to resign. The First Minister told the Committee:
“I am not aware that they threatened to resign”,
but she will have seen a report that clearly states that counsel
“in light of their professional duties”
and their view of the case
“will require to withdraw from acting on January 3”.
Fourthly, the Scottish Government have repeatedly denied the Committee relevant evidence for what they claim to be legal reasons. That position is nonsensical. Of course there should be protections over sensitive material exposed in criminal trials—we agree on that—but those protections should not prevent a parliamentary committee from doing its job of holding Government to account.
Together, those form a litany of acts that repeatedly frustrated the Committee and denied the public full transparency and accountability. They fit squarely into a pattern of evasiveness and abuse of process that the Scottish Government have woven from the start. As I said in opening, the proper place for these matters to be determined is Holyrood. It would be eminently preferable for MSPs to be exposing any relevant evidence, but given the British Government’s failure in 1998 to give sufficient power to the Scottish Parliament, and given that the Scottish Parliament derives its authority from this House, certain evidence must now enter the public domain here.
The Holyrood inquiry has exposed some critical failings at the heart of the Scottish Government. They failed with the complaints process, they failed to heed legal advice, and they failed to honour commitments to ensure a transparent parliamentary review, but perhaps more worryingly the inquiry has revealed the limits of what the Scottish Parliament can expose. There is a deficit of power, and with it comes a deficit of accountability.
At the very least, I ask the Minister to consider an amendment to the 1998 Act to deliver separation of powers to Scotland—something that I believe a previous Justice Minister, the hon. Member for East Lothian, has written to the Justice Committee about already—to strengthen the civil service, and to reinforce the powers of the Scottish Parliament, correcting the fundamental power imbalance between the Executive and the legislature in Scotland. Let us give the Scottish Parliament the power to do the job.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Iain Stewart)
May I start with the customary congratulations to my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) on securing this timely debate? He has a long and distinguished record of shining a light on matters of probity and accountability in public life. I should note that he does that against Governments of all political colours and is not discriminatory in his desire to see the truth and accountability.
My right hon. Friend has raised important questions tonight, but I must make it clear from the outset that it is not appropriate for me as a Minister to comment on the specifics of the various inquiries to which he referred that have not yet concluded, or on the information that he has put before the House tonight. I am sure, though, that those matters will be of considerable interest and widely debated elsewhere. I hope my right hon. Friend understands why I have to limit my comments to some of the general procedural and structural issues that he raised in his speech.
I do not have a huge amount of time, so I will try to cover three broad issues that my right hon. Friend raised: first, the privilege and powers of MSPs to obtain and discuss evidence, compared with the rights we have in this House to hold the Executive to account; secondly, the dual role of the Lord Advocate as both Scottish Government legal adviser and head of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service; and thirdly, a more general point on the lines of accountability in the Scottish civil service in Scotland.
Let me take each issue in turn. In this House, matters of parliamentary privilege are regulated by Parliament alone. Parliament holds sole jurisdiction—known as exclusive cognisance—over all matters that are subject to parliamentary privilege. That principle underpins all privilege, with article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1689 being the most important statutory expression. It says that the
“freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament”.
In comparison, Members of the Scottish Parliament are protected against defamation as set out in section 41 of the Scotland Act 1998 but are not covered by article 9 of the Bill of Rights, so they have fewer protections. It is within the gift of the Scottish Parliament to amend the situation if it so wishes. As my right hon. Friend will know, there are Scottish Parliament elections in a couple of months’ time; the new Parliament can explore this matter, should it wish.
The second point is on the dual role of the Lord Advocate, who is the Scottish Government’s most senior Law Officer and principal legal adviser. Although not a member of the Scottish Government Cabinet, he or she may attend Cabinet in that capacity, and they represent the Government in civil proceedings. Given the inclusion in the 1998 Act of the role of the Lord Advocate, any formal separation of their responsibilities would require legislation in Westminster.
I note that my right hon. Friend referred to the fact that the hon. Member for East Lothian (Kenny MacAskill) has asked the Justice Committee of this House to consider the matter. The dual role is historical—it precedes the creation of the Scottish Parliament—and I imagine that unpicking the different roles would entail quite a complex debate, but that does not mean that it should not be considered. As I say, I mention that in a general way, not in relation to the matters of the specific case to which my right hon. Friend referred.
The third point I wish to touch on briefly in the two or three minutes I have left relates to the civil service in Scotland. My right hon. Friend is correct to point out that under devolution the civil service in Scotland is a reserved matter. The Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 provides a statutory basis for the civil service code. This includes provision for the publication of a separate code of conduct covering civil servants who serve the Scottish or Welsh Governments. The Northern Ireland civil service is a separate organisation, but shares the same culture and values as set out in the civil service code. So although civil servants working to different Administrations are accountable to their own Ministers—in the case of Scotland they are accountable to Scottish Government Ministers, who are in turn accountable to the Scottish Parliament—with their own political priorities and mandates, the core values of the civil service support civil servants working across the UK.
The civil service has a number of safeguards in place to make sure that civil servants are able to raise concerns if they feel they are being required to act in a way that conflicts with the code and its values. Departments and agencies have a duty to make their employees aware of the code and its values. If a civil servant believes they are being required to act in a way that conflicts with the code or becomes aware of actions by others that they believe conflict with the code, their Department or agency must consider this concern and make sure they are not penalised for raising it. They can raise their concerns with someone in their line management chain or with nominated officers within their Department. If a civil servant has raised a matter in line with the relevant procedures and does not believe they have received a reasonable response, they can report the matter to the Civil Service Commission. It is independent of Government and the civil service. It is established by statute to provide assurance that civil servants are selected on merit and help to safeguard an impartial civil service.
I hope that these background points are helpful to my right hon. Friend and to the House in understanding the context in which he raised his important points. He has raised some serious questions. I am sure they will be widely debated in the weeks and months ahead, but for now I congratulate him on securing this important debate.
Question put and agreed to.
Members Eligible for a Proxy Vote
Member eligible for proxy vote | Nominated proxy |
|---|---|
Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Adam Afriyie (Windsor) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Imran Ahmad Khan (Wakefield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nickie Aiken (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Tahir Ali (Birmingham, Hall Green) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Rosena Allin-Khan (Tooting) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sir David Amess (Southend West) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con) | Robbie Moore |
Stuart Anderson (Wolverhampton South West) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Edward Argar (Charnwood) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sarah Atherton (Wrexham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Victoria Atkins (Louth and Horncastle) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gareth Bacon (Orpington) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kemi Badenoch (Saffron Walden) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Shaun Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Siobhan Baillie (Stroud) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Duncan Baker (North Norfolk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Steve Barclay (North East Cambridgeshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Paula Barker (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr John Baron (Basildon and Billericay) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Simon Baynes (Clwyd South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Margaret Beckett (Derby South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Apsana Begum (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Scott Benton (Blackpool South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Saqib Bhatti (Meriden) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mhairi Black (Paisley and Renfrewshire South) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kirsty Blackman (Aberdeen North) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Steven Bonnar (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Andrew Bowie (West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tracy Brabin (Batley and Spen) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Suella Braverman (Fareham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jack Brereton (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Paul Bristow (Peterborough) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sara Britcliffe (Hyndburn) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudon) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Ms Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Anthony Browne (South Cambridgeshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alex Burghart (Brentwood and Ongar) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Conor Burns (Bournemouth West) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dawn Butler (Brent Central) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Amy Callaghan (East Dunbartonshire) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Dr Lisa Cameron (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Sir Alan Campbell (Tynemouth) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP) | Ian Paisley |
Dan Carden (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir William Cash (Stone) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Miriam Cates (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Douglas Chapman (Dunfermline and West Fife) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jo Churchill (Bury St Edmunds) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Feryal Clark (Enfield North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Greg Clark (Tunbridge Wells) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Simon Clarke (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Theo Clarke (Stafford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Brendan Clarke-Smith (Bassetlaw) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Chris Clarkson (Heywood and Middleton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
James Cleverly (Braintree) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Elliot Colburn (Carshalton and Wallington) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Alberto Costa (South Leicestershire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Robert Courts (Witney) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Sir Geoffrey Cox (Torridge and West Devon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Angela Crawley (Lanark and Hamilton East) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Virginia Crosbie (Ynys Môn) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jon Cruddas (Dagenham and Rainham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
James Daly (Bury North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ed Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gareth Davies (Grantham and Stamford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mims Davies (Mid Sussex) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alex Davies-Jones (Pontypridd) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dehenna Davison (Bishop Auckland) (Con) | Ben Everitt |
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Thangam Debbonaire (Bristol West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Miss Sarah Dines (Derbyshire Dales) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Jonathan Djanogly (Huntingdon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson (Lagan Valley) (DUP) | Ian Paisley |
Michelle Donelan (Chippenham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Ms Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Steve Double (St Austell and Newquay) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Oliver Dowden (Hertsmere) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
David Duguid (Banff and Buchan) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Colum Eastwood (Foyle) (SDLP) | Ben Lake |
Mark Eastwood (Dewsbury) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (Ind) | Stuart Andrew |
Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Michael Ellis (Northampton North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mrs Natalie Elphicke (Dover) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
George Eustice (Camborne and Redruth) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ben Everitt (Milton Keynes North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Laura Farris (Newbury) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Simon Fell (Barrow and Furness) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind) | Stuart Andrew |
Katherine Fletcher (South Ribble) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mark Fletcher (Bolsover) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nick Fletcher (Don Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Yvonne Fovargue (Makerfield) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Lucy Frazer (South East Cambridgeshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
George Freeman (Mid Norfolk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mike Freer (Finchley and Golders Green) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Richard Fuller (North East Bedfordshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Marcus Fysh (Yeovil) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Roger Gale (North Thanet) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mark Garnier (Wyre Forest) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ms Nusrat Ghani (Wealden) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nick Gibb (Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Peter Gibson (Darlington) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Preet Kaur Gill (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Paul Girvan (South Antrim) (DUP) | Ian Paisley |
John Glen (Salisbury) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Robert Goodwill (Scarborough and Whitby) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Michael Gove (Surrey Heath) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Neil Gray (Airdrie and Shotts) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Chris Grayling (Epsom and Ewell) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Damian Green (Ashford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Kate Griffiths (Burton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
James Grundy (Leigh) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Luke Hall (Thornbury and Yate) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Fabian Hamilton (Leeds North East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Matt Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Greg Hands (Chelsea and Fulham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Claire Hanna (Belfast South) (SDLP) | Ben Lake |
Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Rebecca Harris (Castle Point) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Trudy Harrison (Copeland) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Simon Hart (Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Oliver Heald (North East Hertfordshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
James Heappey (Wells) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gordon Henderson (Sittingbourne and Sheppey) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Drew Hendry (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Darren Henry (Broxtowe) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mike Hill (Hartlepool) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Dame Margaret Hodge (Barking) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Kate Hollern (Blackburn) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Adam Holloway (Gravesham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Paul Holmes (Eastleigh) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Rachel Hopkins (Luton South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Stewart Hosie (Dundee East) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Sir George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
John Howell (Henley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Paul Howell (Sedgefield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con) | Anthony Mangnall |
Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Mr Alister Jack (Dumfries and Galloway) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sajid Javid (Bromsgrove) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Ranil Jayawardena (North East Hampshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mark Jenkinson (Workington) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Andrea Jenkyns (Morley and Outwood) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Robert Jenrick (Newark) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Boris Johnson (Uxbridge and South Ruislip) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
David Johnston (Wantage) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr David Jones (Clwyd West) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Fay Jones (Brecon and Radnorshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gerald Jones (Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Simon Jupp (East Devon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alicia Kearns (Rutland and Melton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gillian Keegan (Chichester) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Liz Kendall (Leicester West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kwasi Kwarteng (Spelthorne) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Robert Largan (High Peak) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con) | Mr William Wragg |
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Chris Law (Dundee West) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ian Levy (Blyth Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Andrew Lewer (Northampton South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Brandon Lewis (Great Yarmouth) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger (Bridgwater and West Somerset) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Chris Loder (West Dorset) (Con) | Robbie Moore |
Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP) | Ian Paisley |
Mark Logan (Bolton North East) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford and Eccles) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Marco Longhi (Dudley North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Julia Lopez (Hornchurch and Upminster) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Jonathan Lord (Woking) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Kenny MacAskill (East Lothian) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Karl MᶜCartney (Lincoln) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Glasgow South) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Mr Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Conor McGinn (St Helens North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Craig Mackinlay (South Thanet) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Cherilyn Mackrory (Truro and Falmouth) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow North East) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Rachel Maclean (Redditch) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jim McMahon (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Anna McMorrin (Cardiff North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
John Mc Nally (Falkirk) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Esther McVey (Tatton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham, Perry Barr) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Alan Mak (Havant) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Scott Mann (North Cornwall) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Julie Marson (Hertford and Stortford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mrs Theresa May (Maidenhead) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jerome Mayhew (Broadland) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Mark Menzies (Fylde) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Johnny Mercer (Plymouth, Moor View) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Robin Millar (Aberconwy) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mrs Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Amanda Milling (Cannock Chase) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Navendu Mishra (Stockport) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) | Owen Thompson |
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Penny Mordaunt (Portsmouth North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Anne Marie Morris (Newton Abbot) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley regis) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Wendy Morton (Aldridge-Brownhills) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con) | Robbie Moore |
Holly Mumby-Croft (Scunthorpe) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ian Murray (Edinburgh South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
James Murray (Ealing North) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Mrs Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Charlotte Nichols (Warrington North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Lia Nici (Great Grimsby) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
John Nicolson (Ochil and South Perthshire) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Neil O’Brien (Harborough) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Brendan O’Hara (Argyll and Bute) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Abena Oppong-Asare (Erith and Thamesmead) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Kate Osborne (Jarrow) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Priti Patel (Witham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Owen Paterson (North Shropshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Stephanie Peacock (Barnsley East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Sir Mike Penning (Hemel Hempstead) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con) | Antony Higginbotham |
Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Chris Philp (Croydon South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Dr Dan Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jeremy Quin (Horsham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Will Quince (Colchester) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tom Randall (Gedling) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Angela Rayner (Ashton-under-Lyne) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Christina Rees (Neath) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jonathan Reynolds (Stalybridge and Hyde) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Nicola Richards (West Bromwich East) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Angela Richardson (Guildford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Ms Marie Rimmer (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Rob Roberts (Delyn) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP) | Ian Paisley |
Mary Robinson (Cheadle) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Matt Rodda (Reading East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Andrew Rosindell (Romford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dean Russell (Watford) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC) | Ben Lake |
Selaine Saxby (North Devon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Paul Scully (Sutton and Cheam) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Bob Seely (Isle of Wight) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Naz Shah (Bradford West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Grant Shapps (Welwyn Hatfield) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alok Sharma (Reading West) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Alyn Smith (Stirling) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Chloe Smith (Norwich North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Royston Smith (Southampton, Itchen) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Amanda Solloway (Derby North) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Andrew Stephenson (Pendle) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jo Stevens (Cardiff Central) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jane Stevenson (Wolverhampton North East) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
John Stevenson (Carlisle) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Sir Gary Streeter (South West Devon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Graham Stringer (Blackley and Broughton) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Zarah Sultana (Coventry South) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Rishi Sunak (Richmond (Yorks)) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
James Sunderland (Bracknell) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con) | Mr William Wragg |
Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Sam Tarry (Ilford South) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Derek Thomas (St Ives) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op) | Mark Tami |
Nick Thomas-Symonds (Torfaen) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Edward Timpson (Eddisbury) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Kelly Tolhurst (Rochester and Strood) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Michael Tomlinson (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Anne-Marie Trevelyan (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jon Trickett (Hemsworth) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Laura Trott (Sevenoaks) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Elizabeth Truss (South West Norfolk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Mr Shailesh Vara (North West Cambridgeshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Matt Vickers (Stockton South) (Con) | Robbie Moore |
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mr Ben Wallace (Wyre and Preston North) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Jamie Wallis (Bridgend) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
David Warburton (Somerset and Frome) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Suzanne Webb (Stourbridge) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Claudia Webbe (Leicester East) (Ind) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Helen Whately (Faversham and Mid Kent) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mrs Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Dr Alan Whitehead (Southampton, Test) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
John Whittingdale (Malden) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Bill Wiggin (North Herefordshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
James Wild (North West Norfolk) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Craig Williams (Montgomeryshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC) | Ben Lake |
Gavin Williamson (Montgomeryshire) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD) | Wendy Chamberlain |
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP) | Ian Paisley |
Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab) | Bell Ribeiro-Addy |
Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP) | Owen Thompson |
Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Jeremy Wright (Kenilworth and Southam) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Jacob Young (Redcar) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Nadhim Zahawi (Stratford-on-Avon) (Con) | Stuart Andrew |
Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab) | Mark Tami |
Draft Representation of the People (Proxy Vote Applications) (Coronavirus) Regulations 2021
(3 years, 8 months ago)
General CommitteesRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chair
Before we begin, I remind hon. Members to observe social distancing and sit in the places that are clearly marked. I also remind Members that Mr Speaker has stated that masks should be worn in Committee while Members are not speaking. Our Hansard colleagues would be most grateful if Members could send their speaking notes to hansardnotes@parliament.uk.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Julia Lopez)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Representation of the People (Proxy Vote Applications) (Coronavirus) Regulations 2021.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. The statutory instrument brought forward today will make sensible provision to support the effective administration of elections. Democracy should not be cancelled because of covid. The Government have confirmed that the elections scheduled for May will go ahead and have made a firm commitment that the Government will support the sector to deliver them. The Government have put forward a package of measures to support statutorily independent returning officers to deliver these elections successfully and with the right precautions in place. Those measures are set out in a delivery plan, published by the Government on 5 February.
The draft Representation of the People (Proxy Vote Applications) (Coronavirus) Regulations 2021 will temporarily change the eligibility criteria for emergency proxy applications, so that electors who are self-isolating because of coronavirus on election day have an additional option to vote remotely. The provisions in the SI will also allow those with an existing proxy to change the person acting as their proxy if their original proxy is affected by coronavirus.
The last opportunity to make a routine proxy application is at 5 o’clock, six working days before election day. After that deadline, the only other option to create a new absent voting arrangement is to apply for an emergency proxy vote. Under current regulations, there are strict eligibility criteria for emergency proxy applications, which, as I shall outline, are not optimal during this pandemic. Usually, emergency proxy applications on medical grounds are required to be attested by a medical professional. Not everyone will be able to seek such attestation; an example is those who become symptomatic too late to take a test. The SI will remove that requirement for those affected by covid, and removing the requirement for attestation will also avoid putting more pressure on already busy medical professionals.
Under current provisions for emergency proxy applications, applicants are not eligible if they were aware of their change in circumstances when they could still have made a routine proxy application—for example, if they broke their leg two weeks before polling day and could no longer walk to the polling station, but did not apply for a proxy vote before the six-working-days deadline. If someone contracted covid in the days before the usual proxy deadline and did not apply for a routine proxy on time, that could lead to infectious persons being ineligible for any absent voting arrangement. Furthermore, if an elector were informed that a member of their household had tested positive for coronavirus, but they were unable to evidence that they also had the virus then, under current regulations, the elector would be ineligible to apply for an emergency proxy vote even though they ought to remain at home.
The SI will remove those limitations for people affected by covid-19 and provide a more flexible approach for those who ought to remain at home on election day. The changes proposed in the SI mean that if an elector believes that their particular circumstances would lead to an increased risk of transmission of coronavirus to themselves or others in a range of circumstances, they are eligible to apply for an emergency proxy vote. For example, an elector who has been made aware that they may have been exposed to the virus at home or at work in the days leading up to the election can apply for an emergency proxy vote even if they are not yet showing symptoms.
Beyond the removing of attestation, the usual security measures for absent voting applications—such as the signature requirement, the provision of date of birth and the requirement that electors declare that they understand all the information provided is true and that providing false information to an electoral registration officer is illegal—remain in place.
Those electors who are granted emergency proxies will be included in the absent voting lists, and those lists are available to candidates and agents on request for the express purposes of ensuring scrutiny and integrity.
These temporary changes are both necessary and proportionate to ensure that those who are affected by coronavirus are still able to exercise their right to vote. The SI does not affect the regulations regarding any other route for emergency proxy applications. Almost all provisions in this SI will expire at the end of February next year and therefore will not apply to any regularly scheduled elections in May 2022. The only permanent provisions in the SI simply clarify and add certainty to the existing position that those electors with long-term proxy arrangements, such as those with a disability, can replace the person acting as a proxy without having to go through the entire application process again. Going through the full application process would require an elector to prove their eligibility for a long-term proxy vote again, simply to change the person who is their proxy, and that should not be necessary.
The SI has been considered by both the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments and the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which have not drawn the attention of the House to it. We have consulted the Electoral Commission, which is supportive of the proposed changes. We also shared a draft of the SI with the Association of Electoral Administrators, the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives, and officials in the Welsh Government.
There is broad support among stakeholders for the proposed changes set out in the instrument. I note that both the Welsh and Scottish Governments have also put in place similar measures for polls on 6 May for which they are responsible. It is important that we are able to offer voters a consistency of approach wherever possible, and I am pleased that all three Governments are working to support the voters in that way. I commend the instrument to the Committee.
Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)
Labour will support the SI as a practical step to give voters greater flexibility when applying for an emergency proxy vote in the context of covid-19.
The provision is important, allowing voters who develop symptoms of covid-19 on election day to exercise their democratic right to vote by appointing an emergency proxy. People should not be forced to choose between their health, public health, and their right to vote. We support the measures as far as they go, but I want to make it clear that they do not begin to go far enough.
The Government have had nearly a year to put in place the necessary provisions to protect our democracy, but Ministers have once again been too slow to act, and here we are, at the eleventh hour, passing legislation for emergency proxy votes, which were entirely foreseeable almost a year ago. I am deeply concerned that Government inaction risks creating a perfect storm of disenfranchisement, with dangerously crowded polling stations and long queues on election day.
The provisions only begin to scratch the surface when it comes to the opportunities to make voting and democracy more accessible in the UK. The Government should have used this moment to update the most archaic and inaccessible aspects of our democracy. For months, Labour has been calling on the Government to adopt and introduce safer voting methods, including voting over multiple days and all-postal voting.
With so many questions left unanswered, I hope the Minister will answer a few of mine in her closing remarks. When do the Government plan to give local authorities specific information about the £30 million allocated by the Cabinet Office to make elections covid-secure? Electoral officials tell me that they are still uncertain about how the money can be spent and whether they will be entitled to claim it all back, given the huge expense of Perspex screens, personal protective equipment, and cleaning equipment.
As the Minister has pointed out, people whose health changes at the very last minute risk being disenfranchised at future elections, but she has indicated that the measures will end in February next year. Will she consider extending the changes to proxy voting rules and making them a permanent change, to ensure that our democracy is open to people, regardless of what happens to their health—or indeed they might have family emergencies—on polling day?
Will the Government consider updating our electoral process for the 21st century? Franky, the covid emergency has revealed the archaic nature of our electoral system and electoral laws, which still demand at future elections printers for postal vote applications and physical signatures for the nomination process, for example. Has the Minister observed the elections in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador? Those were scheduled to go ahead in February, but owing to a covid spike, in-person voting was cancelled the day before the election, and an all-postal vote ballot had to be turned around at short notice. Can the UK Government learn any lessons from elections that have taken place around the world?
Julia Lopez
I thank the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood for her insightful contribution, particularly on the experiences from abroad in Newfoundland. Elections have been taking place during this period, particularly in Scotland, where proxy voting has worked at a time of high covid rates.
I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s support for the measures. We have provided additional resource, as she will know, for covid-secure voting facilities in councils and polling stations. As she will know, some of the issues that she has raised will require primary legislation to implement, which would be difficult at this particular time.
We want people to have the ability to vote by proxy, in person and by post. We wish for that to continue, and would not want to move to an all-postal system. We do not have plans, as yet, to introduce digital aspects to elections, but we may look at things such as moving proxy vote applications for absent voters online, but again, that might require primary legislation.
We are working with the Electoral Commission to sort through some of the concerns that have been raised by local authorities. We will provide updated guidance as we get nearer to polling day. Broadly, the instrument before the Committee makes sensible changes to support the effective administration of elections. It would give electors who must remain at home on election day the option either to cast their vote remotely if they are affected by covid, or to replace a proxy who has been affected by covid if they had already made arrangements to vote remotely.
Question put and agreed to.
Draft Grants to the Churches Conservation Trust order 2021
(3 years, 8 months ago)
General CommitteesRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty's Treasury (Michael Tomlinson)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Grants to the Churches Conservation Trust Order 2021.
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher, for my first contribution from the Front Bench.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Nigel Huddleston)
I thank you, Sir Christopher, and my colleague from the Front Bench for helping out at the start of the sitting. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.
The order is required so that the Government may continue to provide funding for the Churches Conservation Trust. The trust takes into its care some of the most magnificent examples of our churches that are no longer required for regular worship. All these churches are listed; they are mostly grade I and grade II*, and some are also scheduled ancient monuments. Historic places of worship are a valuable and vital part of the nation’s heritage. About 45% of all grade I listed buildings are Church of England churches or cathedrals. They are some of the finest examples of our historic buildings and showcase the most accomplished design and workmanship.
The Churches Conservation Trust currently cares for more than 350 churches in towns, villages and cities across England. They range from small hidden treasures to grand Victorian buildings. The churches that the trust has saved are some of the finest examples of architecture and craftsmanship, spanning over 1,000 years of our history. The trust keeps these buildings open to the public and does not charge an entry fee, believing that historic churches are buildings that belong to everybody and to their local communities.
The Churches Conservation Trust is a charity and was established by ecclesiastical legislation in 1969 as the Redundant Churches Fund, aimed at protecting an essential part of our heritage. It demonstrates a successful partnership between the Church, Government and community. In 2019-20, the Government made up 31% of the trust’s overall funding; the figure was down from 35% in 2017-18. The CCT raised the rest of its income from other sources.
The trust’s recent strategy has been to invest in staff to create an infrastructure to support local communities to use and love their historic church buildings. This infrastructure provides community support, learning, fundraising, conservation and maintenance expertise, and major project support, as well as funding.
The trust has increasingly made use of its statutory grant to raise new income from other sources, such as donations, legacies and grant-giving foundations. Among its many initiatives, champing—church camping, Sir Christopher; that was a new one on me as well—is a scheme offering overnight stays in historic places of worship. This is extremely popular. The scheme began in 2015 and has continued to thrive, even in the 2020 season, as there is now greater emphasis on UK breaks. Champing is a successful social distancing holiday option. It has so far proved to be a good income stream and will be again, I am sure, when restrictions allow.
Filming has also been an important contributor to the diversification of the CCT’s income streams. It offers another creative route to supporting and conserving the estate. In the last year, the organisation has facilitated film and TV productions from the BBC, Sky, HBO and Netflix across its sites. While the country continues to recover from the impact of covid-19, there remains the potential to attract more film and TV production to the CCT estate.
Over the last three years, the trust has earned an income of about £1.4 million from consultancy, champing and the maintenance business. The trust’s people are award-winning experts in conservation when it comes to regenerating historic churches for new uses. The organisation has an international reputation for innovation in the field of historic church buildings. Consultancy work is a positive income stream for the trust, working on projects with dioceses, churches and community groups, as well as a new maintenance business initiative.
The impact of covid-19 has meant that the Churches Conservation Trust has been unable to open its buildings at the very time of year when most of its activity takes place. Therefore, in common with many other parts of the sector, the trust has experienced a considerable loss of income throughout the lockdowns. Although the trust has been able to manage pared-down, basic care of its buildings, we need to ensure that it can continue to thrive and to protect them. During the pandemic, membership of the trust has grown, predominantly through the Thursday lunchtime lecture series, which has attracted more than 200,000 viewers to date. It has also created an online community of interest in the work of the CCT.
Sadly, the trust has been affected in other ways during the pandemic. An illegal rave, for example, took place in All Saints’ in East Horndon in Essex, causing damage to the grade II* listed 15th-century church. However, after a public appeal was made to raise £2,000 to clean and repair the damage, the community far and wide raised an incredible £22,000, which is testimony to the support the trust has from the wider public.
The trust has saved nine additional churches of exceptional merit for the nation since 2016, with more in the pipeline. The trust’s primary objective and the greatest call on its funds is the conservation of its churches, particularly upon initial vesting when buildings may have been out of use for a number of years. I am pleased to say that the trust has an excellent reputation for quality in its conservation work. In 2015, the CCT won one of the European Heritage Awards/Europa Nostra Awards in recognition of its role in protecting the architectural significance of historic places of worship and their essential function as centres of community life. The work, and also the expense, does not end there.
With an estate of more than 350 buildings serving their communities, there is a rolling programme of repairs and new facilities across the estate. Between 2019 and 2020, 1.74 million people visited a Churches Conservation Trust church. The trust’s churches are run by 1,800 volunteers and I offer my sincere thanks to those people without whom the churches could not hold such diverse events. The trust has shown that it is excellent at partnership working and at the forefront of saving buildings by looking well beyond the traditional heritage solutions. I am aware, also, that the trust is lending its expertise in the development and delivery of workshops on caring for historic places of worship as part of the £1.8 million Taylor pilot scheme, set up and funded by the Government to help build a sustainable future for listed places of worship. I take this opportunity to thank the trust for that support.
I am extremely fortunate to have three Churches Conservation Trust churches in my constituency: All Saints’ Church in Spetchley, St Michael’s Church in Churchill and St Lawrence’s Church in Evesham. That means I have more than my fair share of CCT churches. These historic buildings remind us of communities of old. They anchor us to our history in a way that we should never take for granted and, indeed, which other countries rightly envy. To close, I hope the Committee shares my enthusiasm for the work of the trust and the key role that it plays in preserving and promoting a vital aspect of our nation’s heritage, and that it will consent to approve the draft Grants to the Churches Conservation Trust Order 2021, as the Lord Commissioner of Her Majesty's Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Michael Tomlinson), proposed.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a great pleasure to see you in the Chair, Sir Christopher, and see the Minister on the Front Bench. The last time we debated heritage matters was the fairs and fairgrounds debate in Westminster Hall, which was quite a while ago. Hopefully, it will not be so long before we get another opportunity to debate heritage matters.
Churches are so important for a number of reasons: as places of worship, of course, but also as community spaces, foodbanks, homeless or refugee support centres, creches and very often beautiful buildings of great historical significance. I am lucky enough to have a number of historically significant churches in my constituency, which bring great benefit to all members of our community, whether Christian or not. Adel St John has served the community of north Leeds for 850 years. The building is one of the finest examples of Norman architecture in Britain. Picture an elaborately carved doorway, a chancel arch with sharp carvings, still clearly visible despite being 850 years old, and a corbel table of 78 grotesque heads. Carvings on the capitals of the supporting pillars include a centaur with bow and arrow, a favoured device of King Stephen, who visited Leeds and whose mother, Adela, was William the Conqueror’s daughter.
Just a few minutes away sits the grade I listed Bramhope Puritan Chapel built in 1649. The chapel’s four walls, doorways and windows stand as they were originally placed. In Otley, we have All Saints’ Church, consecrated as early as the 2nd century, with the present-day chancel dating back to the 11th century. In the centre of Leeds is St John the Evangelist, the oldest church in the city. Unfortunately, despite its great historical significance, it became redundant in 1975. Thankfully, however, the Church Conservation Trust stepped in and saved it from alteration or demolition. Thanks to the trust, it is beautifully maintained and now attracts many visitors with its magnificent Jacobean fittings and architecture.
Such buildings are defining parts of the communities in which they stand. They are places of rejoice, reflection and remembrance, and they are also places of great history and heritage. They are often architectural masterpieces—each one unique, yet part of an integrated whole. Churches encourage tourism to remote or neglected areas, and they tell our shared history. They can also bring great economic benefit.
Like the Minister, I congratulate the Churches Conservation Trust—perhaps we are both now considering a holiday this summer involving some champing. We are reflecting on the good work the trust does in the round. The CCT looks after more than 350 buildings, which would usually attract more than 2 million visitors each year. Its work is vital in protecting some of Britain’s listed buildings and scheduled ancient monuments, which is why the Opposition will support the statutory instrument. The CCT’s commitment to accessibility is something to celebrate, as is its unwavering support for small, knowledgeable and specialist building contractors. Through its vesting programme—the initial repair contracts for newly acquired churches—the CCT is preserving not just buildings, but skills and knowledge. It is also creating jobs in heritage construction, which is really struggling during this period of covid.
Unfortunately, like so many other institutions and organisations, the CCT has lost out to the pandemic, suffering a loss of visitor numbers and income. The usual community events and fundraising activities have been unable to take place in person, although, as the Minister said, the CCT has moved to online fundraising and made up a significant proportion of that income. For churches, the pandemic has compounded issues caused by an intense programme of funding cuts to local authorities, which has been presided over by successive Conservative Governments. Local authorities have been forced to make savings wherever possible while still protecting the most vulnerable people in their communities. That has often come at the expense of our heritage sites, which too often face neglect and decline. The Government must recognise the need to properly conserve all our listed buildings and other historical sites, not just the ones that fall under the CCT’s remit. Can the Minister outline how he is working to protect other sites, especially those under local authority stewardship?
I want to touch briefly on the impact that climate change is having on our historic churches. Higher rainfall is causing damage to timber and stonework, and stronger winds are causing more frequent damage to roofs, towers and spires. One of the greatest threats to church buildings is termites, which are likely to become a real problem in the coming years as Britain’s climate becomes ever more accommodating for them, as we have already seen in France. We have seen northward migration of animals that usually live in the UK. The Government must consider these new threats to our heritage and act accordingly.
All the churches managed by the CCT help tell the story of our heritage. They have stood strong through war, revolution and deadly pandemics, but we must not take them for granted. For them to stand strong for generations to come, we need a proper programme of funding and investment—not just for charities such as the CCT, but for local authorities and heritage organisations. Having said all that, and with room for improvement on the Government’s part, we will not be contesting the SI, because we know how important such funds are for protecting church heritage. However, if the Minister could clarify how the CCT ensures that the funding reaches the sites that most need it, I would be very grateful.
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Andrew Selous)
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I do not intend to detain the Committee for long, but I have been asked on behalf of the Church to say a few words. I thank my hon. Friend the Minister, whom I have known since before we were elected to this House, for his very sympathetic remarks. I was particularly pleased that he mentioned the public response following the rave in the church in Essex. That just shows exactly what we are talking about: the public really care about such buildings. I was very touched that both the shadow Minister and the Minister were clearly aware of the churches looked after by the Churches Conservation Trust in their constituencies, and it was really wonderful to hear them both talking about how important those buildings are.
As the Second Church Estates Commissioner, I want to put on record the thanks of the Church Commissioners to the Treasury and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport for their continued joint support for the Churches Conservation Trust. This is a brilliant example of partnership between the Church and state, and it was founded back in 1969—it is well over 50 years old—to ensure our nation’s architecturally significant and historic churches remain open to the public when they are unable to sustain a regular worshipping congregation.
As a reminder to the members of the Committee, the Church of England is currently responsible for the upkeep and management of 45% of the country’s grade I and II* listed buildings, including over 4,000 churches and cathedrals up and down the country. Today, the Churches Conservation Trust has the care of 356 churches right across the country, from rural Somerset to inner-city Bolton. They are used by diverse communities and are visited each year by more than 1.6 million people, along with the 4,000 volunteers who work to maintain these architectural treasures. The Committee may not be aware that the churches remain consecrated and, when allowed, they are open for private worship and often have significant community support as well.
They are often located in highly rural communities—although not always—or areas of low economic activity. The trust’s work brings jobs, maintains craft skills such as masonry, glazing and leadwork and helps levelling up, giving opportunities for young people to receive apprenticeships and preserve other heritage crafts for the next generation. The Church Commissioners look forward to developing this vital Church-state partnership in the coming years and are pleased to see the Churches Conservation Trust already revitalising its communications and public engagement strategy.
On the Church of England side, the General Synod will be asked at its meeting next month to give approval for its side of the funding order. I hope the Committee will recommend passing this financial support order and recognising the important partnership between Church and state to care for our national heritage.
Nigel Huddleston
I thank all hon. Members for their contributions and their positive words about the work of the trust. In particular, I thank the Second Church Estates Commissioner, my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous). We go back quite a long way, to an election in Luton South back in the general election in 2010, which I can assure hon. Members is an experience I will never forget. I thank him in particular for his role as Second Church Estates Commissioner, a role which he fulfils incredibly gracefully and effectively. I thank him for all the work that he does.
I also thank my opposite number, the hon. Member for Leeds North West. We share a great deal of passion for all things culture and heritage. I take the comments he made on board very seriously. He probably does recognise and acknowledge that we are trying to do what we can to support the heritage sector. In recent difficult times, the culture recovery fund has been hugely beneficial and much needed for the sector. I mentioned the Taylor review in my speech as well; he also mentioned several other issues, including the importance of skills, as indeed did my hon. Friend the Second Church Estates Commissioner. It is important that we do not just save the buildings, but also the jobs and the skills that go with them—skills that we could all too easily lose if we do not focus on that.
The hon. Member for Leeds North West also asked how effectively the money is spent. I assure him that I and my officials hold regular meetings with the CCT, both independently and jointly with the Church Commissioners who fund the CCT, to discuss its strategy, the maintenance of buildings, new acquisitions and so on. In addition, the CCT presents its annual report and accounts to the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, where they are examined before being laid each year before the House. The Secretary of State also holds the CCT to account through a funding agreement, which sets out his priorities, along with the indicators that are used to measure the performance. We have mechanisms in place that ensure that the money is spent effectively, but with consensus and agreement.
I extend my grateful thanks to the trustees under the leadership of Peter Ainsworth, to the staff and to the many volunteers who ensure that the churches are open and welcoming. I have highlighted some of the programmes put in place by the Churches Conservation Trust to generate independent income from philanthropic endeavours and appropriate commercial use of buildings. We fully support those endeavours, which increase the use of the buildings in a way that anchors them even more firmly in the local communities that love them and use them. They increase access, increase use and reduce their dependence on public funds. That is the future for how these historic buildings will continue to thrive: through the commitment and dedication of the people involved and the communities that love and use them.
Question put and agreed to.
Westminster Hall
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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.
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Commonwealth Day 2021
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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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
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes to normal practice in order to support the new hybrid arrangements. Timings of debates have been amended to allow technical arrangements to be made for the next debate. There will also be suspensions between each debate. I remind Members participating physically and virtually that they must arrive for the start of debates in Westminster Hall. Members are expected to remain for the entire debate.
I should also remind Members participating virtually that they are visible at all times, both to each other and to us here in the room. If Members attending virtually have any technical problems, they should email the Westminster Hall Clerks’ email address. Members attending physically should clean their spaces before they use them and before they leave the room.
There are no Members in the Public Gallery at the moment, but Members may sit there if there is not sufficient room in the horseshoe. They should take their place in the horseshoe after another Member has spoken and moved from it. Members may speak only from the horseshoe, because that is where the microphones are.
Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger (Bridgwater and West Somerset) (Con) [V]
I beg to move,
That this House has considered Commonwealth Day 2021.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I want to thank you personally for the work that you have done for the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association over many years, as did your father before you. This debate is always an absolute pleasure for me, as it is for colleagues. As I look at the list of speakers today, I see that many have been in touch with the CPA and worked diligently with it and helped it over many years. I am delighted to see so many on this call today.
Some might wonder why this debate is taking place after the formal date of Commonwealth Day. The answer is a very simple and good one: the Commonwealth celebrations clashed with International Women’s Day, and the Commonwealth valiantly supports worldwide women’s issues. It is, after all, led by one of the best and most renowned women in the world, who is totally committed to her job. So we gracefully stood aside for a week, although in my book, and I think in most of my colleagues’ books, Commonwealth Day is every day. The work of the Commonwealth never stops; it goes on.
The Commonwealth brings together the 54 countries of the family—very different nations with enormously different cultures, languages and races of their own. Some 2.5 billion human beings are part of our family. The figurehead of this unique organisation has done what few could ever achieve so well and has led it with distinction over many years. The goal of the Commonwealth has and always will be to unite all of this with three positive aims: prosperity, democracy and, of course, peace. It is a tall order in today’s world, which is less safe than it used to be, but it is worth every ounce of effort. Much of that effort is unsung, unreported and unseen—in my view, that is a great pity—but vital.
A week ago, the media focused on a single American television interview. I barely saw a mention of the new British trade deals agreed with the 27 Commonwealth nations that have already held trade talks with us such as Kenya and Cameroon. Soon Australia, New Zealand, Canada and India and many more are coming on board, which shows that the Commonwealth, which we are a part of, plays a vital role for all of us.
There are critics who will continue to claim that the Commonwealth is just a pale reinvention of the economic model of old empire, but they could not be more wrong and, in a way, arrogant. The whole purpose of the Commonwealth is to stand up to prejudice and promote diversity and prosperity at every level. The Commonwealth is about recognising individual weaknesses and, above all, sharing our incredible strengths. The extraordinary range of study and research delivered by many arms of the Commonwealth organisation has proved to be an immense force for good worldwide—through the Clerk system, Select Committees, our own Hansard, and all the things that we put together in all of our Parliaments to make this work.
The many ways in which parliamentary government is promoted bear mentioning as well. The Commonwealth applauds democracy, and I believe strongly that it helps to make it happen fairly. The Commonwealth is not a single answer to all the world’s ills—of course not: we do not try to be, and we never have. But the role it plays is of very valuable and lasting importance, and sometimes it is too easy to mock. However, its influence and impact are difficult to equal or—I would very strongly suggest—to replace. Next year, the biggest multi-sport event to be held in the UK in 10 years will take place in Birmingham. Thousands of acres of forest will be planted around the city to ensure it meets its target of becoming carbon neutral. I speak, of course, about our very special Commonwealth games, which I first went to as a young boy in Edinburgh.
The practical example behind this spirit of friendly competition is its extraordinary organisation. Such international games have long been favoured by men, as we know, but the organisers and the public are convinced that this time more medals will be won by women. That is because the role of women in sport is now recognised as an overdue, realistic ambition by every nation in the Commonwealth.
The role of women in tackling covid-19 has been a global reality recognised and nurtured by the whole Commonwealth. The great thing is that we in the Commonwealth all believe in equality. We believe in change—the right change; we believe in progress; and above all, we believe in tomorrow. We will continue to play that part. As chairman of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, I am more delighted than I can say with my colleagues on the executive committee, which meets tonight, for all the work they put in. However, we do face challenges with the situation of status. The status issue of the Commonwealth has gone on for too long. We all accept that.
At this point, I must pay tribute to the formidable Lord Ahmad, who has been extremely good at helping us to see that we can change the status of the Commonwealth. That does mean that we need parliamentary time and, to that end, I and so many colleagues have been in touch with the Leader of the House and the Prime Minister to see what we can do to foster that change—even if it is through a Private Member’s Bill, started either at this end or the other. We need to make this happen. It is crucial and, quite honestly, as an international organisation we now need to grasp that nettle.
I would like to thank Emilia Lifaka, the chairperson of the CPA. She has done a phenomenal job and is a great friend to all of us. She is a very formidable woman indeed—someone you do not cross. The Commonwealth has been led beautifully the last few years, and I am delighted about that.
I also thank vice-chairperson John Ajaka, who is standing down and leaving Parliament in Australia this year. He has done a remarkable job and, again, we must give our grateful thanks.
Personally, I would like to thank my colleagues on the executive council. It works because we work together, and I am delighted with the vice-chairman, the treasurer, and everyone else—we all know who we are; most of us are on this call—for the work they put in to make sure that we can do what we do.
I am sorry that we have not been able to travel or do everything we would like to do, but today, for instance, we are meeting our Canadian counterparts. The meetings go on and on, and I am grateful to the Clerks of the House, the Select Committee Clerks, Hansard and everyone else who takes part in our Commonwealth meetings for the effort they put in, alongside clerks, reporters, Select Committee Chairs and Members from around the world. We all learn from each other, and we keep on learning.
I would also like to thank the incredible team at the CPA UK branch, led by Jon Davies and Helen Haywood. They have all been remarkable over the past, rather difficult year. They have worked continuously not only to support the executive committee, but to support the Commonwealth generally, and they have done so incredibly efficiently. It has not been easy, and at times it has been intensely frustrating for them, but they have kept their humour and done it with enormous aplomb.
Lastly, I would like to thank Stephen Twigg, our former colleague who took over as the secretary-general of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. He has done an incredible job, and I am very grateful to Jarvis Matiya for backing him up and stepping in when it was needed to make sure that everything ran smoothly.
From what we have had over the last few weeks and right across the Commonwealth, one can see the amount that is coming out from the secretary-general—all of it challenging, all of it useful and all of it helpful. I can only say that this is a very strong family led by a remarkable woman, running together for the future of the Commonwealth and the future of the people.
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
I thank Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger for his speech and for his very kind comments at the beginning of the debate. As Mr Liddell-Grainger has not taken up all the time allotted to him, I am able to give each Member five minutes to speak. I call our colleague from Sunderland Central, Julie Elliott.
Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central) (Lab) [V]
As ever, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I am very proud to be the treasurer of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association UK branch, and I thank the hon. Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger) for securing the debate. I associate myself with all his warm words, both to colleagues on the executive committee and to the amazing staff who make our work on the CPA UK branch possible. They do a wonderful job.
This is an incredibly timely debate, because the position that the UK holds in the world and its relationships with other countries have changed demonstrably over the last couple of years. Although we are not here to debate that change or our opinion on whether it was the right thing to do, it is undoubtedly important to refer to the incredibly positive work done through our relationship with other Commonwealth countries and through our partnerships—in this case, therefore, the incredible amount of work done through the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. I evidently declare an interest.
The CPA gives us an opportunity to work with parliamentarians across the Commonwealth, providing a forum through which we can learn from each other and talk openly about the issues we face and how to solve them. It also gives me an opportunity to connect with women parliamentarians across the world.
The representation of women in politics and democracy is an incredibly important subject to me. Through my involvement with the CPA, I have had the chance in this Session to connect with women parliamentarians in Bangladesh, Sierra Leone and Australia, to name a few. It was an incredible opportunity to learn about their relationship with their democracies and representative structures. I believe such conversations are incredibly important: we may be in different countries, but we are more often than not faced with similar barriers to progression and achievement, similar objections and similar obstructions. Through a constant dialogue, we are able to learn how others have dealt with such situations.
The debates that have happened about the place of women in society—the most recent is something of which we are all aware—show how important it is to have women in positions of decision making and supporting other women across the world. Through the Commonwealth, we are able to work with women parliamentarians and show solidarity in an increasingly fractured world, so I return to the original point that I was making about a post-Brexit world. As we reset our relationships with other countries, the Commonwealth provides existing strong bonds with a whole host of other countries. Although the UK is just one equal member among 54 other equals, it has a unique prominence and significance that must be made the most of, for a range of different reasons.
Finally, there are many issues that simply go beyond borders, much like the issues of representation and equality of women, as I have mentioned. Two further examples are climate change and modern slavery, which the CPA has done a lot of work on. These are issues that simply cannot be solved unilaterally. The Commonwealth, with the bonds and relationships that it provides, is an extremely important forum in which we can work with others, learn what works and what does not, and ensure that progress is made for the benefit of all. Even if the debate is taking place a little after it happened, this Commonwealth Day is a chance to celebrate what joins us together and the support that we give each other.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con) [V]
It is a great pleasure to take part in this Commonwealth Day debate. I do so as the Prime Minister’s trade envoy to South Africa.
Africa is, of course, home to a number of Commonwealth countries and it is a continent of enormous opportunity. Today, the continent accounts for 17% of the world’s population but only 3% of its gross domestic product. By 2050, more than a quarter of the world’s population will be African, and that population will be overwhelmingly young and middle class. The continent is experiencing the fastest growth of the middle class in the world. Its collective gross domestic product is nearly $7 trillion and is among the fastest growing in the world. Business opportunities are soaring at an unprecedented rate.
All this presents an enormous opportunity for the businesses of the United Kingdom. As we trade and invest in each other’s economies, the United Kingdom looks forward to making our trading partners richer as our own prosperity grows. South Africa is the United Kingdom’s largest trading partner in Africa and we do trade together every year worth £8 billion, which I look forward to seeing increase significantly as we both emerge from the covid pandemic.
The United Kingdom is a major investor in South Africa, with almost £15 billion in investments, and many South African businesses invest here in the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom is mobilising UK expertise and capital to support President Ramaphosa’s ambitions for infrastructure to act as a flywheel of recovery. That represents a major commercial opportunity for UK businesses, with a pipeline of billions of pounds’ worth of orders.
The United Kingdom is also seeking opportunities for commercial partnership to support South Africa’s transition from coal-based energy generation to renewables. The South African Government will be seeking proposals for 2.6 GW of solar and wind energy under round 5 of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer programme. I am also keen to see what collaboration the United Kingdom can put in place to help South African coal miners and others in fossil fuel industries to transition to high-skilled, highly paid renewable energy jobs.
We already have existing partnerships between the United Kingdom’s further education colleges and South Africa’s technical vocational education and training colleges. I would like to see that collaboration enhanced.
South Africa remains a very attractive proposition for UK businesses. It is the most diversified economy in Africa, drawing heavily on UK legal and financial systems. It uses English as the language of business and it is on a similar time zone. Its role as a gateway to Africa will continue, particularly with a strong investment in the African continental free trade area.
I am, however, disappointed that so many British businesses, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises, are unaware of the enormous opportunities in Africa generally and South Africa in particular. I hope that businesses in my constituency and across the United Kingdom will grasp the opportunity to trade with and invest in South Africa as South Africa continues to invest in the United Kingdom, so that we can be trading partners of choice for each other in the future and for many years to come.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab) [V]
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley, and to speak in today’s debate. At a time when increased global co-operation is vital in tackling the coronavirus pandemic, it is right that we celebrate our union on this Commonwealth Day, as well as the fantastic work of our Commonwealth Parliamentary Association as we look outwards to our family of nations.
It would be wrong, however, to celebrate the global diversity of our Commonwealth without acknowledging Britain’s legacy and standing in a post-covid and post-Brexit world. Much has been documented on the historic scourges of slavery, colonialism and empire, but I do not believe that the current Government are doing themselves any favours by creating their own scourge: the hostile environment policy towards immigrants, a points-based system, issues with students and tourists, and the recent accommodation of asylum seekers in disused military barracks. That is to say nothing of the Government’s missed opportunities to trade closely with the likes of India, which previously was one of our largest trading partners, because we refuse to make allowances on our immigration legislation. It would also have been appropriate for the Government to stand fully behind Commonwealth nations and others for a waiver to access much-needed vaccines and treatments during the covid crisis. Sadly, that opportunity to combat inequalities in global vaccine distribution was missed, and I fear that it will only harm us all.
I want our celebration of the Commonwealth to be a renewal of our commitment to making things right for everybody across the world. I therefore fear that the Government may at times remain tone deaf to the global needs of the wider world and the Commonwealth. Members may have heard me speak with pride about my Ghanaian heritage, and will continue to do so. Like many people of Ghanaian heritage in the UK, however, I was appalled to see Ghana’s LGBTQ centre in the capital, Accra, close only one month after opening its doors to the community. There is a worrying trend of homophobia and discrimination against LGBTQ+ people by Government, religious institutions and the media across some Commonwealth countries. No law in Ghana states that being LGBTQ+ is illegal, but outdated colonial law validates that unjust treatment, because it is deemed to be “unnatural carnal knowledge” and a misdemeanour offence with a penalty of up to three years’ imprisonment. Since the closure of the centre by national security forces, we have seen members and leaders of the Ghanaian LGBTQ community being persecuted, and fearing for their own lives as a result.
That is why I was proud to join prominent Britons of Ghanaian heritage—including Edward Enninful, the editor of Vogue, Naomi Campbell and Idris Elba—in expressing my dismay at the ongoing situation and calling for the country to create a pathway for allyship, protection and support for this marginalised community. It is important that at this time we praise the work of organisations that continue to go above and beyond in supporting LGBTQ people right across the world, such as UK Black Pride and its formidable leader, Lady Phyll.
The Kaleidoscope Trust is also an LGBTQ+ international human rights charity that continues to work to uphold human rights in the Commonwealth—it actually hosts the Commonwealth equality network as well as being its secretariat. The Kaleidoscope Trust is the only accredited human rights-based organisation focused on these issues. The Government in the UK must continue to do all they can to put pressure on any country that is causing issues with the human rights of LGBTQ people right across the world. It is right that we use our influence and continue to do so with equality. As we celebrate Commonwealth Day, it is important that we are 100% behind all of those who may face any sort of persecution across these countries and right across the world.
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con) [V]
I am delighted to see you in the Chair, Mr Paisley, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Ian Liddell-Grainger) on obtaining this important debate. He is obviously key, given his position. Now that I have started to speak, it is clear that I have an interest: I have dual nationality. I carry a New Zealand passport from one end of the world, and a UK passport from this end.
As everybody has pointed out, and will continue to do so, the Commonwealth is a unique worldwide family. It is international, colourful in every way, and a fantastic mixture of races, religions, languages and creeds. It is based around the United Kingdom and the Queen. In saying that, I cautiously recognise that New Zealand’s near neighbour—that little island called Australia just off the shore of New Zealand—occasionally has a few republican problems. Ask any New Zealander and they will explain that merely being an Australian is a problem in itself.
I should explain that point a little. These two old Commonwealth nations in the south Pacific have had a huge rivalry for probably a century or longer. The insults and jokes between them are phenomenal, but every joke can be turned round and played back the other way. The two have huge battles, particularly in sport and most especially in rugby, yet in normal work and normal life, and especially in times of war, these two old Commonwealth nations work extremely closely, and particularly as part of the British Commonwealth. Along with Canada and South Africa, Australia and New Zealand make up what I call the old Commonwealth. They have a Commonwealth link, reinforced by huge kith and kin links, and a two-way flow of tourism and migration dating back almost two centuries.
The biggest examples of kith and kin links involves times of conflict. In the first world war, there was Gallipoli, which led to Anzac Day, the antipodean equivalent of Remembrance Day. Anzac Day there is very important. The people in these countries remember the soldiers, sailors and airmen who fought for the United Kingdom as part of the Commonwealth. I found it hard to understand as a child. I remember living in my little village, and I do mean a little village in the north of the south island of New Zealand, and we had a war memorial. The war memorial walls were covered with the names of soldiers who had died—hundreds and hundreds of soldiers, just from that little village.
I have visited Monte Cassino, the scene of the battle for Rome in world war two, which took place between 17 January and 18 May 1944. In fact, four battles were fought there. The soldiers involved on our side were called allied troops. With the exception of the Polish forces, who finally went over the top, they all came from Commonwealth countries. A total of 54,000 men from Britain, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India and Canada died at Monte Cassino, plus quite a number of Gurkhas. The reality of what happened there came home to me during a visit, and I recommend anybody who is in the area to go and visit, too.
These Commonwealth countries were not particularly happy when the United Kingdom went into the Common Market. However, rather than sitting and moping, they set about making trade deals with many nations, rather than just suffering from the loss of trade with the United Kingdom. Brexit and our eagerness for free trade deals will now enable us to use our Commonwealth ties to obtain trade deals more easily with Commonwealth nations.
Australia and New Zealand are formidable agricultural producers. Fortunately, rather than seeking to dominate the UK market in agriculture, they wish to work with our farmers to fulfil the trade deals that they themselves have with other nations, such as China and those in the EU.
The opportunities that these Commonwealth countries offer for our manufactured goods are also formidable. Neither Australia nor New Zealand have their own home vehicle production, and I believe that the same is true of Canada. They could and should be formidable markets for British-made cars, particularly Jaguar Land Rover cars.
I disagree with the hon. Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy) about immigration. When I first came to this country, immigration was easy, or at least easier, if someone came from a Commonwealth country and had professional training. Now that we are looking after our own immigration, we will be able to return to using the expertise that we can gain from abroad, particularly from the old Commonwealth nations, and the national health service in this country will benefit dramatically.
The possibilities that a partnership between Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the UK will bring for this country, and the access that it should help to provide to the trans-Pacific partnership, are also of great interest. Being a Commonwealth of nations must grease the wheels just as we desperately need trade—indeed, it is starting to work.
Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con) [V]
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. It is also a pleasure to follow the opening speech in this debate by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger), who is proving to be an excellent chair of the CPA. I well remember the last time I attended a CPA conference in 2014, with him and other colleagues, in Cameroon. I had come from a visit to Kenya, which, given the health issues in Africa at the time, with the Ebola virus, ended up as a single-handed visit, but I was able to use the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and its offices and get support from the British high commissions in both Kenya and Cameroon to advance the values, objectives and soft engagement—the connections and everything else—that the Commonwealth brings to us. It is an institution of enormous value in that soft sense, but it can also have a slightly harder edge.
We ought to note that the Commonwealth appeared in the conflict, stability and security fund for the period between 2018 and 2020. There was a fairness programme, aimed at Commonwealth nations, that focused on supporting universal access to justice; effective, accountable and inclusive legal institutions; democratic participation and inclusive decision making; transparent Government and trade; fundamental freedoms and non-discriminatory laws and policies; and promoting greater civil engagement among young people and disadvantaged groups.
The advancement of those values, and of institutions on those lines, is hugely important for the future of developing nations, because once they get those things right, international investors can take advantage of the labour price advantage of those countries, if they see it, knowing that their investments will be secure in those nations and that they will not be subject to the terrible economic price that can be paid through corruption in the governmental and political process. The way would be open to enable those countries to move rapidly towards greater economic equality with us. That is a huge security interest to the United Kingdom, and it would begin to address the issues raised by the hon. Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy) about immigration pressures on the United Kingdom.
Fairness and equality are a central economic interest, and the values and policies to secure that can be advanced by the institutions of the Commonwealth quietly coming together and engaging us, parliamentarian to parliamentarian, civil service to civil service, as well as through the excellent Clerks’ programme about the management of Parliament that the chair of the CPA promoted.
I will now focus on the announcement we will get today from the Prime Minister on the integrated review of security, defence, development and foreign policy. To a degree, that is the conflict, stability and security fund writ large as our policy. By bringing together elements of expenditure around goals, values and the promotion of institutions that deliver security as well as the harder edge of security for the United Kingdom, there will be many advantages, and that will hopefully be a significantly better way of managing the security challenge that is inevitably linked to values.
On values, I chair the all-party parliamentary group on global LGBT+ rights, and I am delighted that we have had a really good take-up for our parliamentary liaison scheme, which will use the informal links we have as a nation and as parliamentarians—the hon. Member for Streatham, with her Ghanaian heritage, made that clear—to find individuals to help institutions in those nations representing LGBT groups who have been criminalised and oppressed. It will quietly make links with those parliamentarians to keep an eye on the British high commission and embassies to ensure that we are standing up for the values that we profess as a nation and actually deliver them in practice. The Commonwealth is a fantastic vehicle for doing that. As I said, it is a delight to take part in the debate.
Theo Clarke (Stafford) (Con) [V]
It is a pleasure to speak in this debate under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger) for securing this important and timely debate, as Commonwealth Day was last week and the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting 2021 is due to be held in Kigali, in Rwanda, this summer.
CHOGM, in my view, is an excellent opportunity for the UK to lead by example in the Commonwealth, including by raising the importance of girls’ education, international conservation and women in trade, all of which should be critical to the Government’s global Britain agenda. I welcome the Prime Minister’s ambition that all girls should receive 12 years of quality education, and I commend the Government for the work they are doing on the SheTrades programme throughout the Commonwealth. I was honoured to have been appointed as the Prime Minister’s trade envoy to Kenya, and I am particularly pleased that, in this role, I am able to work with such a crucial Commonwealth country, and to connect with its citizens.
Let me start by recognising the devastating impact that the coronavirus pandemic has had, and not just on my constituency of Stafford but throughout the Commonwealth. According to a recent report from the OECD, covid-19 has now pushed the number of people living in extreme poverty in Africa to over 1 billion. The immense scale of the challenges that lie ahead demand collaboration across the Commonwealth, and I am determined to ensure that our countries work hand in hand so that, together, we can build back better, stronger and greener than ever.
At the end of last year, I attended the signing of the UK-Kenya economic partnership agreement, where we were fortunate enough to host Cabinet Secretary Maina, in person, at the Foreign Office. This new trade deal between Kenya and the UK ensures that, as the UK forges a new path outside the European Union, businesses in Kenya— such as those selling tea, coffee, food and flowers—can continue to enjoy duty-free access to the UK market, supporting jobs and livelihoods in both our countries. Trade deals such as this have now been replicated with countries throughout the Commonwealth, and much of this, I believe, is due to the strong existing diplomatic ties that the UK has with our Commonwealth partners.
I was also pleased to attend the Africa investment conference in January, where it was clear to me that the Government remain absolutely committed to the Commonwealth and to delivering a global Britain agenda. At the inaugural UK-Africa investment summit just last year, which was hosted by the Prime Minister, I was pleased to see deals facilitated that totalled more than £6.5 billion and spanned sectors from infrastructure to retail, technology and energy.
In November, I also attended the UK-Kenya economic development forum, which was also attended by the UK’s Africa Minister, who is here with us today. I was pleased that the UK announced so much funding for trade and investment opportunities, which really showed the Government’s commitment to this region.
Last month, I hosted my first virtual visits to Kenya, where I saw at first hand the aim of this year’s Commonwealth Day, which is a theme of delivering a common future. I first met the UK-backed TradeMark East Africa to see the excellent work that it is doing to improve trade infrastructure and improve the goods flow for British businesses. I also held discussions with the Kenyan Insurance Regulatory Authority about how it is increasing financial inclusion, particularly in rural Kenya. I also visited the Durham School, which I commend as the first British school to open in east Africa, to see this international school’s partnership with the UK in transforming education opportunities for children in Nairobi.
Finally, to coincide with International Women’s Day, I held a roundtable with the British Chamber of Commerce on female businesses in Kenya. We had a very interesting discussion about inclusive leadership, supporting SMEs and how to get more women involved in businesses.
I was reminded of the connections between the Commonwealth and my constituency when I spoke with the executive director of General Electric in east Africa, as many of my constituents are employed in its Stafford-based facility, and it is of course exporting generators to these less developed countries, creating jobs both at home and abroad. It is very clear to me that increasing trade can lead to business opportunities across the Commonwealth, from Kenya to Stafford, helping both to build back better. The Queen said in her Commonwealth message last week:
“Looking forward, relationships with others across the Commonwealth will remain important as we strive to deliver a common future that is sustainable and more secure”.
For me, that is the key message. Our Commonwealth community is immensely valuable and we must continue to increase trade for the UK, and throughout the Commonwealth.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con) [V]
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Theo Clarke) for her speech. I also pay tribute to the chairman of the UK branch of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger). He has done a brilliant job, with the entire team, to unite the UK in terms of our relationship with the Commonwealth. It is of course right to pay tribute to the leader of the Commonwealth, Her Majesty the Queen, and the entire royal family, who do so much good work, across the world, bringing together our disparate nations.
The Prime Minister will set out Britain’s relationships across the world in the integrated review. It is right that we will return to many of our historical links, which we unfortunately turned our back on, in many ways, when we joined the European Union. I am struck by the fact that on visits to Australia, New Zealand and Canada, the feeling was generally that the United Kingdom had turned its back on its historical ties. It is vital that we reunite and redevelop those ties.
I want to concentrate on the Indian subcontinent. I have the privilege of representing a constituency with people from every country on the planet and every faith on earth. We have a heavy concentration of people whose families originate from the Indian subcontinent. Later this week we shall debate human rights in Sri Lanka. There is no doubt that in 2016 CHOGM helped in trying to isolate and highlight the problems in Sri Lanka after the bloody civil war. I shall not dwell on that longer.
On 26 March we shall celebrate the 50th anniversary of the creation of Bangladesh as an independent state. It is a cause for celebration. The United Kingdom was instrumental in assisting Bangladesh to become independent and develop as a nation thereafter, and our strong links must remain. I have had the opportunity, with others, to visit Bangladesh to participate in social action projects to help to improve the life of ordinary Bangladeshi citizens. Parliamentarians are right to do that.
Our relationship with India goes back more than 300 years and it is fascinating that even now India is the third biggest investor in the United Kingdom. We used to be the third biggest investor in India, but I am afraid we have slipped down the leader board. There is much to recover. I look forward to the fact that in addition to visits by the Foreign Secretary and the International Trade Secretary the Prime Minister will, probably in April, visit India to set out our new relationship as we go forward in the world. It will incorporate international trade—and of course we have done new deals around the world—combined with security, defence and other aspects of our relationship. That will enable and entitle citizens from India and across the Commonwealth to come here and study, and our citizens to study in India and other countries around the world. It is vital to allow and encourage young people to build up friendships and relationships across the world, so that we and other countries will be friendly and well disposed towards each other.
That is part and parcel of the work that we have to undertake in the Commonwealth. It is an institution with no parallel anywhere in the history of the world. We are now in reality equal partners—different countries coming together because we have a shared past, but also a shared future.
As we pay tribute to the Commonwealth, let us unite in ensuring that we do so by encouraging diversity, and encouraging different people from different backgrounds to celebrate the fact that we are one Commonwealth. When we look at sport, recreation, education and trade, we realise that this is an unparalleled opportunity, and we must grasp it for the good of not only our citizens, but the citizens of the world.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con) [V]
Thank you for calling me to speak in this great Commonwealth debate, Mr Paisley, which I think was started shortly after I was the inaugural chair of the all-party parliamentary group for the Commonwealth, as the Minister, who is in his place, will remember. It is wonderful to hear so many colleagues talking about their positive experiences with, and feelings for, the Commonwealth. We are, in one sense, all children of the Commonwealth—in my case, like one or two others, literally. My first years were spent in Kenya, where I later served as a diplomat and, perhaps even more importantly, was married, so our children, too, are children of the Commonwealth.
Today, I want to focus on one particular link that I think is very important, which is the work of the Westminster Foundation for Democracy in the Commonwealth; I speak, obviously, as the chair of the WFD. This is particularly relevant with the Minister in his place, because he will remember vividly how in 2017, when he was chair of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association—a role now ably held by our hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger), who I congratulate on securing this debate—we forged the Commonwealth Partnership for Democracy, or CP4D, between his organisation at that time, the Westminster Foundation, and two other partners.
At that time, during our period as chair-in-office of the Commonwealth, we did some remarkable work in 15 different Commonwealth countries and 30 legislatures. Above all, we promoted the incredibly important values of inclusion and participation in democracy by those with disabilities, those who are female, young people, and the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, as well as increasing accountability through effective and transparent parliamentary practices. If, during those two years, we did achieve some valuable things, can I encourage the Minister to consider—even though we are in more strapped times today—the idea of a daughter of CP4D, and not letting go of that precious momentum of inclusive and transparent democracy throughout the Commonwealth?
However, even sadder would be the complete withdrawal of the WFD from our current Commonwealth programme. That is, sadly, a possibility unless the funding is secured by the end of this month for our activities in the remainder of this year and the years ahead. Currently, we run the Commonwealth Equality Project, which is a £1 million project in 15 Commonwealth countries. We work in participation with decision makers and civic society to make meaningful progress on gender equality and LGBT issues, which have been mentioned by several colleagues already this morning, and there is a strong need for that programme, as various Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt), have stressed. The UK has led real efforts to address these gaps.
The funding for this programme ends on 31 March, so I must be blunt in saying that unless we have confirmation of funding for the Westminster Foundation within the next few weeks, there is a real danger that this programme will come to an end, and the WFD will not be able to run programmes in the Commonwealth at all. This would be particularly sad for women and girls and marginalised groups, who benefit directly from this programme, as those in the CPA who were fortunate enough to meet some of the beneficiaries who visited here in 2019 will vividly remember.
I will finish by saying that this is a wonderful debate; I am delighted it has been secured, and we should maintain this practice every year. There is masses we can all talk about in terms of the Commonwealth. I would love to have time to mention Malaysia, a great Commonwealth country in the far east, where I had the honour of being the Prime Minister’s trade envoy, and which is still doing great things—there was a very successful visit by the Prince of Wales only a couple of years ago—but today I have one clear plea for the Minister: please make sure that the Westminster Foundation’s funding can continue after the end of March, to maintain these valuable programmes in the Commonwealth.
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
There is nothing virtual about our next speaker—he is here with us in the Committee Room. I call the Member for Bracknell, James Sunderland.
James Sunderland (Bracknell) (Con)
It is a great pleasure to be called to speak in this very important debate on Commonwealth Day, Mr Paisley. As we know, the Commonwealth is a voluntary association of 54 sovereign states—it is pretty impressive. It covers almost 30 million sq km, with almost 2.5 billion people, and stretches across the entire globe, covering 21% of the world’s land area. Along with Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, the Commonwealth will have a larger share of the global population as time passes. Given that the majority of member nations are developing, the Commonwealth share of global GDP will also increase. Combined GDP was £10.4 trillion in 2017, moving to an estimated £13 trillion in 2020. The Commonwealth is a big beast.
Importantly, politically, no one Government within the Commonwealth exercises power over the other members. It is not a political union. The Queen exerts no political or Executive power; she merely occupies a symbolic position. Rather, this is an international organisation made stronger by the social, political and economic diversity of our members, where all are regarded as equals. We operate with common values and goals and we do a lot of work on the promotion of individual liberty, democracy, the rule of law, human rights, good governance, equality before the law, free trade and world peace, so it is very persuasive.
I want to make three points today. First, politically, we have a golden opportunity now with our position as a strong voice within the Commonwealth to forge closer links with the many up-and-coming nations that we share this membership with. In the post-EU world, the UK is the diaspora—we have people from all over the world and the Commonwealth living in the UK—and with this group of countries having a GDP of nearly two thirds of that of the EU, it is a fantastic opportunity to forge closer links. I am really pleased that the Government have made great progress this year and last year in new free trade deals around the world, but so much more can be done. I urge the Minister to do everything in his power to enhance mutual prosperity through trade with our Commonwealth friends.
Secondly, the Commonwealth games, due to be held in Birmingham in 2022, are a fantastic opportunity. We must showcase what we do. It is good for Birmingham, good for the Commonwealth and good for sport. I urge the Minister to ensure that the Government back the games fully. If we need more money, so be it.
Lastly, I have been made aware of significant issues facing Commonwealth soldiers in our armed forces and Commonwealth veterans. It frustrates me deeply that their service to our nation has yet to be fully rewarded with a clear offer of right to remain. As the commanding officer for 27 Regiment Royal Logistic Corps in Aldershot only a few years ago, I was very proud to command the biggest and most diverse regiment in the British Army, with soldiers from more than 40 countries serving in that regiment. My view is quite clear: if you wear the uniform, go on operations, serve the Crown, serve Her Majesty, you are British—fact. These guys are not mercenaries; they are British.
I urge the Minister to help make two things happen. First, I want to see informal resolution for the eight Fijians who recently lost their court case. Notwithstanding the outcome from the court, it is really important that we recognise their service with an offer of indefinite right to remain. Secondly, I urge the Ministry of Defence to consider a much better offer for our foreign and Commonwealth soldiers. How fantastic would it be for these guys who serve our country, who serve our Crown, to be given what they rightfully deserve?
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
Now for the erudite elder statesman, Sir David Amess.
Sir David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
Today, I will not be calling for city status for Southend, because I know that will happen in any case, but I will be celebrating with others Commonwealth Day.
The CPA is a wonderful organisation; the Minister is a former chairman and is my parliamentary neighbour. Over the years, I have been fortunate to visit many Commonwealth countries. Her Majesty the Queen does a brilliant job in leading the organisation.
I will concentrate briefly on two countries: Sri Lanka and the Maldives. I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I am a supporter of British Tamils, especially the Tamil community in Southend. My constituents have raised the issue of how Mrs Ambihai Selvakumar is being treated and her hunger strike. She is protesting at the violations of human rights of Tamils in Sri Lanka, and I want to raise that today.
I have recently written to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office about the hunger strike and the destruction of Tamil memorials in Sri Lanka. I was pleased to table early-day motion 305 in support of improving water quality in northern Sri Lanka, where the Tamil community is disproportionately affected. As a nation, we should help those individuals in Commonwealth countries, and improve their quality of life and access to freedom. That most certainly includes the Tamils in Sri Lanka.
The Maldives is a wonderful country; I have been the chair of the all-party British-Maldives parliamentary group for a number of years, and we held the AGM yesterday. Last year, the Maldives was readmitted to the Commonwealth, so one nation leaves and another one joins. That has been a long-term goal for the nation for several years and it is a testament to the high regard in which the Commonwealth is held that membership is so important.
The benefits of membership have included the promotion of mutual understanding and friendship between its member states, giving increased opportunity to strengthen conservation, democracy and human rights. On a lighter note, the Maldives will also participate in the Commonwealth games next year in Birmingham.
When people think of the Maldives, they first think of luxury holidays, with sandy beaches and all the rest of it. However, that does not present an accurate reflection of the way people live in the Maldives. Tourism counts for nearly two thirds of the GDP, and covid-19 has forced the Maldives to close its borders and tourism industry for months. GDP was forecast to contract between 11.5% and 29.7% in 2020. The country is now in debt to the tune of 128% of GDP.
The Maldives’ main industry, after tourism, is fishing. I have had useful meetings with two of my hon. Friends who are the responsible Ministers. The fishing industry employs around 30% of the country’s population and is responsible for virtually all of the country’s exports. Last year, due to the pandemic, the tuna industry was the sole contributor to the Maldives economy.
The vast majority of the fish caught are tuna, all of which are line and rod caught, which is much better than the other method of, frankly, hoovering them up. The Maldives tuna industry has gone five times beyond the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission’s requirement to reduce overall catch of yellowfin tuna. The way the fish are caught and the scale of fishing make the industry entirely eco-friendly and sustainable. Women have always participated in the fishery sector. Although industry is dominated by men in most of the world, in the Maldives the current fisheries Minister is a woman. Women also make up the majority of employees at the fish-processing plants.
The Maldives is part of the Commonwealth Blue Charter action group on sustainable coastal fisheries, which aims to support ongoing fisheries programmes and the sustainable management of coastal marine resources. That is central to the sustainability of the country’s fishing industry in the face of climate change.
Given the importance of the fishing industry to the Maldives economy and how sustainable and equal it is, one would have thought that the United Kingdom would have a good trading deal with the country. However, the UK currently imposes import tariffs of 20% on tuna. The Maldives is the only comparable Commonwealth country where that happens. Almost all of the 38 small island developing states have a preferential trade agreement with the UK, and the Maldives is the only Commonwealth country that is not accorded preferential trading.
I have yet to hear a good reason for that; it is such a shame. Considering how sustainable the fishing industry is, I hope the Minister will pass that message on to other Ministers.
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
Thank you, Sir David. We now go to the first of the Front-Bench spokesmen.
Alyn Smith (Stirling) (SNP) [V]
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. It is also a pleasure to contribute to this debate and to follow a number of interesting contributions from various points on the political compass. As my party’s foreign affairs lead at Westminster, I am fond of the idea of the Commonwealth. I am glad to see 54 sovereign states working together, proving that post-independence countries do work together closely to achieve common endeavours, can co-operate, and maintain bonds and the ties of affection that we all want to continue.
Post-independence, which is my party’s proposition, we will seek to join the Commonwealth as an independent state in our own right—making it 55. We want to maintain the bonds that we have and work together, but we want to work together as sovereign equals because my party has a different vision of Scotland’s best future, and that is a lively debate within Scotland parallel to Commonwealth membership.
Joining the Commonwealth is part of our foreign policy stance going forward, but it is part of our foreign policy stance, not the main one, frankly. The cornerstone of Scotland’s foreign policy will be EU membership. The cornerstone of Scotland’s defence policy will be NATO membership. The cornerstone of our trade policy will be EU membership, because it is possible to have the best of both. It is possible—as the UK enjoyed until recently—to be part of the Commonwealth and part of the EU, as has been proven.
We will look at the Commonwealth on its merits, but the EU is our focus. We want to regain the real-world practical advantages of individuals as citizens able to live, work, study and retire across the whole of the European continent, and to maintain the good relationships with the Commonwealth going forward that will also be useful.
We think it is a potentially useful forum, but I must say—striking a slightly more critical note—that it is also an opportunity missed, and some of the praise that we have heard for the Commonwealth today needs to be balanced with some of the reality that we need to see far greater progress. In 2013, the Commonwealth adopted a charter on justice, democracy, human rights, tolerance, the rule of law, the promotion of women’s rights and others—all laudable aims and very much to be supported.
What we have not seen, however, is the progress towards those aims that needs to actually happen to effect real change in the lives of the people of the sovereign countries working together towards those aims. For Commonwealth countries, the reality is that far too many still fall far too short of the standards we need to see on women’s rights, LGBTI equality and the rule of law. The Commonwealth has been far too quiet in that discussion.
I appreciate keenly that the Commonwealth is not about telling one country or another how to run its affairs, but where there are common aims it is incumbent upon the centre to speak with a loud voice when those standards are falling. We have seen the Commonwealth being far too quiet and too little resource being put into the Commonwealth secretariat. We are seeing a UK that is walking away from its official development assistance commitments in terms of the 0.7%, which really is the gold standard of decency internationally. The gap between perception and reality is what we will be focusing upon and upon which the Commonwealth can do much better.
However, I believe in engaging to make things better. I think the Commonwealth is a potentially useful forum, and we wish it well on Commonwealth Day, albeit recently passed. I look forward to an independent Scotland being part of that co-operation where we will be an enthusiastic voice for precisely the things that we all say we want to see happen.
Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship today, Mr Paisley. I thank the hon. Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger) for securing this debate and for his work with the CPA, and the excellent contributions from a number of Members, including my hon. Friends the Member for Sunderland Central (Julie Elliott) and the Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy).
The Labour party has long been a supporter of the positive agenda of the Commonwealth going back decades and we remain a strong supporter today. Many of us will have heard Her Majesty the Queen’s powerful words for Commonwealth Day last week reflecting on the impact of the pandemic on the Commonwealth, where she said
“as we celebrate the friendship, spirit of unity and achievements of the Commonwealth, we have an opportunity to reflect on a time like no other… stirring examples of courage, commitment and selfless dedication to duty have been demonstrated in every Commonwealth nation and territory”.
I wholeheartedly agree with those sentiments.
I also begin by expressing my personal and family connections and affection for the Commonwealth, having visited members from Canada to Malawi to Cyprus to New Zealand, and the many meetings and events I have also had the pleasure of doing with the CPA. As a 16 year old, I studied in Canada, my brother lives and works there and my father worked with the Commonwealth Youth Exchange Council for 40 years, helping link young people from Cardiff and Wales to Uganda, Kenya, Malawi and all over the world. My constituency in the proud dock city of Cardiff has been shaped by Commonwealth influences from south Asia to the south Pacific, from Africa to the Caribbean. We are also proud of our historical links to European Commonwealth members such as Malta and Cyprus and, of course, the strong links between Malaysia and Cardiff City football club.
The CPA has been rightly praised by many Members. I fully support its work, supporting and strengthening parliamentary democracy throughout the Commonwealth and particularly its key themes in relation to women in Parliament, modern slavery, financial oversight, security, and trade. I was pleased to take part recently in an event with Sierra Leonian parliamentarians through the CPA. I am proud of our overseas territories family too. The CPA UK Overseas Territories Project, now in its second phase, is a particularly important programme supporting public financial management across our overseas territories.
We have heard of the breadth of the Commonwealth, the 2.4 billion people, the voluntary nature of the association and, of course, that countries have joined the Commonwealth that are not formerly part of the British empire, including Rwanda and Mozambique. Others are also seeking membership or observer status, including Somaliland, on which I declare my interests, which the Minister knows. Throughout its history and its proudest moments, the Commonwealth and its citizens have united to create more prosperity through trade, challenge those who undermine human rights and democracy, share knowledge and inspire young people, share culture and act as a key player on trade and climate change.
The work of the Commonwealth is as broad as its membership, from the work of the CPA to the Commonwealth Foundation to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission to the Commonwealth games to the Commonwealth Development Corporation, to name but a few. There is much that is positive about our continued relationship with the Commonwealth, but there are also examples of where we have failed and continue to fail. Look at the Windrush scandal. Look at the inequitable treatment of Commonwealth armed forces personnel and veterans, as rightly pointed out by the hon. and gallant Member for Bracknell (James Sunderland) and which I and others raised in the Armed Forces Bill. Look at the proposed cuts in aid to our Commonwealth partners, which were extraordinarily ill-judged when they face such pressures on health and covid-19, education, challenges facing women and girls, climate change and conflict.
It was particularly saddening, in that respect, to hear this weekend that one of the UK’s genuine national treasures, the Voluntary Service Overseas, is under threat because of uncertainty about its FCDO grant. Its work among 9 million people, the majority of it in Commonwealth countries, stretches back to the early days of the Commonwealth in 1958. Without urgent clarity from Ministers, VSO tragically says that it will have to immediately halt its covid-19 response work, close 14 of its country programmes, including across the Commonwealth, and make 200 of its staff redundant. That would be a genuine tragedy and I hope the Minister can provide some reassurances on that matter. This is an organisation that has had cross-party support for decades.
The political power for change that the Commonwealth represents was highlighted at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in 2018 in the UK and it was a stepping stone on crucial issues, such as the future for young people, who make up 30% of the Commonwealth population, the advancement of rights of women and girls, fighting gender-based sexual violence, improving education around sexual and reproductive rights, strengthening democratic institutions, fighting climate change and, of course, increasing trade. It was a successful summit.
My personal reflections on that event, however, include a meeting I had with LBGTQ+ activists from the Commonwealth Equality Network and organisations such as the Kaleidoscope Trust at the Speaker’s House here in Westminster. We heard powerful speeches from the hon. Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt), my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham, and the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) on that issue earlier in this debate. It is currently tragic that 35 Commonwealth member states criminalise same-sex activity in some way and persecute LGBTQ+ people across the Commonwealth.
That is a toxic legacy of colonial laws and ideas introduced predominantly by this country during the British empire and we have a particular responsibility. The right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), the former Prime Minister, spoke powerfully in 2018 saying she deeply regrets the role the UK played in criminalising homosexuality abroad and stating,
“Those laws were wrong then, and they are wrong now.”
We have seen in recent days and weeks unacceptable attacks on LGBTQ+ organisations in Ghana, a media campaign and attempts by lawmakers to bring in laws to further discriminate and restrict the rights of LGBTQ+ citizens in Ghana. Such things are not in line with the principles of the Commonwealth nor, indeed, with other United Nations human rights institutions. I hope the Minister can explain whether he has raised this issue with the Ghanaian authorities, what representation our high commissioner has made and what work he will do across the Commonwealth to strengthen human rights and rights for the LGBTQ+ community and other groups.
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
Please ignore the clock. There’s plenty of time.
Stephen Doughty
Thank you, Mr Paisley. Turning to more positive matters, we cannot debate the Commonwealth without mentioning the Commonwealth games. I was inspired as a child by people such as the two-time Commonwealth champion, and now one of my constituents, Colin Jackson. With the youth of the Commonwealth being so important, sports are an increasingly important part of the life of the Commonwealth. Commonwealth parasport is also inspiring millions of young viewers around the world. It was a particular delight to hear that the medal event programme for the Birmingham games has been revealed with more parasports to take part in than ever before and more events for women than men—an incredibly important signal to send.
We are all excited about the progress towards in the games in 2022 when, I hope, we will have made enough progress against the pandemic to be able to welcome back athletes from around the world for a time of celebration and inspiration. Will the Minister update us on the latest planning for the Commonwealth games?
While speaking about youth, I should mention the role of the Association of Commonwealth Universities which provides 100 million students with the opportunity to study in universities across the Commonwealth. Will the Minister say what role it will play in the Turing scholarship scheme?
Trade has been mentioned many times and there are many aspects of important trade in the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth trade in goods and services was approximately $560 billion in 2016, and projected to reach $700 billion by 2020. The value of UK exports to the Commonwealth has increased in the last few years, and so has the value of imports. That shows us the importance of the trading partnership which the Commonwealth provides.
However, the partnership must also be based on equity and fairness. The UK Government sadly started the year by letting down Commonwealth citizens and producers in Ghana over the tariffs on fair trade bananas, with the price being paid by the workers and producers. I praise the work of my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas) in raising this issue. Like him, I am a Co-operative MP and deeply concerned about the issue, as is the Co-operative party.
The hon. Member for Southend West (Sir David Amess) made important points about the Maldives and fishing, which have also been recently raised with me. Will the Minister explain how he will work with his colleagues at the Department for International Trade to ensure that development, sustainability and workers’ rights—highlighted to me by many trade union federations from across the Commonwealth in meetings I held a few months ago—will be at the heart of our trade deals going forward?
The climate change programme of the Commonwealth secretariat is an important player in helping member states work towards building resilience, adaptation, and mitigation in response to climate change. The Commonwealth Climate Finance Access Hub has aided many countries in accessing finance, especially small island developing states such as Tuvalu. In 2018-19, it helped countries receive $24 million to fight climate change. That is particularly important when countries such as Bangladesh, Tuvalu and other small island states across the Commonwealth face inundation from rising sea levels and, of course, storms. We know the terrible legacy of the hurricanes Irma and Maria in the Caribbean in 2017 when huge damage was done. In response to that, Commonwealth funds helped, for example, Antigua and Barbuda receive a grant of £20 million from the green climate fund. Will the Minister set out what role the Commonwealth and its members will play at the upcoming Conference of the Parties in Glasgow? The issue is absolutely critical, not least given the unique risks faced by some of the Commonwealth members by nature of their geography.
I have two final points. First, on human rights and democracy, the political influence that the Commonwealth has had over its member states over many decades is showcased by many interventions made towards members who have not held up the core values of the Commonwealth. We think historically of the Commonwealth’s powerful role in relation to South Africa and apartheid and in relation to Zimbabwe, Fiji and other regimes and putting in place systems for ensuring that democracy is respected in member states. There have been observations of over 70 elections since 1990 and programmes promoting judicial and public administration reform and civil society development.
However, there are many unanswered issues currently across the Commonwealth: the repression of the opposition in Uganda; the activities of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad in Nigeria; the repression of the opposition in Tanzania; the rights of Indian farmers protesting in recent months; Pakistan’s blasphemy laws and forced marriages of girls from religious minorities; and the allegations in Sri Lanka, raised by the hon. Member for Southend West opposite, which I know will be debated later this week?
On the borders of the Commonwealth, we see instability and allegations of human rights abuses and humanitarian catastrophes in places such as Ethiopia which could risk destabilising our Commonwealth partners. Will the Minister explain how he is working through the Commonwealth to tackle threats to human rights, democracy and the rule of law, especially in relation to what we have seen in Uganda in recent days? I hope he will say something specifically about that.
There are shocking reports today from Mozambique—one of most recent members of the Commonwealth—of Islamist militants beheading children, according to Save the Children. Furthermore, nearly 1 million face hunger in that country alone. The Minister revealed to me that across sub-Saharan Africa there are, I think, 95 million people facing food insecurity, with many people already in famine conditions. This is not the time to be cutting our aid and disengaging our support for food, for education, and for healthcare, especially given our particular responsibilities and relationships with our Commonwealth members and partner countries.
In conclusion, Mr Paisley, there is much to be proud of in our Commonwealth membership and Commonwealth relationships and the role that Her Majesty the Queen plays in leading the Commonwealth, and it is crucial to our mutual interests in relation to development, trade, security, climate change and human rights and democracy. It is a shame, as we head into the 2021 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Rwanda, that the Government should be breaking its promises on 0.7%, apparently reducing focus on Africa, which we will see later today in the integrated review, and failing to join up strategies on trade deals. Will the Minister commit to maintaining our ODA commitments to our Commonwealth partners? Will we be able to hold our head high as we attend that CHOGM in Rwanda and hand over the chairpersonship? In a post-Brexit world, the Commonwealth should be at the heart of our global Britain strategy, and it is at the heart of the name of the Minister’s Department, but will it be at the heart of the integrated review announced later today?
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
Thank you, Mr Doughty, for that very informative and wide-ranging contribution to the debate. Now over to the Minister, James Duddridge.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (James Duddridge)
Thank you, Mr Paisley. As already referenced, thank you for your personal work on Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, although I appreciate that you are here in a different guise chairing this Westminster Hall debate, which confusingly is not in Westminster Hall.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset (Mr Liddell-Grainger) for bringing us this debate. I must say, he is a great improvement on his predecessor, and I can say that with absolute clarity, given that it was me. I was proud to serve the organisation and I took over the baton from him and passed it back when I became Minister for Africa for the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
Many people pray in aid of their country of birth, but my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) even got married within the Commonwealth. There is a very rich history. We have had a veritable smorgasbord of interventions and speeches covering many of the 54 countries, 30 of which I have visited. Of the 19 African Commonwealth countries, I have had the pleasure of visiting 17, and I very much look forward to visiting Cameroon and the Seychelles at some point in the future.
May I take this opportunity to thank the CPA for all its work, along with other organisations that serve the Commonwealth so ably, such as the Westminster Foundation for Democracy? I thank the trade envoys that have contributed across the Commonwealth, but specifically in their country, linking back trade to the United Kingdom and their own constituencies, as mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Theo Clarke)? We have also heard a lot from chairs of the all-party groups that are involved across the Commonwealth. I am particularly minded of the references to the LGBT community and the problems they face, and I would like to reach out, as I have done in the past, to my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt) and his excellent work on matching parliamentarians with countries, because one size does not fit all in terms of HMG’s best response to these issues. A much more nuanced approach works well, and I have discussed with him a number of times that we want to reach out as Minister and do that within a plethora of countries, but specific issues were raised around Ghana and Uganda.
It is brilliant to be celebrating Commonwealth Day. We are slightly restricted because of covid, but it is good to celebrate the values enshrined within the charter. It is good to be part of an organisation that people want to join and rejoin. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (James Sunderland) said, the Commonwealth has many nations and is a convening body across the globe for 2.5 billion people, bringing us together. It has many of the world’s young people, half of the top 20 emerging cities around the world, and a quarter of the nations of this world. The UK is immensely proud to have been the chair over the past three years—a slightly extended period due to covid. We brought all our energies and commitment to deliver a more secure, prosperous, fair and sustainable future for the Commonwealth. In June, we will pass the baton to the chair in Rwanda. As mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford, the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting is in Kigali, which is a good opportunity to review what we have done over that extended period and what baton we are passing on.
Many of us watched the wonderful celebrations on television last Sunday, with Her Majesty delivering the traditional Commonwealth message—this time from the magnificent St George’s Hall in Windsor Castle—among the 54 bright flags of the Commonwealth. For the first time in 72 years, sadly there was no service in Westminster Abbey, which I know is a critical moment of celebration in most hon. Members’ diaries each year, but it was reassuring to see the flags flying in Parliament Square as they normally do. It was really good to see that, even during covid times. The Commonwealth flag was flown across Whitehall and in many of our high commissions on the six continents, in celebration of that day.
Nearly 50 Heads of Government and Foreign Ministers came together at CHOGM 2018. I was part of a parliamentary delegation, and many hon. Members who spoke during the debate also attended CHOGM as parliamentarians and in other capacities. We announced £500 million of programmes and projects, and our delivery against these commitments was detailed in the Commonwealth chair-in-office report, which was published last September. That was notified to the House in a written ministerial statement from Lord Ahmad, the Minister for the Commonwealth in the other place, and I recommend reading the report to look at what we did over the period of three years.
Our activity was focused on four key areas: sustainability, fairness, security and prosperity. A sustainable future is the only way forward. We built a Commonwealth partnership to protect the ocean, and we have looked at plastic pollution. A number of hon. Members have mentioned climate, and it is absolutely critical that we look at climate through the G7 and the Commonwealth Heads of Government, but also through COP26 later this year, and we will use the Commonwealth to do that.
The Commonwealth finance access hub in Mauritius was co-founded by the UK and has mobilised much money to support 23 projects in climate-vulnerable countries such as Antigua, Barbuda, Jamaica, Barbados, Fiji and Tonga, focusing particularly on the issues affecting small island states, which have been raised by a number of hon Members. All too often we forget that the Commonwealth is a very diverse organisation, from India and Canada on one end of the scale, to the small island states and countries such as Eswatini, where I used to work. It is a broad and diverse family that was brought together in London and will be brought together again in Kigali.
We worked with our partners to secure a fairer future for all Commonwealth citizens. I will take forward the comments from my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell on the armed forces, and I will discuss the issue of the court case, which he raised so eloquently, with the Minister for the Armed Forces, my hon. Friend the Member for Wells (James Heappey). I am certainly happy to do that. It is the right thing to do, and I will certainly go forth and do that.
We cannot have equality without proper security. During our term in office, we focused particularly on cyber-security, which I suspect we will hear more about today in the integrated review. We shared our expertise and trained over 1,000 individuals in the Commonwealth.
I am very proud of the work that the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association has taken forward, and I am conscious of the issue of status. I am more than happy to discuss that with Emilia Lifaka and Stephen Twigg, formerly of this place, in his new role working with Emilia Lifaka for the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association on an international basis. As has been mentioned and celebrated, we have also funded standards networks to support the Commonwealth in reducing and bringing down trade barriers, particularly through our trade envoys. I commend in particular the work of SheTrades in Kenya, which has been mentioned.
In the extended 12 months, we were able to address the impacts of covid, and work together with the Commonwealth to build resilience in vulnerable countries, to ensure that no one was left behind. In October, the Commonwealth Heads of Government agreed a very strong statement on racism. That was initiated by the UK, but it was by the whole of the Commonwealth.
Human rights were mentioned by a number of Members. Although this is a bit of a love-in—no one has spoken against the concept of the Commonwealth—the hon. Member for Stirling (Alyn Smith) is right to challenge us not to rest on our laurels and to see what more we can do as parliamentarians across the diverse range of the Commonwealth. There are opportunities for trade, and for people to travel and work here. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford), I am optimistic about bringing very strong people from the Commonwealth, and moving them around the Commonwealth, to share and bring different experiences together. During covid, we have also supported our Commonwealth partners, through COVAX. A number of Commonwealth countries are already vaccinating, which is good to see, as part of the Commonwealth response.
India was mentioned by the hon. Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy), as well as by my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) and others. There is a massive opportunity to do more trade in India, and I will reflect on their comments. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East mentioned that he has been to Australia and New Zealand, so perhaps he can liaise with my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley on the ongoing conflict of jokes, puns, innuendo and discussion between those two countries.
I encourage trade envoys to double down on the work that they are doing, not only on the trade side, but as our eyes and ears. The previous trade envoy to Angola, which is outside the Commonwealth, visited that country 10 times. Trade envoys can visit a lot more frequently than Ministers, so they are the eyes and ears, and we encourage them to do more.
The hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) made a number of points. The Turing scholarship scheme will clearly involve the Commonwealth, and, alongside Chevening, will open up Commonwealth scholarships. I have dealt with the issue of climate change. I take seriously the issues in Uganda, and like the hon. Gentleman, I am very concerned about the situation with Bobi Wine. Only yesterday, I was discussing that situation with our high commissioner in that country. The hon. Gentleman also mentioned the situation in Cabo Delgado, which the report this morning said is often forgotten, but not by me. I am very engaged on these issues, through the high commissioner there.
I think my hon. Friend Member for Gloucester claims credit for this annual debate, and I look forward to the next one. I suspect that it goes back many moons, but it has occasionally fallen into disrepair. In many ways, he has brought it back front and centre. I remember advocating for it to become an annual debate when I was on the Back Benches and chair of the CPA. I am now perhaps hoist by my own petard in having to respond for the Government, but it is has been a pleasure and, slightly belatedly, I wish all Members of the House a happy Commonwealth day.
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
Thank you, Minister. I think you covered practically everything that was raised and more, so very well done. Before the curtain falls, we have the opportunity for a swansong from the hon. Member for Bridgwater and West Somerset. I call Ian Liddell-Grainger.
Mr Liddell-Grainger [V]
Thank you, Mr Paisley, and may I thank you once again for all your help with the CPA? I also thank the Minister. He has been very self-deprecating, but he was an extremely good chairman. I was his deputy, and we worked well together. I have many fond memories of the work that we did, but there is also the work that he is now doing, and I thank him for his reply to this debate. Crucially, a lot of the things that were brought up today need to be actioned, especially with regard to the Westminster Foundation for Democracy. My hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) made very powerful points about that. It is an incredibly important organisation.
There are also the trade envoys and the APPGs. Everybody works together, and the CPA is always glad to help where it can to ensure that the trade envoys or APPG chairmen and members are able to use our facilities to help get them what they need and want. As the Minister rightly said, quite often trade envoys can visit many more times than a Minister can.
I thought that my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Sir David Amess) made some very good points. I am afraid a lot of them I do not understand, but they are obviously serious and need to be looked at. Every Member mentioned, one way or another, trade, access, prosperity and human rights. I was very taken by what the hon. Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy) said. She made very powerful points about her heritage and gave information that, again, surprised me but needs to be addressed. I am delighted that she had the chance to talk in this debate about what is certainly one of our great colleagues and countries—Ghana. I am very pleased that she was here.
I was disturbed to hear what was said about VSO, which has a huge history in this country; it is a phenomenal organisation. I hope that the Minister will take the comments on board, because doing VSO is an important part of being British. I never did VSO, but I know many colleagues and friends who did. They came out of it better people and learned an awful lot about other countries and the aspirations of people in those countries.
I pay tribute again to Lord Ahmad, because the sustainability issue, as my hon. Friend the Minister has said, is incredibly important. It is something that my hon. Friend was addressing when he was chairman, and I will certainly continue to do so. All of us know that change has to come and therefore, working with Lord Ahmad, we will try to achieve that.
I look forward to the year ahead, especially as we will have the Commonwealth games next year—all colleagues are aware of that—and, hopefully, we will be getting trips back up and running, so that we can visit the Commonwealth countries and help to continue to strengthen our family and the family of nations that make up this incredible organisation. I also look forward to being able to talk to as many countries as we all do—so many people on this call and colleagues outside this call have taken part in these discussions—and to reaching out to countries that we normally cannot get to. We have been able to do that through the rather bizarre format of Zoom and whatever the other one is called—Teams—and all the rest of it. It does work, albeit it is not the same as a personal visit; it is very good. There was mention of some of the more remote Pacific islands, which we can talk to now. Instead of having to fly out, which is a bit of a nightmare, we can talk to them. That is crucially important.
I would also like to thank the Labour party for its support and, in particular, the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) for his work.
Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
Please come to a conclusion, Mr Liddell-Grainger.
Mr Liddell-Grainger
Thank you very much indeed, Mr Paisley. This has been a great debate, and I thank all my colleagues for their incredible kindness to the CPA. I wish you well, Mr Paisley, and everyone else.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered Commonwealth Day 2021.
Release under Investigation: Metropolitan Police
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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Ian Paisley (in the Chair)
I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes to normal practice in order to support the new hybrid arrangements. Members participating must wipe down their workstations at the conclusion of their speeches. No one is speaking virtually. I have the pleasure of calling the mover of today’s motion, Sir David Amess.
Sir David Amess (Southend West) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the use of Release Under Investigation by the Metropolitan Police.
Since the Policing and Crime Act 2017 was introduced by the Government in April 2017, there has been a substantial use of suspects being released under investigation, more commonly known as RUI, by police forces around the country, with the Metropolitan police the heaviest users of this controversial practice. Moreover, since the introduction of RUI, there has been a substantial decrease in the use of pre-charge bail. Being released under investigation means that someone is suspected of a criminal offence and that the investigation into their alleged criminal activity is ongoing. They may have been arrested, but they have not been charged, nor has their case been passed to the Crown Prosecution Service. However, they are not out of the woods, because the police are still suspicious that they might have committed a criminal offence.
The controversial nature of RUI is that it places those accused of crimes effectively in a state of limbo, not infrequently waiting many months or even years for the police to make a decision on whether to recommend a charge or recommend that no further action is taken against the accused. I cannot stress too much to my hon. Friend the Minister that the time the accused waits for a decision is a time when that individual suffers enormous stress and strain from all points of views and, as I will come on to, can ultimately take a terrible toll.
By way of background, when RUI was created in 2017, the purpose of its introduction was to overhaul the use of police bail. The very good intention was to remove the onus on those involved in lengthy investigations of having to frequently attend a police station to have bail extended. On face value, RUI was well intentioned, but as is often the case it has since fallen foul of the law of unintended consequences, and this power has been badly abused, in some cases by overstretched police.
When suspects or their legal representatives inquire about the progress of their case, they are frequently told by the police that they are pursuing “further lines of inquiry”. When they ask what these are, they are told, “This is confidential”, and when they ask how long the inquiry will take to conclude, they are told, “It’s difficult to say, but you will be updated”. The update often takes the form of a derisory monthly email simply saying that “Our inquiries are ongoing, but you will be updated”, which then results in much the same email being sent the next month, and the month after that, and so it goes on, in many cases for years. Indeed, RUI is often perceived, to the detriment of both alleged suspects and alleged victims, to be a pending tray for more complex cases, allowing overstretched detectives to tackle simpler cases with an easier prospect of conviction, which is a very unsatisfactory state of affairs.
It is clear that this system is not an improvement on the previous system of pre-charge bail, which had clearly defined time periods, whereby the suspect was updated on the progress of the investigation. That also helped to focus the minds of the detectives investigating a case.
So, with that in mind, the Law Society has proposed, as a minimum requirement, that the police should be required to explain to suspects who have been under investigation for more than four months why there is a delay in determining their case, and I would be very grateful if my hon. Friend the Minister would clarify whether or not he shares the Law Society’s view.
To paint a picture, typically what happens is that someone is interviewed under caution by the police, but there are not sufficient grounds to charge them. However, the police do not want to dismiss that person as a suspect just yet; instead, they want more time to make their inquiries, before deciding whether or not to refer the person’s case to the Crown Prosecution Service. The police therefore choose to release the person under investigation, which allows the person to leave the police station, but the police can still seize their personal property as evidence.
The person will be told about the outcome of the investigation at some point in the future. That creates a great deal of uncertainty, because they do not know if the police will eventually charge them or drop the case against them. To make matters worse, the investigation process has no maximum time limit, which is absolutely ridiculous. It means that the person could be kept waiting for weeks, months or even years before discovering their fate.
For someone to have the threat of prosecution hanging over their head can be very unnerving and may even damage their ability to earn an income. As has been previously stated, people in this position are left in a state of near-paralysis. Unsurprisingly, that can have a severely deleterious effect on a suspect’s mental health.
In preparation for this debate, I contacted an established firm of London solicitors that frequently interacts with the Metropolitan Police and it explained that
“Of three clients, one client who was under RUI and was in his early 50s has developed a brain tumour, which can only be partly removed. The other has begun to experience psychotic episodes and is now registered with local police by the crisis team. The other suffers from severe depression.”
I am not surprised. Tragically, the firm’s explanation continues:
“We know of at least one case in our office where a client took his life, having been accused of an offence in circumstances where he believed that if charged, he would not be able to see his children, only for notice to be sent within days of him taking his own life advising that the police were taking no further action.”
My goodness, how could I live with my own conscience had I been part of this process? I do not know. Taking that horrific example into consideration, does the use of RUI not ride roughshod over the principle of Blackstone’s ratio—that it is better that 10 guilty persons escape than one innocent suffers?
How widespread is the use of RUI? This is a difficult question to answer, as since 2017 no reliable, national police data has been published on the numbers of suspect RUIs. Indeed, a report in December 2020 by the Criminal Justice Inspectorates found that some forces cannot even identify cases involving RUI because their IT systems cannot flag these cases centrally. Simply, that is not an acceptable explanation.
Nevertheless, data obtained by the law firm Hickman & Rose says that in 2018, 236,996 cases, almost a quarter of a million individuals, were at the time released under investigation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. That is ridiculous. Some 56,555 of those were from the Metropolitan police area alone. Not only is there an issue with the sheer scale of people under RUI, but there is a clear issue with the length of time suspects are subject to RUI. Available data shows that the average time spent before a final decision is made is 139 days. The average length of police bail, by comparison, was 90 days. It is just not acceptable. Some may even have to wait years for justice, in the case of alleged victims, or for vindication of those innocent of the crimes levelled against them, making a mockery of the central tenet of our criminal justice system: the fact that you are innocent until proven guilty.
The London Criminal Courts Solicitors’ Association reported recently that when a sample of 109 RUI cases was examined, more than 69 had been ongoing for between 18 months and two years. That is just not acceptable.
In fairness to the Commissioner of the Police of the Metropolis, whom I do recognise is in the eye of the storm at the moment, I attended a virtual briefing of the APPG on policing and security just a few months ago. When I raised this issue on the call, the Commissioner did admit that the whole system of RUI was, indeed, not working and needed to be replaced. When the professional head of the Metropolitan Police Service acknowledges that the system has to change, changes should be made. I would have hoped that it might have been in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that we started to debate yesterday, and will further debate today.
Having checked the Metropolitan Police Service’s business plan progress report, I was pleased to see that the Met has implemented a so-called RUI recovery plan, led by commanders in Met Ops and frontline policing. However, much more needs to be done. The continued, unfettered use of RUI is unsustainable. I am therefore pleased to see that the Government have concluded their review into pre-charge bail, and published the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, but I must ask the Minister: in light of the Bill, what is to become of RUI? Will it be abolished? Will it be reformed—or, essentially, will it stay the same? Although I am not prejudging the Minister’s reply, I must tell him that I am not going to leave the issue alone. I want a precise answer.
The effects of delayed justice on the individuals involved cannot be stressed enough. My former parliamentary colleague Harvey Proctor, although he was not subject to RUI, spent many years fighting to clear his name after the fiasco of Operation Midland. The cloud over his reputation led to the loss of his job. He lost everything, including his home. The failings of the Metropolitan police have never been satisfactorily investigated, and a public inquiry or independent external investigation by another force is long overdue. It should have happened by now. I shall listen carefully to my hon. Friend the Minister, but if he cannot satisfy me on this subject I, and several colleagues, will consider calling for a full-scale debate in Parliament on Operation Midland and who should be held to account.
In summary, who guards the guards? Since its introduction, despite noble intentions, RUI has been an untimely policy failure. I have no doubt that its excessive use by forces has been exacerbated by previous pressures on police numbers; but that is simply not good enough. The use of RUI has had far-reaching ramifications for both victims and suspects, some of whom have, tragically, taken their own lives with the sword of Damocles still hanging over them. I am therefore pleased to note that the Metropolitan police leadership sees the continued use of RUI as unsustainable and has at least tried to remedy its excessive use. Furthermore, it is my hope that the 2,000 extra police already announced by the Government—and under the leadership of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, a fellow Essex Member who is doing a wonderful job at the Home Office—will mean that crimes can be resolved more quickly, removing the need to use RUI in the future.
As the age-old legal maxim states, justice delayed is justice denied. I am keen to hear the Minister’s reply, which I hope will be to say that RUI is to be discontinued sooner rather than later.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Kevin Foster)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Sir David Amess) for securing the debate. It is always a pleasure to respond to a fellow Blue Fox, and to have a chance to set out the Government’s latest thinking on RUI.
My right hon. Friend spoke quite a bit about the use of RUI by the Metropolitan Police Service. Yes, it is the highest user, as the largest force. However, the statistics for 2017-18 show a discrepancy in the percentage use following an arrest. For example, in some forces the rate is nearer 20%. For the Metropolitan police it is about 37%. In the force with the highest rate it is nearer to 60%. Clearly, discrepancies in the use of the process are producing such a contrast; and it is not driven by such issues as rural versus urban forces, or metropolitan versus county forces. The Government are committed to ensuring that the police have the powers they need to protect the public and to ensure the welfare of vulnerable victims at the heart of the criminal justice system, but it is clear that something needs to change in this area.
The process overall has been raised as an issue in the debate, and it is something that we are looking to reform and put right. Last week, the Lord Chancellor introduced the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, and it will hopefully receive its Second Reading later today. The Government are using this opportunity to reform pre-charge bail and improve wider confidence in the criminal justice system with the Bill’s wider provisions. It might be helpful if I say a bit more about how the Government see the context behind the reforms.
As my hon. Friend identified, the Government made changes to pre-charge bail through the Policing and Crime Act 2017 to address concerns that suspects were being left on pre-charge bail for long periods of time while also being placed under conditions that severely restricted their liberty. In some cases, they went far beyond the concept of having to attend a police station to renew bail; some were on onerous bail conditions for very long period of time. In some cases, those individuals were eventually told they would face no further action, following years of being on those restrictions.
My hon. Friend rightly highlights some similarities and crossover into RUI, where someone does not have clarity on where they are going. To address that, in terms of pre-charge bail, the Government introduced statutory timescales at which the progress of investigations could be reviewed, and further bail periods required authorisation by the appropriate rank in the force concerned. The changes also introduced judicial oversight into the process to ensure that pre-charge bail was being used appropriately and any restrictions were proportionate to the circumstances faced. It has now become clear—my hon. Friend gave some useful information on this—that some of the changes have led to unintended consequences. In some cases, the police have released suspects under investigation rather than on pre-charge bail. There are a couple of sides to that and why we feel reform is important.
While the 2017 Act changes were intended to reduce the number of suspects being placed on pre-charge bail for lengthy periods of time, it was also not intended that victims could be left with inadequate protection—the other side of this—in the absence of conditions that could be applied. Similarly, we do not want people waiting for outcomes for lengthy times. Too often, we have heard accounts of suspects who have been arrested on suspicion of very high harm offences, such as domestic abuse, have been released under investigation rather than placed on bail, where sufficient conditions would be in place to protect victims and witnesses. As my hon. Friend may be aware, that was tragically highlighted in the case of Kay Richardson, who was murdered by her estranged husband following his release under investigation even though there was evidence of previous allegations of domestic abuse. That is simply not acceptable. The first priority of a Government is to protect their citizens. That is why we must change the law, and we are seeking to do so with—I hope—my hon. Friend’s support on Second Reading later today.
Aside from release under investigation not providing adequate protection for victims, as he rightly highlighted, it has often left suspects in limbo, given that the process is not subject to any timescales. Much like pre-charge bail before 2017, suspects are being placed under investigation for lengthy periods of time with no real sense of how investigations are progressing. At the same time, as I said, victims are left unprotected, given that conditions cannot be applied to release under investigation. We believe that we need to put that right for all parties involved.
The Government launched a public consultation in 2020 to understand how we could create a more effective pre-charge bail regime that would balance the needs to safeguard the public with the rights of individuals who have been arrested on suspicion of offences. As has been touched on, we obtained views from law enforcement, members of the public, charities, the legal profession and others to enable us to create a system that will protect the most vulnerable but also ensure that individuals are not effectively left in limbo during an investigation, with the obvious consequences that my hon. Friend pointed to. Allegations of some offences—not petty offences—can very much hang over someone and really affect their life. They may not be able to move forward or perhaps change job. As he said, there is an impact on career and employment as well. We are conscious that RUI cannot just be a file that cases are popped in because they are difficult. If it is to be used, that must mean that a case is still being progressed.
As already mentioned, reforms will be brought into effect by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, and I very much thank my hon. Friend for the additional thoughts he has provided today to help us take that work forward. Our proposed changes will encourage the police to use pre-charge bail where it is necessary and, crucially, proportionate to do so. They will also require the consideration of key risk factors in the decision-making process, which we are putting into statute because of what the conditions are. Officers will need to consider factors such as the need to safeguard victims of crime and to safeguard the public when determining whether to release an individual on bail. We expect this to lead to a significant decrease in the use of release under investigation.
We also recognise that there is a need to bolster victims’ confidence in the system. That is why we are inserting a new duty that would require the police to inform the victim of the conditions on suspects, and seek the victim’s views on such conditions where it concerns their safeguarding—let me be very clear, it is their safeguarding. This duty will also apply when there is any variation of these conditions during the course of the suspect’s bail. We do believe it is crucial that victims have the opportunity to provide input or information when key decisions are made that could affect their safety.
To put it the other way around, again, to ensure a just system, police investigations should continue to be conducted as quickly and efficiently as possible. We are clear that we will look to issue much more rigorous national statutory guidance via the College of Policing about the use of release under investigation. Again, we are conscious that long periods of limbo are not acceptable in the criminal justice system. RUI is not a position that forces can just put somebody in: they need to be clear about the reason why they have released the person under investigation, rather than deciding to take no further action, or charging and allowing a court to resolve the matter.
We will be more widely amending the timescales on pre-charge bail periods so that they better reflect police investigation lengths, because we recognise that the current 28-day first period of bail has created challenges for the police, and we have engaged with them at every stage to get this right. I know that hon. Members will appreciate the changing landscape of criminality, investigation methods and tools. It has evolved over recent years, particularly examining digital chains of evidence and establishing forensics, which may take slightly more time but can still be vital in securing prosecutions. Again, we are conscious that there is a need to balance those things while making sure that the process is moving forward. We believe that the future guidance will be far more effective at delivering these outcomes than the current position is.
As I say, we will also look to work with the police sector to improve the data available on pre-charge bail and release under investigation so that we can much more effectively monitor its use and the effectiveness of this system, ensuring justice both for victims and, at the same time, for those who have been accused of a crime and have a right to know that the police will deal with it as efficiently and effectively as they can. As my hon. Friend has touched on, there is a presumption of innocence in the system, and people should not have their life left on hold without the investigation progressing.
Sir David Amess
I very much hope to catch Mr Speaker’s eye in today’s debate. If I am hearing my hon. Friend correctly, the Bill that we are dealing with today will tackle everything surrounding RUIs. Could he also comment on Operation Midland, because I do intend to raise these matters on the Floor of the House later?
Kevin Foster
The Bill will reform the pre-charge bail process and remove some of the disincentives against it that we now believe are inappropriate, or have created unintended consequences. RUI is a process that is not actually set out in law and statute, so the Bill would not change that; however, we are clear that we want to issue much more rigorous guidance on its use. The figures I gave are the differential between forces’ arrests: some are about 20%, and one is 60%. That tells us that there is a need for much more rigorous guidance on how this process is used, and also what information should be provided to the defence so that they know the progress of the case. I do not think I can do justice to Operation Midland in about 30 seconds, but I am sure that the Minister responding later will be able to do so.
We believe that the changes will allow for further protection of victims, clearer timescales for suspects, and more confidence in the system among the police. I very much thank my hon. Friend for having brought this useful debate to the Chamber today.
Question put and agreed to.
Covid-19: Animal Welfare
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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Esther McVey (in the Chair)
I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes to normal practice to support the new hybrid arrangements. Timings of debates have been amended to allow technical arrangements to be made for the next debate. There will also be suspensions between each debate.
I remind Members participating physically and virtually that they must arrive for the start of debates in Westminster Hall, and Members are expected to remain for the entire debate. I also remind Members participating virtually that they should be visible at all times to each other and to us in the Boothroyd Room. If Members attending virtually have any technical problems, they should email the Westminster Hall Clerks’ email address. Members attending physically should clean their spaces before they use them and as they leave the room.
Alex Davies-Jones (Pontypridd) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on animal welfare.
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms McVey, and to serve under your chairship. I am delighted to have secured the debate on an issue that, if my email inbox is anything to go by, many of our constituents across the country feel very strongly about.
I want to place on the record my gratitude to some of the incredible organisations who work hard all year round to support animal welfare projects across the country. Indeed, many of those organisations—there are far too many to list—have supported me with my preparation for the debate. Locally, I am grateful for the expertise of Hope Rescue, a dog rescue charity working across south Wales who operate from a rescue centre in Llanharan, just across the border in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore). Thankfully, Hope Rescue’s work covers the whole of Rhondda Cynon Taf and beyond, and I am extremely grateful for its engagement ahead of the debate. The same sentiments apply to Friends of Animals Wales, which has been working constantly behind the scenes to improve, educate and inform on the importance of robust animal welfare standards for all of us in Wales.
I must finally extend my thanks to the many national organisations whom I have met and engaged with ahead of today. I will try my best to name them all, but an exhaustive list is practically impossible. Battersea Dogs & Cats Home, the Dogs Trust, Blue Cross, the Kennel Club, Wildlife and Countryside Link and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Cymru all have some incredible research and recommendation reports. I urge colleagues of all political persuasions to reach out and read the information readily available to us all. Finally, I am especially grateful to the House of Commons Library service, whose briefing will, I am sure, be well referred to by colleagues.
The debate feels particularly timely for two reasons. Colleagues will be aware that this is Pet Theft Awareness Week. I have specific concerns relating to the impact that the coronavirus has had on pet owners like me, and I am sure they will be echoed by others. Given that we are all increasingly spending more time out walking in our local areas, I know that, sadly, some places have seen rises in opportunistic pet thefts. I will touch on that worrying trend in my contribution.
In addition, it would seem foolish not to reference the dialogue around the issues relating to violence and abuse towards women and girls that has grown in recent weeks. There is little research connecting domestic violence with animal abuse, but thankfully this is an area of growing academic interest. We now know that pet dogs and cats are at high risk in abusive households as perpetrators direct their anger at them and use them to manipulate and control their human victims.
I am sure colleagues agree that we need to be having those conversations around welfare—whether human or animal-related—regularly in this place. It is vital that regulation and law enforcement are considered key parts of that conversation, too. I specifically look forward to hearing from the Minister about the cross-departmental work and conversations that I sincerely hope are taking place with her colleagues in the Home Office on how to tackle issues specific to crimes against animal welfare.
It is often said with great pride that we are a nation of animal lovers. From old tropes connecting Great Britain with the British bulldog to the jokes made far too often about sheep and Wales—none of which I will reference here today; I am sure colleagues can use their imagination —it cannot be denied that animals big and small are at the very heart of our global identity. That is certainly the case in my constituency of Pontypridd, and I would be hard-pressed to find a Welsh valleys resident who was not at least a lover of cats or dogs.
Obviously, no debate on animal welfare would be complete without reference to my own two gorgeous Jack Russells, Dotty and Dora. I got them when they were just a few weeks old, and in September they will both turn nine. They have truly seen me through thick and thin, the good and the bad. Family aside, they really are my world. If anything, coronavirus has made our bond stronger than ever before, and I know that sentiment is shared by many others in my community.
Since I was elected in December 2019, I have received more emails from constituents concerned in one way or another about animal welfare than I have on any other topic—second only to inquiries about coronavirus. They cover a huge range, dealing with badger culling, puppy smuggling, fur imports and concern about bee-killing pesticides. In applying for the debate, I wanted an opportunity to touch on some of the ways the coronavirus epidemic has had an impact on animal welfare across the country.
For many of us, the pandemic has meant that we could spend more time than ever before with our pets. For Dotty and Dora, that has been a wonderful thing. I am lucky to be surrounded by the gorgeous Welsh valleys and to have plenty of open space to take my two out and about whenever possible. It is one of the only benefits that the coronavirus pandemic has brought us, I think—the opportunity to spend time with family and pets.
Sadly, for other animals the coronavirus pandemic has been anything but a good thing. During the first lockdown, calls to the RSPCA’s national cruelty and advice lines halved from their 2019 level. At face value, that sounds like a good thing, but on looking at the stats in detail we can see a worrying picture developing. There are concerns from the sector that that was simply because lockdown meant people did not see incidents of neglect or cruelty as they usually would. When restrictions began to be lifted, from May to July, the number of calls to the RSPCA rose above 2019 levels, and there are concerns that we have not yet seen the real impact of the pandemic on domestic animals.
Another worrying trend is the fact that there have been significant increases in the demand for animals, as more people than ever before have seen the benefit of having pets, especially when we are all spending so much time at home. Research conducted by Battersea Dogs & Cats Home found that 31% of people who acquired a dog or cat during the first lockdown had not even thought of becoming pet owners before. Its research also found that online searches about buying a dog increased by about 217% between February and April 2020.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
We keep springer spaniels and cocker spaniels, because we do hunting and shooting. My son sold a dog last year for £150 and the pups this year are making £2,500. The value is absolutely abnormal and as a result dog thefts have risen dramatically. Does the hon. Lady agree that better co-operation on dog sales is needed between all the regions of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, to ensure an end to dog thefts, and an end to the dispersal of dogs around the UK—or at least better regulation?
Alex Davies-Jones
I wholeheartedly agree with the hon. Gentleman. There has been a dramatic rise in pet theft throughout lockdown and, sadly, those pets are being transported across all four regions of our United Kingdom, so it is vital to have a joined-up approach to tackling the issue.
I am sure that the majority of the people who have acquired pets during the lockdown will go on to become loving pet owners, but impulse purchases are hugely worrying for rescue centres, which anticipate a surge in the number of animals being brought to them when life returns to normal. It is important to note that a dog is for life, not just for lockdown. The RSPCA has concerns that as the economic consequences of covid-19 continue to take hold, more and more larger animals, including horses, will face neglect and abandonment too.
Sadly but unsurprisingly, the increase in demand for animals has had a huge impact on the incidence of pet theft, as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) said. The Minister will be aware—I am sure she is as concerned as I am—of the response to a recent freedom of information request stating that in five policing areas there was a double-digit increase in the number of dog thefts reported between January and July 2020, compared with the previous year.
I know at first hand how worrying those incidents can be for communities. Community Facebook groups in my area are full of posts from people worrying about dog thefts, vans driving around suspiciously and chalk prints being put on houses where a dog is known to be present. I should be interested to hear the Minister’s comments about conversations with colleagues in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport about the spread of misinformation, and social media companies’ responsibility to regulate fake news, particularly in the context of animal welfare. Pets really are part of our families, so I fully understand why such posts and the threat of pet theft cause such alarm in communities.
Given the heightened demand for animals during the lockdown, there has been a rapid increase in the number of dogs entering the country for commercial reasons. Some of the recent responses to written parliamentary questions have revealed that the number of intra-trade animal health certificates issued for dogs from May to August 2020 was almost 16,000. That is double the figure for the same period in 2019.
Animal welfare groups also, justifiably, have major concerns about puppy smuggling, where animals are illegally transported into the UK in horrendous conditions. Puppies are often bred in terrible conditions and are taken away from their mums at increasingly early ages. They then face a perilous 33-hour-long journey to the UK, often with no food, little water and no exercise. Recent research from Dogs Trust has also found that, increasingly, heavily pregnant dogs are being imported into the UK, often at the late stage of their pregnancies, in order to circumvent the ban on commercial third-party puppy sales, which came into force in England in April last year.
The Government have a responsibility to act to stop these barbaric practices, and I urge the Minister to work with charities that have the expertise in this area to achieve lasting change for our four-legged friends. Although I am pleased to see that the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill just about managed to clear Report stage in the Commons on Friday, and I congratulate the hon. Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder) on his fantastic work campaigning on this issue, without the adequate funding and support, how are the police supposed to enforce such changes to the law? I recognise that policing and enforcement are not a key responsibility of the Minister’s Department, but I am discouraged by responses that I have received from her colleague, Lord Goldsmith, on this particular issue.
We all know and recognise the importance of an inter-agency, Government departmental approach to tackling social issues, and the policing and enforcement of these abhorrent crimes against animals should be no different. Indeed, I remind the Minister that since 2010, the number of police officers in our forces across England and Wales has fallen by more than 14%. Worryingly, we also now find ourselves with one of the lowest ratios of police officers per 100,000 inhabitants compared with our friends in the EU.
Estimates suggest that the current scale of the increase in the backlog of cases before our courts would take 10 years to clear at pre-pandemic rates. That is clearly outrageous, and I shudder to think of the impact that that will have on the victims of crime in this country, who will be forced to wait years for their day in court. What does this really mean for animal cruelty cases? Well, I suspect that, with our courts and police forces stretched beyond breaking point, there simply will not be capacity to deal with the animal cruelty offences.
Throughout the pandemic, we have seen that there is one rule for them and another for us. When the Prime Minister’s special adviser, Dominic Cummings, drove across the country with symptoms of coronavirus, the rest of us were struggling through lockdown at home—obeying the rules. The same was true with the Government’s absurd exemption to the coronavirus rule of six for hunting in autumn 2020. Not only that, but over Christmas, when so many of us were unable to spend time with our families after a difficult year because of the pandemic, the Tory Government introduced yet another exemption to enable Boxing day hunts to take place. It is no surprise when you find out that the Tories and the Prime Minister have taken more than £1 million from donors linked to hunting. If that does not tell you what this Government think about animal welfare, I do not know what does.
Still, after years of campaigning from animal rights groups, the import of so-called hunting trophies into the UK is legal, as long as the animal is licensed under the convention on international trade in endangered species of wild fauna and flora. However, the trade is exacerbating the decline of threatened species and is causing unnecessary suffering to animals. Even worse, it is often being used as a cover for illegal poaching, as traffickers pass off illegal wildlife products as legal.
I welcome the UK Government’s decision to hold a consultation on options to restrict the import and export of hunting trophies into the UK, but the consultation closed on 25 February 2020. It has been over a year since the consultation closed and still the Government have not responded. I implore the Minister to confirm when her Department will formally respond to the consultation, and I look forward to an update in her remarks later.
I am afraid to say that this is not the only area where the UK Government have been too slow to act. Three years ago, the Government promised, after much pressure from public and animal welfare organisations, to include animal sentience legislation in law after Brexit. Well, the transition period has now ended and still no legislation is forthcoming from the Government. What we need now is action, and I fear we are simply stuck in a climate of consultations. I look forward to hearing in the Minister’s update how the Government plan to bring forward legislation on animal welfare protections beyond the current parliamentary Session.
For the animal welfare sector, who work so hard to ensure that every animal lives in a safe and loving home, the pandemic has, of course, sadly brought its own set of financial challenges. Indeed, research by the brilliant Battersea Dogs & Cats Home, who have partnered with the Association of Dogs and Cats Homes to conduct a survey of over 100 centres in January this year, found that nine out of 10 rescue centres had experienced a drop in income, with a third losing over half of their income. According to the RSPCA, the total predicted financial loss for the sector was over £101 million for 2020. Like so many sectors up and down the country, animal welfare charities need specific support from the UK Government in order to survive the coronavirus pandemic.
I sincerely wish, on behalf of animals in need across England, that the UK Government showed a level of commitment to providing funding for charities in line with the support on offer from the fantastic Welsh Labour Government. In Wales, our Welsh Labour Government have ensured that animal welfare charities have access to emergency funding grants, including local authority rates grants, the third sector resilience fund, the voluntary services recovery fund and sector-specific funds via Business Wales. Sadly, it is not the same for colleagues in England, where funding for charities has largely been given to national funders for distribution, such as the National Lottery, which often excludes animal welfare charities.
I have said it before and I say it again: I urge the Minister, if she is serious about animal welfare, to consider following the approach in Wales and to work with colleagues in Her Majesty’s Treasury to provide access to funding for the charities that need it the most. Indeed, I am aware that the Association of Dogs and Cats Homes has specifically lobbied her Department for sector-specific funding—but that has not been forthcoming, despite zoos and aquariums being awarded such funding.
It is also somewhat ironic that the greyhound racing industry was awarded emergency funding through the sports package. That sends a clear message to me and to others across the country that the Government are willing to engage in animal-related pursuits, but only when there is a gain to be made. Hunting and greyhound racing are two examples of such pursuits that put animals at great risk, yet both appear to have the support of the UK Government.
I conclude by referring to two specific animal welfare concerns that I truly believe the Minister’s Department needs to pay close attention to. First, she may be aware of the alarming rise in the number of ear-cropped dogs in the UK. I am sure she knows that the practice of ear cropping is illegal in the UK—quite rightly. The barbaric practice involves the unnecessary and painful mutilation of ear flaps, and often takes place without anaesthesia or pain relief. I should clarify that it also has absolutely no welfare benefit. However, the RSPCA has reported a 621% increase in reports of ear cropping between 2015 to 2020.
Although it is illegal to crop dogs’ ears in the UK, it is not illegal to sell ear-cropped dogs, to import them from abroad, or to take dogs abroad to be cropped. These loopholes act as a smokescreen for those who are illegally cropping dogs in the UK. Sadly, the coronavirus pandemic and the overall increase in demand for dogs and puppies have led to an increase in demand for dogs with cropped ears. These are often Dobermans or American Bullies. Hope Rescue, which I referred to earlier, currently has eight seized puppies from their local area, and six of the eight have cropped ears. This issue really is closer to us than many people may imagine or understand.
Indeed, the Minister may be aware of the petition, which is currently live, to stop this barbaric practice. At the moment, it has more than 67,000 signatures, which just goes to show the widespread feeling about it. I am proud that Hope Rescue is partnering with the “Flop Don’t Crop” campaign, but really things should not be happening this way.
It would also be remiss of me, in a debate on animal welfare, not to mention breed-specific legislation. Too many harmless dogs are being destroyed simply because they are a banned breed—they are destroyed because of what they look like, regardless of their temperament. We must recognise that all dogs can bite and that any animal can be dangerous in the wrong hands, regardless of breed or type, or the fact that they look a certain way. Any action to tackle dog bites and all other instances of canine aggression must be focused on the deed, not the breed.
The RSPCA believes that breed-specific legislation is ineffective in protecting public safety, and results in the unnecessary suffering and even the euthanasia of many dogs. It believes that breed-specific legislation should be repealed and that the issues surrounding human safety should be tackled using education and effective legislative measures that do not unnecessarily compromise dog welfare. Sadly, to comply with the current legislation, the RSPCA has had to euthanise hundreds of dogs, and many other rescue centres have had to do the same. Many of these dogs would have been suitable for rehoming.
I am particularly looking forward to hearing the Minister’s specific comments about what her Department is doing to work with local authorities and law enforcement organisations to review the current legislation and to prevent the barbaric practice of ear cropping.
Taken together, it is clear to me that the issues raised in this debate show the urgent need for a comprehensive animal welfare Bill to be introduced by the Government, yet legislation is only a stepping stone to solving the issues that we see far too often with the regulation of animal welfare practices. Parcelling up individual policy ideas into announcements might work well for the Government’s press office, but it does not truly address the animal welfare problems in this country.
With a Queen’s Speech just around the corner, I urge the Minister to bring forward specific legislation on this issue and, crucially, to ensure that police, courts and local authorities are properly funded to ensure that such legislation is enforced.
Diolch.
Esther McVey (in the Chair)
Back Benchers will now be called, followed by the Scottish National party spokesperson, the Opposition Front-Bench spokesperson and the Minister. I will look to call the first Front-Bench spokesperson no later than 3.30 pm. We have plenty of time—approximately 10 minutes—for each of the Members to speak.
Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con) [V]
It is a privilege to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey. I congratulate the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) on securing this important debate. Animal welfare is an issue that unites us; I firmly believe that we should work together and that animal welfare should transcend party politics.
First, I declare a strong interest as a veterinary surgeon, and put on record my thanks to the vets, nurses and staff in practices up and down the country, who have done so much to look after the health and welfare of animals during these challenging times. They are the custodians of animal health and welfare and they have stepped up admirably to administer care in challenging circumstances. I would also like to thank the animal welfare charities that have had a challenging time during this period.
As we heard from the hon. Lady, covid has brought into sharp relief many issues related to animal welfare. We all know the benefits of owning animals and looking after pets; how that can help our own mental and physical health, as well as bring benefits to the animals. That is an important point to remember.
Unfortunately, the covid crisis has brought into sharp relief related negative aspects. As we have heard, there has been a significant increase in demand for pets and animals, leading to huge increases in prices, which fuel the trade in animals and the scope for unscrupulous breeders to come into the market. We have also heard about a significant increase in pet smuggling, leading to puppies being transported in dreadful conditions. There have been horrific cases of heavily pregnant dogs being transported in awful circumstances to give birth, in order to get round loopholes in legislation. There has been a decrease in the number of animals transported through the Pet Travel Scheme but conversely an increase in the commercial movement of animals into the UK, for instance, through the Balai directive.
The Select Committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, on which I sit, is conducting an inquiry into the movement of animals across borders and will look at many of these issues. Sadly, there has been a significant increase in reports of theft of both domestic animals, such as pets, and livestock and horses. There have been reports from various police authorities of the increase in domestic abuse throughout the crisis. Sadly, we know the link between domestic abuse and animal abuse in certain households. That has significant animal welfare implications.
There are concerns that we are potentially storing up problems. People who have taken on animals or are looking after them may have been slow to bring their animals for vaccination. There has been a reported reduction in the number of neutering surgeries. Animals that have been taken on, such as puppies, may also have had reduced socialisation, which could lead to future behavioural problems.
As we come through the crisis, animal charities have expressed fears about significant abandonment of animals. People who thought this was a good time to take on a pet might not have thought through the implications or financial cost, with the potential for increased abandonment. As we get society back to normal, people return to the workplace and kids go back to school, stored-up behavioural issues for animals are possible, such as the syndrome known as separation anxiety. We need to be cognisant of that.
Charities and rescue centres have struggled during the crisis. Their funding sources have been reduced alongside their fundraising capability. Some have been able to find support through the generous Government schemes instituted through the crisis, but we need to keep an eye on that, to ensure that targeted support can be made available. This is not just an issue of small animals—cats, dogs and pets. Equine welfare charities estimate that at the start of 2020, approximately 7,000 horses were at risk of imminent need of rescue. That could have escalated to more than 10,000 by the end of the year.
We need to think about the take-home messages from this crisis. We need to keep an eye on the charitable sector and ensure that there is targeted support for animal welfare charities to deliver the care that may be needed as we come through the crisis. I look forward to hearing from the Minister on the role that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs will take in keeping a watching brief on this area for any unintended consequences, and any animal health and welfare issues that may have been stored up through the crisis.
We also need to think about tightening legislation. As the hon. Member for Pontypridd said, we all welcome the fact that the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill is progressing to the other place. That is fantastic news and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder) on championing that Bill. With increased sentences for animal cruelty, we also need to work out whether there are better ways of deterring people from pet and animal theft. We need to look at sentencing there.
There is scope to tighten up rules and legislation now that we have left the European Union. I ask the Government to look at this closely, so that we have a real opportunity to improve the health and welfare of animals that are moved around, and of animals in our own country. I suggest that we look at raising the minimum age at which cats and dogs can be brought into the country to six months. We also need to be able to tighten the health requirements of animals as they are moved into the country and reinstate, for instance, the mandatory tick treatment that was abolished a few years ago, which will improve the animal health and welfare status of animals in the United Kingdom.
As we have seen, there have been significant challenges to animal health and welfare during the coronavirus crisis. We need to learn the lessons from that and see if we can put in place measures to improve animal health and welfare. We need to monitor the situation closely and keep a watching brief on the care of the animals that we have a moral duty to look after—these fully sentient beings that we are so privileged to look after.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP) [V]
I thank the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) for her sponsorship of this debate and her excellent exposition of the challenges for animal welfare as a result of covid-19.
Although, with covid-19, we face a situation unparalleled in our lifetime, with all its challenges and all it has cost us in the loss of loved ones, job opportunities, and disruption, we know that there is no situation that will diminish the importance of animal welfare in the eyes of our constituents. The UK is indeed four nations of animal lovers. Animal welfare has been a mainstay of my inbox since 2015, whether the subject is the cruel practice of puppy smuggling, the ivory trade, the fur trade, experimentation on animals, the wildlife trade, animal caging, or trophy hunting. Animal cruelty of any type has motivated my constituents to contact me in large numbers to express their concerns. I am sure every Member present would say the same.
Covid-19 has thrown up challenges for animal welfare, as it has in a whole range of areas. For charities such as Dogs Trust, covid-19 has put significant strain on its operations, and its rehoming centres have had to operate at a much reduced capacity. All 20 of its rehoming centres were closed to the public while staff continued to do all they could to safeguard the welfare of the dogs in its care. Rehoming has taken place during covid-19, but it has been very challenging and last year decreased by 88%. The same is true for cats, according to Cats Protection. This is deeply unfortunate when we know that covid led to an increased demand for dogs, with Google searches for “buy a puppy” increasing by 166% after the first lockdown was announced.
It is not surprising that more people want the companionship of a dog or cat when they are forced to spend more time at home. But, as we have heard, there is some concern that, when people return to something like a normal routine, or if people find themselves out of work and on a much tighter budget, they may find that they can no longer accommodate a pet in their lives as they once did. Charities like Dogs Trust, the Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, Blue Cross or Cats Protection will somehow take on these animals, and offer them whatever home they can. We also expect that the so-called pandemic puppies are likely to be less socialised than they would be if they had been bought in normal times. Animal charities have some concerns about puppies acquired during lockdown, with limited opportunities for socialising, social distancing, a lack of exposure to other people and, indeed, a lack of exposure even to traffic and everyday life. Ultimately, those charities may have to pick up the pieces if those pets are required to be rehomed.
We also know that having a dog and a cat can incur costs that may not have been considered at the outset. The Battersea Dogs and Cats Home estimates that 19% of new pet owners come to regret their decision to acquire a pet, mainly because of costs. Unfortunately, the demand for puppies during covid has also been exploited by those engaged in puppy smuggling. We know that puppy smuggling causes great distress to puppies, and is damaging to them. My view is that the barbaric practice is so lucrative that nothing but the potential threat of a significant custodial sentence for the crime can realistically hope to help mitigate the growing problem.
It is also worth considering the challenges that people faced in accessing and financing veterinary care during the pandemic, as we heard earlier. Lockdown limited access to veterinary care, which means that there is a backlog of neutering, and vaccination courses for pets have been disrupted. Even when those normal services resume, we cannot assume that every dog owner—however well-intentioned—will be able to afford the cost of veterinary care for their pet as they perhaps once could. Delays in accessing treatments for pets, or an inability to afford it, could have real longer-term implications for the overall health of pets. That is an especially significant issue for cats, as it could lead to much higher numbers of unwanted litters.
Charities that work hard to improve animal welfare are under pressure, and they will be dealing with the fall-out for years to come as the consequences are all too real. The Paws Protect service of Cats Protection, which supports survivors of domestic abuse and their cats, found that it simply could not cope with all the referrals to its service during 2020. Yet, as we have heard, the link between domestic abuse and animal abuse is well established. Indeed, pet cats and dogs are at high risk in abusive households, as perpetrators direct their anger at pets and use them to manipulate their victims.
Just as animal welfare charities have found that their services are more in demand than ever, the opportunities for traditional fundraising have all but disappeared, and their income stream has been very seriously curtailed. Charity shops are closed, which meant the loss of £4 million in the first four months of shop closures in 2020 for Cats Protection. That income can never be recovered, as all fundraising adventure challenges were cancelled as well, and there were fewer and fewer opportunities for cat adoption and the fees derived from that.
We are all concerned about the negative impacts on animal welfare as a result of covid-19, so today seems like a good day to highlight to the Minister what can be done about it. For a start, animal welfare charities could be helped: we know they will be under severe strain in the months and years following lockdown as they deal with the animal welfare crisis. The fallout from covid looks all too set to continue, so it is really important that the Government work with animal welfare charities to see how they can better support the work that those charities currently do, as well as all the additional work the sector will face as we return to some kind of normality.
Underpinning all that is the need to ensure that the high standards we all wish to see are a feature of our trade deals. During the passage of the Agriculture Act 2020 and of the Trade Bill, the SNP fought to ensure that imported foods had to match our high animal welfare and safety standards in domestic produce to ensure that our farmers are not undercut by low-quality and low-grade animal welfare regulations. Instead, foreign traders with lower animal welfare standards, and consequently lower costs, may have a competitive advantage now and in the future over our own farmers.
A race to the bottom does not promote the high standards of animal welfare that we all want, including, of course, for the sake of the food that we eat—we surely cannot have forgotten the risk of damage to our foods posed by compromising on animal welfare—and to militate against diseases such as foot and mouth disease and swine flu. It is really important that the Government lobby through international bodies to pressure countries to upgrade their animal welfare regulations, to avoid the potential of disease outbreaks crippling our domestic standards in trade deals.
Since 2015, when I was elected to this place, I have been calling for tougher penalties for animal cruelty. The Scottish Government agreed, and have enshrined tougher penalties for animal cruelty into law, with a maximum five-year sentence and unlimited fines. It really is time for the UK Government to get this on the statute books as well, as soon as possible, because they have fallen behind in that regard. Covid-19 has been hard on all of us, but the consequences for the animal welfare charitable sector have been devastating. We must do more to support the vital work undertaken by animal welfare charities, and I very much look forward to hearing from the Minister as to how she intends to do so.
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Ms McVey, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) on securing time to debate this important issue. After 12 months of this health emergency, we are all very conscious that thousands of people have lost loved ones; others are debilitated by long covid and the after-effects of the virus; and, of course, so many people have lost their jobs or had their incomes drastically cut by the emergency. All those people have my sympathy and support after all the difficult experiences they have been through.
However, the sad fact is that this health crisis has also hit defenceless animals, as we have already heard in this debate. Like others, I pay tribute to everyone who has been involved in caring for animals, whether that is people caring for their own pets, vets and their staff, zoo staff, farmers, or the animal welfare charities and rescue centres that do such incredible work. The sad fact is that most charitable fundraising has become almost impossible over the past year, leaving a really significant gap in the income of these very important bodies. As we have already heard, the Battersea Dogs and Cats Home reports, for example, that nine out of 10 rescue centres have seen their income fall. Furlough clearly will have helped, as will much of the rest of the Government’s comprehensive covid support scheme, but it still leaves a hole in the income of these charities caring for vulnerable animals.
The Battersea charity also reports a 214% spike in people searching online to buy a dog. Heightened demand has seen prices climb, leading to increased anxiety about pet theft. It will have also increased dependence on pet imports, some of which, as we have heard, involve smuggling and illegal and unacceptable welfare practices. Over £280,000 has been lost to fraudsters from people paying deposits for pets advertised online. The big increase in the number of people buying new pets will, for many, have provided a crucial and much-valued antidote to loneliness and boredom during lockdown, particularly for many children stuck at home week after week, away from their friends. However, the worry is that the covid rush to buy cats, dogs and other pets may ultimately lead to an upsurge in companion animals being relinquished or abandoned when reality bites and we all start to return to the office.
Another grave concern is domestic violence. Being shut up at home in lockdown with an abusive partner can, of course, lead to horrific and frightening consequences for women, and it is very sad that such situations can also lead to horrendous treatment of pets.
In conclusion, I hope the Minister will listen to what has been said today and to the animal welfare charities and campaign groups. It is crucial that the Government find a way for big charity fundraising events to start up again. The cancellation of the London marathon alone will have left a huge dent in charitable fundraising. We have to get these events open again with spectators and mass participants.
I also call on the Government always to emphasise the benefits of people getting a pet from a rescue centre, rather than taking risks with unreliable online sources. We also need to see determined action to crack down on pet theft, reflecting the fact that the loss of an animal is far more heartbreaking, distressing and upsetting than having a phone or TV stolen. Now we have left the European Union, we have an opportunity to crack down on unlawful puppy imports, as we are now allowed to place tougher restrictions on imports that were previously barred by the single market. It is vital that we fulfil our promise to get recognition of animal sentience on the statute book.
Last, but possibly the most important of all, the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill must finally be implemented. It has had such a depressing stop-start history. How many times has it started in this House—three or four times? It is time to get this done. It is a great opportunity for us to discuss these issues and I look forward to the Minister’s response. I know this Government are really serious about animal welfare. They have done good work, but there is really vital work still to be done.
James Daly (Bury North) (Con) [V]
It is a delight to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I congratulate the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) on securing such an important debate. Having heard the contributions so far, there is very little to add, as my colleagues have expressed the very real and varied issues of animal welfare that have been exacerbated during the pandemic period in an articulate and passionate way. I am always interested and delighted to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Dr Hudson), who uses his expertise on these matters as a true animal welfare champion, and I would always turn to his wise words on many of these issues.
Like other Members, I have consulted many facts and figures about what I wanted to say today, but I am going to go back to something I have spoken about before to the excellent Minister. I have had an opportunity to speak to her on a number of occasions, and she is a champion of animal welfare. Rather than simply regurgitating facts, I have to mention my private Member’s Bill, which is snappily titled the Pets (Microchips) Bill, and urges the Government to consider putting Tuk’s law and Gizmo’s law into legislation. For those who are unaware, Tuk’s law—this is the aim of my private Member’s Bill, as well as the aim of hundreds of thousands of people throughout the country—would make it a legal requirement for veterinary surgeons to scan for rescue back-up contact details of, for example, a former owner or breeder, and contact those people to inquire whether they would like to take ownership of the pet, and confirm that the person presenting the animal to the veterinary surgeon is registered on the microchip prior to euthanasia of the pet.
When I was first approached about this issue, I was absolutely astonished. I have a pet dog, Bertie, who is, along with many other things, the light of my life. The impact of Bertie, who was bought during the pandemic, especially on my two young children has been a joy to behold. The idea that people could go to a veterinary surgeon with a fit and healthy dog, present themselves as the owner—or not the owner in certain circumstances—and that animal could potentially be euthanised is clearly something that legislation is required to address.
My hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border knows far more about these issues than me, but there has been much consultation on this, and I genuinely believe this is a matter of animal welfare that the Government can support. The protection of innocent dogs is something we all want to see strengthened within legislation, and clearly the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill is an absolute prerequisite in terms of statutory provision for animals.
I was a criminal defence solicitor for 16 years before coming to Parliament. The sentences in court for animal welfare offences were ludicrously lenient for many, many years, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder) for the work he has done in this Parliament on that issue.
Other Members have articulated the case that many pets have been purchased over the period of the pandemic, and many people who bought their pets in good faith are finding it difficult to cope with those animals for a wide variety of reasons. The role of Tuk’s law is to strengthen and protect the interests of every animal—whether a stray animal or animal that has been bought, perhaps mistakenly, during the pandemic, or an animal that the owners cannot cope with—to make sure that there is a requirement that the microchip is scanned, that contact details are sought, and every animal is protected.
I would also like to talk about Gizmo’s law. The first person I met after being elected was a wonderful lady called Helena Abrahams, who spent the last number of years leading a campaign for Gizmo’s law. Gizmo’s law is a very simple, cost-neutral measure to respect pet cats in both life and death. Sadly, many pet cats—and other pets—die on our roads and in various other circumstances. When they are found they are often taken to local authorities, which dispose of those pets without scanning the microchips that they may have, and without trying to establish the ownership of a much-loved pet.
Helena, whom—this is very unparliamentary language —I love to death, is passionate about wanting to make sure that those pets are respected and that animal welfare rights are respected, and that the owners have the opportunity to be reunited with their pets in these difficult circumstances. She has fought a campaign in which she has persuaded a very large pet-food manufacturer to undertake to purchase scanners for every local authority in the country to ensure that this is a cost-neutral measure.
I have taken the opportunity today to support everything that my colleagues have said. We need to face up to the realities of the pandemic and its negative impact on many facets of the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will wish to take the opportunity to support my private Member’s Bill, to support the hundreds of thousands of people who want to put Tuk’s law and Gizmo’s law into legislation, and feel that it is an animal welfare measure that all of us can support across the political spectrum. I welcome any further opportunity to speak on this matter with the excellent Minister.
Esther McVey (in the Chair)
I move now to the Front-Bench contributions, mindful of the fact that we will leave time at the end for Alex Davies-Jones to make some winding-up comments.
Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) for securing this debate, which is about a very serious problem for people across these islands. My constituents in Angus are no different, and have contacted me in significant numbers about this issue.
Since devolution, where Scotland leads, the rest of the UK often follows, and so it is in animal welfare. Scotland was the first part of the UK to ban performances of wild animals in travelling circuses. That important animal welfare policy was widely welcomed, and since been replicated elsewhere in the UK.
As part of the European Union, we were obligated to maintain strict animal welfare policies. In some instances, Scotland exceeded the minimum standards, for example, with bans on fur farms. While there are historic positives, there are also low points, such as the Conservatives’ manifesto position in 2015 and again, in 2017. They stood on a manifesto that would give their MPs a free vote on repealing the fox-hunting ban—a ban against which the Prime Minister himself voted in 2004.
With the effects of covid compounded by the administrative and exporting challenges thrown up by Brexit, along with to the Government’s refusal to uphold animal welfare standards in either the Trade Bill or the Agriculture Act 2020, we see a challenged position. Moreover, that position is inconsistent with “Scotland the Brand”, which has a world-class reputation, thanks in no small part to Scotland’s strong animal welfare policies.
Covid has presented additional challenges, over and above Brexit, on animal welfare and, in particular, on the domestic and international trade in puppies. Alongside my colleagues on the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, which includes the wise counsel of the hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Dr Hudson), I heard harrowing evidence about the malice of puppy smugglers and the contempt with which they treat litters, and especially the mothers of those litters: caesarean sections are carried out inhumanely quickly one after the other, leaving insufficient time to heal. It is an egregious, greedy trade. The Government have an opportunity to address this issue, which is of real concern to ordinary members of the public.
Puppy demand and prices experienced an extraordinary jump following the covid outbreak. That, in turn, led to a 140% increase in commercial import licences for foreign dog breeders. It is important to note that not all foreign dog breeders are breaching animal welfare standards en masse. Likewise, it is important to acknowledge that there are instances of breeders breaching standards on these British Isles. Taken together at home and abroad, this issue is of significant concern to my Angus constituents, as is the horrendous spike in dog thefts, which is terrifying for families with dogs.
As a dog owner myself, I know the importance of dogs to families across the UK, and the place that they hold in the hearts of the British public. The difference that my beautiful old golden retriever, Maggie, has made to my family during lockdown has been invaluable—she ensures that we get exercise and she provides companionship. It is no wonder that people have sought similar comfort and enjoyment from having a pet.
I was delighted to support the excellent work of Dogs Trust, which provided information to hon. Members before the debate. The Scottish Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals reported that a gang of puppy smugglers were arrested following the use of an Airbnb property to sell trafficked puppies. There is a significant element of duplicity in the trade. Half those puppies died, including from parvovirus, because of the squalid conditions in which those poor creatures must have spent their brutish, short lives. That poses a more general risk to dog health in the community.
One SSPCA investigator noted that public demand for puppies
“remains sky high and as long as this continues, bad dealers will find any means to operate.”
Dogs Trust also noted that the effects and impact of the pandemic would be felt for some time to come. That is true for all walks of life, but in this context, it would be sensible for Government to carefully consider the Blue Cross recommendation that Governments undertake work to determine the impact of covid-19 on puppy farming and smuggling, the damage caused to date, and how to reverse that trend.
The demand for puppies fuelled the unsustainable rise in prices, and for families duped into buying a puppy from an unreputable breeder, that causes significant financial loss, as well as heartache. We have seen an apparent increase in impulse purchases: 31% of people who acquired a dog or a cat during the first lockdown stated that they were not considering becoming pet owners beforehand. Although the great majority of recent pet owners will go on to provide safe and loving homes for their pets, that spike in ownership presents a clear risk that, for some, the good intentions will give way to the financial reality—not least the first uninsured visit to the vet for health complaints which, if the animal was poorly bred, may be the first of many visits to the vet.
That will inevitably lead to increased health and behavioural problems. Puppies that were introduced to their families with an abundance of affection and attention during lockdown will need careful management when adults return to work and kids go back to school. It will be a very demanding adjustment for animals and humans alike, which will have consequences, including abandonment and pressure on rehoming services. When the consequences of poorly bred dogs or inappropriate and unsustainable ownership or changes in circumstance post lockdown wash out, it will be animal welfare charities that have to pick up the pieces, at a time when their ability to fundraise is seriously constrained, which we must all bear in mind.
There is significant scope for the UK Government to tighten the licensing regime for foreign dog breeders importing puppies into the UK and for the UK Government to work together with devolved Administrations on better regulation for domestic breeders. I look forward to the Minister’s reassurance in this regard.
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to be able to sum up this debate for the Opposition. First, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) for the way in which she introduced this debate with such passion and care. It is very clear that she is an animal lover, not just of Dotty and Dora, but of many other animals as well. I think she spoke for nearly all of us in the debate when she spoke so eloquently about what has happened during the pandemic to our pets and animals, and why it is so important to take action to ensure that there is no more suffering for animals during this period. She is one of Labour’s rising stars and her remarks show us why.
Britain is indeed a nation of animal lovers and, as we have heard throughout the debate, wherever we are in the United Kingdom, there is a requirement, a need and an urgency to see better protection for animals, better enforcement and better funding for those services that are trying to look after those animals. Successive lockdowns have shown more than ever how important animals are to our wellbeing and how much joy and comfort they can bring to our lives. They really are incredibly special.
Pets are not just a commodity; they are not just an item to be purchased; they are not a DVD player or an iPhone—they are part of the family. When we talk about pets and the impact on animals throughout the pandemic, we should approach it from that point—our pets are a full part of our families, not just property. Sadly, that is not how they are described in law. Many of the challenges presented to the Minister today are about how the law can better reflect the importance of animals and how our relationship with animals has changed over time. They are no longer just work animals in support of our economy, but animals to comfort, nurture and be a full member of our families.
A number of issues have been raised in this debate. I thank all hon. Members who have spoken. They have all raised very important, serious issues that need to be addressed by the Minister—I hope they will be.
There has been a huge rise in demand for dogs and cats—pandemic puppies and covid cats—during this period, and that is clear not only in the price paid for them, but in internet searches for them. That creates an opportunity for unscrupulous dealers and those people who want to exploit, con and make money at all costs, including accepting cruelty to animals. As well as the increased sale of healthy pets, there has been a rise in the number of dogs and cats being imported into the UK from unscrupulous dealers. As the hon. Member for Angus (Dave Doogan), not all foreign imports are from unscrupulous dealers, but sadly, far too many of them are. That needs to be addressed.
Many unscrupulous dealers are taking pets away from their mothers at an extremely young age. Those pets have a higher risk of carrying diseases and have not been fully nurtured into the healthy young animals we hope them to be. Many new pet owners have participated in impulse-buying over the pandemic. Battersea Dogs and Cats Home found that 42% of pandemic pup buyers had not seen their puppy’s breeding environment prior to purchase, and 27% paid for their puppy without even seeing it.
This situation underlines the need not only for regulatory action, but for better communication of the laws that already exist. In many cases, campaigners, on a cross-party basis, have changed the law, to require that animals should be seen with their mother and to make sure that animal cruelty in the breeding process is eliminated as much as possible, but if people do not know that those laws exist, they might as well not exist. That is a really important part of the communication effort that I encourage the Minister to look at. As well as arguing for regulation, we need to make sure that people understand what is going on, so they can be better protected.
Now more than ever, when demand for pets is so high, it is vital that the Government increase the legal imported age to six months, as has been discussed. Doing so would make it easier for imported dogs to be checked for rabies and would also ensure that pets are not taken for long journeys at far too young an age. I would also like the Government to stop allowing soft repercussions for those who disregard animal welfare for their own monetary benefits.
We have heard much about the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill—and believe me, the Minister has heard an awful lot from me about it over many years. As we heard from the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers), we can have no more false starts on this Bill. She argued for it during her time at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs; indeed, successive Secretaries of State have argued for it. There seems to be a blockage in the way that Bills are brought forward to Parliament and a blind spot towards the needs of animals among those doing the parliamentary programming. I know that the Minister shares that concern and will do all that she can to ensure that the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill is passed through the other place in due course.
Equally, I pay tribute to my fellow west country Member, the hon. Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder), for his work. In praising him for the way that he has conducted his campaign, I also place on record the work of Anna Turley, the former Member for Redcar, who did so much during her time in this place to learn the lessons from the experience of Baby, the young dog that was cruelly abused in such an awful way. Although increasing the sentence for animal cruelty from six months to five years in the most extreme cases is a substantial step, the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill does not do two things that in my mind it must do.
The first is to apply equally to wild animals as it does to domestic animals, a step that has been taken elsewhere in the United Kingdom but not in England. Secondly, learning the lesson from Baby’s law, we should consider introducing the aggravating offence of deliberately filming the animal cruelty for the personal enjoyment of those doing it or to boast by sharing it online. That is an extra-special form of cruelty, and the law should better reflect that. We did not have the chance to vote on those amendments, which Labour tabled, to the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill. The Minister will know that I am hopeful that she will look to cut and paste those amendments, in the spirit of cross-party co-operation, in any future legislation.
I want to turn briefly to pet theft, which my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd and others mentioned. Losing a pet is not about losing property, which is what the law currently suggests, so I think the law on pet theft needs to be updated. It needs to be better understood and communicated; it also needs to be better enforced. Lockdown has created situations that have led to social media panic, certainly in Plymouth and Pontypridd, about the risk of dog theft. Although pet theft has increased during the pandemic, especially for rare and valuable breeds of dogs and cats in particular, the worry for people that someone will steal their animal, or that something could happen if they let it out of sight, has been combined with the extra worry of those walking their dog on their own, especially at night. Many dog owners have correctly taken extra steps to avoid people during the pandemic, following Government advice to stay away from people, but in doing so they potentially put themselves at greater risk, if only of greater worry about what might happen to them. The Minister urgently needs to communicate with her colleagues at the Home Office to ensure that pet theft is adequately addressed in law and also regulation.
We have seen not only risks of cruelty towards pets, but risks of animals not receiving the medical care they need. The hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Dr Hudson) used his expertise very wisely to talk about the implications of not taking a new animal to a vet for support, and I support his words of thanks to those in the veterinary profession for their tireless work to help animals during the pandemic. We need to ensure that we pick up on the lessons from microchipping, which the hon. Member for Bury North (James Daly) spoke about. Tuk’s law and Gizmo’s law are much to be supported, but I would like the Minister to apply the same emphasis elsewhere, because it is not right that steps are taken to microchip animals without then scanning them at certain points. Indeed, I might go one step further and suggest that we extend the current requirement to report on motor incidents involving livestock and dogs to include cats, because as we know, the loss of an animal, especially when they have a microchip, or not knowing what has happened to them is very serious.
I would also like to echo the concerns raised by hon. Members about the funding for animal welfare charities. Each animal welfare charity is really important in stopping cruelty in their community and for campaigning for better standards, and I am very concerned to read of the huge numbers of losses that many animal welfare charities have had during this period. Dogs Trust has seen a loss of income of 15% to 30% in donations and legacy income. RSPCA had a 12% fall in donations and a 9% reduction in legacies, and Battersea Dogs and Cats Home has suffered a £4 million loss in fundraising income.
Smaller charities have also suffered. They might not have the public affairs team to send us briefs on it, but smaller animal charities up and down the country are equally facing difficult times. The Association of Dogs and Cats Homes found that 47% of the 142 UK rescue organisations have reported an income drop of more than 50%. With a recession looming, their recovery will be incredibly difficult, and extending support to those organisations is incredibly vital, as we have heard from the hon. Member for Pontypridd. Just as we have seen with the zoo support fund, the Minister has allocated funding for it, but with 97% of the zoo support fund not yet spent, I encourage her to look at the conditions for that and see whether money can be allocated to support those individuals or steps can be taken by the Treasury.
The hon. Member for Penrith and The Border spoke about the need to ensure that it is not just domestic animals that are protected during this period. The case he made around equine health is especially important because of the incredible cost of keeping a horse. I share his concern that horse abandonment will increase during this period. I know these concerns are shared by the animal welfare sector as well, and I think the Minister would be wise to look at this issue. One way that she could address this area and provide a bit of hope would be to look at the Labour animal welfare manifesto from the previous election. There is much to be said for bringing forward a comprehensive animal welfare Bill in the next Queen’s Speech. It is a proposition that I have put to the Minister previously in debates, and I hope that she will take it up in the spirit that it is intended.
There is cross-party support for tougher measures for animal welfare, better support for pet owners and better support for those people working in this sector. In my mind, an animal welfare Bill should include provisions for tightening the rules on pet theft and puppy smuggling. Should the Bill sponsored by the hon. Member for Bury North not pass, an animal welfare Bill should adopt Tuk’s law and Gizmo’s law and look at cat microchipping. It should look at cruelty to wild animals and include tougher sentences for filming, as I mentioned in relation to the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill earlier. It should also include provisions for animal sentience and for the “flop not crop” campaign to ensure that dog ear cropping is not part of our national culture.
An animal welfare Bill should also improve accessibility to vets, improve affordability for those on low incomes, and improve tenants’ ability to properly keep pets. It should improve reporting of motor incidents to include animals beyond livestock and dogs, and take action around livestock worrying. Many people have taken their animals into rural areas and that has had consequences for farm animals. I think that can be better supported without necessarily reducing the right to roam along the way. As we have heard from the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson), action should be taken to ban fur imports and to address trophy hunting. Finally, there should be an animal welfare commissioner to produce an annual report on the state of animal welfare in England in particular.
With a Bill as comprehensive as that, there would be much that would have cross-party support. I would encourage the Minister to look carefully at how that can be included in the Queen’s Speech that we are expecting, so we can avoid so many of these debates where hon. Members on both sides make the same cases. Let us have one single Bill to deal with all these issues and to make sure that we are properly putting into law the fact that every pet and every animal matters, with proper, decent protection and funding to go along with it.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Victoria Prentis)
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I join in thanking the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), inspired by Dotty and Dora, for organising this debate today. It has been thoughtful and full of many ideas, to which I will try to respond. If I do not manage to deal with everything, then please do come and talk to me at any point about animal welfare. It is right that we talk about this a great deal in this place, and it is right that our constituents are concerned about it. While much of the national attention has rightly been focused on the impact on humans of the pandemic, today’s debate is a reminder that we are a nation of animal lovers and we do have compassion and concern for the impact of the pandemic on animal welfare generally.
We have all heard a great deal about the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill, which I was thrilled to see finish its stages in this House last Friday. It was tense to the end—we have been kept guessing throughout its passage—and if I may say so, it is a testament to cross-party working, for which I will put on the record formally my thanks to the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard). I heard the points that he made once again today, in particular about the filming of animals. Although I do not think that we will amend the Bill—we want it to go through and the way to achieve that is by not amending it—I have said before and I will say again today that I will make points in the guidelines about filming. I hope that they will remain part of the way that sentences are given under the Bill, which we hope will soon be a piece of legislation.
DEFRA has been monitoring animal welfare very closely since the start of the pandemic and I would like to assure everybody that we will continue to work closely with the sector to understand the long-term impacts, which are not exactly as we imagined they would be this time a year ago. I, too, pay tribute to the hard work of animal welfare charities, the pet industry and the vets who have all been affected by the pandemic but have continued to prioritise animal welfare in the face of financial hardship and, indeed, uncertainty.
I will also take this opportunity to thank farming organisations and charities for all the support that they have given to farmers during this very difficult year. I never forget that most of the captive animals in this country are, of course, on farms. When we talk about animal welfare, we often do not focus on those animals, but DEFRA will very much focus on them in the future, and it is important that we remember that.
We have had really good speeches this afternoon on a number of topics. Another point made by the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport, was that it is important to remind people of our laws. So I will, if I may, pick up on some of the laws that have been mentioned by others, as a reminder to us all.
My hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Dr Hudson) is a vet and he spoke passionately to remind us all of the importance of taking our pets and our farm animals for vaccinations and neutering, for example, even during the pandemic. I have accessed vets several times during the pandemic. The first time, in full lockdown, the animal was handed over in a carrying case. Indeed, the vets also had to attend my smallholding during full lockdown; I remember leaving the animals’ passports outside their doors, so that the vet did not even have to speak to me. It has been possible, though difficult, to treat animals throughout the pandemic and vets have done a really good job of managing that.
My hon. Friend is also a member of the EFRA Committee and he spoke about the report on the movement of animals across borders that is being prepared by that Committee. It is a report that I look forward to very much. This is an area where, following the end of the transition period and our departure from the EU, we will be able to take further action, if we think it is appropriate to do so. Several Members talked about pet smuggling, for example, and this is an issue where there may now be the possibility of taking the action that I believe many people would welcome. So, I look forward to that report and to engaging with him further on this issue.
The hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) spoke about pandemic puppies and how she fears they will be less socialised than other puppies. She spoke, too, about the cats that have not been neutered during the pandemic, who will of course go on to have unwanted litters in the future. I thought that was a point very well made; we need to remember that the effects of the pandemic on animals will continue in future years.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) made an excellent speech in which she reminded us of many of the important issues that we need to tackle in legislation. She also made the really fundamental point that if we want new animals to keep at home, we should get them from a rescue centre. That point cannot be made too often. She also argued forcibly for big charitable fundraising events to take place again soon. On the way to the debate, I spoke to a Minister from the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport about that very subject. I am glad to say that I also spoke to the Leader of the House once again about how to continue the progress of the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill. I was worried that I would be late for the debate as a result, but that was important.
I turn to my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (James Daly), the owner of Bertie. He and I have discussed Tuk’s law and Gizmo’s law many times. The Government are a great supporter of microchipping for animals in general, and I very much hope that he receives good news on that in the next Session of Parliament.
The hon. Member for Angus (Dave Doogan), inspired by Maggie the golden retriever, spoke with particular passion about puppy smuggling. I draw attention once again to the Petfished campaign, which has run throughout the pandemic and raises awareness of many of the issues associated with low welfare and the illegal supply of pets. On pet theft generally, raised by a number of hon. Members in this debate and outside it recently, I reassure all those who are worried that DEFRA is working closely with the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice to gather and analyse data and scope the scale of the issue. We will continue to work very closely with those Departments to ensure that we can come up with the correct solutions to this difficult issue.
In April 2020, the Government commissioned the Animal Welfare Committee to advise on animal welfare impacts relating to the pandemic. It made a preliminary report in June 2020, which included concerns about: the ability of businesses, vets and charities to continue to provide services; the need for contingency planning; and the impact of owners’ physical and mental health on their ability to care for their animals. I was relieved to note that, in the committee’s second report, which was published in December, it concluded that many of the animal welfare risks that had concerned it had not been fully realised. The report recognised that the farming sector remained vulnerable to slaughterhouse closures, for example, which might cause animal numbers to build up on farms, with possible welfare consequences.
There were concerns about the companion animal sector relating to increased ownership, reduced access to vets, potential impacts of personal restrictions on pet care and the ability of animal welfare charities to operate with reduced resources. Some of the initial concerns raised by that committee were realised, but we were pleased to note that most of them were not.
DEFRA has provided updated advice for pet owners and livestock keepers on looking after animals throughout the pandemic. The advice explains how people who are self-isolating or hospitalised can access support to care for their pets. We have worked very closely with the Canine and Feline Sector Group, the National Equine Welfare Council and other organisations to review guidance for pet businesses and animal charities so that operations can continue wherever possible. That has enabled rescue centres to continue core services and pet shops to remain open and supply all the needs that our pets have, including food. It has meant that the services of pet groomers can be accessed for welfare reasons, and those who have been hospitalised have had access to pet boarding, dog walking or dog day care.
There have been positive trends as a result of the pandemic, including a real reduction in the number of stray dogs dealt with by local authorities and increased interest, as we have heard all round, from people wanting to foster or rehome pets, which has helped to alleviate some of the sector’s pressures. However, even though covid-19 appears to have had a reduced impact on animal cruelty, that may well be, as many have said, because of reduced visibility. I take the points about the link between animal cruelty and domestic violence. We are very live to that and are monitoring the situation closely with others in the sector.We are aware that the picture we have is not yet the full one.
Luke Pollard
For anyone watching this, can the Minister confirm that there are organisations that will support the animal of anyone fleeing domestic violence as well? The power that a perpetrator may have over an animal should not be used to keep a victim of domestic abuse in their home.
Victoria Prentis
That is an extremely good point. One of the more unpleasant aspects of domestic violence is the use of a pet as a psychological, and sometimes physical weapon by the perpetrator. It is right that there are organisations that can specifically provide care in those situations. This issue may not have had the full light of day shone on it in the past, but I want to assure all those listening that we take it very seriously.
The hon. Member for Pontypridd raised various specific points, first about mutilating dogs’ ears, which she rightly said has been banned for 15 years in the UK. I am happy to discuss that further with her. It is illegal and unlawful to mutilate a dog. One of the major concerns at the moment is about dogs coming in from abroad who are already mutilated. It is to be hoped that that will be picked up in the work that the EFRA Committee and then DEFRA are doing, looking at the way that pets cross borders.
On breed-specific legislation, I too have visited Battersea Dogs and Cats Home and have seen delightful-looking animals who fall on the wrong side of the breed divide. There are strong views on both sides of this argument and it is only fair that we recognise that the legislation was brought in because of fears for public safety. However, DEFRA has commissioned Middlesex University to do some research on this issue and it is important that we continue to follow the evidence in this difficult area; it really is.
In summary, I wish to reassure all those present that the Government are committed to safeguarding the welfare of animals, particularly during this challenging pandemic period. I have been encouraged to commit to a large animals Bill next session. Sadly, Madam Chairman, that is above my pay grade, but I want to assure those present that DEFRA has a good track record of conducting legislation over the past year. We have had the Agriculture Act 2020, the Fisheries Act 2020 and 94 or so statutory instruments and counting—there will be many more this year. I was thrilled when the private Member’s Bill, the Animal Welfare (Sentencing) Bill, passed the House on Friday. If we are unable to persuade the powers that be to give us one big animals Bill, I want to assure those present that there will be a whole series of Bills to deal with as many of the issues raised today as is possible for us. We are committed to continuing engagement with animal welfare organisations, enforcement agencies and groups across the sector to understand the long-term effects of the pandemic on our animals. I want to assure everyone that we will continue to take action where necessary.
Alex Davies-Jones
Diolch, Madam Chair. It truly has been a pleasure to take part in today’s debate. I am grateful to all colleagues for their contributions and for their excellent pronunciation of the name of my constituency—da iawn. I said at the beginning, and I know, that animal welfare is an issue that cuts across the political divide. Given the incredible cross-party support for some of the issues, I truly believe that.
I recognise that we are living in extraordinary times. People have seen their incomes cut, the job market is increasingly competitive and I know that for many, animal welfare may not be an issue that sits at the top of their priorities. However, we are fortunate to have the opportunity, as elected representatives, to debate important issues and I am grateful to be able to air my concerns, as well as those I have received from constituents in Pontypridd. I welcome the Minister’s comments. She has always been open to discussions with me on animal welfare issues and I thank her for that co-operation. I am glad that she recognises the issues with animal abuse, particularly the comorbidity with other violent and abusive behaviours. I hope that close attention is paid, and that the Minister will take up the issues raised today with colleagues at the Home Office for further discussion.
I welcome the Minister’s comments on pet theft and look forward to hearing more about the discussions she has with the MOJ and the Home Office on that issue. I also welcome the report on puppy smuggling and the movement across borders, and look forward to seeing what help can be given in that area.
Much has been said today about law enforcement. I would like to bring colleagues back to my earlier point about the importance of having laws that both protect and can be readily applied in cases of animal abuse. The Minister’s comments will help us move in the right direction and I am very grateful for that. I look forward to seeing her promises enacted in future legislation from the Government. Diolch.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on animal welfare.
Arrest of Opposition Politicians: Turkey
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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Esther McVey (in the Chair)
I remind hon. Members that there have been changes to normal practice to support the new hybrid arrangements. I remind Members participating virtually that they are visible at all times to each other, and to us in the Boothroyd Room. If Members attending virtually have any technical problems, they should email the Westminster Hall Clerks’ email address. Members attending physically should clean their spaces before they use them and as they leave the room. They should take the cleaning material with them or put it in the bin. I call Feryal Clark to move the motion.
Feryal Clark (Enfield North) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered arrest of opposition politicians in Turkey.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey. I thank the Minister for her time today.
It is said that to be a true friend and ally, one must point out when friends fall short and always be honest in one’s views. By that marker, it would be a dereliction of our friendship if we did not address our growing concerns about how some of our international partners are acting. We would be setting a dangerous precedent that says a formal allegiance trumps values among our neighbours and friends. Turkey is such a friend.
Turkey is a NATO member and an ally of Britain, and has been a member of the Council of Europe since 1950. Turkey is also a trade partner to Britain, but none of that can prevent us from speaking out when it is right and timely to do so. Turkey’s status as a friend makes it even more important that we speak out, and the actions of the Turkish Government should worry us all. The Turkish Government’s attack on free speech and their complete and utter intolerance of pluralism, in politics and the media and in nearly every walk of life, should set off alarm bells for us all.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The hon. Lady is absolutely right. I speak about the human rights abuses and I want to bring to her attention that it is not just politicians who suffer; it is also religious minorities. There is evidence that 140 Protestant families have been expelled from their homes and their jobs owing to the Islamic radical policy of the Turkish Government. Does the hon. Lady feel that it is time there was accountability for all those who suffer human rights abuses in Turkey?
Feryal Clark
I agree with the hon. Gentleman. A real intolerance of religious minority groups is building in the country, which I will touch on in my speech.
Many of us here know that the Kurdish question in Turkey is not new. The treatment of more than 20 million of its Kurdish citizens has been a major cause of concern in the west for many years. In 2015, the general election in Turkey saw HDP, a pro-Kurdish party led by a charismatic leader able to form a coalition of progressives, run in the elections. They were successful in breaking through the 10% threshold needed to win seats in the Turkish Parliament and, in doing so, deny the incumbent Government a majority. The response of the Government was to launch an all-out attack against HDP and the democratically elected opposition politicians who represent it. The litany of abuses stretches far and wide.
Selahattin Demirtaş, one of Turkey’s most prominent politicians and the co-leader of HDP, was arrested and has been in prison for over four and a half years. One of the first charges brought against Mr Demirtaş was that of attending an anti-ISIS protest—let us allow that to sink in. President Erdoğan’s purge of opposition politicians that began in August 2019 included MPs, mayors and councillors from both the HDP and the CHP parties. The CHP party is one of the oldest parties in Turkey, and those MPs, mayors and councillors were stripped of immunity and imprisoned.
Where these democratically elected officials have been imprisoned, President Erdoğan’s AKP Government have implemented a queue-like replacement of them. The AKP Government have imposed Ministry-appointed trustees in Kurdish majority eastern and south-eastern provinces, as well as in secularist and republican areas in the west, such as Izmir. These are actions that undermine democracy and representation, and will undermine the long-term stability of any democratic system.
When we look at the devastation that those actions have done to the plurality of Turkish democracy, we can see that 48 of the 65 municipalities won by HDP in the 2019 local elections have been taken over by the Ministry of the Interior. A total of 122 democratically elected municipal councillors have been detained since August 2019 by an incumbent Government for little more than having the nerve to stand against them in an election and win.
The constant harassment of HDP politicians and members is no longer done in disguise, but with boldness and impunity. This shocking number alone should spur action on the part of the UK Government. A fundamental tenet of a free and democratic system is accepting the right of people to elect their representatives in Government. Without this right, there is no democracy; there is just its appearance, in the hope that countries such as ours will continue to turn a blind eye.
The UK Government already know all this. They also know that the European Court of Human Rights has ordered the immediate release of Selahattin Demirtaş from his extended pre-trial detention. Turkey is a member of the ECHR and therefore has an obligation to uphold the European convention on human rights—a convention that the UK was pivotal in drafting, under the leadership of Winston Churchill. We need to see the very same leadership extended from the UK once more.
I will end my contribution with some serious questions for the Minister. What action are the Government taking to encourage Turkey to work towards the full protection of fundamental human rights in areas of minority rights, freedom of religion and freedom of expression? Will the Government call on Turkey for the immediate release of democratically elected politicians? How will the Government work with our NATO, European and global allies to impress on President Erdoğan that he must adhere to the international treaties that he has signed? What message do the UK Government believe taking no action sends to our other international partners, who look to us for leadership on human rights issues? Will the Minister raise with her Turkish counterparts the unacceptable and brutal attack on the Kurdish populations in Turkey?
Turkey is fast becoming a one-party, one-religion, one-ideology state, with no distinction between Parliament and the judiciary. It has created a system that allows one man to have an almost absolute monopoly of power, where the constitution is changed to ensure that that man can never be removed from office. It is of no benefit to anyone to repeat worn-out platitudes about Turkey’s important geo-political and strategic role. We must stand up for the people of Turkey, our true allies, to help recover a democracy in decline.
Esther McVey (in the Chair)
I will call other Members to speak now, mindful of the time, as I wish to call the Minister no later than 4.25 pm.
Kate Osborne (Jarrow) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield North (Feryal Clark) for securing this important debate. As she said, the increasingly authoritarian policies of President Erdoğan and his Government have been dragging Turkey into further political polarisation, social turmoil and economic instability.
The main opposition party, the HDP, which is majority Kurdish, has suffered continuous harassment, arrests and imprisonment, including over 700 arrests on 15 February this year. The party’s leaders have all received lengthy prison sentences and elected MPs and local politicians have been arrested and replaced with the Government’s appointed trustees.
This authoritarian regime has had a disproportionate effect on women in the country and their legal rights have been eroded. Women face abuse and violence, often by uniformed authorities, and disappearances by the police are commonplace. Many women politicians and trade union activists have been terrorised for defending basic human rights. Non-governmental organisations, including women’s groups and human rights organisations, have been closed by the authorities in the country. The LGBT+ community has also come under threat from the authoritarian policies of President Erdoğan. The country’s justice system is systematically used to criminalise peaceful activities such as Pride events and art exhibitions. Several students and an academic are currently facing prison sentences for organising a Pride march on campus that was banned by the university.
Trade unionists are also under constant attack by the current regime in Turkey, facing both administrative and judicial harassment for carrying out legitimate trade union activities. This makes it extremely concerning that on 29 December last year, the UK Government signed a trade agreement with the Government of Turkey that contains no enforceable commitments for Turkey to respect labour rights, following the same approach as Turkey’s customs agreement with the EU. This means that it will not be possible to use the UK-Turkey agreement to stop the Government of Turkey abusing the rights of unions and workers and committing widespread human rights abuses, as they have done in an increasingly brutal manner in recent years. The UK Government must follow the new US President, Joe Biden, in taking a much firmer line against Turkey’s continued human rights and workers’ rights violations, both within and outside its own borders.
With all that in mind, will the Minister do all she can to ensure that the UK Government do not become complicit with the Turkish Government in a bid to keep the recent roll-over trade deal with Turkey? If the UK Government fail to hold Turkey to account for its human rights abuses, they will, in effect, become complicit. The UK Government must therefore do all they can to push the Turkish Government to work towards protecting fundamental minority rights in the country, and commit to suspending the UK-Turkey trade deal should the Turkish Government implement their threatened ban on the socially progressive HDP party. Finally, I call on the UK Government and the Minister to require the Government of Turkey to show respect for core International Labour Organisation conventions as a precondition of the UK-Turkey agreement being applied.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
I thank my hon. Friends who have just spoken. This is an area of work that the all-party parliamentary group for Kurdistan in Turkey and Syria has been deliberating on. The connection with Kurds in Syria is important, because many of the demonstrations that the Turkish politicians have been accused of attending, and then arrested for, relate to their fight against ISIS in Syria. Over the past few weeks and months, the APPG has been interviewing politicians from Turkey, including municipal leaders and MPs. Our recommendations will hopefully be out at the end of this month, but I want to sum up a few quick points that seem to be coming out of some of those deliberations.
First of all—I will phrase this as “I”, because the APPG has not signed any of these things off; these are my interpretations of what the APPG has heard so far—I am concerned that politicians from opposition parties are routinely accused of bizarre crimes. We heard that they were accused of committing crimes before they were born, such as attending political demonstrations, or were accused of crimes because their families or relatives had done things, going against the principle of justice that states that a person should be judged for what they do, not for what their predecessors have done. Politicians have also been accused of crimes for speaking out for ethnic groups in the Parliament, so protected speech in the Parliament has disappeared.
There have also been trials of politicians from the leading party, AKP, so let us not pretend that they have all been HDP, but they are vastly, overwhelmingly HDP—something like 90% of its MPs, compared with only two AKP MPs, have been tried in the past 10 years. Traditionally in Turkey, with the ruling party’s MPs, the system was that trials were held in the local area. The recent change to trials being held in the central court in Ankara, therefore making MPs unable to provide witnesses or local representatives to those court trials in order to defend themselves, is a key difficulty in obtaining justice. We know that there have been European Court of Human Rights judgments, but they are clearly not complied with.
The removal of MPs should, in my view, be a rare circumstance. However, 154 MPs have had their immunity removed in Turkey, 54 of whom were HDP MPs, and almost 100 were from other parties. Let us remember that the CHP is not a radical loony left or loony right party, but the founding party of modern Turkey. The fact that its MPs are now being targeted makes me feel that if we do not speak up when minority MPs are targeted, we will see what happens: majority MPs from established parties start to be attacked.
Many Kurdish MPs have said that they do not demand their own state but want to be able to talk about how Kurdish representation happens. When the ambassador wrote to me, he said, “We don’t recognise Kurds in our country. We recognise only Turks.” To me that is a denial of people’s civil and cultural rights, and it is a real problem with representation. I do not want to go on for much longer, because I want to give the Minister time, but I hope that she will respond to those points and commit to reading the APPG’s report in detail when it is completed, and responding to it in writing.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (Wendy Morton)
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Enfield North (Feryal Clark) for securing this important debate. Democracy, security and human rights are rightly of serious interest to all Members of this House, and in the time that I have I shall try to respond to the points that the hon. Lady and other hon. Members have raised this afternoon.
President Erdoğan says that 2021 will be a year of reforms for freedoms and the Turkish economy. We welcome those positive intentions and encourage the Turkish Government to deliver action that will improve the human rights situation, not least through reforms to the judiciary. Turkey has made it clear recently that increased prosperity and protecting human rights would be in its own interests. Naturally, we wholeheartedly support that. We therefore welcome the recent publication of Turkey’s human rights action plan and encourage its speedy and comprehensive implementation. We stand ready to assist in any way we can. With nearly 400 actions, the action plan is thorough, but the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and I reiterate that it must be implemented in full.
As a fellow, and long-standing, member of the Council of Europe, we hope that the measures in question will bring Turkey more into line with the high standards that it expects of its members. We fully expect Turkey to implement each of the judgments against it by the European Court of Human Rights. As NATO allies and G20 economies, the UK and Turkey should continue to work closely together. Our shared interests encompass trade, security, defence and climate change. We also share an interest in resolving regional issues such as the continued division of Cyprus, Syria, Nagorno-Karabakh and migration.
Turkey is strategically important to us as we forge links with a more diverse range of partners in the interests of Britain’s security and prosperity. That said, and although the UK enjoys a productive partnership with Turkey on the issues that I have mentioned, we have concerns about the human rights situation, and we raise them with the Turkish authorities. We share the concerns of our US and European partners on issues to do with media freedom, the treatment of human rights defenders, and the LGBTI community and opposition parties.
We note that a number of HDP—or Peoples’ Democratic party—MPs have been arrested for alleged links with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, the PKK. The UK has also proscribed the PKK as a terrorist group, as have many of our international partners.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle
I do not want to challenge the proscription of the PKK, but does the Minister recognise that the European Court of Justice has twice now said that the proscription was illegal in the European sense and did not meet the requirements? So has the Belgian court. There are court cases ongoing on the issue, so it is a slightly open question—not what Turkey thinks, but what the international community thinks.
Wendy Morton
As I have explained, we have proscribed the PPK as a terrorist group, as have many of our international partners. If those links are proved to be accurate, we urge the HDP to distance itself entirely from the PPK and its ongoing terrorist activity.
Like others, I am deeply saddened by the news that Turkish soldiers and civilians lost their lives in Gara at the hands of the PPK. Our ambassador offered his condolences to Turkey at the time, and I reiterate them now. However, we have registered our concern at the OSCE and the Council of Europe about the large number of detentions. Those include the ongoing and lengthy detention without trial of former HDP co-leader Selahattin Demirtaş. We maintain an ongoing dialogue with the HDP to hear its concerns, just as we do with all the main political parties.
We are also concerned by Turkey’s delayed implementation of the European Court of Human Rights judgments on the imprisonment of Demirtaş and Osman Kavala, the human rights activist. We expect Turkey, as a member of the Council of Europe, to implement those Court decisions, in line with the base values that underpin our co-operation. In accordance with that position, we have participated in Council of Europe discussions on both those cases as recently as just last week.
We support the rights of LGBTI groups in Turkey. We have encouraged Turkey to respect the rights of the LGBTI community, to allow Pride marches to go ahead unchallenged, and to discourage disparaging public statements targeting the LGBTI+ community.
The hon. Member for Enfield North and others mentioned the replacement of mayors. We, too, have concerns about the replacement of a large number of HDP mayors by state-appointed trustees in the south-east of Turkey. The Turkish Government took those decisions because they contend that those mayors were allegedly channelling funding and support to the PKK. Again, if that is proved to be the case, we condemn support for terrorism unreservedly. However, Turkey must undertake fairly, transparently and with full respect to the rule of law any legal processes against opposition politicians or legally elected representatives.
Allowing fair representation and the provision of local democracy is essential to the long-term health of Turkish society and to Turkey’s international reputation. As we all know here, a healthy opposition is a sign of functioning and flourishing democracy. Turkey must respect the views of the opposition and allow their politicians to speak freely and without fear of reprisal. We keenly encourage that Government’s renewed calls for reform in this area. We also encourage Turkey to ensure that freedom of religion and belief is upheld, as enshrined in Turkey’s constitution, and that the rights of minorities, such as the Alevi, Jewish and Christian communities, are fully observed.
We will continue the conversation about our human rights concerns with Turkey. The hon. Member for Enfield North asked whether I would raise that issue with my counterparts. I hope to visit Turkey soon—travel restrictions permitting, of course—to raise those issues with my Turkish counterparts. My ministerial colleague Lord Ahmad, who holds the human rights portfolio in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, also plans to visit Turkey in the coming months.
Jim Shannon
When the Minister visits Turkey, will she please bring up the issue of the 140 protestant families who have been expelled from Turkey—or whose expulsion is pending—primarily because they are protestant Christians? Turkey is taking their houses and their jobs, and asking them to get out.
Wendy Morton
Obviously, I will have a range of discussions with counterparts when I am in Turkey, and I have had discussions previously. I discussed the human rights situation, and specifically Osman Kavala’s ongoing detention, during the virtual visit that I made to Ankara in December. The FCDO has discussed with the Turkish embassy in London not only our concerns, but the development of the reform proposals.
I have some concluding remarks, but in the time I have left—five minutes, I believe—I will see whether I can cover a few more of the questions raised. Hon. Members raised the issue of LGBTI rights. We support the rights of LGBTI groups in Turkey. We have encouraged Turkey to respect the rights of the LGBTI community and to allow Pride marches to go ahead unchallenged, and to discourage disparaging public statements targeting the LGBTI+ community. We also support minority groups in Turkey, including the Alevi community and Christians, in line with the provisions in the Turkish constitution that protect the rights of religious minorities.
The hon. Member for Jarrow (Kate Osborne) raised the issue of trade and human rights. The UK has long supported the promotion of our values globally. We are clear that more trade does not have to come at the expense of human rights. We do not see a choice between securing growth, investment and trade for the UK and supporting human rights. Despite our varying approach to agreements with partners, we will always have open discussions on a range of issues, including human rights.
Hon. Members also raised the issue of opposition politicians who have been arrested or detained. To reinforce what I said in my remarks, we remain concerned about the four-year detention of Selahattin Demirtaş, who is the former co-chair of the Peoples’ Democratic party. With our international partners, we call on Turkey to meet its obligations as a founding member of the Council of Europe and to release Demirtaş from his extended pre-trial detention.
To conclude, while we seek to strengthen our positive links with Turkey, we make no secret of our concerns and values. We are a critical friend. I can assure colleagues that stronger UK-Turkey relations will not be at the expense of standing up for human rights, a principle that this Government hold dear. We do share values with Turkey. We are in the family of NATO and at the Council of Europe. Although these issues continue to be a challenge, we talk to Turkey about them as a friend and with encouragement.
We will urge our Turkish counterparts to make swift progress, to deliver the reforms they have promised for this year, and to enact them fully through the human rights action plan. The hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) referred to a report. I am sure that he will send it to me in due course so that I can read it.
Question put and agreed to.
Union Connectivity Review
(3 years, 8 months ago)
Westminster HallRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Esther McVey (in the Chair)
I remind hon. Members that there have been some changes to normal practice to support the new hybrid arrangements. Timings of debates have been amended to allow technical arrangements to be made for the next debate. There will also be suspensions between each debate. I remind Members participating physically and virtually that they must arrive for the start of debates in Westminster Hall. Members are expected to remain for the entire debate.
I must also remind Members participating virtually that they are visible at all times, both to each other and to us in the Boothroyd Room. If Members attending virtually have any technical problems, they should email the Westminster Hall Clerks’ email address. Members attending physically should clean their spaces before they use them, and as they leave the room, and take the cleaning materials with them.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the Union Connectivity Review.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I am pleased to have secured this debate on the Union connectivity review and delighted that so many Members have shown an interest in taking part. I will certainly bear that interest in mind and try to keep my remarks reasonably brief.
Sir Peter Hendy published the Union connectivity review interim report last week, and I want to start by congratulating him and his team on their work so far. What leaps out from the pages of that report is a genuine enthusiasm for transport connectivity and its enormous potential to strengthen our economic performance by improving the opportunities available to the people we all represent. In my discussions with Sir Peter, it has been clear to me that he gets it. I believe we can expect a substantial and potentially transformative piece of work when the final report appears in the summer. The review should be welcomed by everyone who cares about improving connectivity within and across the United Kingdom. It is to be welcomed for practical reasons and for reasons of principle.
Before I talk in more detail about some of those practical benefits, particularly as they apply to my area in the Scottish borders, I want to set out why the review is right in principle. As Sir Peter states unequivocally in his interim report:
“Devolution has been good for transport”.
As he is a former commissioner for transport in the devolved Greater London Authority, it should come as no surprise that he says so—and he is correct. His review is rightly seeking to engage with the devolved Administrations across the United Kingdom, though in the case of the SNP Scottish Government, sadly, that co-operative attitude has not been reciprocated. The decade I spent as a Member of the Scottish Parliament convinced me of the huge potential for more responsive decision making, which is inherent in devolution, even if I did not always think that the nationalist Government were always making the most of that potential. I might return to that point if time permits.
Nothing in the content or intention of the review in any way undermines the ability of the devolved Governments to make transport policies for the nations they serve. Instead, the review does something new, imaginative and, I think, necessary—it looks at our transport connectivity right across the United Kingdom in the round. As Sir Peter points out, devolution, for all its undoubted benefits, has led to a lack of attention to connectivity between the four nations. The review seeks to pay some attention to that important matter.
It is quite right that the United Kingdom Government, as the Government serving the whole UK and accountable to representatives of the whole UK in this Parliament, should have commissioned the review. Everyone who wants devolution within the UK to work should welcome this approach. Of course, if someone’s objective is to show that devolution does not work and that separation is the only answer, no doubt they will object to it. If it is good for the United Kingdom, it is bad for the cause of separation. I fear we might hear some of that dog-in-the-manger negativity from SNP Members later in the debate, but perhaps they will pleasantly surprise me.
There is another reason that this is a timely moment to conduct a review of this sort. As we have left the European Union, we have consequently left the EU’s Trans-European Transport Network, or TEN-T. That common policy seeks to forge greater economic and social cohesion across the EU through the development of transport networks. How successful it has been, or could ever be, in achieving that aim across as vast and diverse a geography as the European continent is debateable.
What is clear is that the UK was not a major beneficiary of TEN-T projects. The UK contributed in the region of €447 million annually to the TEN-T funding vehicle, the Connecting Europe Facility for Transport. However, we achieved only around €48 million in awards. TEN-T was not a great deal for the United Kingdom, and the EU’s transport policy making was inescapably distant and remote from our needs and concerns. We now have the chance to replace that distant and remote policy with a new, bespoke and pan-UK strategic transport network. That is principled, it is timely, and it can deliver tangible practical benefits.
I will set out some of those benefits as they would apply in my own area in the south of Scotland. An obvious focus for the review has been cross-border links, and those are crucial for us in the south of Scotland. For the communities I represent, access northwards into the central belt, particularly the economic and cultural centres of Edinburgh and Glasgow, is of huge importance, but so too are links south into England and west into Dumfries and Galloway. For my constituents in Berwickshire, the local economic centre is over the border, in Berwick-upon-Tweed. Similarly, to the south-west of my constituency, around Hawick and Newcastleton, many residents look to Carlisle as their economic hub. As I am sure my right hon. Friend the Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale (David Mundell) —if he catches your eye, Ms McVey—will say that residents in Dumfriesshire also look to Carlisle.
Frankly, the south of Scotland has not been well served by successive Scottish Governments, whose focus has always been on the central belt and who have consistently neglected rural areas, particularly in the south and north-east of Scotland.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Obviously, the hon. Gentleman will acknowledge the fact that the SNP Government delivered the borders railway, which is obviously a great benefit to his constituency.
John Lamont
I am grateful for that. There is an opportunity in the review to accelerate the extension of the borders railway from Tweedbank to Hawick and Newcastleton, and on to Carlisle, which is why I and most of my constituents are baffled as to why the Scottish Government refuse to engage with the review and allow the acceleration of that project to take place.
That is even more surprising because the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) has called for an extension of the borders rail link to Carlisle, and for it
“to become a proper cross-border connection.”—[Official Report, 17 October 2018; Vol. 647, c. 353WH.]
Back in 2018, he asked whether the UK Government would work with the Scottish Government on that line, so I do not understand what has changed. There is an opportunity to get that project moving more quickly, yet his colleagues in the Scottish Government are trying to stop investment in transport in my constituency and other parts of Scotland.
It is hard to get it across to the SNP Government that transport links across the border are important too, and that Scotland’s two Governments should work together to improve them. The UK is a willing partner in that enterprise, as the review testifies, and it is time that the SNP put the politics aside and joined the UK Government in that spirit. My constituents welcome the ideas and intent of the UK connectivity review to boost cross-border infrastructure. The Borderlands initiative, behind which the UK Government have been the driving force, reflects the fact that the south of Scotland and the far north of England are a functioning economic area with strong ties. That is one of the reasons that voters in my area rejected by two to one the suggestion in 2014 that an international border should be erected to separate Scotland from the rest of Britain. We do not want new barriers; we want new connections and stronger links.
I have campaigned for a number of years alongside my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan) for improvements to be made to the main A1 trunk road, which links Edinburgh and the borders to Berwick, Newcastle and the rest of England. I am delighted that the A1 between Newcastle and Edinburgh is listed as a major priority in the interim report.
Alongside improvements to the A1, my other chief priority for the review is the campaign to extend the borders railway to Hawick and Newcastleton, and on to Carlisle. That extension would bring huge benefits to the local area and has the potential to open up a new cross-border rail corridor. A £10 million feasibility study of an extension was announced last year as part of the UK Government-backed Borderlands growth deal. I pressed the case for borders rail directly with Sir Peter Hendy, and I will continue to make the case for it. The Campaign for Borders Rail is looking forward to meeting the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), in the coming weeks.
The Union connectivity review is taking a new approach to assessing where our transport investment priorities should lie. In line with the Government’s levelling-up agenda, and following the Treasury’s recent review of the Green Book process, the focus is rightly shifting away from a narrow cost-benefit analysis towards a more strategic approach, taking into account wider environmental and social impacts. That is why I say that the connectivity review has the potential to be transformative, because better transport connectivity can transform lives.
Those who live in cities or in well-connected suburbs take connectivity for granted. They know that if they want to change jobs, embark on further study, take up a new hobby or simply go to the shops, the cinema or a concert, there will be transport options to get them there and back, but there is no such certainty in the smaller rural communities that I represent. That limits people’s opportunities, and it drives away younger people who might want to stay in the local area surrounded by family, friends and support networks but just cannot make it work because of the lack of transport connectivity.
The improvements for which we are fighting in the Scottish borders are not about shaving a few minutes off a commute or increasing the chances of getting a seat on a rush-hour train, important as those things are for many people. We are fighting to replace no service, no choice and no opportunity with something new and something better.
I remember speaking to a parent in Newcastleton about the lost opportunities experienced by her family. Her children could not take part in after-school activities at the high school in Hawick, as the school was more than 28 miles away, and there were no public transport options for getting the kids home after the sports and other activities had finished. What impact does that have on our children who live in communities where they simply cannot access what other young people take for granted as part of their educational experience? Doing things the old way has not served many of the communities in the Scottish borders well. The Union connectivity review represents a new, principled, pragmatic and imaginative approach that has the potential to change lives. It has my support, and I urge Governments at all levels across the United Kingdom to give it their support too.
Esther McVey (in the Chair)
I shall call other Back Benchers, followed by the SNP spokesperson, the Opposition spokesperson and the Minister. We want to get to Front-Bench contributions by 5.30 pm, and a lot of people wish to contribute today, so the time limit will be between four and four and a half minutes so we can get through everyone.
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP) [V]
I will not use up four and a half minutes and I will respect those who wish to speak in the debate. That is how it is done: include other people, talk to other people and it is shared around. That is a lesson the UK Government should learn.
As with the levelling-up perspective, published with the latest UK Budget, the UK Government are using the powers they gave themselves through the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 to bypass the Scottish Parliament and govern in ways that could contradict the devolved priorities of Scotland. Where is the consultation in the Union connectivity review? I heard what was said by the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont), but there is a difference between consulting and talking down to what is already a devolved area. The UK Government keep saying that they will consult with the devolved powers when the opportunities arise, but they truly do not. What happened to “Lead not leave”? What happened to the most powerful devolved nation in the world? Promises were swept aside with a smirk, or a shrug of the shoulders.
Now comes a new set of promises, exhibiting what I would describe as a superiority complex, going by its political title—one nation conservatism. The UK Government are once again ignoring the plans of the devolved powers and failing to take those plans into consideration. If the UK Government will not consult, we can only presume that they will not seek consent to any projects relating to devolved matters.
We know what the talk of a physical link between Northern Ireland and Scotland is all about. Businesses in Scotland are being burdened with heavily increased and complex paperwork to ship Scottish goods to Northern Ireland and the European Union. That is a direct consequence of the UK Government’s choice to remove Scotland from the single market and customs union. A bridge will not fix that; a tunnel will not fix it. They cannot bury their mistakes.
The UK Government must honour their commitment to UK-wide infrastructure investment, and they should do so by ensuring that adequate new resources are made available through relevant budgets, to allow decisions on infrastructure priorities to be taken by each devolved Government.
It is not clear from the Union connectivity review’s terms of reference that the review comes with additional funding as a mechanism for prioritising existing funding. However, there is now, more than ever, a need for the UK Government to agree increased fiscal flexibilities for the Scottish Government, so that they can take advantage of the historically low cost of borrowing to invest for Scotland’s future. Such large infrastructure programmes should not be used as last-minute attempts to paper over the cracks in the Union, when support for independence is riding high. If the UK Government and institutions of state really cared for the development of the whole UK—and with that, inter-connectivity—Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the north of England would not have been ignored for decades before now.
Finally, this process is not about a Union of equals; it is not about connectivity. This is a political bribe. It is today’s equivalent of baubles and shiny beads for the natives because the Tories can see that Scotland is building its own road—a road to independence—and that scares the life out of them.
David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con) [V]
Obviously, the hon. Member for Inverclyde (Ronnie Cowan) is disappointed and has delivered what we might have expected. It is all about independence; it is not about delivering for the people of Scotland on the issues that are really important to them.
My constituents, watching this back in Dumfries and Galloway, will be absolutely appalled by the ignoring of the issues that really impact on them. One of those issues is that the A75, which is one of the most important strategic routes in the UK and was identified as such in Europe, has received little or no investment from the Scottish National party Scottish Government.
That is something of a surprise, because back in 1997, when Alasdair Morgan, the former MP, was campaigning, the A75 was Scotland’s forgotten road and was to be prioritised. Then, in 2001, I read in my local paper that the A75 was the nationalists’ top priority. It had been identified in an SNP policy paper as an absolute in terms of upgrading Scotland’s transport infrastructure. But still there is no meaningful upgrade to that road.
Back in 2016, ahead of the Scottish parliamentary election, we were promised a transport summit in Dumfries and Galloway within 100 days of that election. Well, guess what? The SNP Government could not even meet their 100-day target, which did not even come with any financial consequences. A meeting was subsequently held in 2016 and—surprise, surprise—what has happened since? Nothing, nothing; no meaningful upgrades to the A75. That is why my constituents and I welcome this report, which identifies the strategic importance of the A75 for traffic coming from Northern Ireland, but it also is important for my constituents who live in the Dumfries area and want to go to work in Carlisle.
Instead of having these snivelling, pathetic constitutional arguments about the administration of the project, I want to see the Scottish Government grasp this opportunity and get the job done. I want to see a dualled A75 between Gretna and Stranraer. I would work with anybody to achieve that. My son, Oliver Mundell, who is the MSP for Dumfriesshire and has campaigned relentlessly to dual that road, is of the same mind. It is not about all these constitutional technicalities and the obsession with independence, it is about getting the A75 dualled. When people come to vote on 7 May in the south of Scotland, I think they will know who are the people who stand up to get something like the A75 done and who are just apologists for the SNP Government in Edinburgh.
I want to use the final minute to make one brief plea to the Minister about a very particular local issue: the upgrading of junction 45 of the M6. Cross-border connectivity is not just about big schemes. Junction 45 of the M6 serves the Gretna area, but is in England and administered by Highways England. There have been long-running efforts to improve that junction, which would prevent heavy traffic having to go through Gretna, which, as the Minister will know, is world renowned for its wedding industry and offerings. The junction needs to be upgraded to stop that. There have been various attempts to do it, but they have not progressed. I hope in her closing remarks she will give me some hope that that will indeed happen.
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab) [V]
While we await the final recommendations of the connectivity review, when Sir Peter Hendy publishes his final report this summer, I am pleased that the interim update released last week identifies issues with cross-border rail services between south Wales and Bristol and the Bristol area as an important emerging theme.
As referenced in the interim report, 9.4 million passenger journeys were made between Wales and England in 2018-19. This total includes many of my constituents who commute to work in Bristol and the west of England from Newport, the Severn tunnel and the Severn tunnel junction
The Severn tunnel junction is a gateway station for Wales. It has been one of the fastest growing passenger stations on the Great Western mainline over the last two decades. This is despite having lost a number of services on the Great Western franchise back in 2006 and more recently having one less cross-country service. Over the last 10 years, total passenger growth has been large—three times the UK average.
Unfortunately, there has not been an investment in capacity to meet this growing need for cross-border travel from south-east Wales. I realise that at the moment we are in different times, but, for example, in pre-pandemic times, GWR morning services from the Severn tunnel junction to Bristol Temple Meads and beyond have been plagued by overcrowding and a lack of reliability for years.
The situation is compounded by the fact that the Welsh Government and Transport for Wales were restricted by the Department for Transport from providing any additional cross-border services under the current terms of the Wales and Borders franchise. Extra services would help to alleviate some of pressure. As I have highlighted in numerous Transport questions, it is still not clear why the DFT is blocking this. I hope the final report of the Union connectivity review this summer will have something to say about that.
It is not good enough either for Tory Ministers to continually point the finger at the Welsh Government on transport issues, when they will not do anything about the ones that are within their remit and their gift to remedy. On this theme, a connected issue—which was not explicitly mentioned in last week’s interim report, but is the elephant in the room for Welsh passengers—is the UK’s chronic under-investment in Welsh rail infrastructure. Wales accounts for 11% of the UK rail network but receives only 2% of rail investment enhancement. Welsh Government research suggests that, on current estimates, there will be an under-investment in Welsh rail of between £3 billion and £8 billion by 2029.
This under-investment was specifically identified by Lord Burns in the South East Wales Transport Commission’s recent report as something for the UK Government to fix, with crucial work on the south Wales relief lines and new stations for Magor, Llanwern and Somerton as part of the plan. If the Government are serious about creating an interconnected Union, they cannot keep ignoring their responsibilities here.
The interim report published last week said the review will continue to engage with stakeholders over the coming months. I hope that the views of the Welsh Government and the South East Wales Transport Commission can form an important part of that. The report will provide a stimulus for long awaited investment in our rail network. My constituents and I will be watching closely.
Esther McVey (in the Chair)
Before we go to Dr James Davies, I will reduce the time limit to three minutes.
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con) [V]
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. Ms McVey. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) on securing this important debate.
The Government’s levelling-up agenda, in particular the Union connectivity review, represents a welcome step forward for north Wales, where there have been decades of under-investment in infrastructure. Although the UCR focuses on all forms of transport connectivity, in the interests of time I will confine my comments to rail services.
The all-party parliamentary group on Mersey Dee North Wales, which I chair, works closely with a rail taskforce with the same footprint, otherwise known as Growth Track 360, to promote the infrastructure needs of our region. For that area, the connectivity we need is not just efficient long-distance travel but fit-for-purpose regional services that can better support day-to-day life and the success of our cross-border economy.
Mobile phone data from 2019 demonstrate that the number of daily journeys from north Wales to the north-west is more than 20 times higher than the number from north Wales to other parts of Wales. Those journeys take place despite the poor existing infrastructure. At present, a 65-mile journey by train from Prestatyn in my constituency to central Manchester takes at least one hour and 45 minutes. Travelling by car is a quicker option, at just over an hour. A rail journey of the same distance in the south-east takes as little as 40 minutes. Perhaps unsurprisingly, currently only 1% of cross-border commuting in our region is by rail, some 80% less than the national average.
Sir Peter Hendy’s interim report highlights connections from Ynys Môn and the north Wales coast to Merseyside and Manchester for freight and passengers as a key issue arising from the work he has undertaken so far. That recognition is welcome, as is £20 million of funding to explore the development of projects across the country. I hope that forthcoming plans for the north Wales line will be ambitious, seeking provision for eight train paths an hour, greater line speeds, more frequent signalling stanchions as necessary, and the accommodation of express, freight and stopping services.
In the APPG’s submission to the UCR in January, I raised the need for HS2 to work for north Wales. It is pleasing to see the UCR acknowledge that. It will require the correct configuration at Crewe, including both a hub station and a junction to allow trains to reconnect to HS2 northbound. It is also important that the interchange between HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail at Warrington benefits north Wales and west Cheshire.
Ultimately, the electrification of the Crewe to Holyhead line will be necessary, for reasons of both connectivity and decarbonisation, and preferably by the time HS2 first operates. I would appreciate an indication in the Minister’s response of how the initial £20 million UCR fund is to be allocated and prioritised, and of the timescales for the process.
Sir Peter Hendy’s interim report shows that the UCR is heading in the right direction. The review must continue to focus on how infrastructure of national and regional importance, including that which is divided by an administrative border, can be delivered in a more successful and joined-up fashion.
Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP) [V]
Our Union connects us constitutionally, politically, economically and culturally. There are links of identity and a web of physical and emotional ties that all come together to make this Union great. Today, we focus on a very important aspect of any union: physical linkages, infrastructure connectivity. It is welcome that the Government of the United Kingdom are putting such priority on that end.
For Northern Ireland, we have specific needs that we ask to be addressed as part of the review. Members will know that, as part of our confidence and supply agreement in 2017, we asked that the Government review domestic air passenger duty. We see APD as a regressive tax that disproportionately impacts on the outer regions of the United Kingdom. We urge the Government to seize the opportunities that scrapping APD would bring, such as job creation and boosting GDP. Importantly, it would also assist in better connectivity with more routes developed within the United Kingdom.
Connectivity to the rest of the United Kingdom is vital for Northern Ireland’s economy. As the protocol has shown, Great Britain is Northern Ireland’s largest market and being cut off from that in any way is damaging for business. We are about removing barriers. That is why the protocol must go. We must ensure that ease of travel and trade is restored. We encourage those advocating the opposite to rethink.
I will also address the issue of the proposed physical connection between mainland UK and Northern Ireland. In our 2019 manifesto, we supported a feasibility study of a fixed connection between Northern Ireland and Scotland. We asked the Government to ascertain whether it was feasible, so we welcome this being part of the review and await the consultation on this study. It is regrettable yet not surprising to watch the hysterical, immature dummy spitting of nationalists and others to the very suggestion. To see a devolved infrastructure Minister so frenzied in opposing infrastructure. For those same people, it would seem the harder the border, the better, the more barriers, the better, but dare not anyone suggest better connectivity across our United Kingdom. We want a Government that are bold and ambitious in promoting better connectivity within the United Kingdom.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
It is pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. The Union is over 300 years old. The Tories have been in power for 66 years since the end of world war one, and yet now suddenly we need a Union connectivity review, with Westminster telling us what we need. Westminster has failed Scotland for years and now we are supposed to embrace a vanity project such as a Union bridge or tunnel to Northern Ireland.
If we look at Scotland’s road systems, it is the SNP that has been making up for a previous lack of ambition. The SNP Scottish Government have delivered the new M74 and the new M80 motorways—we never even had a continuous motorway linking Glasgow and Edinburgh until the SNP made it happen. We have also built the Queensferry bridge and are dualling the A9.
In a similar vein, our island communities benefited from EU funding, not Westminster generosity, for bridges such as Scalpay to Harris, causeways, ports and road upgrades, including the Fort William to Mallaig road to the Isles, which was the last remaining single-lane trunk road in the UK until 2009. It was being in the EU that helped Scotland to access funds, which were not coming from Westminster, and now the Tories have also taken that avenue away from us.
If we look at the A75, which has now suddenly become a modern Tory totem, what about acknowledging the Cairntop to Barlae, the Newton Stewart, Barfil to Bettyknowes, Planting End to Drumflower, and Hardgrove to Kinmount upgrades, as well as the Dunragit bypass? There has been a lot of money spent in the A75 by the SNP.
If we look back at Hansard, it confirms the Tories actually promised the Dunragit bypass, as a scheme that was in progress in 1989, as was the Barlae upgrades. It is the SNP that is making up for decades of failed Westminster promises and failures of Labour at Holyrood as well, yet the Tories still shout “More, more, more!” They do not want the Scottish Government to have additional borrowing powers, they stand by while the Chancellor cuts the capital budget to Scotland to 5% and yet they shout “More!” The SNP has also undertaken several upgrades to the A77 including the Maybole bypass—a project first thought about decades ago and also promised by Lord Douglas-Hamilton in 1989.
Turning to rail, the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) actually had the cheek previously to speak out against the Borders rail project because, he said, if it was only going to Galashiels, he would rather have the money spent elsewhere.
Alan Brown
I do not have time.
The hon. Member still has not complimented the SNP on delivering what was the longest new railway in Great Britain for over a century, and we do not need a Westminster review to tell us the benefits of extending it to Carlisle. I appreciate he did point out that I have spoken about this in the Chamber before as well.
On rail, I have also highlighted the absurdity whereby the choice of rolling stock for HS2 means that when it comes into operation, trains from Scotland to Crewe will go slower than they do now. What we need is independence and to be able to speak about cross-border transport as a nation of equals, rather than being told what to do.
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD) [V]
I thank the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) for securing this important debate. I hope that we can all look forward to seeing the benefits, rather than harking back to past complaints and trying to settle old scores. It is part of who I am and part of my party’s core belief that we achieve more by working together with our friends and neighbours than not.
From Portmahomack to Preston, from Edinburgh to Essex, like many people, I have connections to all corners of our country, but I am perhaps not as well connected as I would often like or should be. While I welcome the interim report, which references Scotland 57 times in 61 pages, I believe there is much more that should and could be done. While I would want to focus on how we link up the whole of the United Kingdom, I know that there are people outwith Scotland’s central belt who would welcome a similar approach to connectivity from the SNP Government at Holyrood.
Improving the transport links right across the country is vital. However, we must ensure that we reduce our impact on the environment at the same time. As businesses seek to grow and families reconnect, these improvements will form a key part of rebuilding after the pandemic. Our transport systems are broken and our climate is under threat. This is an opportunity to address both at one time. Sustainability must therefore be central to our connectivity.
At the same time, I was disappointed not to see any mention in the interim report of the importance of the aviation industry, to both our connectivity and economy, because regardless of our commitment to greener transport, we must also support our aviation industry and encourage it to improve its climate-friendly credentials. Our airports and wider aviation industry are facing the largest threat to their existence, so while pursuing the green agenda, we must make sure they have the support they deserve. Both rail and aviation have a vital role to play in the UK’s economic recovery, in covid-19 and in achieving net zero by 2050, yet to do so we need certainty and long-term schemes such as the HS2 eastern leg.
For my city of Edinburgh, I see this connectivity report as an opportunity to create a transport hub for Scotland, to make the capital the best it can be and to give it the best chance to recover as we face another summer of streets devoid of the usual buzz of festival goers. But there is an important wider point. To take part in this review is to buy into the premise that, together, we can improve the lives of people across our four nations. We can be better connected. We can drive economic growth and give the people of Scotland and the rest of the UK more opportunities than they have at the moment.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms McVey. I am also very pleased that the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) has brought this issue forward. I am unashamedly an Ulster Scot. I am also unashamedly British, because I want to be and because I feel it. I am very much a Unionist, so I will speak from a very pro-Union point of view. I share the Gaelic connection with my friend to my right-hand side in the Chamber, the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown), and I am very proud of that, by the way. If it came to it, we could probably speak the same language, I suspect.
I believe that the one United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland—often my catchphrase in this House, Ms McVey—is always better together. I believe it to be the case, and I believe it in my heart. I want to repeat what my hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart) said just a few minutes ago. This is a debate about connectivity, and my constituency is being disconnected by the Northern Ireland protocol. I sit going through what businesses cannot access, and each day I see a different example: pet food, grass seed, plants, machinery parts, cheese, livestock—the list goes on and on. The Minister is undoubtedly aware that this responsibility lies with the Brexit Minister, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Lord Frost and also the Secretary of State. On numerous occasions, we have begged to be once again connected and considered as part of the United Kingdom, rather than as a protectorate, which is how we feel at present.
The Secretary of State has made some movements in relation to the soil. The soil that was okay on 31 December was not okay on 1 January—same soil, same plants, same trees, everything. I could not quite understand that. There was a palpable anger back home about the Northern Ireland protocol and where we are. So given the concern of the report, I say bend the Northern Ireland protocol and ensure deliveries can be made and received to ensure that the people of Northern Ireland feel connected in the most basic way, as actually being a part of the great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
I do not have the time to refer to the physical link that others referred to. I just want to say this: Northern Ireland has so much to offer international investors—a highly skilled workforce, high-speed internet connection and low rates. Yet what puts them off is the feeling that there is not enough connectivity. We could address that by reducing the air passenger duty. I understand the Minister has referred to that and I look forward to a response.
We must also allow investment in what we have to offer, securing and harnessing international flights as well. We must do that for Northern Ireland, by investing in the airports and the shipping ports. I welcome a physical connection, but at this time the priority must be investing in connections through the airports—Belfast City, Belfast International and Londonderry—and also through the four ports of Belfast, Larne, Warrenpoint and Londonderry. We have, I understand, a freeport. Perhaps that will bring us some jobs that we need as well.
Esther McVey (in the Chair)
We now move to the Front-Bench speakers, aware of time.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP) [V]
It has been a lovely day up here—the first proper day of spring, I think—so I am not going to let the contrived drivel that the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) spoke at the start, with some others following, ruin my otherwise sunny disposition. In contrast, the speeches delivered by my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Alan Brown) and my hon. Friend the Member for Inverclyde (Ronnie Cowan) were both passionate and had the benefit of being accurate.
Fundamentally, the review is an insular exercise. Scotland’s horizons are much broader than just the rest of these isles. As a European nation, our connections to the continent are important—and I mean connections in every possible sense of the word. Decades of southern-centric planning has resulted in much of our export trade being taken to channel ports rather than exported directly from Scotland. Nowhere in the review is our international trade capacity dealt with. Nowhere in the review are direct air links to Europe from Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland even mentioned, because international connectivity was not in the remit. However, our links overseas are crucial.
That is fundamentally a problem with a review that was concocted for purely political reasons. Not only was it announced without any consultation with any devolved Administration; the fact is that the Government already had a connectivity review under way. A review of regional connectivity announced 14 months ago still has not reported, yet the Prime Minister felt the need to announce a Union connectivity review late last year. He must think we are all buttoned up the back.
The Prime Minister also wants to build a bridge or tunnel next to an unknown number of unexploded bombs, 2 tonnes of nuclear waste, with occasional undersea explosions of decaying ordnance, all sitting at a depth of 1,000 feet. The latest wheeze is to use the Isle of Man as a roundabout. For a Prime Minister who has appointed himself Minister of the Union, the fact that the Manx are not actually part of the Union seems to have passed him by.
We should think big and we should be planning for transformational investment that connects our communities, but that investment should be guided by our communities, not determined by diktat from a refurbished and overpriced briefing room in Downing Street. Thinking big does not mean wasting millions on a feasibility study for a bridge that the dogs in the street know is as likely to happen as the Prime Minister’s doomed garden bridge, which cost the public purse an eye-watering £43 million.
The review might mention HS2 in the same sentence as Scotland and Wales, but it is clear that we will not be seeing a single centimetre of real high-speed rail north of Manchester. We will be left yet again in the sidings, while tens of billions are poured into HS2 and its property acquisitioning. With the UK Government’s track record, we really should not be surprised.
To take one small but important example, it took the UK authorities decades to upgrade a six-mile stretch of the M6 leading to Scotland—the Cumberland Gap—leaving the busiest route between Scotland and England with outdated infrastructure. No one should, therefore, have much faith that their priorities will align with those of Scotland. Contrast that with the many infrastructure improvements made in less than 14 years, as highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun. Or a costlier failing: the Regional Eurostar and Nightstar trains promised to Scotland, Wales and the north of England when the channel tunnel was conceived, quietly ditched when no longer needed for political cover. That Union dividend cost the taxpayer hundreds of millions of pounds, and as Europe invests in a new generation of long-distance, low carbon international rail, that has been shown to be short-sighted in the extreme. Meanwhile, there are no concrete plans to upgrade the west or east coast main lines to anything approaching high-speed capacity; similarly, there are no plans to improve the west coast main line’s freight capacity, despite recent investment at Grangemouth and Eurocentral, proving demand for Anglo-Scottish rail freight could grow substantially with the right plans.
With that track record, the idea that the UK Government are best placed to decide on what is needed to support Scotland’s connections outside its borders is for the birds. To this litany of failure, add cancelled electrification and privatisation on our railways, their current failure to properly support our aviation industry, and failing to prepare properly for Brexit. If the desire for investment is there, the simple answer is to make sure that Scotland’s fair share is delivered to Scotland, for the transport priorities decided by our democratically elected Parliament, not subject to the whims of No. 10 or pledges to the Democratic Unionist party.
Moreover, this cannot be billed as Westminster’s munificence or spirit of generosity. The hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk spoke of Scottish Government investment. What he failed to mention was that, while the UK’s overall capital spend is up, his Treasury colleagues have cut Scotland’s capital budget by 5%. Therefore, it is Scots themselves who are ultimately paying for this conceited connectivity con. When they have the capital funds to do so, the SNP Scottish Government have proven time and again that they will deliver on Scotland’s infrastructure priorities. It is time for the small and insular minds hanging their hopes on a political scheme to boost support for the Union to realise that the power to think big will soon be accompanied by the political and economic power to match—a power that only Scottish independence will deliver.
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) for bringing forward this important debate. I thank all hon. Members who have spoken eloquently today about ways in which we can improve connectivity throughout the United Kingdom.
The Union connectivity review was announced and the interim report published during the coronavirus crisis—a pandemic that has had a profound impact on the transport network across the UK, with vastly reduced services and varying support across industries. In the wake of the economic impact of the pandemic, it is clear that we must rebuild across the whole UK, working in partnership with our devolved Governments and mayoral regions, ensuring local leaders and communities are heard, and transport priorities are delivered. Decentralisation of powers and resources is essential in preserving our Union and improving connectivity, to collectively boost the UK economy.
Transport has been one of the industries most impacted by the pandemic, with the latest figures showing the air and rail sector operating at minus 94% and minus 79% respectively of their usual activity for this time of year. Much of what has been called for by those consulted —better connectivity, increased capacity and improved journey times—has the potential to achieve this. More convenient rail services to reduce traffic from our roads, connections to airports to stimulate jobs and the local economy, increased capacity and high-speed services, improving opportunities for passengers, businesses and freight—there is endless potential for transport to be a driver for a green and bold economic recovery to meet our net zero commitment by 2050.
I am pleased to see a range of critical transport issues outlined, including improvements to the east coast main line and A1, extended HS2 connections to Scotland and north Wales, faster and higher capacity connections from Belfast to north-west Northern Ireland and to the Republic of Ireland, relief from congestion along the M4 corridor in south Wales, improved transport capacity and journey times east to west, and better air links to and from Northern Ireland and Scotland, including an appropriate rate of air passenger duty for journeys not realistic by rail.
Transport, of course, can be transformational for communities and the opportunities available to them. As the interim report notes:
“Those lacking the resources and transport options required for mobility become deprived from interacting with the whole extent of opportunities offered by society.”
However, I am somewhat sceptical of the Government’s commitment to these plans for an infrastructure revolution. Sadly, the Prime Minister has form for overpromising and underdelivering. There is a litany of failed transport proposals—the failed London garden bridge, at the cost of £53 million to the taxpayer; the mythical Boris estuary airport; rail electrification plans announced only to be scaled back or cancelled; and the continued mismanagement of the spiralling finances of HS2. I fear there may be more victims of the Government’s mishandling of transport projects currently in the pipeline. Just in the past year, 40% of Transport for the North’s core budget has been slashed. The Government failed to outline the timetable for rebuilding the eastern leg of HS2, attempted to avoid proper consultation with local residents and failed properly to support aviation with a sector-specific support package, leaving northern airports in particular to bear the brunt of the crisis.
While the Government are coming up with plans for a multi-billion-pound tunnel to Northern Ireland, complete with an underground roundabout below the Isle of Man, they have completely abandoned those who run the undersea tunnel that we already have. Eurostar is struggling for survival and begging for support, but the Government are silent. I welcome further transport investment plans to address critical areas for connecting the Union better, but they should be developed alongside, not at the cost of, other essential connectivity projects such as Northern Powerhouse Rail, the midlands rail hub and a full commitment to HS2.
With the fallout from coronavirus, a fragile economy, a climate crisis and the Union under strain, there has never been a more urgent need to strengthen the connections and bonds across our United Kingdom. The Opposition support Sir Peter and his team as they conduct their work, but I encourage the Government to grasp the scale of the challenges that we currently face. While this Tory Government fumble from pillar to post on almost every issue, the future of our Union and our prosperity is simply too important for them to get wrong.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Rachel Maclean)
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) for securing this vital debate. I thank him for his engagement with Sir Peter Hendy and his team, and for the diligent way in which he has campaigned for the interests of his constituents and highlighted how vital transport connectivity is for their lives.
The debate is a vital one, as many Members have said, about a major piece of work. It is an opportunity for me to set out how we are looking at the opportunities provided to our United Kingdom through the Union connectivity review. I thank all hon. Members for their contributions this afternoon, which were passionate and detailed. Unfortunately I do not have time to address all the individual points that people have made in the debate, but I assure hon. Members that I and my fellow Ministers in the Department, and Sir Peter and his team, have listened to them and heard them.
It has been a great pleasure and honour for me to have learned so much in the past year about the importance of transport connectivity to the people and businesses across our great United Kingdom. Indeed, it was at around this time last year that I began chairing regular meetings with my ministerial colleagues in the devolved Administrations to work through the transport challenges that we all faced as a result of the pandemic. Ensuring that we could enable people and goods to continue moving with minimum disruption was at the forefront of all our minds during those discussions. Now, in our drive to build back better from the pandemic and further level up the country, we must seize the opportunity to implement a suite of measures with the potential to transform the provision of transport connections across the UK.
Rachel Maclean
I am very sorry, but I do not have time to give way, unfortunately.
The measures in question would seek to support economic growth and our ambitious decarbonisation goals, as many Members have highlighted, as well as contributing to the quality of life of people across the entire UK and providing resilience in the face of similar crises.
Last October the Prime Minister appointed Sir Peter Hendy, a respected and experienced figure in the transport landscape, to lead a review independent of Government to establish how the quality and availability of transport infrastructure across the UK could meet the objectives I have set out, and to recommend how best to improve transport connectivity in the longer term.
As well as considering the needs of transport in providing intra-UK travel, the review will consider a variety of other issues that are integral to the aim of connecting the UK better. It will examine key routes, for instance, between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, and how they can be strengthened, and look at how travel between England, Scotland and Wales can be improved through, for example, enhancements to rail and road infrastructure. It will also suggest ways in which infrastructure can support the move to more sustainable forms of transport as we look to harness green technology, and differing working patterns as we emerge from the current pandemic.
I wish I could say that all Governments within the UK took the review as it was intended: a way to improve the lives of our citizens and make life easier for businesses. However, it will surprise nobody that the SNP Government were determined to create wedges that need not otherwise exist and refused to engage constructively with the review despite the obvious benefits it has for people and businesses in Scotland. Never let it be said that the SNP wastes an opportunity to put separatist ideology over sensible policy making.
Sir Peter’s interim report, published last Wednesday, contains his early thoughts on forming a UK strategic transport network. Prior to its publication, Sir Peter met more than 100 stakeholders as well as Ministers from the devolved Administrations, and the call for evidence process received nearly 150 submissions from interested parties. Early meetings with stakeholders suggest broad support for a UK strategic network, and Sir Peter will explore the idea further for the final review. He will need to look closely at the transport projects highlighted by stakeholders, and the Prime Minister has asked him to take into account what will be different in the next 20 to 30 years and consider our ambitious environmental agenda.
The UCR interim report notes that devolution has at times
“led to a certain lack of attention to connectivity between the”
nations of the UK
“due to competing priorities and complex funding.”
The review aims to address that, and Sir Peter will look at further transport priorities based on the wider strategic case for investments.
A couple of hon. Members mentioned aviation, about which I have one reference to make. Hon. Members will be pleased to hear that we have announced a consultation on air passenger duty to consider its impact on domestic flights in particular, as has been called for by colleagues from Northern Ireland.
We welcome Sir Peter’s interim report and have made £20 million of UK Government funding available to assess options on road and rail schemes that have been identified by the review as crucial for cross-border connectivity. That funding will be used to get such projects off the ground. Once the final UCR recommendations are received ahead of the spending review, we will consider and confirm funding plans for delivering the improved connectivity crucial to our United Kingdom.
John Lamont
I thank all right hon. and hon. Members for participating in the debate and the Minister for her response and constructive engagement. I think what my constituents in the Scottish borders—and, indeed, Scots across the nation—will remember about the debate is the SNP MPs arguing against more investment in Scotland and investment in Scotland’s transport network. When they go to the polls in a few weeks, I am sure they will remember that Scottish nationalist MPs were arguing against extension to the borders railway, against improvements to the A1 and A75 roads and against many opportunities to improve employability and opportunity for people in Scotland. That is a great shame.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the Union Connectivity Review.
Written Statements
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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Ring-fenced Public Health Grant to Local Authorities: 2021-22
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Jo Churchill)
Today l am publishing the public health allocations to local authorities in England for 2021-22.
Funding for local government’s health responsibilities is an essential complement to our plans to invest strongly in both the NHS and social care, and an important element of our commitment to focus on prevention of ill health.
Through the public health grant and the pilot of 100% retained business rate funding for local authorities in Greater Manchester, we are spending £3.324 billion on local authority public health in 2021-22. This includes baselining of local government funding for pre-exposure prophylaxis for HIV.
The 2021-22 grant will continue to be subject to conditions, including a ring-fence requiring local authorities to use the grant exclusively for public health activity. This may include public health challenges arising directly or indirectly from covid-19.
In addition to this baseline funding for public health, we have already announced £80 million for local government funding of drug treatment as part of a wider crime package announced in January 2021, and over £70 million for weight management services through the NHS and local government.
Further, we are providing in total around £10 billion of support for local government in responding to covid-19.
Full details of the public health grants to local authorities can be found on www.gov.uk. This information will be communicated to local authorities in a Local Authority Circular.
Attachments can be viewed online at: http://www. parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-statement/Commons/2021-03-16/HCWS850.
[HCWS850]
Police and Crime Commissioner Review: Concluding Part One.
(3 years, 8 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Priti Patel)
I am pleased to set out to the House findings from the first part of our two-part review into the role of police and crime commissioners (PCCs).
The Government’s manifesto committed to strengthening the accountability of PCCs and expanding their role. The public want to see a reduction in crime and PCCs are elected to deliver on the people’s priorities. Eight years on from their introduction, it is the right time to step back and consider how we can better ensure that the public can hold PCCs to account for the performance of their force.
In delivering the recommendations from part one of the review, we will make it easier for the public to make an informed decision about the record of their PCC at the ballot box by strengthening accountability and improving transparency. The recommendations set out below apply to PCCs and Mayors with PCC functions.
Part one of our internal review began in late July and collated views and evidence from stakeholders across policing, fire and local government as well as voluntary and community organisations. Through polling and focus groups the review also took account of public views and opinions. We focused on changes required to sharpen the model which, where possible, can be delivered ahead of the 2021 PCC elections.
On policing, the Home Office will bring forward a range of measures which will: strengthen PCC accountability; improve their transparency to the public; clarify the relationship between PCCs and chief constables; bring more consistency to the PCC role; raise professional standards; and improve the checks and balances currently in place.
The review concluded there was more to be done to explain the role of PCCs and make their record on crime more transparent to the voting public, thus enhancing their accountability. To help achieve this:
The Home Office will amend the specified information order to require PCCs to provide a narrative on their force’s performance against the Government’s crime measures, and Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) force performance reports. The specified information order currently places a duty on PCCs to publish certain information within specified timeframes, to ensure the public have the information they need to hold their commissioner to account at the ballot box.
In line with the Government’s manifesto position in favour of first past the post, which provides for strong and clear local accountability, and reflects that transferable voting systems were rejected by the British people in the 2011 nationwide referendum, the Home Office will work with the Cabinet Office and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to change the voting system for all combined authority Mayors, the Mayor of London and PCCs to first past the post. This change will require primary legislation, which we will bring forward when parliamentary time allows.
We concluded there are clear steps we can take to sharpen local accountability and ensure the framework guiding the relationship with chief constables is clarified:
The Home Office will work with the College of Policing, Association of Police and Crime Commissioners and National Police Chiefs’ Council to build on the accountability guidance already in place, including in relation to the performance management of chief constables, to help to promote and embed a positive relationship between chief constables and PCCs.
The Home Office will consult on potential changes to the Policing Protocol Order 2011 to provide a “brighter-line” on the boundaries of operational independence and reflect changes in the relationship between the parties to the protocol which have taken place over time. The protocol sets out how the policing governance relationships should work, including that of the Home Secretary, and clarifies the roles and responsibilities of PCCs, chief constables and police and crime panels.
The Home Office will also legislate to amend section 38 of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011, to make the chief constable dismissal process more rigorous and transparent, by requiring a PCC to give the chief constable written notice (including grounds), as the first stage of the dismissal process; allowing for the chief to provide HMCIC with a response to those grounds; and introducing some form of time limit or review interval on a chief constable’s suspension from office. The Home Office will also work with the College of Policing, NPCC and APCC to develop a framework for the use of independent mediation in appropriate circumstances.
We will also seek to address the HMICFRS recommendations included in its “Leading Lights” (September 2019) report, looking into the role of the College of Policing in the senior recruitment process. We will work with stakeholders to address the issues raised through this review in relation to fixed-term appointments.
To improve scrutiny, the Home Office will work with the Local Government Association (LGA) to develop a good governance training package for police and crime panels.
Part two of the review will also allow us to consider the role of the Independent Office of Police Complaints (IOPC) with respect to their handling of complaints made about the conduct of PCCs and their deputies.
The review concluded more should be done to ensure that all PCCs adopt best practice and, given our later recommendations on fire, there is now a need to improve the resilience of the Office of the PCC:
We recommend that the APCC works with the College of Policing to build on the policing knowledge hub to develop a “what works” compendium for PCCs.
The Home Office and APCC will jointly develop a comprehensive set of non-statutory guidance on the core elements of the PCC role. In conjunction, the APCC should deliver a formal programme of induction for new and returning PCCs post-elections in May 2021.
To enhance resilience and capacity of PCCs, given our intention to expand the role into fire, the Home Office will bring forward legislation to mandate that each PCC must appoint a deputy (of the same political party where the PCC represents a political party). In the interim, we will issue guidance to PCCs’ offices requesting that a formal succession plan is put into place to deal with vacancy and incapacitation, involving the police and crime panel in those discussions as necessary. This will not apply to Mayors with PCC functions, where legislation already mandates that a deputy Mayor must be in place.
To ensure PCCs have the levers they need to tackle crime, in part two of the review, the Home Office will consult on giving a general power of competence (as afforded to local authorities) to all PCCs, to potentially help PCCs with the role they play in the wider crime and criminal justice landscape, and will consider partnership arrangements more fully.
On fire, the Government are clear that further reform of fire and rescue is required in order to respond to the recommendations from phase 1 of the Grenfell Tower inquiry and the Kerslake review, and to build on the findings from Sir Thomas Winsor’s state of fire and rescue report. Our reform agenda will focus on three key areas: people; professionalism; and governance. Taken together, improvements in these areas will help deliver higher standards and greater consistency across fire and rescue services.
The review kick-started our work on fire service governance and the findings signalled strong support for a directly elected individual taking on fire functions to help simplify and strengthen the governance of fire and rescue services across England. The Home Office will be launching a consultative White Paper on fire reform later this year. The White Paper will be used to set out our reform agenda in further detail and explore the review proposals on fire governance which include:
Consulting on whether to mandate the transfer of fire and rescue functions to the Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner model across England where boundaries are coterminous, unless there is an option to transfer fire governance directly to an elected Mayor.
Consulting on how to address coterminosity challenges, including in the south-west.
Legislating to create operational independence for chief fire officers and to clearly separate and delineate strategic and operational planning for fire and rescue.
Considering options to clarify the legal entities within the PFCC model.
With regard to mayoral devolution, this review has cemented our view that the join up of public safety functions under a combined authority Mayor has the potential to offer wider levers to prevent crime. We will take steps to remove barriers to more Mayors taking on these functions and will work with MHCLG to develop the forthcoming devolution and local recovery White Paper with that longer-term trajectory in mind.
Part two of the review will begin after the 2021 elections and will allow us to consider further ways to strengthen and expand efforts to help cut crime. It will focus on longer-term reforms and the potential for wider efficiencies to be made, with a view to implementation ahead of the 2024 elections. Terms of reference for part two of the review will be published in this House at the appropriate time.
I would like to put on record my thanks to our advisory group which supported the first part of this review, comprising senior external stakeholders with expertise in the policing and fire sectors.
[HCWS849]