House of Commons
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Prayers
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Oral Answers to Questions
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
May I begin by welcoming the new shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon), to his place? I am sure that, like all of us, he will find that the rich and colourful diversity of the issues in the portfolio means that there is never a dull moment. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) for his two years in the role.
Work on implementing the Environment Act is well under way. We have started developing legally binding environmental targets, consulted on measures to reform the way we deal with waste, published a draft principles policy statement and published a consultation on due diligence in supply chains. Finally, the Office for Environmental Protection has been legally established.
Mr Mohindra
I thank the Secretary of State for those words. In my beautiful constituency of South West Hertfordshire, as he will be aware, we have some stunning chalk streams, including the rivers Chess, Bulbourne and Gade, so I am glad to see the additional protections that the Environment Act offers. I have monthly meetings with Thames Water and related organisations. Can the Secretary of State tell the House how he is working with private companies to implement measures on limiting storm overflows?
George Eustice
I thank my hon. Friend for his work on the important issue of improving water quality. The Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow), shares his passion for improving chalk streams in particular. We have made it clear to water companies that they must significantly reduce sewage discharges from storm overflows as a priority. We have set out that expectation through the strategic policy statement for Ofwat; we have also taken action to place it on a legislative footing in the Environment Act.
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP)
As we look at improving the environment, have the Government looked at the possibility of subsidising the growth of hemp, which allows us to make environmentally friendly cloth and biodegradable plastics and is a very good break crop for farmers to incorporate?
George Eustice
I know that there are the benefits that he mentions from growing hemp. Licences for medical hemp is an issue that the Home Office leads on, but it is an interesting crop; more people are starting to look at it and grow it. The hon. Gentleman raises an important point.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I welcome the proposals in the Act for biodiversity net gain, with an obligation on developers to ensure that all new proposals feature at least a 10% improvement in biodiversity. In the guidance that the Secretary of State issues, will he ensure that that obligation applies to planning applications that are already in the pipeline, not just new applications?
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes an important point. Biodiversity net gain will be an important policy tool to support work in local nature recovery strategies and make space for nature in new developments. On his point about timing, I think the measure will take effect in 2023 and will apply at that point to applications going for determination when it is active.
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
Fly-tipping incidents increased by 16% to March this year. The number of enforcement actions has decreased in the same period because of a lack of staff and resources. How does the Secretary of State think that the implementation of the Environment Act will ever improve those figures and clean up our country?
George Eustice
As the hon. Lady will know, we have a significant number of staff—more than 10,000—in the Environment Agency. Waste crime and fly-tipping have been a priority for them, and a number of successful prosecutions have been brought.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
Improving water quality is a priority for this Government. We are the first Government to work to tackle the historic issue of storm overflows, including by placing a duty on water companies through our landmark Environment Act 2021. That duty builds on the expectation for the water industry to achieve a significant reduction in harm from storm overflows, as laid out in our draft strategic policy statement for Ofwat.
Danny Kruger
I am grateful for that and very much welcome it. The Secretary of State will be aware that Morgan’s Hill in my constituency is the source place for southern England; a drop of rain that falls there could end up in the North sea, the English channel or the Atlantic ocean. The Government are reviewing the mandate for Ofwat. Will the Secretary of State confirm that Ofwat will be directed to ensure that the water companies have the funding that they need—that they can raise the funding that they need—to make the necessary investments in infrastructure: not just the grey concrete infrastructure, but the green nature recovery infrastructure that is needed to clean our rivers?
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes an important point. I can confirm that the new draft strategic policy statement that we have issued to Ofwat states that there is a clear priority around reducing storm overflows and delivering our environmental outcomes. Yes, in the next price review, such infrastructure will be at the top of its list of priorities.
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Jo Churchill)
Ministers have regular discussions with Cabinet colleagues on a range of issues. We work with the Environment Agency when necessary, and our chief scientific adviser engages with various experts to consider any adverse impacts arising from landfill sites.
Liz Twist
My constituents have been plagued for many years by landfill sites that often produce really foul smells, and many of them are concerned about the health implications. Now that we are all much more aware of air quality issues, will the Government take further steps to review the advice issued by Public Health England on toxic smells from these sites?
Jo Churchill
Only last week I visited a landfill site in Newcastle-under-Lyme, and I know that it has a considerable impact on local communities. I also know that the hon. Lady has campaigned vigorously in respect of the site in Blaydon. We are now at the point of capture and contain: the site is being capped and the gases are being captured to prevent them from having that harmful impact. The site was monitored between January and September 2020, and the fumes were not found to be above safe limits.
Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)
The Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food (Victoria Prentis)
There is great potential for farmers to continue to increase productivity in an environmentally sustainable way. Last month we launched the farming investment fund, which will encourage that through, for instance, investment in new technology, new equipment and small infrastructure projects.
Greg Smith
I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s answer, and also for the time that she took to visit farmers in my constituency last month. How will the investment fund support agri-tech innovation, which is surely a pathway to prosperity and profitability for Buckinghamshire farmers?
Victoria Prentis
The fund is broad, and we are willing to look at all sorts of programmes within it. Some great solutions could include new livestock feeds that might reduce methane emissions, robotics in horticulture—I have seen some very good examples around the country—and bio-fertilisers, which we are particularly interested in developing at the moment.
Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP)
Far from helping farmers to increase productivity, this Government are demonstrating their keen ability to get in the way of productivity. We have a crisis in pig exports to China and seed exports to Northern Ireland and the EU, there are export health certificates for Scottish goods going to the EU but none for the EU’s goods coming to Scotland, there are the tariffs on jute sacks, and there is also the gross shortage and obscurity of the availability of labour. Would the Minister like to apologise to farmers in Scotland and say how she intends to improve this dynamic?
Victoria Prentis
I am indeed concerned about farmers in Scotland, but that is because they are not benefiting from the revolution in agricultural support that we are undertaking in this country, and I am afraid that the Scottish Government are holding them back.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Jo Churchill)
We are committed to increasing tree planting to 30,000 hectares per year across the United Kingdom by the end of this Parliament. We are spending £750 million through the nature for climate fund on trees, woodland and peat restoration in England.
Jason McCartney
The UK and Ireland’s “sourced and grown” standard preserves the biosecurity of our woodland, as it ensures that trees are sourced and grown solely within the UK and Ireland for their entire lifespan. Following the Government’s biosecurity consultation, can the Minister please reassure the House that the tree sourcing standard will allow these future projects to be eligible for Government funding?
Jo Churchill
I thank my hon. Friend for asking that important question. The plant health management standard will be the future baseline biosecurity standard for Government grants and contracts. That comprehensive standard, with 23 robust biosecurity requirements, covers the domestic production and international supply of all plants. I know that this is important to my hon. Friend, because the Colne Valley Tree Society is doing outstanding work.
Bob Blackman
I strongly support the provision of new trees, not only in woodland and beyond but in urban and suburban settings. Will my hon. Friend join me in praising the Trees for Streets project, which is working across urban settings to encourage the provision of trees in streets where residents can get involved not only in planting trees but in nourishing them?
Jo Churchill
I join my hon. Friend in congratulating Harrow Council on being one of the first councils in the country to join the Trees for Streets project, which is funded by the green recovery challenge fund. It aims to support the planting of 250,000 street trees over the next 10 years, transforming our urban environment. The national planning policy framework supports that; it promotes street planting and makes clear the expectation that trees should be incorporated into new developments, making our environment better for us all.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The Woodland Trust Northern Ireland has encouraged all local councils to adopt a tree strategy in order to adopt ambitious tree planting targets. Will the Minister introduce a similar scheme here on the UK mainland to encourage the idea of localised tree planting in communities?
Jo Churchill
I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answer I gave a few moments ago, but I would be happy to talk to him further about what is happening in Northern Ireland to see whether there are lessons to be learned.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Given that forestry is devolved, is not that 30,000 hectare target a bit of a con trick? Scotland’s target is 18,000 hectares, so the actual UK target is closer to 10,000 hectares. Why does the UK Government not step up, learn from Scotland and put forward an ambitious tree planting target?
Jo Churchill
I am slightly surprised that the hon. Gentleman does not laud the ambition to plant those 30,000 hectares. Having spoken to those in Scotland, I would encourage the Scottish Government to get on and grant people the permission to plant those trees.
Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Speaker. The Minister was before the Select Committee last week saying that 7,000 hectares of trees would be planted in England by 2024. When planting those trees, we want native trees that have been grown in this country so as not to import disease. It takes three years to grow a tree, so we need the nurseries to be told exactly what we need for 2024.
Jo Churchill
We are working hard to ensure that my hon. Friend has that clarity and that we have that understanding in the area of biosecurity. We want to ensure that everybody knows what the rules are so that we can get on with improving the environment and planting those trees.
Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Jo Churchill)
We know that air pollution is the greatest environmental hazard to health, and we have taken significant action to clean up our air. Emissions of nitrogen oxides are now at their lowest levels since records began, but there is much more to do. The Environment Act 2021 sets a clear duty to set new targets for air quality, which is something that I am now working on.
Afzal Khan
People have a right to breathe good-quality clean air, regardless of where they live. Greater Manchester’s clean air zone is set to come into force in May next year, and it will go some way towards tackling the atrocious levels of air pollution in the region. However, the clean air zone will be effective only with sufficient funding, so will the Minister confirm the Government’s commitment to work closely with Greater Manchester to understand the impacts of the clean air zone and assess the need for further funding? To this end, will the Minister agree to a meeting?
Jo Churchill
As I have discussed with the hon. Gentleman prior to this, I would be happy to have that meeting. I agree that we need to get this right in Manchester and the broader Manchester area, and to understand that the clean air zone works for everyone. The Government have provided £132 million through our clean air fund to support the retrofitting of buses and coaches and the upgrading of heavy goods vehicles, private hire vehicles, hackney carriages, vans and minibuses, mitigating the impact on businesses and individuals. I would be happy to work with him, because I will be looking for assurances on how the money is spent and that it is being well spent on the people of Manchester to clean their air.
Scott Benton (Blackpool South) (Con)
The Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food (Victoria Prentis)
The Government launched the pet theft taskforce earlier this year, and it published its recommendations in September, including the development of a new offence. I am pleased to say this is now included in the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill, which has passed its Committee stage. I look forward to its Report stage in the new year.
Scott Benton
I welcome the Government’s taking animal cruelty seriously by introducing a specific dog abduction offence to crack down on dog theft. Cat owners have recently been more likely to purchase high-value pedigree cats and, heartbreakingly, criminals are now exploiting these cats and their owners, with cat theft rising more than threefold in the last six years. What measures are the Government taking to protect cats and to ensure there is no place for animal cruelty in our society?
Victoria Prentis
I am sympathetic to my hon. Friend’s point. The offence, as currently drafted, includes the power to extend it to other species. We are also taking other measures to protect cats, including compulsory microchipping, which was announced last week.
Mark Eastwood (Dewsbury) (Con)
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
The Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food (Victoria Prentis)
I am sure the whole House will join me in welcoming the news that the US market is reopening its doors to UK lamb after two decades of restrictions. We want people at home and abroad to line up to buy British. We are establishing an export council and expanding our network of agrifood attachés.
Mark Eastwood
New Zealand currently exports £4.8 billion-worth of meat per annum, including £1.8 billion-worth to the Muslim world via a national scheme. Will the Minister agree to meet me and the Minister for Exports, my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer), to discuss setting up a similar UK-wide scheme that could potentially open up millions of pounds’ worth of exports for our farming industry?
Victoria Prentis
I would, of course, be delighted to meet my hon. Friend, as I have in the past. He is a great trade envoy to Pakistan. We work very closely on this with Ministers in the Department for International Trade, and we see significant opportunities for British agriculture in markets across the world, including the US, Japan, India and the middle east. We will be well represented at the Gulfood exhibition in February.
Martin Vickers
Exporting agrifood is fairly straightforward if it is wholly produced in the UK. Where part of it is imported from the EU or elsewhere, there are complicated rules of origin. What is the Minister doing to improve the situation so that exporting becomes much easier?
Victoria Prentis
There is no doubt that the rules of origin are complicated. We regularly meet our colleagues in the EU to discuss issues raised by our exporters, and we work collaboratively to resolve them where we can. We have also set up a new export support service to help businesses navigate the EU’s requirements. I would be delighted to meet any hon. Member who has a constituent with a specific problem.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)
Free trade agreements like the one with New Zealand are the biggest contributor to British farmers needing to improve productivity. What recent discussions has the Minister had with colleagues across Government on protecting farmers’ interests in future agreements? As I said, we work very closely with colleagues, particularly in the Department for International Trade, and I am confident they understand the issues raised by our farmers.
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
Farm incomes have grown significantly since 2016, as farm-gate prices in sectors such as beef, sheep and arable have risen to record highs. This Government are also delivering their manifesto pledge to maintain the agriculture budget throughout this Parliament but to spend it more effectively. Farmers will have access to new funds next year to help them invest to reduce costs and to manage their soil sustainably through our new sustainable farming incentive.
Sarah Olney
We hear stories of landlords turfing out their tenant farmers because the transition to the environmental land management scheme makes it possible for them to receive payments directly from the Government for rewilding or doing absolutely nothing, which means that the farmers who are producing our food will not have enough land to farm. So will the Minister tell me: how is it possible for tenant farmers to survive if they lose a quarter of their income now and are only getting a promise of a replacement in seven years’ time?
George Eustice
We have designed the sustainable farming incentive so that it is accessible to tenant farmers, and we have worked closely with the Tenant Farmers Association on that. As is always the case, even some of the agri-environment schemes we had while we were a member of the EU would have been carried out by the landlord—some of those investments and things such as land use change. However, the farmer is the one who farms sustainably and can deliver these projects, and so should be able to access the schemes.
Siobhan Baillie (Stroud) (Con)
I had a useful meeting with Stroud farmers and the National Farmers Union recently at a fantastic dairy farm that has introduced state-of-the-art robotics and transformed its practice. We all know, however, that even with fancy-pants technology farmers work around the clock and that farm labour is almost non-existent at the moment, so I was not surprised to hear nerves about farmers finding time to apply for the new schemes and getting their heads around them. What support is available from the Department?
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes an important point. Last year, we made some funding available to a range of consultants and advisers across the country to help support all farmers with the transition. That advice is available, and I can write to her to make sure that she can relay it to her constituents.
Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
I regularly meet the chair of the Environment Agency to discuss flood risk management, and indeed I spoke to its board yesterday. We have doubled our investment in flood and coastal erosion defence to £5.2 billion, to better protect 336,000 properties across the country by 2027. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will welcome investment, for instance, in the new flood storage areas on the River Mersey, which were vital to reducing the risk to vulnerable communities during Storm Christoph earlier this year.
Jeff Smith
That is welcome, because in my constituency we found out that this is a growing problem this time last year, when we narrowly—by 2 cm—averted a disastrous flooding incident in Chorlton and Didsbury when the Mersey flooded. What is the Department’s assessment of the state of readiness in general of flood defences and flood response services as we go into the peak winter storm season?
George Eustice
I discussed this issue with the Environment Agency board yesterday. It is that time of year when being alert to flood risk is absolutely at the top of our priorities, and I visited the flood response centre at Horizon House in Bristol earlier in the autumn. So we stand ready; sadly, we have got quite used to flood response, but we have a good team responding to this now and they are ready for anything the winter might throw at them.
Mr Speaker
We now come to the shadow Minister and welcome him to the Dispatch Box in his new position. I call Alex Sobel.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
On Boxing day 2015, many town and city centres were devastated by floods. Spending on national flood defences is, in fact, 10% down on what it was in 2015. With increased storm events, how will the Minister defend residential and business properties with adequate climate adaptation this winter?
George Eustice
First, may I apologise for my oversight in not welcoming the hon. Gentleman to his place at the beginning of this session?
We have made available £5.2 billion, and this is a significant increase in the capital programme over the next few years. Included in that is some dedicated work on property resilience, where we are working with communities and flood forums locally to identify how we can improve the resilience of individual properties and, when there is a flood incident, to make grants available to them so that they can replace some of their doors in order to be more flood-ready in future.
Tom Randall (Gedling) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Jo Churchill)
We have banned plastic straws, stirrers and cotton buds; carrier bag sales are down by 95% in main supermarkets, and we have extended our move on that issue to all businesses; and we are consulting on banning single-use plastic plates and cutlery and exploring how we tackle the scourge of wet wipes, sachets and other items. The Environment Act 2021 gives us a framework for extended producer responsibility, deposit return schemes and greater consistency in recycling, to help drive down plastic waste.
Tom Randall
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her answer. It has been said that the UK is one of the most significant plastic waste producers: each year it produces 99 kg of plastic waste per person, compared with 88 kg in South Korea and 81 kg in Germany. My constituents Amy and Ella Meek have set up the charity Kids Against Plastic to help to raise awareness in schools, and I am due to speak with them on a panel later today. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is the responsibility of us all to reduce our plastic waste output?
Jo Churchill
Hear, hear—I agree absolutely and thank my hon. Friend for highlighting the excellent work of Amy and Ella Meek and their Kids Against Plastic charity. I wish my hon. Friend well on the panel this afternoon and congratulate them and others who are taking action against plastic and raising awareness in schools. It is the responsibility of us all to reduce, repair, reuse and recycle. We must get on with reducing plastic waste.
John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
Each year, the UK faces a seasonal risk of the incursion of avian influenza associated with migratory wild birds. Although we have that threat each year, this year we are seeing the largest-ever outbreak of avian influenza in the UK, with 36 confirmed cases—the largest number since last year, when we had 26. We have put in place an avian influenza prevention zone, which came into force on 3 November in England and on 17 November in Northern Ireland, and an additional housing order was introduced on 29 November. Our chief veterinary officer continues to lead the response to this episode.
John Penrose
The replacement of bureaucratic and burdensome EU red tape with modern, nimble, digital UK alternatives, without compromising food or environmental standards, should be one of the biggest and most important opportunities following Brexit. What plans does my right hon. Friend have to introduce the “better regulation” proposals in my Government-commissioned “Power to the people” report, and when?
George Eustice
I thank my hon. Friend for his work on that report, which he and I have discussed many times. There are many things in his report that we do indeed intend to take forward.
Mr Speaker
I welcome Jim McMahon to his new position as shadow Secretary of State.
Jim McMahon (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
The devastation caused by Storm Arwen was significant. Even a week later, more than 20,000 homes in the north of England were left without power, and some with very little on-the-ground support. This was a national emergency that required a national effort, yet it took a full week before it was declared a major incident and it was a full week before the military were called in. Given that those most impacted were those in rural communities, and given the Secretary of State’s overarching responsibility for those communities, will he inform the House of when he visited those communities and what he took away from that?
George Eustice
My colleague the Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food visited those areas last week and saw some of the devastation. The hon. Gentleman is right that there has been severe devastation and a tragic loss of many trees in those areas. There have been particular challenges in respect of power disruption; my colleagues in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy obviously lead on getting that power back, and I know they have been working hard to ensure the issue is addressed.
Jim McMahon
Let us be absolutely clear: this was a national emergency but a Cobra meeting was not called; the Prime Minister was missing in action; and now we discover that the Secretary of State was missing in action. Instead of supporting the affected communities, the Government were bogged down here in London defending a dodgy Christmas party while hard-working people in the north of England could not even turn on the Christmas lights. Ofgem has announced a narrow review of the response by grid networks, but the situation requires the Government to take charge and carry out a full review, including of their own response. Will the Secretary of State apologise for not taking the time to visit and commit to a full and proper review?
George Eustice
As I said, the Minister for Farming, Fisheries and Food did visit and she held meetings with farmers to discuss their concerns. I have had raised with me issues such as damage to fencing and some of the problems that has caused for farmers. I know that my colleagues in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy have been working hard on the key issue of power disruption.
Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con)
George Eustice
I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for his passion for campaigning on these issues. We have made a number of improvements to Government procurement over the years, including introducing the so-called balanced scorecard some five years ago. There is more that can be done, and I will certainly look in great detail at this particular proposal that has come from him and the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
I welcome the new shadow Minister and the new shadow Secretary of State to their places. I commend the shadow Secretary of State’s predecessor, because I always found him a very diligent, knowledgeable and collegiate opposite number, and I look forward to working with the new team in the same vein.
After our exit from the EU, agricultural support for our farmers is changing throughout the UK, but support levels remain higher in Scotland than in England, and farming improvements are encouraged and promoted through our direct payment scheme. Will the Minister confirm that the UK Government will not, under any circumstances, attempt to use the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 or the forthcoming Subsidy Control Bill to undermine agricultural support in Scotland, or attempt to lower it to the levels in England?
George Eustice
We set out, through our schedule at the World Trade Organisation, the so-called aggregate market support that is available for these things, and that does not provide any particular constraint. Agriculture policy is devolved and so it is for each part of the UK to decide what policy works best for its own part of the UK.
Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)
George Eustice
I am aware that my hon. Friend lives in a part of the country, and represents a constituency, famous for its ciders. I would be more than happy to meet with her and any of those businesses to discuss any particular concerns that they have, although she will understand that alcohol duties are very much a matter for the Treasury.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
My constituents were horrified to learn just how much sewage is dumped into Newcastle’s waterways during hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours each year. Instead of the meaningless progressive reductions that the Government are currently proposing, when will they ban the dumping of sewage so that my constituents can enjoy the glorious River Tyne in all its natural beauty and safety?
George Eustice
Earlier this year, we published the direction—the strategic policy plan—for Ofwat, which requires it to prioritise reducing the use of these combined sewer overflows and to secure the funding through the pricing review to deliver that.
Scott Benton (Blackpool South) (Con)
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes a good point. My noble Friend Lord Benyon is leading on this issue and I will ensure that he can have that conversation. As I have said, we are following this closely, and the chief veterinary officer is leading our response.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
When will the Secretary of State wake up and take a lead on sustainability? We have talked about clean air and clean water, but we need every town and city in this country to be sustainable for communities. When will he join our campaign for 500 sustainable towns, cities and communities? Moreover, will he stop dodging “Farming Today” and not appearing on the show?
George Eustice
I regularly appear on “Farming Today”, as do my ministerial colleagues.
The issue that the hon. Gentleman raises specifically is addressed through the Environment Act 2021, which has just been passed into law. We now have biodiversity net gain, which very much relates to local authorities, making sure that we have sustainable growth and space for nature in every part of our country.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
Although hon. Members on both sides of the House are justified in saying that it took a long time to restore power following Storm Arwen, is the Minister aware that when Storm Sandy hit the east coast of the United States, it took six months to restore power in some parts of southern Manhattan?
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes a good point. A storm of this scale, which brings down this number of trees, can cause significant damage to infrastructure. We should pay tribute to the work that many engineers would have been doing around the clock to try to restore power.
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)
Wetlands, such as the RSPB’s Newport wetlands, are one of the best nature-based solutions for the climate, biodiversity and wellbeing challenges that we face, so what steps are Ministers taking to restore and create wetlands, as Government advisers have recommended?
George Eustice
Some of this work will be taken forward in coastal areas through our agriculture policy. We are also looking at protected sites more generally and the work that we can do in wetland areas.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
Christian Matheson (City of Chester)
The commission’s view is that, as currently drafted, the proposals for a strategy and policy statement are not consistent with its role as an independent regulator. The provisions would enable actual or perceived involvement by the current Government or future UK Governments in the commission’s operational functions and decision making, including its oversight and enforcement of the political finance regime. The scope of the proposed power is significantly broader than similar mechanisms in place for other regulators. If these provisions are not removed, this would allow Ministers from one party to shape how electoral law is applied to them and their political competitors.
Alan Brown
It is clear that this power grab will mean risks to democracy. Even under existing rules, we have had party overspending seen as business as usual; that money funding the Tories in Scotland; Tory treasurers who donated £3 million made Lords; dodgy Russian donors; and cash for curtains. That shows the risk. Surely we need more power for the Electoral Commission, rather than a power grab by Tory Ministers.
Christian Matheson
The commission has made a series of recommendations to improve voter confidence in the regulation of election finance. The proposed new powers for the commission include the power to require information outside of an investigation and to allow data sharing with other regulators. These recommendations were recently echoed by the report of the Committee on Standards in Public Life. The commission will take any opportunities to discuss these proposals further when it meets the Government from time to time.
Deidre Brock
The Electoral Commission identified that although unincorporated associations are considered permissible donors, those who give money to them are not required to be permissible donors, which means that they could receive money entirely legitimately from overseas sources and donate that money to political parties with nothing but the most perfunctory of checks. No transparency is required from unincorporated associations when they provide donations to candidates, rather than to parties. Government responses to the Committee on Standards in Public Life suggest that they feel that sufficient safeguards are in place to address the committee’s concerns. Does the Electoral Commission still consider these key vulnerabilities?
Christian Matheson
The commission has highlighted weaknesses in the transparency requirements for political donations by unincorporated associations. As the hon. Member says, they are not required to ensure that those who donate to them are permissible donors, which means that they could legitimately make donations using funding from otherwise impermissible sources, including, as she says, from overseas. There are also no transparency requirements in law for unincorporated associations that donate to candidates rather than to political parties or campaigns.
Steven Bonnar (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (SNP)
Christian Matheson
The commission’s independent evaluation of the Government’s pilots, which were held in 2018 and 2019, found no evidence that turnout was significantly affected by the trialled introduction of an ID requirement at polling stations. However, it was not able to draw definitive conclusions, particularly about the likely impact at a national poll with higher levels of turnout. The commission has recommended that any ID requirement should be secure, accessible and realistically deliverable. The detail of the Government’s proposals for a free, locally issued voter ID card will be key to ensuring accessibility.
Steven Bonnar
Disabled people are less likely to have the valid ID required in the Elections Bill. Blind and partially sighted people are also singled out for greater challenges to their rights to vote, with the Government using the Bill to weaken requirements to accommodate their needs at polling stations—an issue that the Government refused to rectify in Committee by rejecting an SNP amendment. Does the hon. Member agree that the Bill—through its voter ID requirements, and loosening support for the blind and partially sighted—is unjust and undermines the rights of those who are most vulnerable to exercise their vote?
Christian Matheson
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to say that if we are putting barriers in place in order to protect the sanctity of elections, those barriers should not disproportionately affect sections of society that are already faced with other barriers. The commission has identified certain demographic sections of the population, including people with disabilities, who might be more affected by voter ID proposals. It is also important that voters with disabilities can be confident of the support that will be available to them at polling stations when they vote, wherever they live. The commission will work with returning officers to ensure that they understand the new duty to provide any reasonable equipment that could help someone to vote. It will also provide guidance and set standards to help to ensure that all voters receive a consistent level of support.
Dr Neil Hudson (Penrith and The Border) (Con)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Andrew Selous)
The Church of England is very grateful for the generosity of congregations and local communities for the upkeep of its buildings, as it is to the Government for the recent £54 million of culture recovery funding, which included £20 million for capital repairs. However, putting repair and maintenance funding on a stable footing is essential if the Church is to continue contributing about £50 billion a year to national wellbeing, as calculated by the Treasury’s Green Book methodology. Past partnerships between Government and the Church have been very helpful in this regard, and with levelling up this opportunity is even greater.
Dr Hudson
I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. Churches in rural communities face challenges of small and sometimes decreasing congregations, significant upkeep of old buildings, and, often, being in a group of churches under a common minister. These churches are at the heart of our rural communities and play such an important role for the people in those communities. What is the Church doing to support the long-term survival of small rural churches?
Andrew Selous
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this issue; he is absolutely right to do so. Our rural churches are a precious part of the Church of England, and we are looking at various options for small rural churches that could include, for example, new insurance and maintenance partnerships to remove some of the bureaucracy from priests and churchwardens while, very importantly, retaining local ownership. We are committed to a thriving rural ministry to attract the congregations to be able to sustain these churches into the future.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
In my work as a lay canon in the Church of England I have always been impressed by the engagement of local communities with churches in the process of sustainability in terms of caring for the building and caring for the place of the church in the community. Increasingly, we in the Church of England have new plans to make young people more energetic in this regard. Is that not at the heart of sustainability in the Church of England estate?
Andrew Selous
Sometimes the church is described as 22 people in need of a rest and a crowd in need of exercise. The hon. Gentleman has absolutely put his finger on something important, and I am grateful to him for raising it.
Mrs Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)
Andrew Selous
The Church of England places a high value on the covenant of marriage and does all it can to support families and parents. The Archbishops of Canterbury and York want to strengthen family life further and have set up a commission to examine what more the Church can do to achieve that.
Mrs Murray
I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. I also thank my local vicar, Michael Brown, who came to Westminster to play an active role in my own wedding, for all he does in the parish. What more can we do, as politicians, to recognise these often unsung heroes of our communities?
Andrew Selous
I am sure we would all like to congratulate my hon. Friend on her wedding. I am delighted to learn about the support that Rev. Michael Brown gave to her for her wedding and about all the good work that he does in his parish. It gives me, and probably all of us, enormous pleasure to pay tribute to Rev. Brown and indeed to all our parish priests who work tirelessly to show the love of Christ to their parishioners.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Having been married for 34 years, I understand the importance of marriage and relationships that last. With that in mind, can I ask the hon. Gentleman what has been done to ensure that, where there are difficulties in marriages—and that happens—and difficulties perhaps in looking after children, the Churches can work with Relate and other organisations to ensure that marriages can last beyond for the years to come?
Andrew Selous
I think we can do something even before that, because I am very keen on marriage enrichment as well, and I think that the Church can do more to prevent marriages from coming into difficulty in the first place. My hon. Friend is absolutely right, it is a very important role for the Church to play when marriages do run into trouble, and that is what the Archbishop’s joint family and household commission is also looking at.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk)
In November, the National Audit Office produced an important report examining the financial sustainability of schools in England, which complemented its report on school funding in England in July 2021. The Government will respond to the expected Public Accounts Committee report on school financial sustainability after it is published.
Mr Hollobone
I welcome the Public Accounts Committee’s scrutiny of the financial sustainability of schools. This is an important report by the National Audit Office, and it shows that 22% of academy trusts had reserves equivalent to a fifth or more of their annual income, but on the other side of the equation, 27% of maintained secondary schools were in deficit. Does this not need to be investigated?
Mr Bacon
It is very possible that it does. Most maintained schools and academy trusts have been in surplus, but there have been significant pressures on some maintained secondary schools. As my hon. Friend says, a sizeable minority of academy trusts are building up substantial reserves, meaning that they are spending less than their annual income on their pupils. What is done about that is a policy question and thus a matter for Government, rather than for the National Audit Office.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Andrew Selous)
At last month’s General Synod, the Archbishop of York spoke about the revitalisation of the parish in order that parish churches can reach and serve everyone in their community. I can tell my hon. Friend that since 2017, the Church Commissioners have given £130 million to support ministry in deprived parishes.
Danny Kruger
I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. I quickly pay tribute to the Bishop of Ramsbury in my constituency, Andrew Rumsey, who has been appointed by the Church to review the use of church buildings across our country. The bishop is England’s foremost expert on the parish, and I know that my hon. Friend will want to save the parish as much as the rest of us. The Church of England’s vision for future ministry includes the line:
“a Christian presence in every community”.
What is the Church of England doing to ensure that every community has a locally based, theologically trained and well-resourced cleric?
Andrew Selous
I am delighted to welcome my hon. Friend’s new bishop to his post. I can tell my hon. Friend that the Church of England remains committed to providing a Christian presence in every community. Last year, 591 people were recommended for ordained ministry, the highest number for 13 years. Ordinations to stipendiary ministry have increased by 43% since 2013. I also warmly commend the work of the Church Revitalisation Trust and its Peter and Caleb streams, which are increasing the number of clergy from diverse or working-class backgrounds and those in later life.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
Notwithstanding what my hon. Friend has just said, he will know that there is considerable concern in parishes up and down the country about the recent consultation, which many fear could result in a weakening of the ministry, rather than a strengthening. What can my hon. Friend say to reassure people?
Andrew Selous
I understand my hon. Friend’s concern and that of many of our constituents up and down the country. I can only repeat that the Church of England remains committed to a Christian presence in every community up and down the country, and the work that the Church of England is doing at the moment is focused on making sure that that remains the case.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I understand that the Government have set moneys aside for the restoration and maintenance of churches. Can the hon. Gentleman tell me and this House whether the same amount of money will be set aside for the UK? Will Northern Ireland be a participant and a recipient of those moneys?
Andrew Selous
The hon. Gentleman, whom I call my friend, asks a question slightly beyond the remit of my responsibilities as the Second Church Estates Commissioner, but I will make inquiries on his behalf and write to him. I speak for the Church of England.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
My hon. Friend said earlier—[Interruption.] Good point. I ask question 8.
Michael Fabricant
Andrew Selous
Being a new Member, my hon. Friend is still learning the ropes. I can tell him that the commissioners recently allocated £20 million to the cathedral sustainability fund, and grants have been made for more than 120 new posts in cathedrals to support fundraising, engagement and financial stability. Deans and staff from our 42 cathedrals also recently met to learn from each other and share best practice.
Michael Fabricant
Take two, Mr Speaker. My hon. Friend said earlier in answer to a previous question that according to the Treasury, £50 billion is generated for the economy by our lovely English cathedrals, including, of course, the 800-year-old cathedral in Lichfield. Cathedrals are not just places for worship; they are used as vaccination centres and concert halls, and even for political hustings and debates. They cost several million pounds each year to maintain, so could he say a bit more about what regular funding can be provided?
Andrew Selous
I am happy to do that. Indeed, £50 billion is the contribution to national wellbeing that the Treasury calculated through its Green Book methodology. My hon. Friend is one of Lichfield cathedral’s most steadfast and vocal supporters, and rightly so, because the cathedral is not just a centre of worship; it plays a vital role in the local community and economy by serving, for example, as a vaccination centre recently, as he said.
Although we are hugely grateful for the £29.4 million for cathedrals from the Government’s culture recovery fund, £140 million is needed for cathedral repairs and maintenance over the next five years. If we want our cathedrals to continue to be at the heart of our national life, we will all have to put our hands in our pockets to keep them in good repair, because we cannot let 800 years of worship and service fail on our watch.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Andrew Selous
Our parish clergy and lay workers try really hard to reach out to the isolated and lonely day in, day out. In addition, the free DailyHope telephone line—0800 804 8044—from the Church of England has been described as a “spiritual lifeline” for many isolated and vulnerable people. More than 620,000 people have listened to its prayers, hymns and services. It was recently described by one listener as,
“Something of a raft on which to hang on for dear life on occasions.”
Rachael Maskell
Churches have loci in every community. Across our country, a staggering 9 million people experience loneliness frequently or occasionally. As a result, in the coming Christmas season, many people will be isolated. They might be a new mum, somebody who has lost someone dear to them or somebody who has been left lonely because of the twists and turns of life. Churches could develop a loneliness strategy to address that issue across our communities and to provide friendship, love and hope to people. This season gives real impetus to the opportunity to do that. Will the hon. Gentleman ensure that the Church has a proper loneliness strategy, not just on the phone but in person, to support people across our communities?
Andrew Selous
I am very grateful to the hon. Lady for raising this incredibly important point, and at this time of year as well, when it is even more significant for many people. She is right that Christmas can be an especially lonely time, which is why I am pleased, for example, that churches such as St Michael le Belfrey in York are running the Love Christmas campaign as part of a national project to provide 1 million bags of kindness across the country. For some people, that Christmas gift will be the only one they receive, and there have been wonderful stories of people joining local churches after that type of outreach. I would say to her that a lively worshipping, outward-looking church, which looks to speak to the issue of loneliness, at the heart of our community is one of the best antidotes to the loneliness she speaks about.
Downing Street Christmas Parties Investigation
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office if he will make a statement on the details of the investigation into Downing Street Christmas parties.
The Paymaster General (Michael Ellis)
As the Prime Minister said to the House yesterday, he understands and shares the anger up and down the country, as do I, at seeing No. 10 staff seeming to make light of lockdown measures. I join the Prime Minister in apologising unreservedly for the offence that it has caused to people who have been through what everyone in this House knows is immeasurable pain and hardship as a result of this appalling pandemic. The Prime Minister has been repeatedly assured since these allegations emerged that there was no party and that no covid rules were broken. However, the Government also recognise the public anxiety about this and the public indignation—and I share that—in the sense of where it appears as though the people who have been setting the rules may not have been following the rules.
As the Prime Minister confirmed to the House yesterday, he has asked the Cabinet Secretary to investigate the facts, and I would like to update the House now, if I may, on the details of this investigation. The terms of reference for the investigation are being published, and I will lay a copy in the Library of the House later today. I can confirm to the House that the Cabinet Secretary’s investigation will establish the facts surrounding the allegations made of a gathering at No. 10 Downing Street on 27 November 2020, a gathering at the Department for Education on 10 December 2020 and allegations made of a gathering at No. 10 Downing Street on 18 December 2020.
The primary purpose of the Cabinet Secretary’s investigation will be to establish swiftly a general understanding of the nature of the gatherings, including attendance, the setting and the purpose, with reference to adherence to the guidance in place at the time. If required, the investigation will establish whether individual disciplinary action is warranted. The work will be undertaken by officials in the Cabinet Office at the direction of the Cabinet Secretary, with support from the Government Legal Department. Those officials will have access to all relevant records and be able to speak to members of staff.
As with all internal investigations, if during the course of the work any evidence emerges of behaviour that is potentially a criminal offence, the matter will be referred to the police and the Cabinet Office’s work may be paused. I must emphasise that the matters relating to adherence to the law are properly for the police to investigate, and the Cabinet Office will liaise with the police, as appropriate. All Ministers, special advisers and civil servants will be expected to co-operate with this investigation.
Finally, I can confirm that, as I have said, the findings of the investigation will be provided to the House and made public. Following the long-standing practice of successive Administrations, any specific HR action against individuals will remain confidential.
Mr Speaker
I just say to the Minister that his remarks were meant to take three minutes, not over four minutes. [Interruption.] Just a minute. So I will give some flexibility to the other two Front Benches.
Fleur Anderson
Thank you, Mr Speaker, and I thank you, too, for granting this urgent question today. I also thank the Paymaster General for his statement and for giving more information about this investigation.
Trust is vital during a pandemic—trust in the decisions being made and, most importantly, trust in the people making those decisions and the judgment about them. My constituent Sophie wrote to me yesterday to say:
“My mother died of Covid on Christmas Day last year—she was alone and frightened in an isolation room in hospital on 18 December while the alleged party was happening. She was admitted to hospital for a non-Covid related issue and contracted the disease whilst in there. Both of us had followed the rules and it breaks my heart that I was only able to see her a handful of times last year, and couldn’t be with her in her final moments.”
She is angry; people across the country are angry.
I welcome the Prime Minister’s announcement that he has asked the Cabinet Secretary to conduct an investigation. I have asked for this urgent question as there are further urgent questions to be asked about the investigation into the parties—we do not need to call them alleged parties; they were parties—held in a Government Department or by Government Ministers elsewhere. Are there more parties that we need to hear about? Is this investigation just a way of being able to say, “We’re doing something” while pushing it into the long grass, or is it a serious investigation?
The Prime Minster said yesterday:
“I have been repeatedly assured…that there was no party and that no covid rules were broken…But I have asked the Cabinet Secretary to establish all the facts.”—[Official Report, 8 December 2021; Vol. 705, c. 372.]
Who gave these repeated assurances? If there was no party, why did Allegra Stratton feel the need to resign? Is she taking the fall instead of Government Ministers? If this investigation finds that the Prime Minister has misled the House, will he resign?
I look forward to the publication of the terms of reference for the investigation later today. Will it include all the parties—not just the three but any others that were held? Who went to these parties? Can the Minister confirm that the Cabinet Secretary and the remainder of the legal team that has just been referenced did not go to any of the parties and so are able to conduct the investigation without personal interest? If they happened, who colluded for a year in the cover-up of these parties? When is the deadline for the investigation? How will the outcomes be made public? Is there any limit on the sanctions that will be given to people found to have been in the wrong?
I welcome the assurance from the Paymaster General that the matter will be referred to the police if there is a case to answer. We on the Opposition Benches will be following what happens very closely.
Finally, will the Government just be straight with the British people?
Michael Ellis
May I first say that my heart goes out to the hon. Lady’s constituent and the many thousands of other people who have lost loved ones as a result of this pandemic?
As I said in my opening remarks, the investigation will be conducted by the Cabinet Secretary. I know that the hon. Lady and those on the Benches behind her as well as everyone in this House has confidence in the independence and integrity of our civil service; the Cabinet Secretary heads the civil service and he is conducting this investigation. How long it lasts will be a matter for him, and the matter will, if it discloses criminality, be reported to the Metropolitan police for further investigation. In previous ministerial roles as a Law Officer—Solicitor General and Attorney General—I superintended the Government Legal Department, another organisation which of course has integrity and the confidence of all; it will be supporting the investigation. All those who are questioned by the investigation—civil servants, special advisers, Ministers—will be expected to co-operate with it. I hope that answers the hon. Lady’s questions.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
Would it be helpful if there were a greater understanding of the fact that No. 10 is not a house but a front door, behind which there is a suite of modern offices and meeting rooms across three floors? It is perfectly possible to be in the rafters above No. 11 completely isolated from what else is happening in the building.
Michael Ellis
It is certainly true, as a matter of geography, that No. 10 Downing Street is a very large property with a multitude of offices and with many, many people working inside it. In that sense, of course—geographically—my right hon. Friend is absolutely correct.
Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)
On 16 December, on national television, the Prime Minister asked everyone to exercise
“the greatest possible personal responsibility.”
London also went into tier 3 restrictions, which stated:
“No person may participate in a gathering… You must not have a work Christmas lunch or party,”
whether it was in an office or in somebody’s flat upstairs.
On 18 December, Dr Katherine Henderson of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine stated on the BBC:
“We are at a really dangerous point which could tip into finding it incredibly difficult to manage.”
The same day, 514 people died of covid-19. I am sure the NHS and those in care homes were already over the tipping point.
On 18 December, the Prime Minister stated:
“If you are forming a Christmas Bubble, it’s vital that from today, you minimise contact with people from outside your household.”
The evening that statement was given by the Prime Minister in Downing Street, a Christmas party was held in No. 10, where officials knocked back glasses of wine during a Christmas quiz and a secret Santa. I wonder whether the Paymaster General agrees with me that if something looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and it is at a Christmas party, it is usually a duck.
Michael Ellis
No doubt, if the hon. Gentleman has any evidence, he may wish to supply it to the Cabinet Secretary or the police. He has rehearsed to the House what regulations were in place at the time, and the reality is that that is accepted. What we need to do is investigate the matter of these gatherings. I have said what the primary purpose is going to be, which is to establish swiftly a general understanding of the nature of any gatherings that took place, including attendance, the setting and the purpose. That is what the investigation is all about.
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
There is understandable real public anger about what seems to have happened at Downing Street, and that is contributing to people’s unhappiness and discontent with renewed covid restrictions. Will the Government do everything they possibly can to lift the current restrictions as soon as it is safe to do so and ensure that Christmas is not cancelled?
Michael Ellis
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for her question, and I share the anger. The reality of the matter is that we are focusing on the pandemic as a Government and as a nation. We need to ensure that everything is done to protect the people of this country from the effects of this pandemic, and that of course is going to be the principal focus going forward, as it has been throughout. However, we will always follow the science, and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care will have more to say in due course on the situation.
Dame Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
First, my sympathies go out to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for drawing the short straw on coming here this morning to answer the urgent question. Can he explain to me the difference between a party and a “gathering”, in his understanding of the vocabulary? I note that he did not actually confirm that the “gatherings” or parties that we now know happened in No. 10 on 13 November, 27 November, 10 December, 14 December and 18 December will be within the scope of this so-called inquiry, which many Opposition Members already see as a cover-up.
Michael Ellis
The issue of the nature of the gathering goes to the heart of the investigation. Therefore, the answer to the hon. Lady’s first question about the nature of the gathering will be established by the Cabinet Secretary, assisted by the Government Legal Department, who will inform the police if any criminality is uncovered. So those questions will be answered in due course.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
I should say at the start that I think Boris—sorry, the Prime Minister—is doing a great job of running the country. I congratulate the hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson) on securing the urgent question. I think the Paymaster General, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton North (Michael Ellis) missed one of the questions she put, so may I put the question again? It is quite right for the Prime Minister to come to this House and say that he was told by someone, accepted it and did so in good faith. I want to know who the person was who told him. Perhaps the excellent Minister—he does not need any protection—will tell us that answer.
Michael Ellis
I do not have that answer. What I will say, as I have already said, is that, if required, the investigation will establish whether individual disciplinary action is warranted. That will be one of the principal focuses of the investigation. It will be ongoing and it will be in the public domain as soon as it is ready.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)
In which case, can we get an assurance that the Cabinet Secretary was not involved in giving the assurances to the Prime Minister? If that is not able to be given, then it is quite inappropriate for him to be in charge of the investigation. The question of legal advice also arises because the Prime Minister asserted that no rules were broken. Will the advice on which that assertion was made be given to the inquiry when it is held? On the question of the possibility of the investigation being passed on to the police, will people interviewed by the inquiry be interviewed under caution? The Minister, as a former Law Officer, will know that there is a risk of contamination of evidence that has been obtained in an internal inquiry unfairly, which would then prejudice prosecutions in the future.
Michael Ellis
The right hon. Gentleman is jumping ahead with his last point. Of course, whether or not there will be any police investigation is dependent on whether the investigation by the Cabinet Secretary uncovers any suggestion of criminality, which is then referred to them. If that then happens, that is entirely a matter for the police and not, of course, for the Government. I know the Cabinet Secretary. The right hon. Gentleman makes a suggestion about that. I have confidence in the integrity of the Cabinet Secretary. I also know the Prime Minister and I have confidence in the integrity of the Prime Minister. I have known the Prime Minister for many years. The Prime Minister is a man of honour and integrity, and he presented to this House his position yesterday. What I would say to the right hon. Gentleman is that he should wait and see what the investigation uncovers.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
If it turns out that one of these gatherings involved politicians or Ministers, it is clearly of a very different order to half a dozen members of staff bursting open a bottle of prosecco and having a drink before they departed for Christmas. [Interruption.] That does not excuse it. If it is the case that it was indeed members of staff, it begs the question what sort of supervision and management structure there is. Who was the supervisor? Who was the senior person concerned? Who should have been able to discipline this matter? Can the Minister assure me that a proper management structure is being looked at again, to make sure that this could not happen in the future?
Michael Ellis
The matter my hon. Friend raises is a matter for the inquiry to uncover, but I can assure him that the people who work in No. 10 Downing Street, including over the pandemic, are hard-working industrious people who are seeking to serve their country. They work very hard to do that. What he mentions is a matter of great concern to the people of this country, as it is to me. We all wish to know the terms of the investigation, and I have announced to this House what the terms and the scope of the investigation are. They will clearly be published and a copy of the terms will be laid in this House.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
Revelations of the 18 December gathering in No. 10 Downing Street have triggered much anguish across the country, so may I press the Minister on how exactly the Government Legal Department will support the investigation?
Michael Ellis
The Government Legal Department can provide support in a number of ways, and it will be up to the Cabinet Secretary to decide how he wishes to seek its support. One of the things he could do, for example, is ask for its advice as to the legal position on various matters. There are myriad ways that the Government Legal Department can help and give advice. It will be up to Simon Case as Cabinet Secretary, who heads the home civil service, to deal with the matter.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
I am sure that the whole House will wish to pass on our congratulations to the Prime Minister and his wife on the birth of their new child today. The Paymaster General has been very careful in his words when addressing the House, but does he agree that one of the key issues is that those who are making draconian rules have to live by not only the letter of the rules, but the spirit of them?
Michael Ellis
I thank my hon. Friend for mentioning the news that, in the past few minutes, the Prime Minister and Mrs Johnson have been safely delivered of a baby girl. I am sure that the whole House will want to send them best wishes.
My hon. Friend’s point is understood. He is right to say that the public are angered by this matter. We share that anger and the matter must be investigated. Of course, people should follow the rules and it is crucially important that they continue to do so. That goes without saying and it applies to everyone.
Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)
Everyone experiences bereavement differently, but for those of us who have lost loved ones during the pandemic, there is a sentiment that increasingly unites us: anger. I am angry that while my mum lay dying in hospital, I could not hold her hand. I am angry that I had to bury my father-in-law and mother-in-law two days apart. Above all, I am angry that members of this Government could be so flippant, so callous and so arrogant as to host not one, not two, not three, but seven parties and then lie about it. Will the Minister confirm that the Cabinet Secretary will also investigate what happened on 14 December and 13 November, which he missed out? Will he also confirm that the Cabinet Secretary will have access to all documents, electronic communications, visitor logs and CCTV footage relating to the reported incidents?
Michael Ellis
I start by saying how very sorry I am to hear of the hon. Gentleman’s personal losses, and I offer my profound condolences for them. I know that there are many thousands around the country who have also had personal losses and my heart goes out to them, too.
The hon. Gentleman referred to the flippancy of a video recording that is in the public domain. It was totally unacceptable, grossly inappropriate and, frankly, inexcusable. I can say no more than that, and I will not try to go behind that. We are going to investigate. The Cabinet Secretary, of course, is non-political. He has the authority, as one would expect of the head of the civil service, to call for whatever material—whether it be documents or otherwise—that he wishes, and he will have the support and assistance of the several thousand lawyers in the Government Legal Department and of others if he needs it.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
My constituents in Kettering are very angry indeed at reports of Christmas parties in Downing Street during what was a very large second wave of covid. The behaviour was totally inappropriate and possibly criminal. Does my right hon. and learned Friend agree that serving the public, whether as a Member of Parliament or as a civil servant, is a privilege and that the public should be treated with respect at all times, including with behaviour inside Downing Street?
Will my right hon. and learned Friend answer a question from the hon. Member for Putney (Fleur Anderson) that I do not think he answered in his response? If the Cabinet Secretary or any members of the investigatory team were at any of these parties, will he ensure that they do not take part in the investigation?
Michael Ellis
I agree, of course, that it is a privilege and an honour for all of us to serve our constituents in this honourable House. What I can say is that my understanding is that the Cabinet Secretary has denied any attendance at any gathering that is the subject of this matter, but the reality of the matter is that he can therefore be said to be completely separate at the head of the civil service and able to conduct a thorough investigation, as one would expect from someone with his seniority. I reiterate that he has—I am told—indicated that he was not at any relevant gathering.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
Over the period of the pandemic, people have been unable to have office Christmas “gatherings”, children’s birthday “gatherings” or any other type of annual “gatherings” that they would often have. I certainly hope we will not find that it is the drinks cabinet office that is investigating these matters.
Sanctions against staff have been talked about, but we need to be clear that if any wrongdoing is found, sanctions will also need to be taken against any Members, regardless of what office they may hold. Will the investigation look at whether there have been any breaches of quarantine at any of these “gatherings”?
Michael Ellis
The Prime Minister said yesterday to this House that Ministers, special advisers, civil servants and anybody else would be subject to disciplinary action if appropriate, so that applies. I hope that that answers the hon. Gentleman’s question.
Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)
The Minister said that
“Ministers, special advisers and civil servants will be expected to co-operate”.
What will happen if they do not co-operate? Will they be required to incriminate themselves? Does this also apply to other guests present, including members of the press?
Michael Ellis
Mr Case, the Cabinet Secretary, will have to determine how he wishes to deal with that matter. One would expect him to take a robust course.
Derek Twigg (Halton) (Lab)
My constituents, like those of a lot of hon. Members here today, are very angry about what has gone on at this party. They have made sacrifices throughout the year, and they think that one of the outcomes of this should be the resignation of the Prime Minister. He should take full responsibility for the incompetence that has been going on in his Government.
I think it is important to get to the point here. Surely someone yesterday must have asked the person at the rehearsal for the press conference who asked Allegra Stratton the question about the party why he asked that question. We would like to know the answer to that.
Secondly, to come back to the point made by the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), I am sure that the Minister wants to come to this House fully briefed and to respect the House for what it is. Before he came here today, did he not ask anybody at No. 10 who briefed the Prime Minister that no party took place?
Michael Ellis
I share the hon. Gentleman’s constituents’ anger. I know that they will be representative of constituents around all the parties. [Hon. Members: “Gatherings!”] The fact of the matter is that the gatherings will be investigated for what they were and for the scope thereof, and I think he knows that.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
A No. 10 source has told CNN that Downing Street was an island where they had to work, and lockdown was not happening in the same way there as it was happening for the rest of the country. That single sentence sums up the culture of entitlement of this Government. No man, or woman, is an island—and, of course, we must remember for whom the bell tolls. Does the Paymaster General think it is right that the Prime Minister can get away with throwing staff members under the bus, rather than reining in the culture of entitlement that he himself has created?
Michael Ellis
The right hon. Lady quotes John Donne. It is true that no man is an island entire of itself, but we know that there is no culture of entitlement, and I do not recognise that characterisation. An investigation will be launched by the Cabinet Secretary. It will uncover what needs to be uncovered and the details will be ascertained.
The right hon. Lady referred to the key workers who have had to work in myriad different ways during the pandemic and its various stages. Of course we appreciate the work that all our key workers do, in whatever capacity.
Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)
At the beginning of the year, because I was following rules, I almost missed the birth of my son. I was told that I had to protect nurses and midwifery staff in the hospital where my wife had an extremely complicated labour. It would seem that, just five weeks earlier, Downing Street was holding soirées, or gatherings, or parties, while my wife and I—and many of my constituents, and people all over the country—were dreading and living in fear of not having their birthing partners present at the beginning of what are often very complicated processes. I think it is deeply shameful that the Paymaster General—whom I believe to be an honourable man—should stand there defending the completely and utterly indefensible behaviour of the Prime Minister, possibly other Ministers, and civil servants in thinking that they were simply above the rules that everyone else was told they had to follow.
I would like a straight answer—yes or no—from the Paymaster General. Did any Minister or Conservative MP attend any event, soirée or whatever he wants to call it that allegedly broke covid rules in Downing Street last year on 13 or 27 November or on 10, 14 or 18 December? If they did, they should be sacked and they should be investigated by the police.
Michael Ellis
I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman experienced the personal effect of the pandemic that he has described to the House and I am sorry that he missed out on the birth of his child. He asked about the nature of the people who attended any gathering. That is exactly what the investigation will establish—whether there was a gathering, the nature of it, the scope of it, any attendees and so on. That is exactly what it will be all about and the hon. Gentleman will hear the result in due course.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the Paymaster General agree that the one person who has come out of this with any shred of integrity is Allegra Stratton? I have known Allegra for many years. She is a first-class journalist, a woman of honour and a very nice person, and I am sure that she would not have agreed to the description “a gathering in the attic”. She is a woman of integrity, and I admire the fact that she had the honesty to resign yesterday.
Michael Ellis
I thank the hon. Gentleman for saying that. It was, if I may say so, characteristically generous of him. I do not personally know Ms Stratton, but I am absolutely sure that he is right. She was clearly mortified yesterday, and extremely upset by what has happened.
We all, in our day-to-day lives, seek to do the best we can to represent our constituents and serve in the public interest. I know the hon. Gentleman has done that for many years, and I thank him for it.
Ms Anum Qaisar (Airdrie and Shotts) (SNP)
The Christmas party debacle proves further what we all know—this Government are sneaky, manipulative and corrupt, and believe they are above the law. Even their own Back Benchers are fed up. We in the Scottish National party have repeatedly called for the Prime Minister to resign because it is the morally right thing to do, so I ask this question: are reports that the resignation of the Prime Minister is dependent on a decision by rich Tory donors true?
Michael Ellis
I do not understand the nature of the hon. Lady’s question—[Interruption.] She does not know the Prime Minister. I do know the Prime Minister and have done for many years. He is a friend of mine and I know him to be a man of honour and integrity who is working hard in the interests of the people of this country, and she should reflect on the public service that all in the Government and the Opposition do to the best of their abilities.
Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)
From Collette in Middlesbrough:
“During lockdown, my 74-year-old mam was really lonely and depressed, but obeyed all the rules, as we all did. She sadly passed away in January 2021 alone in her flat. We were only allowed 30 people at the funeral so lots of mam’s friends and family were unable to attend. Nor were we able to have a wake to celebrate her life afterwards and comfort us. The government robbed us of that. So how dare they break the rules and hold a Christmas party. I’m crying as I’m typing this email, been crying since I watched the news yesterday. People must be held accountable and police action taken. We cannot let them get away with it.”
So instead of Allegra Stratton carrying the can, will the Prime Minister for once in his privileged, narcissistic, cheating existence do the right thing and resign?
Michael Ellis
My condolences to the hon. Gentleman’s constituent. The Prime Minister has said, as I have said from this Dispatch Box, that disciplinary action will be taken if appropriate. I hope that the hon. Gentleman’s constituent can be reassured by that. As to the course of action the police choose to take, if any, that is a matter entirely independent of Her Majesty’s Government; it will be up to the police as they are operationally independent. We have said that the Cabinet Secretary will involve the police if, during the course of his investigation, he uncovers any criminality.
Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)
The Prime Minister has repeatedly told this House that all covid rules were followed in Downing Street. Will the Minister publish the covid risk assessments undertaken prior to any parties, social events or gatherings that took place on Government premises in November and December last year?
Michael Ellis
I have noted what the hon. Lady says. That will be a matter for the Cabinet Secretary, and he will be free to seek any documents he needs during the course of his investigation.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
We have rightly heard much about the consequences of the Downing Street parties on the moral leadership of this Government at a time of crisis. The response of the Met police thus far, in refusing point blank to investigate, must also be called into question at a time when several instances of the breaking of covid regulations in December last year have been prosecuted in the courts. With important regulations being reinstated, does the Minister think that the lack of respect that many will now accord this Government and the police is a dangerous combination for public compliance?
Michael Ellis
I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman chooses to criticise the police. The police are entirely independent in this country, and they make their decisions based on the evidence before them. It is entirely a matter for them, and it is not appropriate for me to comment on the operational actions of the Metropolitan police or anyone else in the police service. I have great confidence in the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police and in the service of the Metropolitan police to this country.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
I, like many in here, have met constituents who have lost loved ones, and I have seen the immense sadness that this has caused. I feel that my constituents and many others have been utterly betrayed, so can the Minister explain how the Government are planning to regain public trust, now that stricter plan B rules are being introduced once again?
Michael Ellis
Public trust is of paramount importance and it is necessary because we want to relay to the public the need for caution in dealing with this pandemic and the necessity of getting a booster vaccination—more than 20 million people have now had a booster vaccination. It is of paramount importance that the general public continue to exercise caution in all their dealings because the effects of this pandemic are what we know them to be, and I offer my condolences to the hon. Lady’s constituents on the loss they have suffered. We need to focus on ensuring the pandemic, which has robbed this country of so many precious lives, is dealt with as effectively and as efficiently as possible. That is what the Government have done, that is what the Government are continuing to do and that is what the Government will do.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Government are supposed to be lawmakers, not lawbreakers. When these gatherings, parties or whatever were happening, across Coventry and Warwickshire we have had 5,000 incidents in the last 20 months in which people have been fined for breaking the law: a bar in Leamington was fined £10,000 for having a gathering; 200 Warwick University students were fined for holding various events; and another pub landlord was fined £1,000. “Party” is a synonym for “gathering.” These were not business meetings, were they?
Michael Ellis
That is exactly what the investigation seeks to uncover. If there was a gathering, it seeks to uncover the nature of that gathering.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)
The issue is not the however many gatherings. The Prime Minister has made a litany of errors, any one of which would have caused a decent Prime Minister to resign, whether it is the illegal Prorogation, the Barnard Castle incident, the comment on letting bodies “pile high in their thousands,” the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan that has cost lives or the scandal surrounding Owen Paterson. Is it not time for the Prime Minister to go back to watching “Peppa Pig” and leave the grown-ups to lead the country?
Michael Ellis
As the hon. Lady knows, the Prime Minister has been given repeated categorical assurances about the party that has been alleged. The reality of the matter is that the allegations are just that. She makes those allegations and the nature of the investigation is to discover whether any gathering was in breach of any regulations. It has been made clear that, if there was a breach of any regulations, disciplinary action will follow, but these are gatherings that occur on a regular basis.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
An event, gathering or party is
“any group of three or more persons who have assembled or gathered together for a social occasion or other activity.”
The Prime Minister has repeatedly said there was no party. The Minister now talks of a gathering. So does the Prime Minister now doubt his own version of events? Will the Cabinet Secretary also be investigating the cover-up of parties and gatherings at No. 10 Downing Street?
Michael Ellis
The hon. Gentleman should wait for the scope of the investigation, which will be made clear in a document laid in the Library of the House later today.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
When, in early December last year, Kay Burley of Sky was busted for having a birthday party in then tier-2 London, she was contrite and accepted a six-month ban from the airwaves. In the interest of consistency, we saw a similarly distressed Allegra Stratton walk the plank yesterday. Will any male members of the Government or prominent public figures face a similar six-month ban? If not, why are women always the fall guys?
Michael Ellis
I do not recognise the hon. Lady’s characterisation of the matter. We have made it clear that there will be disciplinary action if the Cabinet Secretary uncovers any cause for such action.
Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South) (SNP)
In December last year, my friend sat with his dad to write a list of the people who would be permitted to attend his mum’s funeral. At the same time, we now know No. 10 was hosting myriad parties that the Prime Minister claims to know nothing about, despite the fact they happened in his own house. Surely even the Minister must accept that a Prime Minister who seeks to protect partying, indeed a Prime Minister who seeks to protect himself, rather than protecting the integrity of public health messaging, is no Prime Minister at all.
Michael Ellis
The hon. Gentleman says that we “know” certain things, but we do not—they are unproven allegations. That is why we have an investigation, just as investigations take place when other allegations are made every day in police and other affairs. What we will seek to do, through the Cabinet Secretary, is investigate the allegations that the hon. Gentleman and others make.
Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)
Now that the Paymaster General has had the opportunity to hold a gathering of his own, at least when it comes to his thoughts on this matter, will he heed the injunctions of the hon. Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore) and expand the scope of this investigation to include all alleged instances of “gatherings”—or whatever we might like to call them—related to the Government on government property? Given that the Metropolitan police have, to date, shown a marked reluctance to investigate the allegations about these gatherings, will the Paymaster General confirm that he is not aware of any legal impediment that would stand in the way of the Metropolitan police investigating these matters if they so chose?
Michael Ellis
First, I do not think that this is my gathering—if it is anyone’s, it is Mr Speaker’s. I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman chooses again to criticise the police obliquely—I have no idea why he chooses to take that approach. We are blessed in this country with a police service of integrity and independence, and I have every confidence that just as they routinely investigate matters of extreme importance, so here they can be relied upon to investigate where appropriate—I emphasise the “where appropriate”. The Cabinet Secretary has said, and we have said, under the terms of the investigation, that if necessary—if criminality is uncovered during his investigation—he will, again, engage the police.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
I know the pain and sacrifice my constituents in York have experienced over the past 18 months. They are sickened by what they have seen has happened at these so-called “gatherings” at No. 10, but they are also infuriated by the obfuscation of this Government, avoiding accountability. Therefore, will the right hon. and learned Gentleman refer these matters to the police, because my constituents have no confidence in an internal investigation? The investigation must be independent, in order for us all to be able to see what really happened.
Michael Ellis
The Cabinet Secretary is independent. Cabinet Secretaries in this country serve all the political parties, dependent on who is in government, and they can be relied upon to investigate the matter fully, independently. We will await the results of his investigation.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Just today, the Tories were fined nearly £18,000 for not declaring the donation for Downing Street refurbishment. So will the Minister confirm that a gathering to look at the Prime Minister’s shiny new curtains still would breach regulations? More importantly, will the Minister confirm that even if people stick to the line, “It was a socially distanced gathering, with bring-your-own booze”, that is still a party that breached the regulations and that if the Prime Minister was armed with that information, he misled Parliament and must resign?
Michael Ellis
The nature of any gathering is, as I have repeatedly said, going to be a matter for the investigation.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)
Like most ordinary people, I have no idea what the difference is between a gathering and a party, and I note that the Minister has been unable to clarify that. Given the complete absence of leadership that we have witnessed, does he share my wider concern that as we enter a new wave of the pandemic, these unsavoury revelations have seriously and gravely undermined public compliance with the rules, which will cost lives? In view of that, why should anyone believe a single word the Prime Minister says?
Michael Ellis
The Prime Minister has initiated an investigation by the Cabinet Secretary and it is a matter now for the Cabinet Secretary to delve into. He will, of course, have all the authority commensurate with that office to seek to discuss the matter with individuals and to source any documents or anything else he may need. He will have that authority, so it is now a matter for him.
Business of the House
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Thangam Debbonaire (Bristol West) (Lab)
Will the Leader of the House give us the forthcoming business?
The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg)
The business for the week commencing 13 December will include:
Monday 13 December—Consideration of Lords message relating to the Armed Forces Bill followed by, remaining stages of the Subsidy Control Bill.
Tuesday 14 December—Motions to approve statutory instruments relating to public health following the statement made by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care yesterday.
Wednesday 15 December—Second Reading of the Professional Qualifications Bill [Lords].
Thursday 16 December—Debate on matters to be raised before the forthcoming Adjournment. The subject for this debate was determined by the Backbench Business Committee.
At the conclusion of business on Thursday 16 December, the House will rise for the Christmas recess and return on Wednesday 5 January.
By your leave, Mr Speaker, I wish to say a few words of thanks to the former Cabinet Office adviser Gosia McBride, whose secondment to the Government came to an end this week upon her return to the House service to take on the crucial role of the head of the Governance Office and the secretary to the Commission. The period of her secondment has seen some unprecedented challenges and she has worked tirelessly to provide invaluable advice to Ministers, and especially to me, on parliamentary procedure and handling, particularly in response to the covid-19 pandemic, when our procedures had to be adapted.
I am immensely pleased that I will have the opportunity to continue to work with Gosia in her new role on the Commission. She is absolutely brilliant and a source of first-class advice. The House is very lucky to be served by Clerks of such ability and it is truly the case, Mr Speaker, that my loss is very much your gain, but we will both work with her in future and I have a feeling she will keep us both in good order.
Thangam Debbonaire
I thank the Leader of the House for the forthcoming business and, of course, join him in giving wholehearted thanks to Gosia McBride, with whom I look forward to working in her new role on the Commission and in the Governance Office.
Will the motion on Tuesday to approve the statutory instruments relating to public health following yesterday’s announcement include any mention of mandatory vaccination for NHS staff, as has been widely rumoured?
Yesterday, the Prime Minister stood right there at the Dispatch Box and said that he was “sickened” by a party that apparently did not happen—it might have been an event—but, if it did happen, definitely did not break any rules. But that is exactly why he—or rather, the Cabinet Secretary—will now hold an inquiry and that is exactly why evidence will be handed over about something that may or may not have existed. I do not think that was what the Government had in mind for crime week.
The Prime Minister does not seem to know about seven events—parties or gatherings—in his own residence, so perhaps the right hon. Gentleman could help me out. In “Debbonaire Towers”, we would know if an event, gathering or party was happening in our place. How big does a place have to be for the Prime Minister not to know about all seven?
Judging by the video I have seen of the right hon. Gentleman’s comments at a dinner earlier this week, it does rather seem that he, too, thinks it has all been a bit of a joke—that after the British people followed the rules and made the sacrifices that have been mentioned this morning by colleagues throughout this place, yes, the Prime Minister’s staff laughed about covering up their Christmas party, but the right hon. Gentleman also seems to think it is funny.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Dr Huq) mentioned in the urgent question, it does rather look as though the woman staffer has been asked to walk the plank, as my hon. Friend said, while the men around her are just standing back. Will the right hon. Gentleman say why, for instance, he is not apologising for his laughter? Will he tell us—the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) mentioned this—who told the Prime Minister that there was no party? Who exactly was that? It must be known, because we have heard repeatedly from the Dispatch Box, “The Prime Minister was told”—by whom? Will the inquiry now include the cover-up of that information?
Over the course of the past week, just like with the other scandal recently, Ministers were put up to spout lines that they clearly did not believe, until yesterday, when the Health and Social Care Secretary did not even get put up. I know that it must be hard for the Prime Minister to admit that he was not even invited to the party/gathering/event in his own place. Can the Leader of the House please look at the questions that I have just asked? Furthermore, does he also agree that it really is a very bad look indeed for a group of male politicians to let a female staffer take the rap for the mess? She laughed. He laughed. She has apologised and resigned. What will he do?
In November, the Public Accounts Committee published a report into efficiency in Government. It comes as no surprise to me, and I suspect to millions, that the report found that this Government overpromise and underdeliver. Given that the Prime Minister is probably wishing that he had not wasted £2.6 million of taxpayers’ money on a room in No.10 for daily televised press briefings, especially as the only clip that we will ever see now is the one where his now ex-press secretary joked about the party/event, can we have a debate in Government time about efficient and competent Government spending?
On Tuesday, a now former civil servant who had been involved in the organisation of the evacuation of Afghans after the fall of Kabul revealed the chaos in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office at the time. This included the fact that many, many emails—I believe he said thousands of emails—including many sent by Members from across this House, were left completely unread, and even unopened. It must be almost certain that some of those who were left behind have at least suffered and, at best, suffered under the hands of the Taliban, and possibly worse. More than four months later, we still do not have the promised Afghan resettlement scheme. We therefore need to hear from the Foreign Secretary in a statement to this House, to respond to the whistleblower, explain what has happened to the resettlement scheme, and assure us that steps have been taken to ensure that a situation such as the chaos in Kabul this summer could never happen again and that the chaos in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office could never happen again.
Finally, in a new one for Erskine May, yesterday our Opposition day on the Government’s rail betrayal was interrupted for a ministerial statement. The Government have downgraded and derailed the northern powerhouse already, because, in the past seven years, they have re-announced the project or recommitted to a major rail project in the north more than 60 times, and now, like so many train services in the north and elsewhere, it has been cancelled. Our motion passed last night, so can the Leader of the House confirm when the Secretary of State for Transport will update the House in person before the end of the year—he does not have long—on his Department’s cost-benefit ratio analysis for the revised HS2 line? We are talking about overpromising, underdelivering and wasting taxpayers’ money. If it was not clear before, it certainly is now: this Government have lost their grip and it is working people who are paying the price.
Mr Rees-Mogg
First, the motions that will be brought forward on Tuesday will be announced as normal the evening before. That is completely routine with motions coming before this House.
The hon. Lady says with regard to No.10 that something may or may not have existed. That, of course, is the whole point, and that is why an investigation is taking place and why the Cabinet Secretary will be looking into it.
I am delighted that the hon. Lady mentioned crime week, because this has been crime week and the Government are making enormous efforts to tackle violent crime. From 2019 to 2022, in the 18 areas worst affected by serious violence, we will have spent more than £105 million of taxpayers’ money to develop 18 violence reduction units, and more than £136 million to support an enhanced police response. We are recruiting 20,000 more police officers—11,000 of whom we have already recruited—so there will be more police on the streets. We are increasing the number of female police officers and ethnic minority police officers, so the police will represent the community better. The police are getting £15.8 billion of funding, and the Government also announced during crime week a strategic plan to tackle drug abuse. I am delighted that the hon. Lady has given me the chance to talk about what the Government are doing so well and are so committed to doing.
The hon. Lady asked a whole string of questions about what went on in Downing Street. I would like to pay tribute to Allegra Stratton, a very distinguished figure and a very capable journalist, who decided to resign yesterday. That does not undermine, as I heard the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) say in the previous session, her great distinction, her contribution to Government and her wider work as a journalist, which was first class. It also does not undermine what she did as somebody one had to deal with, as I did when she was working on The Guardian, for “Newsnight” and with Robert Peston, and she has left with great dignity.
What I was saying at the Institute of Economic Affairs was how nice it was to be free of restrictions so that we can have parties this year. That was what I was being pleased about, as opposed to the comparison with last year. The situation has got better because of what the Government have done, so the hon. Lady complains about Government spending—although she did not have anything very specific to mention in relation to that—but the £400 billion that was spent on saving the economy was absolutely fundamental. It has meant that the economy is recovering and people are beginning to get back to normal.
Yes, I accept that there is some tightening of restrictions, but those restrictions are there to ensure that we do not have to go back to where we were a year ago. We are being proportionate, sensible and cautious. This is surely the right way to go, because we have seen a rapid economic recovery, which we need to protect and for which taxpayers provided £400 billion. In fact, I am pleased that this week our socialist friends are referring to taxpayers’ money, rather than pretending that it is Government money. This is an encouraging, cross-party approach to the proper use of the money of hard-pressed taxpayers.
As regards the railways, now the runaway train has gone down the hill with £96 billion of spending. It is an extraordinary amount—the highest in real terms since our friends the Victorians were building the railways. What the Government are doing with the railway would make Ivor the Engine proud. It is a really important set of spending commitments that will ensure that we have the transport that we need, through the integrated rail plan. I am glad to say that the north is getting six times the amount spent on Crossrail. Crossrail is not happening as fast as it should because of a socialist Mayor, so it is the socialists who let us down on rail and the Conservatives who get the trains to run on time.
Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con)
After four years, two general election manifestos and a hand-signed pledge by the Prime Minister, where is the legacy Bill? The Northern Ireland Secretary promised this House that we would have it, to help to protect Northern Ireland veterans from endless investigation and reinvestigation, by the summer recess—he broke his word. Then he faithfully promised that the legislation would be introduced into Parliament by
“the end of the autumn”—[Official Report, 14 July 2021; Vol. 699, c. 398-399.]
We now have the business up to Christmas and there is still no Bill. If the Secretary of State repeatedly breaks his word to the House of Commons, he has no honourable option but to resign. He has let down his party and the people who fought to uphold the law in Northern Ireland. When will Brandon Lewis resign his seals of office?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I apologise to my right hon. Friend for the fact that I have not been able to announce the legacy Bill during my period as Leader of the House, and particularly post the general election, but I remind him that the Government speak with one voice on these matters and we share the responsibility for the Bill not having been brought forward; it is not specific or personal to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, because Bills have to be agreed collectively before they can be presented.
This Bill is in equal measure important and complicated. It is right that we should treat former soldiers, who have served this country bravely, fairly and that we should protect them. It is also right that we should not give carte blanche to terrorists. Getting this balance right in the legislation that we bring forward is not simple, so although I regret the fact that this Bill has not come forward to the timetable that was hoped for and anticipated, there is good reason for that, and it is unfair and unreasonable of my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) to lay it all at the door of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.
Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)
Can we have a debate about the Prime Minister just simply going? We have reached a sensitive point in this pandemic where the next few weeks will be absolutely critical in the battle with the virus, yet we are led by someone who the public simply do not trust and who they believe is less than truthful. This is someone who no longer has the authority to see down the maskless, right-wing libertarians in his own party and their dangerous, do-nothing, let-covid-flourish nonsense: a Prime Minister who has just been fined £17,800 regarding the refurbishment of his flat; a Prime Minister with the attitude, “Do as I say, not as I do.” It cannot go on—and the thing is that Conservative Members know it.
There are rumours, Mr Speaker—you have probably heard them—that the Leader of the House is going to have the House rise on Tuesday so that the embarrassing indignity of PMQs is not repeated once again and the Prime Minister can sidestep all of them at the 1922 committee. Will he take this opportunity today to say that this House will run until Thursday next week?
The shadow Leader of the House is absolutely right: it was not just Allegra Stratton who made light of the party that never was. The Leader of the House could not help himself at the Institute of Economic Affairs about the police investigations and with his oh-so-funny, rib-tickling rubbish about imperial measures—his favourite subject. So here is another chance for him—it is not just the women who have to apologise or resign—to apologise to this House for the insensitive remarks that he made the other day.
Yesterday the Prime Minister said that
“you should work from home if you can.”
Well, this House has shown that it can, with virtual participation and proxy voting. After the loss of public trust, we now have an opportunity to lead by example and do exactly what the Prime Minister says, so will the Leader of the House take the Prime Minister’s call seriously? For the sake of the people who work here and the people we serve, will he now turn the virtual Parliament back on?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Once again the hon. Gentleman is furious. It is very hard to tell, because his fury is so perpetual, whether there are any degrees of fury that come forth from him. He said there should be a debate on the Prime Minister. SNP Members had one only just over a week ago; they lost. They do not like losing. They keep on losing. They lost the referendum; they do not like that either. They lose again and again and they come back to the same old subjects.
The hon. Gentleman criticises me for making a joke about imperial measures. I know he has no sense of humour, at least professionally—he may do in private—as it is part of his image, but while making a joke about imperial measures may not be very funny or win any awards for humour, it seems to me to be an eccentric thing to be concerned about.
The hon. Gentleman complained about the Electoral Commission’s report. I seem to remember that there is some very large amount of money missing from the SNP, so perhaps we could have a debate—perhaps I should arrange one in Government time—about the missing money of the SNP, or perhaps he would like to own up about it now. Perhaps we should give him another go later on so that he can say, “Is it half a million pounds that has gone missing from the SNP—I wonder where it’s gone.” Is it missing down the sofa, or has Mona Lott stashed it away somewhere? Who knows, but wouldn’t it be fun to find out?
Then the hon. Gentleman wants to go away again. He never likes being here. He always wants recesses except when we announce them. He now seems to be asking me to give an early recess for some strange reason, when I have just announced the business for Monday to Thursday of next week—but business is announced as it is announced. Of course we should be here working. What the Government have said in their guidelines is that people should not go into work if they do not need to. Parliament does not work properly with people absent. It is very disappointing that the Opposition are so lily-livered about holding the Government to account that they want to go back home early. That is not how democracy should work.
Being here holding the Government to account and asking the difficult questions is just as important as people being in their offices who are delivering Government services. We know from our constituents that services have not been as well delivered when people have been working from home. I know, absolutely, that the House authorities will ensure that people who do not need to be here to deliver services will be able to work from home, and that is quite right, but democratic accountability requires MPs in this Chamber, and that is the policy of Her Majesty’s Government.
Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
Overnight I have been contacted by many businesses in my constituency that are deeply concerned about how the sudden switch to working from home will affect both productivity and the local economy as a whole. Therefore, may I ask for an urgent Government debate on what impact these additional restrictions will have on local businesses and our economy, what support will be provided to businesses following yesterday’s announcement, and how we can make sure that there is a road map in place to ensure that people return to their workplaces as soon as possible?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. There will be a debate on Tuesday on the new regulations, and that will be an opportunity to raise these matters, but I say to my hon. Friend that people are asked to work from home if they can, and it is a judgment for people to make as to whether they can work from home effectively. It is not law, it is guidance, and therefore I encourage people to make decisions for themselves.
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)
I thank the Leader of the House for the business statement and for our meeting yesterday. Subsequent to that meeting, I can inform him that an application for a debate on Holocaust Memorial Day is anticipated, so time for that at the end of January would be greatly appreciated.
On imperial measures, I still remember, sadly, that an acre is a chain by a furlong, so we have to remember these things, because they are vitally important. Our constituents often still work in imperial measures, and the conversion into metric can be difficult for some.
Union Electric Steel, a company locally known as Davy Roll in my constituency, produces forged and cast roll products that are exported around the world. It employs more than 200 people in highly skilled jobs, but its running costs have a high energy factor. The company has seen its energy costs quadruple and, at times, sextuple during the past 12 months, but no Government help appears to be available to support this important business. Can we therefore have a statement on what the Government will do to support energy-intensive industries such as Union Electric Steel through the current energy cost crisis?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful for the early notice on Holocaust Memorial Day, which is a very important date. As the hon. Gentleman rightly says, an acre is a chain by a furlong—22 yards by 220 yards. Where do we find a chain on a cricket field? Between the two wickets, although I am not sure they have been finding that as successfully as we might have liked in Brisbane. I very much note his point on energy costs for highly energy-intensive businesses and for the company in his constituency that produces cast roll products and employs 200 people. It is obviously really important that industry is able to cope with these energy costs, and we have a very good energy strategy. Current spikes in cost are difficult for business, and I will pass on his comments to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
I hope everyone would agree with the Leader of the House that it is absolutely right that this House works by being here and hearing the information, not by having television screens reporting all the information. Why, then, do the Government insist on having TV press conferences to announce new policies? It is, as the Leader of the House says, this House that debates the things. I really hope—this is a genuine request—for a statement next week on ministerial statements. When he announces the day for that, can he tell me that the hour before that a press conference will be given to explain what will be in that statement?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I seem to remember that Jim Hacker was initially the Minister for Administrative Affairs, and having a statement on a statement does sound like it was invented by Sir Humphrey Appleby for the amusement and entertainment of the nation, rather than for the elucidation of facts and information.
It is important that the country at large understands the changes that are being made. It was thanks to your good offices, Mr Speaker, and the co-operation of the Opposition that a statement was made interrupting the Opposition day. A motion was moved without notice, which is a highly unusual procedure, to ensure that protected time for the Opposition day was not eaten into. That ensured that the courtesies to the House and the constitutional proprieties to the House were observed, but there was also the opportunity to inform the nation at large. It is inevitably a balance, but yesterday—thanks particularly to you, Mr Speaker—we got it right.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Yesterday, the Prime Minister referenced the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme and said it is very important that we get the eligibility details right and that an announcement will be coming from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office “in due course”. Given that the scheme was announced in September, and there has been no further progress, will the Leader of the House make time available for an urgent debate on this matter to ensure that vulnerable religious or belief communities remain a priority in the scheme?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The hon. Gentleman is right to raise the subject of religious minorities, whose safe passage it is essential to ensure. The Home Office is working quickly to establish the details of the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme which, in its first year, will welcome to the UK up to 5,000 vulnerable Afghans who have been forced to flee the country, with up to a total of 20,000 over a five-year period. We are working with various partners, such as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, to design and open the scheme amid a complex and changing picture. Further details will be announced in due course by the Home Office, but in the meantime, I will pass on his concern to the Home Secretary.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
I am not sure if my right hon. Friend is aware, but Harrogate Town association football club recently beat Portsmouth in the FA cup, which means that they have qualified for the third round for the first time in their history. That is a fantastic achievement for a club that has been built from the ground up and that became a professional team only in 2017. Can we have a debate to look at that ground-up approach to see what more can be done to encourage younger people in particular to play the game and how talent can be identified early, nurtured and developed through to local and national teams?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The FA cup, which, as right hon. and hon. Members will recall, was won in 1878-9 by the Old Etonians when they defeated the Clapham Rovers 1-0, is a football competition that people take enormous interest in. I congratulate Harrogate Town on their great achievement and wish them success in the third round. With a bit a luck, perhaps they will go to Wembley—let us see if they can do what the Old Etonians did all those years ago.
There is a huge benefit to early participation and the Government work with football authorities to encourage grassroots participation. I hope that we are seeing the fruits of nurturing great talent in this country, not least through the success of Euro 2020. In terms of a debate, I see that the Chair of the Backbench Business Committee is still in his place. I am not sure whether he will take that as a formal application, but I am sure that he will take it as an informal one.
Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab)
The Prime Minister’s former spokesperson resigned after being caught on video laughing and joking about a rule-breaking Downing Street party. This week, the Leader of the House was also caught on video laughing and joking about rule breaking while giving a speech at a lectern. She has resigned and surely he should resign too—or is it another case of Government Ministers believing that there is one rule for them and another for everyone else?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am not sure that the hon. Gentleman would like to come to the Institute of Economic Affairs—it possibly talks too much sense for him to be able to cope with it—but he would be welcome to come to future events to see what goes on and how nice it is, as I was celebrating, that we are back together having parties without restrictions. That is extremely welcome.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
The Leader of the House might be aware that the Mayor of New York introduced compulsory vaccination certification this week for all workers—public and private sector—and for all children aged five and over attending any sort of activity, sport or entertainment. Does he agree that that is tantamount to compulsory vaccination? Can he assure the House that the vaccination certification that we are being invited to vote on for large venues will never be extended in that direction?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The United Kingdom operates a system of informed consent for vaccinations. I was glad to hear my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care say this morning that compulsory vaccination would be “unethical” and “wouldn’t work”. Any employer who proposes to introduce a requirement for staff to be vaccinated will need to consider the existing legal framework, including the law on employment, equalities and data protection.
The Government have committed to, where possible, make time for votes on regulations of national significance that apply to England or the whole of the UK before they come into force. May I make one point about this House? No new restriction can be imposed on Members of Parliament attending Parliament except by primary legislation. We have a right, dating back to 1340, of unmolested access to the Palace, and nothing can or should be done that would restrict that in any way.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
Following the UK’s departure from the EU, the Government opted to initiate an independent programme, the Turing scheme, to replace the operation of Erasmus in the UK. The British Council is currently contracted to operate the scheme in its first year. Yesterday, media reports appeared that the firm Capita had been awarded the future contract to administer the scheme in the British Council’s place. No such statement has been made to Parliament as yet, so given that there are no suitable departmental oral questions prior to recess and given the impact that the decision will have on the British Council’s future, will the Leader of the House advise whether a statement will be forthcoming?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am very grateful to the hon. Lady. It is always important that this House is kept informed. I will take this up with the relevant Secretary of State, and ensure that an answer is provided both to the hon. Lady and indeed to the House.
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
I must say that in my constituency there is a sense of exasperation and exhaustion with the imposition of new covid rules, and a real fear that we are now back on the conveyor belt to more restrictions. Can we have a debate on how we learn to live with covid and its variants in the long term without unacceptable measures such as widespread use of vaccine passports, or the shocking suggestion that members of the public might be forced to get a vaccine? That would be unacceptable, and it is not what we need in this country.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend because I think I share the concerns and frustrations of her constituents. I do not think anybody wanted to be in this position. I think she is right in saying not only that we should learn to live with covid, but that we are in the process of doing so in that through the vaccination programme—88% of people over 12 have been vaccinated—we are getting life back to normal. Some temporary measures have been introduced to try to delay the seeding of the omicron variant, but if variants keep on coming, ultimately we are going to have to return to normal life, and I think that is just the way it is going to be. I think we are beginning to learn to live with covid, and that must be the way policy is going. That is why these temporary measures are both proportionate and go with the consensus among the British public that we have constantly worked with the grain of public opinion in any restrictions that have been imposed, and I think that is the right thing to do.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
In York, I am really worried about vulnerable children and children at risk, I am very worried about vulnerable parents, I am very worried about social workers working in children’s services and I am very worried about the level of funding that is going towards those services. I do not want to hear that we have to have another serious case review, and that we have to learn lessons again. We have heard that too many times, so can we have a debate about children within the care system, the risks that are faced and how we can resolve this issue once and for all?
Mr Rees-Mogg
What can I say to the hon. Lady? I think the angels weep over what happened to little Arthur. It is so just mortifyingly sad to see those pictures of that sweet little boy, who was so brutally treated. I share her frustration that we talk about lessons learned, and I have got in my notes today that I am meant to say lessons will be learned, but that is what we always say, and it is not good enough. We need to protect little children.
Are there easy solutions? No. Are there problems that we can identify? Were there issues with covid that meant people were not going out to work? Why do hon. Members think I keep on saying in this House that there are jobs people need to do face to face? People have to get out and do some of these jobs. The limitations are on people who can work from home, and we should not turn that into being on people whose jobs are essentially done out of the home.
There are so many things that need to be put right, and the spirit is certainly willing, but can I promise the hon. Lady that tragedies will not happen again? No, of course I cannot. However, as I say about the sadness over Arthur, I found it almost impossible to read the news stories because I was thinking of the children I know and my own children, and how could somebody behave like that? I sympathise with what the hon. Lady says.
Gareth Davies (Grantham and Stamford) (Con)
Highway maintenance is one of the top priorities for residents, particularly those in rural constituencies just like mine. Given that Lincolnshire has over 5,000 miles of road to maintain, can we have a debate on the national allocation of the road maintenance grant so that counties such as mine receive the fair share that they deserve?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Yes, I would probably want the fair share for Somerset before it goes to Lincolnshire, but I very much sympathise with what my hon. Friend is saying. Roads are absolutely essential to the lives of our constituents, and the percentage of journeys by road is much higher than any other form of transport by mileage covered within the United Kingdom. The spending review 2021 announced £2.7 billion over the next three years for local roads maintenance in places not yet receiving city region settlements. That is enough money to fill in millions of potholes a year, repair dozens of bridges and resurface roads up and down the country. The three-year settlement should help local authorities plan effectively to manage their highway assets and tackle potholes and other road defects across their local road networks. Individual authority funding for local roads maintenance is allocated using a formula based on the local highway assets for which each highway authority is responsible. Lincolnshire County Council received more than £89 million for highway maintenance in 2021-22, but I understand that my hon. Friend is taking this further and having a meeting with my noble Friend Baroness Vere next week to discuss the issue.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
The Leader of the House is right: we did have a debate just nine days ago on the integrity of the Prime Minister. But in the very short time since that debate we have had the scandal over the Downing Street parties—plural; pick a number between one and seven—and this morning we hear that the Prime Minister told the adviser on ministers’ interests in May that he did not know who paid for his flat refurbishment in February this year yet we have learned that he WhatsApped Lord Brownlow in 2020 asking for more cash. So may we have a debate in Government time on the importance of integrity in public office?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The Scottish National party had its debate nine days ago. The SNP does not like the Prime Minister; that is the state of affairs. Nothing I say from this Dispatch Box will change that. I am not a hypnotist; I will not be able to convert their minds. However brilliant my oratory may or may not be, I will not be able to persuade them, because I am like whoever it was who tried to charm the deaf adder; the deaf adder stoppethed up its ears, and the SNP seem to have their ears very stoppethed up, Mr Speaker.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
On Monday, India and Bangladesh celebrated the first Friendship Day and next week Bangladesh will celebrate Victory Day when it finally gained independence from Pakistan. The then Prime Minister of Bangladesh was welcomed to Downing Street by Prime Minister Ted Heath; the UK was one of the first countries to recognise Bangladesh. So may we have a debate in Government time on relationships between the UK and Bangladesh and how we can further them still more?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The UK and Bangladesh share a close relationship based on strong historical and people-to-people links. We continue to work closely together on our shared interests, including security, development, climate, trade and the Rohingya crisis, and throughout the year we have celebrated Bangladesh’s 50th anniversary. It is worth noting that most of these independence anniversaries are about independence from us, so it is nice to celebrate one that is about independence not from us but from someone else, and we look forward to commemorating Bangladesh’s 50th Victory Day on 16 December. The Prime Minister met Prime Minister Hasina last month to mark the 50th anniversary of our bilateral relationship, but I wonder whether my hon. Friend might want an Adjournment debate, out of your kindness, Mr Speaker, to celebrate this relationship further.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
As you know, Mr Speaker, I have been in this House for 41 years and I agree with you and the Leader of the House that at its heart what makes this place work is that when there is a ministerial statement it takes place in this Chamber. May we also have an early debate on the value of working across parties with all-party groups? That is how I have succeeded on many issues, introducing seatbelt legislation and much else. Working in all-party groups is at the heart of this place yet certain people in this House are murmuring against all-party working. It is important—it civilises this place and is effective—so may we have a debate on the importance of cross-party working?
Mr Rees-Mogg
May I begin by saying that I have read press reports that the hon. Gentleman is thinking of standing down at the next election. May I say how sorry I am to hear that? He has served this House with enormous distinction. I think he told me once that he first stood to be the MP for Taunton so he could almost have been a near-neighbour of mine, which would have been a different state of affairs and different for the people of Huddersfield. But 41 years of public service is a remarkable achievement and one really worth celebrating regardless of our political differences, which leads on to the hon. Gentleman’s point about cross-party working. Of course I am not going to promise him a debate—he knows that—but cross-party working is invaluable, and I do try in this Session, as I hope hon. and right hon. Members have noticed, to do whatever I can to help people particularly with individual constituency issues, because I think we do all have one objective in this House, which is to improve the lives of our individual constituents.
Siobhan Baillie (Stroud) (Con)
I met the most inspirational constituent recently. Bryony Thomas has fought off devastating pancreatic cancer and speaks movingly about the impact on her life, her weight loss, her family and her energy levels. Bryony is campaigning for increased use of pancreatic enzyme replacement therapy and to help others by raising awareness of this cancer, which she found is one of the least understood but most deadly common cancers. Will my right hon. Friend join me in praising Bryony and other campaigners, and consider granting a debate in Government time so that we can consider the merits of PERT treatment?
Mr Rees-Mogg
May I begin by praising Bryony for campaigning in this way, which must be extraordinarily difficult? I thank my right hon. Friend for raising this matter. I know from my own experience that one of the things one can do as a Back-Bench MP is campaign on such issues with cross-party support very successfully. Do not give up—that is my key piece of advice. Ask me questions, ask for Adjournment debates, ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, and ask at Prime Minister’s questions.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence clinical guideline on diagnosis and management of pancreatic cancer in adults recommends offering enteric coated pancreatin for people with unresectable pancreatic cancer and to consider this treatment. NICE publishes a quarterly standard on the diagnosis and management of pancreatic cancer, including PERT, but sometimes the availability of drugs and the decision making of NICE is encouraged and enhanced by campaigning in and through this House.
Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)
There is a plethora of websites run by private companies masquerading as UK Government websites, offering assistance with things such as renewing driving licences and passports. They invite people to call high-premium phone numbers and hold them on the line for long periods or ask them to pay very high charges for very little assistance. These websites stay on just the right side of the law by having very small and very easy to miss disclaimers that they are not official Government websites. Will the Leader of the House make a statement about what action he can take against profiteering by sites masquerading as Government websites to con people out of their hard-earned cash?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Once again, I thank the hon. Lady for raising a point that I think will concern many people across the House. Even when we know that these sites exist, when we are looking for a Government service it is quite easy to find the first one or two that are enormously expensive and have charges that the Government websites do not begin to have. It is easy even for people who are alert to these things and aware of them to be caught. She raises a really important point. Joint Committee scrutiny of the online harms Bill is just about drawing to an end and that Bill will come forward, so this issue will be discussed, but I will pass on her concerns immediately to the Secretary of State.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
In Blaenau Gwent and across the country, illegal off-road biking continues to be a scourge on our towns and countryside, intimidating local people and tearing up our environment. It must be stopped. In my area, Gwent police is doing good work on it, but given that this is crime week, can we have a statement outlining the Government’s plans to act on illegal off-roading?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The hon. Gentleman raises a very important point about something that I think affects many of us in rural constituencies; I have certainly had complaints about it in North East Somerset. It is threatening, it is unpleasant and it can be extraordinarily noisy. I am delighted to hear that Gwent police is acting effectively, but I will of course pass on his concerns to the Secretary of State.
Stephanie Peacock (Barnsley East) (Lab)
Barnsley clinical commissioning group recently stated that there is currently a huge gap between the unprecedented demand for GP services and the available capacity in GP practices, both in Barnsley and nationally. Can we have an urgent debate in Government time about the fact that far too many people cannot get a GP appointment?
Mr Rees-Mogg
In my own constituency last week I went to see St Chads surgery, which is suffering in exactly that way. Demand is exceptionally high. This seems to be partly because of normal seasonal factors, partly because of covid and in particular among children, and partly because people were not necessarily going earlier on in the pandemic. This is an issue that CCGs across the country are working on. Practices are doing their best to meet and manage demand, which is obviously important, but the hon. Lady raises a point which I think is well known but none the less is extremely important. I will raise her point with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.
Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South) (SNP)
Attached to the Government spending review is, of course, the big Red Book, which highlights that Scotland’s North sea oil and gas sector will contribute some £2 billion to the UK Treasury in the coming year, on top of the £375 billion that has already been taken in. Does the Leader of the House not agree that we should have a debate in this House on the merits of ring-fencing that additional £2 billion to deliver two things: the Acorn carbon capture underground storage project in the north-east of Scotland; and match funding for the Scottish Government’s £500 million Just Transition Fund to protect my constituents’ livelihoods going forward?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I wonder whether the hon. Gentleman is in favour of more North sea oil development, which is not, as I understand it, the line of the leader of the Scottish National party in Scotland. He seems to want to have his cake without baking it, rather than to have his cake and eat it. I would point out that £2 billion, though an important amount of money, pales into insignificance compared to the £6.5 billion that is coming from UK taxpayers to support Scotland as extra money under the Barnett formula. There was £1.7 billion that went through the self-employed scheme and 910,000 jobs saved through the furlough scheme. So, £2 billion is not an amount to be sniffed at, but they get a lot more than that.
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
It will be two weeks tomorrow since Storm Arwen hit my constituency, causing many to lose their power supply. I want to thank all the people in the community who helped, including the Chopwell community centre, the Winlaton community centre, the Blaydon youth and community centre, and especially the Riverview Bakery in Blackhall Mill, which catered for residential homes that were without power. Can we have a debate in Government time, please, about the impact of Storm Arwen and how we got to the position of having so many failures for a 10-day period?
Mr Rees-Mogg
May I join the hon. Lady is paying tribute to those who helped, particularly the Riverview Bakery? The mere thought of the cakes they may provide is making me hungry. The point she raises is very serious. As it happens, one of my oldest friends was caught by this storm and had no power for over 10 days —he was made my oldest and coldest friend, I think, during that period. Electricity companies have a very serious responsibility to get power back to people who have been affected. That is what electricity charges are paid for: to ensure there is a robust system of repair when things go wrong. Everyone knows that from time to time storms come in and cause damage to power lines. The service that was provided was simply not good enough. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has made a statement and there was an urgent question.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
The Leader of the House will know that on a number of occasions I have asked him questions on transparency. Today, I want to ask him from a slightly different angle. I recognise that local government is devolved, but we have a situation in Midlothian where the Labour-led Midlothian Council has overturned years of community consultation over the siting of a new Beeslack High School—my old high school, as it happens. In June, a document was made public and taken down within minutes. At three subsequent meetings, private reports have been taken and no indication has been given to any public member about the site of the new school. May we have a debate in Government time on the importance of transparency at all levels of government?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I find myself in considerable agreement with the hon. Gentleman. Local councils must be transparent about what they are doing. Transparency is beneficial for government most of the time. Obviously, we cannot give away the nuclear codes, but beyond that the more people know and the more people understand, the more we get better government. Also, the more people know, the more willing they are to support things. Midlothian Council may have found the best site possible and it may be supported by everybody, but if it is not willing to tell people, it will never know that. On the other hand, it may have made an awful blunder.
Mr Rees-Mogg
From the head movements of the hon. Gentleman, I think that that is what he thinks. I do not know how Hansard reports head movements, but there was a distinct head movement to a bungling by the council. But, yes, of course: the council should reveal all the information it is required to reveal under freedom of information requests and otherwise by law.
Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
I was very pleased that the Leader of the House announced the business for the whole of next week, until Thursday, because the election of the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee is due to take place on Wednesday and I hope I might be a candidate.
Can we have a debate on the issue of county lines? Last Friday, I spent time at Hull interchange with officers from British Transport Police who were carrying out a county lines operation. They were a superb group of officers, assisted by Railway Children, a charity that works to get alongside and support young people who, sadly, have got involved with county lines. I wonder whether we, as a House of Commons, need a debate about what additional resources British Transport police, home police forces and local authorities need to deal with the scourge of county lines.
Mr Rees-Mogg
That was a very subtle campaign moment from the right hon. Lady, but under the circumstances, it was entirely permissible and orderly. She is absolutely right about the scourge of county lines. It is a very serious problem, which the police have been tackling very effectively in the past couple of years. They have managed to break up quite a lot of county lines and, crucially, rescue children. I understand that some of the children involved in county lines are as young as five—certainly as young as seven—so this a serious concern. The police are involved and it is being tackled; people are being arrested and charged with drug offences, and it is part of the drugs strategy that was announced this week. I cannot promise her a specific debate, but the Chairman of the Backbench Business Committee, the hon. Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns), is in his place.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
Very sadly, antisocial behaviour continues to blight parts of Denton and Reddish. It needs firm action, so can we have a statement on whether the powers and resources available to local authorities such as Stockport and Tameside, and to Greater Manchester police, are adequate to tackle the tearaways?
Mr Rees-Mogg
This issue is fundamental—I am sorry to hear of the antisocial behaviour in Denton and Reddish—because the police and local authorities have powers, but we all know that low-level antisocial behaviour can lead to more serious crime. I am beginning to sound a bit like a broken record on the 11,000 extra police, but I must mention that, because having police who are available and present is a very good way of stopping antisocial crime. Dealing with drugs and county lines—this goes to the question asked by the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson)—also reduces antisocial behaviour, because of the enormous quantity of crime that is drug-related, and particularly the theft that is responsible for the purchase of drugs. I believe that half of murders in this country are drug-related, so antisocial behaviour, drug crime and more serious crime are all interrelated. He is absolutely right to raise this matter in relation to crime week and I am sure that the House will discuss it on many occasions.
Ms Anum Qaisar (Airdrie and Shotts) (SNP)
Today marks United Nations International Anti-Corruption Day—a day designed to highlight the negative impact of corruption on society—and from the flat refurbishment to the Owen Paterson scandal to cash for honours, I simply do not have time to list all the allegations of corruption against this Government. However, in the light of their actions that are dishonest and embody corruption, will the Leader of the House make room for a debate in Government time on corruption?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Today is also the feast day of St Æthelgifu, who is the daughter of Alfred the Great and who became an abbess; I am more tempted to offer a debate to celebrate the virtues of one of England’s leading saints. This country should be incredibly proud of its reputation on corruption. We have the toughest anti-corruption laws on what goes on not just in our country, but in our companies trading abroad. We try to ensure that British companies obey the highest standards globally. We should be really proud of that and not talk down the nation. In league tables, we always come very near the top, because we have a good political system, proper representation in this House and a free press. All that ensures that we have a country that we can be proud of.
Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)
We are only days away from the two-year anniversary of the Second Reading of the Bill that became the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Act 2020. At that time, huge promises were made—£350 million a week would be given back to the NHS, and there would be huge trading opportunity and a decrease in the cost of living—but was it all worth it? Can we have a debate in Government time on the impact of Brexit and a report from the Government that would show the impact of Brexit, region by region, and what that has meant for us all? For good or ill, the country needs to know.
Mr Rees-Mogg
We can start Prayers every morning—I may propose this as a formal resolution of the House—with a celebration of Brexit. We should have the Brexit prayer and perhaps even the Brexit song, beginning, “Gloria in excelsis Deo”, because it has been a triumph for this nation in reasserting its freedom. The NHS already had the £350 million that was on the side of the bus. That was delivered by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) in 2018, with an extra £34 billion uplift for the NHS by 2023-24. Just think of the vaccines that we have and the success of the vaccine roll-out programme. I believe that I mentioned earlier in the year the happy fish that we have, so there is general celebrating and rejoicing that we are now a free country once again.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
Across Bath and North East Somerset, 6,000 households are on the social housing waiting list. Our council, which the Leader of the House and I share, is delivering the first new social homes for rent in a generation and we should congratulate it on that. However, the Government are making it incredibly difficult for councils to build new social homes for rent, certainly in the numbers that we need, so can we have a full debate on the dire need to build more social homes for rent and hear what the Government are saying about actually delivering them?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am beginning to think that the hon. Lady has access to my diary, because last week she raised a question relating to the Royal United Hospital, with whom I had a meeting the following day in which I raised some of the points that she made, and tomorrow, I am having a meeting with the chief executive of Curo, which is a social housing company that does a really good job. I have found in my dealings with Curo that it is consistently receptive to issues that their tenants face and quick in response, so I can discuss some of the points that she raised today.
In addition, the Government are committed to increasing house building. The sheer volume of house building is what ensures that there are houses for everybody. Whether it is social or affordable housing—however it is defined—we need to build more, which is why it was announced in the Queen’s Speech that there would be a planning Bill. However, I am grateful to the hon. Lady for helping me with my diary management.
Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)
I reinforce the call from my good and hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) in requesting a debate on Storm Arwen, and particularly the need for an independent public inquiry. At no point have the local authority or Ministers shown any self-awareness of their failings over the lack of leadership and delays in getting welfare support to residents affected by the loss of power, some for 10 days. There seems to have been a collective effort by Conservative politicians at both local and national levels to push all the blame on to Northern Powergrid in the storm’s immediate aftermath. I believe that there are some similarities with the failure to accept responsibility for the No. 10 Christmas party debacle.
Mr Rees-Mogg
It is quite a leap of imagination to go from a party to power lines being blown down in a storm. The responsibility for power lines inevitably lies with power companies. The hon. Gentleman may never have been the greatest proponent of privatisation, but private companies have a responsibility to deliver service to their customers. The message that we had from his hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) was that, actually, society at large had rallied round. That should always be welcomed and viewed positively. The Government do not do everything; society has its place, as does private business.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)
My constituent Jan Ahmadzai, a British national, was in Afghanistan visiting his wife and five children when Kabul fell. He was due to be evacuated, but unfortunately he was close to Kabul airport when the suicide bombing took place. He has since managed to flee with his family to Pakistan, but the only information that we can get from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office is that he should report to the Afghan embassy in Islamabad. Can we have an urgent debate in Government time to raise such issues on behalf of constituents such as Mr Ahmadzai and his family?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Obviously the evacuation from Kabul was incredibly difficult. Operation Pitting was a remarkable achievement; I went to Brize Norton to see some of the people who had been involved, and some of them then came to the House of Commons. Their work was really very remarkable, under extraordinarily difficult circumstances.
Rather than offering the hon. Lady a debate, I think it is more useful if I say that if she sends me the details, my office will be more than happy to take up the case of Mr Ahmadzai and see whether we can help in getting answers from the FCDO—in the hope that they are not all on leave.
Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)
I was delighted to hear the Leader of the House’s words in favour of transparency, so I look forward to his support for a debate in Government time on unincorporated associations and on closing key vulnerabilities identified by the Electoral Commission in how those associations receive donations. The frankly scandalous situation whereby their donors are not required to be “permissible” donors means that those associations can receive moneys from overseas sources entirely legitimately and then donate to political parties and candidates with perfunctory checks, if any.
Mr Rees-Mogg
Unincorporated associations are a fundamental part of how this country operates. Lots of football clubs, cricket clubs and so on are unincorporated associations—they have a very proper place in society. However, I point the hon. Lady to the Elections Bill, which I think is now in the other place, having been dealt with by this House. There will be opportunities, should their lordships make any amendments, for us to consider it further.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)
Can we please have a debate in Government time on the enforcement of the ministerial code? The Electoral Commission’s report today on donations for the refurbishment of the Downing Street flat states that the Prime Minister was WhatsApping Lord Brownlow asking for money in November 2020, but it would appear that the Prime Minister also told Lord Geidt, the independent adviser, that he had become aware of the funding source only in February 2021. It remains to be seen whether in those circumstances Lord Geidt will feel able to continue in the role of independent adviser, but whoever does that job will have to do it with every assiduousness—shall we say—and exhibit perhaps a greater degree of curiosity and perhaps a little less trust than has been the case to date.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I fundamentally dispute that—I think that the right hon. Gentleman has the wrong end of the stick. The Government have a mandate from the British people by virtue of having won an election. The Prime Minister is Prime Minister because of that simple fact. The ministerial code is a code in the Prime Minister’s name. It is followed carefully and the Prime Minister is responsible for it.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
My constituent, who is on maternity leave caring for her baby and her disabled daughter, has just had this month’s universal credit cancelled because her partner was paid a day early and it was counted as double pay. That means that, as well as earnings deduction, they are losing the mother’s carer and child disability elements. Will the Leader of the House instruct the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to make sure that the family get the money they are due, urgently and certainly before Christmas?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am aware of the problem that occurs when people receive two payments within a month; it has caused problems for constituents of mine in the past. If the hon. Gentleman gives my office the full details, I will make sure that they are sent to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions as a matter of urgency. I am not brave enough to instruct the Secretary of State.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)
Today, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has published the names of 208 employers in the UK that failed to pay their staff the national minimum wage. I was very pleased to see that none sits within my constituency’s local authority this year. Will the Leader of the House schedule a debate in Government time on the effectiveness of naming and shaming, and on how smaller or newer businesses can avoid common accounting pitfalls that can lead to it?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I think that naming and shaming is effective, particularly as I think—although I have only seen brief press reports—that the list includes some very large companies that have not been paying the national living wage, which will go up to £9.50 next year. It is a legal requirement; companies must obey the law. Once companies are named and appear on these lists, I hope that the relevant authorities will scan the list and see who they ought to focus on investigating, because it is a serious matter.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I thank the Leader of the House for his statement and for responding to questions for a smidgen over an hour.
Delivering Justice for Victims
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Tom Pursglove)
Today, we are publishing a consultation on a new victims’ law to raise the voice of victims in our criminal justice system, expand their role in it and strengthen the accountability of all the agencies charged with supporting victims across the system.
We have a moral duty to protect the victims of crime, improve the level of service that they can expect from the criminal justice system and raise the quality of support that they receive. It is the right thing to do, but it is also essential on a practical level to ensure that in operational terms we have the most effective justice system possible. After all, we can secure convictions and bring down rates of crime only if victims have the confidence to report crimes to the police and engage with prosecutors to make sure that their testimony is heard in court. For both those reasons and at every level, we must do better.
As things stand, too many victims feel that the criminal justice system does not deliver justice for them. Too many feel let down by the system, which compounds the pain and suffering from the original crime. In fact, it is worrying that as many as three in five victims do not even report a crime that they have suffered. A survey by the Victims’ Commissioner shows that, based on their experience of the criminal justice system, a third of victims would not report a crime again. The evidence demonstrates that a third of victims who do go to police will later disengage from the process.
In those cases, justice is not delivered for victims, and the public are left exposed to criminals left to carry on offending. That must change. The Government are determined to improve the service and support that victims receive from the point at which a crime is reported right through to their experience in the courtroom.
We have already taken a range of actions to support victims. We have strengthened the victims code, which sets out the minimum standards that victims can expect. We have invested £300 million this year in victim support services, of which the Ministry of Justice has provided more than £150 million; we announced in the Budget that that will increase to £185 million per year by the end of this Parliament, ensuring that more victims can access what can be life-saving help. We have passed the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 to protect victims and strengthen measures against perpetrators. We have published the end-to-end rape review report, setting out a plan of action to drive improvements for victims across the criminal justice system. We have begun to improve the trial experience for victims by rolling out pre-recorded cross-examination—known as section 28—for vulnerable victims, so that those who want to can give evidence earlier and outside the courtroom, making the process less harrowing so that victims can present their best evidence and helping to secure more convictions.
But we must go much further. I want to guarantee that victims are at the very heart of the criminal justice system. Rather than feeling peripheral to the process, victims should feel supported so that they can properly engage at every step. Our plan for delivering a world-class service to victims has five crucial elements that we will deliver through the victims Bill.
First, we want to amplify the voice of victims and ensure that they are properly engaged at every stage of the criminal justice system. We want to ensure agencies communicate with victims better. For example, we are consulting on the requirement for the prosecutor in certain types of case to communicate directly with victims before they decide whether to charge a suspect. We believe that such direct exposure to the victim is essential to giving them the confidence to go to trial and to see their cases through, and will help to reduce what are known as the victim attrition rates. As well as amplifying the voice of individual victims, these measures will strengthen the voice of whole communities. We intend to put explicit provision for community impact statements in the victims’ law and the victims code, mainstreaming their use in appropriate cases to ensure that the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and the courts understand the wider scale and extent to which crime can blight whole neighbourhoods.
Secondly, we will increase transparency in respect of the performance of our criminal justice agencies. Today we are publishing the first national criminal justice and adult rape scorecards. They will bring together data to give a cross-system view of performance, including aspects that matter to victims such as how long it takes for cases to be investigated and charges to be made, how long cases wait in the courts before they go to trial, the number of guilty pleas, and what happens to cases when they reach court. One thing that is immediately clear from the data is that we must do better. Some cases are taking too long to get through the system. Covid-19 may be a factor in that, and we are working to bring down backlogs, but rape cases in particular are taking far too much time to get to court. That is not good enough and we are determined to put it right.
A further set of localised scorecards, giving the more granular local detail, will be published early next year. The scorecards will monitor victim engagement so we can see where in the system victims are being failed and take steps to fix that, and the local scorecards will show us where in the country the system is delivering for victims and where it is not. That data and that transparency will equip victims, and our criminal justice agencies more generally, to better monitor performance, and to better understand the problems in the system and address them more effectively, while spreading the very best practice more widely.
Thirdly, we want to ensure that there are clearer and sharper lines of accountability when victims do not receive the right level of service. We will enshrine the victims’ code in law to send a clear signal about what victims can and should reasonably expect from the criminal justice system. It follows that we must also hold the respective criminal justice agencies to account when it comes to delivering for victims. We will strengthen the oversight mechanisms and their focus on victims across the board, from complaints procedures to reinforced inspection regimes nationally and police and crime commissioners locally. That will give victims more effective redress when something goes wrong and it will improve accountability.
Members will recall the Government’s rape review action plan, which was published in June. Today I can announce that we are publishing a report detailing progress against its aims, so that we can hold criminal justice agencies to account for how much they have improved outcomes in tackling this horrendous crime.
Fourthly, we want to help victims to rebuild their lives through accessible and professional services, and ensure that criminals pay more to support those services. We propose to increase the victim surcharge, which helps to fund victim services; that will mean criminals paying more to right their own wrongs, and in the process help victims to recover from what they have suffered.
Our consultation will also meet the commitment made to the House, during the passage of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, to consult on the provision of support services for victims of domestic abuse. We want to improve the commissioning and co-ordination of services, particularly for victims of traumatic crimes—domestic abuse, sexual violence and other serious violence—so that they can be given the right support at the right time to help them recover. As part of that, we plan to strengthen the support available from independent sexual violence advisers and independent domestic violence advisers, which we know makes victims almost 50% more likely to remain engaged with the criminal justice process.
Finally, we want to ensure there are better tools to protect victims and prosecute culprits. We are already making significant progress, and I can announce today that we are planning a national roll-out to expand provision of section 28 pre-recorded cross-examination for sexual and modern slavery victims to all Crown courts, with the specific priority of ensuring that victims of rape across the country pre-record their evidence and avoid the ordeal of facing the full glare of the courtroom.
Let me explain how this will work. The CPS will decide, in consultation with the victim, whether to apply under section 28 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999. The judiciary will retain oversight and discretion to ensure that the interests of justice are properly served. This has the potential to increase the number of successful prosecutions and earlier guilty pleas. The justice scorecards will help us to evaluate progress in this regard, and will highlight any challenges in practice. We will be guided by ongoing evaluation of data from courts already trialling the section 28 arrangements. I am committed to working carefully with the judiciary and criminal justice agencies on this expansion, as are my ministerial colleagues.
This Government will deliver credible change for victims. We will give them a more powerful voice at every stage of the criminal justice system. We will increase transparency and redress in respect of the support that they receive in practice. We will ensure that every criminal justice agency is properly held to account for its role in the wider system. We will better protect victims, especially victims of rape and sexual violence, to give them greater confidence about giving the testimony that can help to secure a conviction. We will make the perpetrators of crime pay more to help victims recover. That is our plan to give victims the justice they deserve, and to build back a better, stronger, fairer country. I commend this statement to the House.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
I am grateful to the Minister for giving me early sight of his statement, which is welcomed by Labour Members. Goodness knows it has been a long time coming, having been promised time and again over several years. I only hope that the proposed consultation exercise is dealt with rapidly, that people are listened to and that we see proposed legislation with no further delay. I also hope that the Minister will tell us what he understands to be the timescale for that to happen. I can inform him that we will work constructively with the Government to ensure that the new victims’ law is fit for purpose, and is a law of which we can all be proud. He could even save himself some time by simply adopting Labour’s victims Bill, which actually does the job.
The Minister’s words were not just an illustration of how much the new law is needed, but a damning indictment of the Government’s inaction over the past decade. The number of victims who have dropped out of the system has doubled in the last five years, and a record of number of cases have collapsed over the last year. I know that the Minister has not been in his post for long, but he must be embarrassed to stand before us today and tell us that confidence in the justice system is so poor. Three in every five victims do not even report a crime, a third of victims would not report a crime again, and a third of victims who do go to the police drop out of the process before any case can come to court.
If we are to help victims, we must get the court system correct. In October 2021, the National Audit Office released a damning report on the Government’s handling of the court backlog. It found that the Crown court backlog had already increased by 23% in the year leading up to the pandemic, and had increased a further 48% since its onset. Not to put too fine a point on it, the NAO said that both the Ministry of Justice and its courts agency were not working together properly to solve problems which had their roots in pre-pandemic cuts.
The Government have their work cut out to deal effectively with rape cases alone. One in 67 rape complainants actually see a case come to court, and it can take four years for that process to be completed. The latest data from the Crown Prosecution Service shows that the number of rape convictions fell by 6.7% in the last quarter, and we have seen the conviction rate fall considerably, from 72.9% in quarter 1 of 2020-21 to 66.2% in quarter 1 of 2021-22, a reduction of 6.7%. The number of days from receipt to charge has been increasing quarter on quarter: according to the latest figures, it increased from 125 days to 170 days in the same period. Under this Prime Minister, rape victims are being abandoned by the justice system. At the current rate, it would take the Government 18 years to return to the pre-2016 levels of prosecution, which they promised to reach by the end of this Parliament.
We welcome the fact that section 28 is being rolled out, but it is all well and good for the Lord Chancellor to commit himself to overseeing that national roll-out; what I want to know is why it has taken so long. He could have got it moving much more quickly and saved more victims from the stresses of court if his Government had supported Labour’s amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill back in the summer. Can the Minister tell us what the timeframe is for this roll-out?
As for scorecards, perhaps the Minister can tell us what score he thinks we should give the Government with numbers like these. There are 3,357 victims of violent and sexual crime who have already been waiting over a year for their day in court, and a further 654 victims of these horrific crimes have been waiting over two years. Will he also assure us that he will have the extra resources to ensure that all his proposals can be implemented?
Five previous Justice Secretaries have promised a victims Bill, and all five have failed to deliver. Victims will have very little confidence that the current Justice Secretary will succeed where his predecessors have failed. It is damning that victims now tell us that their experience of the justice system was worse than the crime itself. Just 19% of victims believe that judges take account of the impact of crimes on them, and just 18% believe that they are given enough support. Fighting to overturn CPS decisions not to prosecute, lengthy court delays and people waiting years for their day in court—all this sends a very bad signal about how victims are treated by the justice system. We can see why women and girls, in particular, give up.
Since 2010, the CPS has faced a 25% budget cut and a 30% reduction in staff. Police forces in England and Wales lost 21,732 officers between March 2010 and March 2018—that is 15% of their total number. More than half of all magistrates courts in England and Wales have closed since 2010. It is an abysmal record.
Victims do not want a consultation; they want action. Labour has a ready-made Bill to end violence against women and girls, to clear the backlog through an increase in Nightingale courts and to fast-track rape and sexual violence cases. Our victims Bill would also improve rights, strengthen protections and accountability, improve communications and ensure that victims were no longer treated as an afterthought. This Government have come out with a statement today. They must now match their warm words with deeds and ensure that they fulfil their promise to put victims at the very heart of our criminal justice system.
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I was sorry to see his announcement last week that he would be stepping down from the House at the next general election. Having been a Government Whip, I have spent many hours with him on Bill Committees, and I have always appreciated the way in which he has gone about his business here in the House. I also appreciated the constructive tone that ran through at least the start of his response to my statement.
One thing that I am particularly concerned about in the approach that the hon. Gentleman is seeking to adopt here is that he keeps talking about a Bill that he and his colleagues have prepared. I do not think that being prescriptive about all this is the right approach. This is a fundamental reform and a once-in-a-generation opportunity to deliver meaningful reforms and get this right, and I think the right approach is to have meaningful consultations with the sector, with victims, and with those with knowledge and experience in these matters, in order to deliver a policy that is fit for purpose and delivers on the aims that I would like to think all of us in this House agree on. At the end of the day, we are talking about the victims of crime. Some of them have been through horrendous, unthinkable trauma, and we owe it to them to come together constructively and responsibly and to debate these matters in a measured way to ensure that we get the response right for them. That is my job, and it is the responsibility of Members of this House and certainly of the ministerial team at the Ministry of Justice to get this right.
We have a strong record on crime, and of course the ultimate objective is to ensure that there are no victims in the first place. That is why we are committed, for example, to rolling out 20,000 extra police officers. We want to prevent crime from happening, and we want more police officers out on the beat catching criminals and deterring crime. That is exactly what we are doing. I repeat that our plan for victims will deliver a world-class service to them by amplifying the victims’ voice, by increasing transparency in the system—Members across the House will recognise the real importance and value of that—by strengthening accountability, by improving support for victims, including through criminals paying more towards the support we put in place, and by generally providing better tools to protect victims and prosecute criminals.
The approach that we take to these matters as a Department and as a Government is one of non-defensive transparency around the policy. Some of what we are announcing today is a starting point. This is an iterative process, for example, with the scorecards. I would welcome input from Members across the House about the scorecards and what more we can do to improve transparency so that we can drive genuine improvement.
The hon. Gentleman specifically raised the issue of the courts backlog. We have taken comprehensive action to address the backlog. As part of the spending review, we are investing £477 million in the criminal justice system over the next three years to help to reduce the backlog and to deliver the swift access to justice that victims deserve. We have taken decisive action, but the shadow team seems to have a pretty short memory. Prior to the pandemic, in February 2020, the courts backlog was 19% lower than it was in the last year of the Labour Government. Meanwhile, we have kept the wheels of justice moving in unprecedented circumstances, so the Opposition really do not have a leg to stand on in this regard. The courts Minister, the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge), is here in the Chamber and is overseeing this important work.
Despite the Opposition’s criticism, the funding that we are putting in place is far in excess of anything that was ever put in place by the previous Labour Government. Our £185 million package is over four times as much as was spent in the last year of the previous Labour Government. Our record shows that we are on the side of the victims, while Labour failed to support them in the way that we are doing now.
On the issue of rape prosecutions, I would just draw the hon. Gentleman’s attention to the fact that the data on the scorecards relates to quarter 2. That provides important context, and we are obviously now six months on from that. Our plans will significantly improve the way in which the criminal justice system responds to rape. Before the end of the year, we will publish the first ever adult rape scorecard; introduce a single source of 24/7 support for victims of rape and sexual violence; roll out a new investigatory model—Operation Soteria—that focuses on the suspects’ behaviour rather than that of the victims; and expand pre-recorded cross-examination through section 28 for victims of rape and sexual violence. The hon. Gentleman asked specifically about the implementation of that last policy, and it is of course crucial that we get it right and that it is delivered appropriately and sensitively. That is why we are working with our criminal justice partners and the judiciary to deliver that roll-out as quickly as possible and in an appropriate manner.
The point that I made at the start applies to how we debate these matters. We are talking about victims of crime, and I want us to have a constructive debate over the course of the next eight weeks as we consult on these measures. There is a comprehensive engagement plan in place to do that, and I would really welcome Members from across the House contributing their ideas, helping to shape this, and encouraging their constituents and the organisations that they work with in their constituencies to make their views and experiences known so that we can get this right and deliver the meaningful change that victims deserve.
Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
I very much welcome this statement, and the tone with which the Minister has approached this matter. We need a serious and measured debate about how we best serve the victims of crime, and I particularly welcome the proposal to put the victims code on to a statutory basis. As he notes, this is something that the Justice Committee has called for, and the Committee stands ready to assist with any prelegislative scrutiny in that regard.
The Minister is right to flag up the issue of delays and their impact on victims, and one of the key causes of delay is victim attrition, particularly in relation to rape and serious sexual offences. The most important means of tackling that is sustained financial investment in the system, which, as he rightly observes, has been lacking for decades. It was lacking under previous Governments when I was in practice at the Bar, so no one party can claim a monopoly of concern on that. The current settlement is the best for decades, but will he ensure that it is applied to investment in maintaining the courts in good physical condition, maintaining the supply of good-quality judges—both full time and recorders—and, importantly, funding the legal profession properly so that we have good-quality barristers and solicitors available to prosecute and defend these important and sensitive cases. Good-quality lawyers on both sides speed up cases and give a better outcome for the victims.
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his sage advice. It is fair to say that on these matters I am keen to have a constructive working relationship so that we can get this right, and I genuinely believe that the Justice Committee has an awful lot to contribute to the consultation process as we shape this policy. He is absolutely right about victim attrition. That has undoubtedly been a barrier to securing the greater numbers of prosecutions that we would all like to see delivered. Of course, section 28 will play a really important part in delivering on that, informed by the work on the trials of that technology that we have seen previously.
Independent sexual violence advisor provision is also important, and engagement with ISVAs has a significant role in helping victims to sustain their participation in the criminal justice system and in bringing perpetrators to justice. My hon. Friend also makes an important point about courts, and my hon. Friend the courts Minister has heard what he said. The £477 million injection that we are making in that regard is also important.
Stephanie Peacock (Barnsley East) (Lab)
Jackie Wileman was on her daily walk when she was killed by four men who were joyriding a stolen heavy goods vehicle around Barnsley. Those four men had a hundred convictions between them, one had previously killed by dangerous driving and one was in the probation system. The judge gave them the maximum sentence of 14 years but said he would have liked to have given more.
Jackie’s brother Johnny has bravely campaigned on the issue of sentencing for dangerous driving, on which I welcome action, but Johnny and his family feel completely let down by every part of the system. Will the Minister outline how things would be different for Johnny under these proposals?
Tom Pursglove
The hon. Lady is a strong advocate for her constituents, and she raises a very difficult and tragic case in her community. I am sure the whole House’s thoughts are with the family and friends of her constituent. It is important to say that we are taking action on this issue through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, which I am sure she will welcome, to take sentences from 14 years to life.
Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
I warmly commend my hon. Friend for his statement and the consultation document. As he will know from when he was my departmental Whip, a lot of the language in this document is familiar to me. I am pleased about that, because it is with a proper seriousness of purpose and a sense of acknowledgment of inadequacy that we have to approach this issue.
I put on record my thanks to Emily Hunt, the independent adviser on victims. I appointed her and worked well with her, and I can see her hand in this excellent document.
Will my hon. Friend assure the House that, when this consultation finishes—and in the spirit of what he said about cross-party working, which is hugely important—we will have prelegislative scrutiny to get this once-in-a-generation Bill absolutely right for the future?
Tom Pursglove
I am fond of my right hon. and learned Friend, and I thoroughly enjoyed working with him. He made a significant contribution during his time as Lord Chancellor, and it undoubtedly shifted the dial considerably on many areas of policy in relation to the criminal justice system. He was consistently passionate about victims and wanting to see genuine improvement for them. It is fair to say that his hand is most definitely on this work, and I would never want to disregard the very good work that has been done previously. I am grateful to him for everything he has done in this regard, and I look forward to his participation in the consultation. I share in his remarks about Emily Hunt, and it is our intention to have prelegislative scrutiny to allow Members on both sides of the House to scrutinise and help shape the plans.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
As the Minister knows, the Home Affairs Committee has also taken a great deal of interest in these matters. I welcome his statement on the intention of Ministers to make these changes to the criminal justice system to benefit victims. I am especially pleased that he mentioned the scorecards that will help spread best practice to areas that are not doing as well as they could and are basically letting down victims. Why does there not seem to be a specific strategy to tackle gender-based violence? That does not seem to be in this package as clearly or as up front as it should be. When will we get something on that?
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the constructive tone of his question. The tackling violence against women and girls strategy, which was published in July, is fundamental to the work in this area. Separate from this session, I am sure Ministers would be happy to talk to him so that he can further understand our work in this inevitably important area.
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)
I very much welcome the Minister’s statement, which emphasised the need for victims to be at the heart of the criminal justice system. I know from my experience as a magistrate that it can sometimes be difficult for victims to fully understand the sentences passed in the courtroom. Does he agree it is important for magistrates and judges to be very clear about how long will actually be spent in prison, or about how a community order will both punish and rehabilitate offenders?
Tom Pursglove
My hon. Friend takes a real interest in these matters, and he has also been a tireless campaigner in this space. I am grateful to him for his contribution.
Transparency is always important, which is precisely why we are introducing the justice scorecards so that people can see more about the work that is happening and the state of play as it stands at any given time. For the reasons I set out, we want to drive improvement not just on a national level but in the local context. I hear my hon. Friend’s point, and I will gladly take it back. We should keep under constant review what more we can do to be transparent so that victims know exactly where they stand.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
I visited Woolwich Crown court on Monday to meet the judges, and I saw the excellent work they are doing to keep the system running through these very difficult times. One point they made that echoes the points raised by the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) is that they need more recorders and more qualified barristers—there is a problem in identifying the number of barristers needed to keep the system going. They also need covid funding to continue beyond the end of March, especially as we face this new variant. Jurors have no choice other than to be in court, and the court has had to create a safe environment. Some of the funding will disappear and some of the facilities will therefore have to be got rid of. Can we look at covid funding to ensure we keep the court system going and to ensure juries are looked after in court?
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for talking about his experience of visiting his local court. It is important to point out that we are increasing the number of recorders, and of course we work in close collaboration with the judiciary on these matters. Ministers, as would be expected, have a strong working relationship with the judiciary to understand the needs that exist. Again, we are investing £477 million in court recovery.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I thank the Minister, my parliamentary neighbour, for his statement, and I congratulate him on his work on the new victims Bill. Residents in Kettering want to see fewer victims of crime and more criminals in jail paying for their crimes. As well as the national effort to help victims, what work is he doing with the Northamptonshire police, fire and crime commissioner to get more localised support for victims in Kettering, Corby and Wellingborough?
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to my constituency neighbour, who is ever innovative in his questions. It is fair to say that many leaflets have gone out over the years with both of us on them to campaign for more police officers out on the beat catching criminals and deterring crime, which is exactly what we are delivering and what people in Corby and east Northamptonshire want.
We have an excellent police, fire and crime commissioner in Northamptonshire, Stephen Mold. I would urge Stephen to take part in this consultation and to get across the experiences and issues of victims in Northamptonshire so they can be reflected in this work and so we can get the policy right for residents in Northamptonshire and across the country.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
As a former police officer trained in the handling of sexual offences, I know very well that victims must be at the heart of the criminal justice process. Allowing victims to prerecord evidence is a key part of that, and it already happens in Scotland. The Home Affairs Committee discussed the section 28 pilot last week, and concerns were raised in evidence that barristers and recorders have been unable to take on cases because the system is not sitting well alongside the standard court process. I am grateful for the outline of how the Government intend to implement section 28 further, but will the Minister advise me on what impact this feedback is likely to have on the roll-out?
Tom Pursglove
I thank the hon. Lady for welcoming the section 28 reforms, and she is right that the reforms are pivotal to helping victims to come forward and to give their best evidence so we can secure prosecutions. She will appreciate that we are consistently discussing these matters with the judiciary, who, obviously, have a significant role in implementing this policy. We will make more detail on that known as the roll-out progresses, but I can assure her that these angles are being looked at closely and those discussions are ongoing.
Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)
I very much welcome this statement. On Tuesday, my hon. Friend said that the consultation was imminent, and he has been true to his word. Does he share my concern, however, that the definition of “victim” within the victims’ code is pretty restrictive, unlike the situation in other jurisdictions, which I touched upon on Tuesday? Will he ensure that as we go through this consultation process the voices of those who have not traditionally been regarded as victims are heard and that as the code moves into statute we do much better by them, so that their situation, and the trauma and tragedy that they go through, through no fault of their own, is mitigated?
Tom Pursglove
I thank my right hon. Friend for his question. We had a good debate on Tuesday evening, at the end of business, on these matters, and I look forward to meeting him to discuss this in greater detail. One key issue that I raised in responding on Tuesday night is that there are always needs that we need to look at. It is important that these matters are considered on a cross-government basis and that the support in place for individuals in the many different circumstances they find themselves in, particularly the mental health support, is kept under constant review. I encourage him to take part in the consultation and makes his views known.
Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab)
I welcome the Minister’s statement today and I hope that we are able to deliver more justice for victims, because being a victim is for life. It is important to bring personal circumstances to the House, in order for people to understand the situation. In my case, the person who was responsible for the death of my daughter in a hit-and-run accident was sentenced to prison, and so got a custodial sentence, but of course they are eligible for home detention curfew. So this is not just about what happens before and after; it is about what happens throughout the whole process. We got a phone call from the probation service about this home detention curfew process, but it was transactional. I am not criticising the people involved or the system per se, but it was a transactional process. We got no guarantee that we would be listened to, as we were in relation to a victim statement—we got no guarantees that we would be taken into account at all. So it is important that that point is incorporated in this: that victims do have the formal right to be heard even after the actual court process itself.
Tom Pursglove
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for bringing his personal experiences to the House this afternoon. That must have been incredibly difficult to talk about, and I can only imagine the impact that that whole experience has had on him and his family—it is truly heartbreaking. I wonder whether he might be willing to meet me to discuss this in greater detail. The point I would make is that I always expect the criminal justice agencies to be engaging with people in an incredibly sympathetic and understanding manner. I would appreciate the opportunity to understand a little more about his experience, so that we can try to make sure that that never happens again and that any issues are dealt with properly. I look forward to meeting him to discuss it.
Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
As my hon. Friend will be well aware, child sexual exploitation is, sadly, an undeniable problem in my constituency. So I am very pleased that the Government are launching this consultation, on a Bill that puts supporting victims of these horrific, horrendous crimes at its heart. Will he explain what further support the Government plan to provide to victims of these horrific crimes, particularly via the independent sexual violence advisers and other services that help those who have experienced child sexual exploitation?
Tom Pursglove
I thank my hon. Friend, who is a vociferous champion on these matters on behalf of his constituents. He raises an important issue through his question. Of course, ISVAs are very important in this work, which is why we are committed to increasing considerably the number of ISVAs that are available to support victims. It is also crucial to point out that, as well as the baseline national provision that we help to support, there are of course opportunities for police and crime commissioners to supplement that work, based on local circumstances and local need. I am sure that he will be making his views known as part of this consultation work, as he has a really valuable contribution to make.
Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)
I very much welcome my hon. Friend’s statement, particularly the commitment to providing additional means by which victims can present their evidence in the courtroom. Does he agree, however, that we need to cast the net a little wider, in order to ensure there are additional means for certain victims to report crimes in the first place? I recall from my time many years ago in local government the success of third-party reporting centres, which were there to ensure that crimes that may otherwise, for a whole number of reasons, go unreported do get into the system.
Tom Pursglove
I thank my hon. Friend for that question on this important issue. The Government are clear—and I know that all Members of this House echo this message in their communities—that it is so important that people come forward and report crimes where they exist, in order that we can have a very accurate picture about the state of play in individual communities and ensure that the right resources are directed at those challenges. I have mentioned this previously, but we want more police officers out on the beat catching criminals and deterring crime. That accessibility to the criminal justice system—that confidence that is given as part of visibly seeing police officers out on the beat—is fundamental to confidence and to delivering on reducing crime. He raises a number of important points through his question, and I will gladly ensure that the Minister for Crime and Policing is made aware of what he raises, but the message that must go out is that people need to come forward to report crime where they find it and experience it. If my hon. Friend has suggestions to make, through the consultation, on how we can do better on reporting, I would be appreciative if he would make them known.
Point of Order
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate
Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I seek your assistance and guidance on how more formally to place on the record thanks to advisers and other officials who helped me during my time in office. I did pay tribute to one adviser earlier, but it has prompted me to ask a more general question about whether there is a mechanism that could allow me and other former ministerial colleagues to properly, and in appropriate circumstances, place such thanks on the record.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I thank the right hon. and learned Gentleman for his point of order. I note that he seeks, rightly, to put on the record certain things he wants to say, and it is possible that he has just done it. It is not unheard of for those who have left ministerial office to make a personal statement. There are various other ways in which he can draw attention to the gratitude that he wishes to express, but I think that in many ways he has achieved his goal. It is very nice to have a pleasant point of order. [Laughter.]
Women in the Armed Forces
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Defence Committee
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Madam Deputy Speaker
We now come to the Select Committee statement. Sarah Atherton will speak for up to 10 minutes, during which no interventions may be taken. At the conclusion of her statement, I will call Members to put questions on the subject of the statement and call her to respond to those in turn. Front Benchers may also, of course, take part in questioning. I call Sarah Atherton to speak on behalf of the Defence Committee.
Sarah Atherton (Wrexham) (Con)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is a real privilege to be able to give this statement to the House today, on behalf of the Defence Committee. First, I wish to put on the record my interest as parliamentary patron for the veterans’ charity Forward Assist.
In July, the Defence Committee published a report on the lived experiences of women in the armed forces and female veterans. The intention was that, on publication of the report, we would come to the House and give a Select Committee statement on its findings and recommendations. However, as the report was released during recess, the decision was made to delay the statement to the House until the Ministry of Defence responded. Last week, we received a 40-page response from the MOD, and I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for granting the time for this statement, which gives me the opportunity to speak on behalf of the Defence Committee.
I wish to acknowledge the people who, over the past 18 months, made the report happen: first, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), who graciously relinquished his chairmanship of the Sub-Committee, allowing me to chair the inquiry; secondly, my colleagues on the Defence Committee, who showed continual commitment and support throughout the inquiry; thirdly, the Committee staff, including the chief Clerk Mark Etherton and the Committee specialist Lucy Arora, who have been a pleasure to work with; and, finally, Rachel Varley, my parliamentary researcher, who spent many days at my side reading and listening to some very sobering evidence.
I thank the Secretary of State for lifting the defence instruction notice to allow servicewomen to speak to the Committee, which is normally forbidden. That illustrates the Secretary of State’s dedication to our endeavour. Thanks to that decision, just short of 10% of the female serving population came forward to give their accounts. I put on the record my most sincere thanks to the 4,106 women and veterans who completed our survey, in addition to the 76 pieces of oral and written evidence that we received. The inquiry happened thanks to all who contributed, and the credit is theirs.
Let me quickly outline the report, its scope and our recommendations before I address the response from the Ministry of Defence. The inquiry looked at the whole military life cycle of a servicewoman, from recruitment and retention to the transition to civilian life. The scope of the inquiry was therefore vast. I have limited time so I shall focus on four main themes: recruitment and retention, especially in respect of those with families; the role of the chain of command in overseeing complaints; the service justice system; and, finally, the issues that female veterans face when they transition to civilian life.
Incredibly, 90% of women would recommend a career in the military, as I would. However, when things go wrong, they go dramatically wrong. I and the rest of the Committee were shocked to discover the volume of women who told us that they had experienced bullying, harassment, intimidation, discrimination and worse: serious sexual assault and rape. In fact, 62% of the women surveyed said that they had experienced abuse while serving. One of the big issues was how the lodging of a complaint coloured their military careers going forward and how the complaint had a legacy that impacted on the rest of their lives.
The Committee made 35 recommendations; I will not run through them all, but I will explain a few of the key areas. First, we recommended that for complaints of a sexual nature, the chain of command should be entirely removed from the complaints process. The reason for that recommendation was that in some extremely harrowing cases the perpetrator was also the commanding officer, with servicewomen unable to escape the environment where the assault took place or avoid the perpetrator.
We also recommended an increase in the independence of the complaints and investigations processes, which should move away from being managed within the unit where the alleged incident occurred; a central defence authority, which should sit outside the single services, to deal with complaints; that the decisions of the service ombudsman be binding; and that cases of serious sexual assault, rape, murder and manslaughter be removed from court martial jurisdiction and heard in civilian courts.
Servicewomen reported to us failings in kit, uniform and equipment—including body armour made for men, helmets falling below their eyes and no sanitary products available on operations—that have huge impacts on operational effectiveness. We recommended that be rectified so that women have suitable kit that enhances rather than inhibits their combat ability.
On retention, most women who leave the Army do so after returning from having children. We recommended policies to improve family and personal life, including the swift roll-out of wraparound childcare to all bases and all services by the end of 2022, and a more flexible working environment.
On veterans, we recommended more recognition for women who have served. Of all the veterans and armed forces charities in the UK, there is only one that deals solely with women veterans: Salute Her in Newcastle. I wish personally to thank Paula Edwards, who runs the charity, for giving evidence to the inquiry and then supporting the extra 147 new referrals—in addition to the 1,800 women she currently supports—as a result of the inquiry.
Let me outline the MOD’s response. First, I put it on the record that the Secretary of State was two months late in issuing the reply. However, I forgive him as he has agreed to most of our recommendations. Crucially, the MOD has agreed to remove the chain of command’s remit from complaints of a sexual nature. That is hugely transformative and will improve the service for women currently serving and for those who serve in future. One question that I have for the Minister and hope to address in this afternoon’s Westminster Hall debate is how it will all work in practice. The devil is in the detail. I need confirmation that if a servicewoman is sexually assaulted, there will be a reporting and investigating process that is completely outside the chain of command, so that she can continue to work without fear of repercussion.
The MOD has also agreed to make the complaints system for non-sexual offences more independent by employing an outsourced investigations service. However, ambiguity remains over the alternative reporting mechanism and just how involved the chain of command will be in complaints relating to harassment, bullying and discrimination.
The service chiefs will be commissioning a six-month sprint to look at women’s health needs and uniforms. In fact, some months ago, prior to the publication of the report, the MOD announced the roll out of sanitary products for all those on operations and more choice on hairstyles—I am reliable informed that one style is called “battle braids”. I am pleased that the MOD is already making changes in those areas. Such changes have huge impacts on the day-to-day living of women and their sense of being valued, recognised and listened to.
I was disappointed that the MOD refused to accept the recommendation to remove rape from military jurisdiction and to place it into civilian courts. The Secretary of State and Ministers know the strength of feeling on this issue and the evidence to support the recommendation is clear for all to see.
In many ways, the Secretary of State went further in his response to our report, which is most welcome. I am pleased about the aspirational target of having 30% women in the armed forces by 2030, showing ongoing commitment to our servicewomen. Having liaised with our equivalent committee in the United States, I am pleased that the Secretary of State has committed to scoping an international conference next year, to look at best practice and progress as the world is waking up to the issues faced by women serving in the military.
This report has taken almost 18 months of work and is the first time that the issues faced by women in the armed forces and female veterans have been examined in this way. The inquiry gave them a platform and their voices have been heard. As a veteran, it has been an honour to chair the inquiry. I commend this special report to the House.
Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton) on chairing a most extraordinary exposition of some of the most profoundly disturbing issues that women face not only in modern life but specifically in the armed forces. They are a credit not only to their constituents and to the Committee but to women who seek a role in the armed forces.
On the cultural change that is required across the forces, which is mentioned in the report, does my hon. Friend agree that cultural change is also required specifically among the officer corps and that that should not be based on gender? Critically, around the Army Servicewomen’s Network, we should ensure equity of representation for younger women and for Black and minority ethnic women in the armed forces, and not only reflect the upper ranks who, frankly, seem in the report to be part of the cultural problem at the heart of this devastating investigation.
Sarah Atherton
I thank the hon. Member for his question. He has been extremely supportive throughout this work, and, like me, sits on the Defence Committee. He is quite right: we both identified that we needed to make sure that the voice of the junior ranks was equal to that of the senior ranks. I know that the Ministry of Defence has referred back to the women’s defence network, and I have assurances from the Secretary of State that there was junior rank representation on that Committee. As far as leadership is concerned, the MOD has introduced a raft of initiatives around leadership. Performance assessments have been adapted to make sure that underperforming officers are sanctioned with a process that makes it easier to get them removed from their positions, but we, the Defence Committee, will keep a watching brief on this.
Mr Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East) (Con)
I, too, pay tribute to my hon. Friend who has done such an amazing job. It proves the importance of scrutiny and what can be done with a sub-Committee, and it was a pleasure to participate. It was also quite shocking to hear some of the evidence from across all three services. We have now opened up all appointments to women across all three services, but, clearly, there is a lot more to do. The fact that we got a 40-page response from the MOD is significant and shows how seriously the work is being taken. I ask the Minister to consider this question of taking serious offences out of the military courts and into civilian ones, and I say well done to my hon. Friend for standing firm on this belief. The Justice Lyons report also said that this view should be recommended. I understand that the position cost my hon. Friend her Parliamentary Private Secretary’s job. I hope the Whips will recognise why she had to stand firm, and that it will not be too long before she is back into that post. I say well done to her. I am pleased that we are able to explore these matters further in the Westminster Hall debate this afternoon.
Sarah Atherton
All I can say to my right hon. Friend is thank you very much.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)
I also congratulate the hon. Member on leading this report. I have just a couple of questions. The Government’s response to the Committee’s report says that many women do not experience harassment, but they are concerned that 11% of women in the services faced sexual harassment last year. Sexual harassment, particularly in the workplace, is under-reported. Does the Committee consider the Government’s statement a fair one, or does it agree that that statistic may not be reflective of the reality?
Secondly, one thing that comes through is the hard work that the RAF has put in to making its force a more welcoming environment for women, and it is clearly a priority. Does the Committee agree that the RAF seems to be a front-runner in the forces in addressing concerns, and has it considered how that could be further honed and implemented across the forces?
Sarah Atherton
I thank the hon. Member for her questions. Based on the evidence that we have received, I absolutely disagree with the MOD’s statement about the level of abuse. Some 62% of our survey respondents had received some sort of abuse. The RAF did the best out of the three services. We had the least amount of evidence coming in from the RAF. This needs to be looked at. It is a younger service. We need to be modelling what it is doing and extrapolating that to the other services. We also have the Wigston review, and I am pleased to say that, in its response, the MOD says that it will give a thorough review of its recommendations in, I believe, 2023.
Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for her report, which is born out of her own experience in the services. I am sure that the service personnel and veterans whom I represent in Swindon will have great cause to thank her for what she has achieved. In particular, I was struck by the point that she made about the importance of holding the investigative process in a far more independent way. Is that not vital if the capacity of the Service Prosecuting Authority is to be enhanced? One worry I have about moving serious offences into the civilian courts is that that could have the unintended consequence of downgrading the investigative capacity of the Service Prosecuting Authority. Probably the better answer is the enhancement of the reliability, independence and integrity of the investigative process so that we see more victims coming forward and for that reaction to see a rise in the number of cases being brought. It seems that the numbers coming forward are very low, which leads to a vicious cycle of inexperience and poor outcomes for far too many servicewomen.
Sarah Atherton
I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for his question, and recognise that he was the previous Justice Minister. He is quite right when it comes to investigations. Many women told me that the investigation process was almost as traumatic as the incident itself, which then affected their future lives. Many of them were discharged on the back of the incident and the investigation, and then a lot of them had mental health issues and problems going back into civilian life. That is where the problem lies. Looking at investigations, I know that, on the back of the evidence that we provided, the MOD is making a few movements in that regard. With only 16% of cases having any forensic evidence taken, how can we expect cases to get to the courts for a conviction? That in itself is a problem, as is the lack of victim support. I know that the MOD has outsourced its investigations unit and that it is putting in place victim support units. I thank my right hon. and learned Friend for his question.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
I warmly commend my hon. Friend for the work that she has done on her Committee and for her report. Her Committee highlights the fact that juggling service life with family life can be hard for all service personnel, but especially for women, who are more often the main care giver, especially for dual-serving couples, and especially against a background of longer and more frequent deployments. Is she satisfied with the Government’s response to these concerns?
Sarah Atherton
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. The MOD has had strategies in place for many years around flexible working. I think my right hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood) may have been involved with putting those in place, but some of the evidence that we heard was that, while they were available, they were hard to get. Personnel were denied access to these schemes because of operational effectiveness. Their commanding officers were not granting the schemes. One thing we want to look at is the accessibility of these schemes. There is absolutely no point putting policies, strategies and initiatives in place if they do not make a positive impact on the ground. I know that, next week, the Minister will introduce his family strategy, which I will look at with interest. Most women leave the military after returning from maternity leave, which is a problem that needs to be embraced. I am confident that the Minister is trying to do that, particularly around dual-serving couples.
Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)
I congratulate the hon. Member on this comprehensive and, at times, quite harrowing report. It is a huge body of work and some of it made for quite difficult reading. I was most disturbed by the tenfold increase in cases of rape and sexual assault on the under-18s. Given the Government response to her report, is she confident that servicewomen are safe from sexual violence in their workplace? Furthermore, given that rape and sexual assault will continue to be dealt with by court martial rather than by civilian courts, will she return to this issue at any future date to see whether there has been any increase in the number of convictions as a result?
Sarah Atherton
I thank the hon. Member for her question. The Secretary of State asked the Defence Committee to visit Harrogate to see what it was doing around support for young servicewomen, and we were quite impressed. The MOD has acknowledged that there is a problem, which is a big step in itself. It is one of our oldest, most male-dominated institutions and it has now recognised and vocalised that there is a problem and is putting plans in place around supporting those women, which is a massive step forward. I was quite pleased with what I saw in Harrogate, and I did go with scrutinising eyes. With regard to serious sexual assault, murder, manslaughter and rape being held within the military service justice system, I am disappointed. To me, the evidence was overwhelming. Over this period, the MOD gave us quite a few streams of evidence and statistics, and, quite frankly, I was not convinced by any of them. The last one seemed to conflate two lots of databases, one of which was about conviction rates. The MOD seemed to be quite happy that it was investigating more and was therefore doing better, but I would say if it is investigating more, it has a problem—and my question would be, if it is investigating more, why are more cases not getting to the courts? That question raises concerns about the investigation process, which the MOD has acknowledged, and it is putting plans in place. The Defence Committee is going to be conducting a review of the MOD’s recommendations and progress on them in a year’s time, and I will continue, if permitted, to pursue this issue.
Stephanie Peacock (Barnsley East) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton) for her hard work in delivering this groundbreaking report, and all the female service personnel and veterans who took part.
The majority of women in our armed forces have satisfying and successful careers serving our country, and I am pleased to see that most would recommend it to others. The Government, in their response to the report, have agreed to some much-needed recommendations that will enhance this experience further. Commitments have been made on fundamental issues with uniform and equipment, and complaints will finally move towards being independent from the chain of command. I hope that those changes will happen swiftly. However, as has been mentioned already, the report reveals that far too many serving women are still experiencing harassment, discrimination, assault and bullying while serving.
We will have the opportunity to discuss the report in more detail in Westminster Hall this afternoon, but I want to address one of the most important points now. The Minister has said that he will not remove cases on most serious crimes from the service justice system and put them into the civilian courts. In the debate earlier this week, he justified this by arguing that his position allows the victim to choose between civilian proceedings and court martial, and that this is necessary in a small number of cases.
I pay tribute to the charity Salute Her, of which the hon. Member for Wrexham is a patron. When I spoke to the organisation this week, it said that of the 600 victims of sexual assault it has supported, not one has wanted to go through the military court system. I think that the hon. Lady agrees that it is simply not acceptable for the Government to ignore the incredibly important recommendation in this report to ensure that the most serious crimes are heard not in courts martial, but in civilian courts. Does she agree that the Government should relook at this matter?
Sarah Atherton
I thank the hon. Lady for her support over the last 18 months. Obviously, I agree that the Government should look at that issue again, and we will be looking at it as we go forward.
The Minister for Defence People and Veterans (Leo Docherty)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton) for this extremely powerful and hugely important report. I look forward to continuing to discuss these issues later in Westminster Hall, but I want at the moment just to put on record my absolute assurance that we see this report as an urgent opportunity and a lever to drive urgent and positive institutional change so that women can thrive and prosper in the military.
Sarah Atherton
I thank the Minister for his response. We will continue to work together.
Backbench Business
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Financial Services: UK Economy
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Anthony Browne (South Cambridgeshire) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House recognises the importance of financial services to the UK economy; and calls on the Government to provide adequate support to help create the right regulatory and operational environment for that industry to ensure that the UK is able to retain its competitiveness on the world stage.
It is a pleasure to lead this debate on the future of the UK’s leading industry: financial services. The arguments about its importance are well known and well rehearsed. The financial services sector is the UK’s biggest export industry by far, with a £78 billion a year trade surplus. In fact, the UK is the biggest net exporter of financial services in the world; we export more financial services than any other country on the planet, including the US, Singapore and all of the EU combined. That means that, as a country, we can afford to import all the smartphones, flatscreen TVs and other manufactured goods that we are so keen on, particularly at this time of year.
The financial services sector adds £194 billion gross value added—that is, it contributes £10 in every £100 of all the UK’s economic output. One in 14 UK workers is in financial services. That is 2.3 million employees, two thirds of whom are outside London. Indeed, this industry really is spread across the country. Scotland has less than a tenth of the population of France, but exports about half the amount of financial services that France does. The financial services sector pays more tax in a year than any other sector—£76 billion in the last year. As the Chancellor pointed out in his Mansion House speech in the summer, that is enough to pay for the entire national police force and school system combined.
During this hideous pandemic, I am glad to say that the financial services sector stepped up to the plate and played a crucial role in keeping the economy going. It lent more than £75 billion in emergency finance to nearly 2 million businesses. Indeed, it lent £101 million to more than 2,000 businesses in my constituency of South Cambridgeshire. To help homeowners, lenders also gave nearly 3 million mortgage deferrals during the pandemic. The financial services sector certainly has played its part in ensuring that the economy has bounced back so quickly. Now, guided by the Government, it is also increasingly playing a critical role in ensuring that we reach net zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2050. From green bonds to climate-related financial disclosures to carbon markets, the financial services sector will help, rather than hinder, in the biggest challenge facing humankind: stopping climate change.
Although we all recognise the importance of financial services, it is not a popular sector. A leading German politician once said to me that it was the great British tragedy—that we do not like our most successful industry. It has often brought that unpopularity upon itself; we all know the reasons, so I will not rehearse them here. It is one of the few industries in which we are genuinely world leaders, but regular surveys of international financial centres show that our crown is starting to slip: London is now usually ranked second to New York; our lead over Singapore and Hong Kong shows signs of shrinking; and our global market share in some sectors, such as insurance and bank lending, is trending down. That is a cause for concern, but not alarm. We can turn the tide, but we need to have a clear strategic objective that the UK should be the world’s leading international financial centre.
The industry is at a major turning point. Financial services policy in the next decade will be very different from financial services policy in the last decade. We are at the beginning of a new era. There are two major reasons for this, and both represent major opportunities. The first is that the wide-ranging reform and reconstruction of the industry in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis has, by and large, been completed. Almost the entire regulation of the industry was rewritten in a tsunami of reforms from both the EU and UK. This absolutely needed to be done to ensure that the crisis could not happen again—to protect taxpayers and consumers—but that regulatory repair job is now largely behind us. We must not forget any of the lessons from it, but we can now pursue a more forward-looking agenda. The Government have set this out in their document, “A new chapter for financial services”, which was published earlier this year and which I very much welcome. It sets out a vision for the UK as a leading financial centre that is open, innovative, competitive, and green.
The second reason that we are at a turning point is that we have left the EU. Clearly, leaving the single market represented a major challenge for many financial services companies—and I think that I am right in saying that not everyone in the industry fully supported Brexit. But leaving the EU has created opportunities to ensure that regulation and legislation is tailored to our national circumstances. We do not have an equivalence deal with the EU, nor, indeed, that promised memorandum of understanding. I actually never thought that such a deal or memorandum was that necessary; it was more a “nice to have”, rather than a “must have”.
There are many other existing legal routes for UK-based financial services companies to sell to clients in the EU, as we are currently seeing. The no-deal scenario that we had in financial services does have the advantage of giving us full regulatory control. There are three fundamental problems with the EU financial services regulation, from a UK perspective. The first is that the necessity of getting agreement from 27 or 28 countries means that it is very inflexible; once a law is made, it is very difficult to change it. Secondly, the EU tends to focus on competition between its members rather than global competition. It is more worried about competition between London, Paris and Frankfurt than between London, New York and Singapore. Thirdly, the EU necessarily assumes a one-size-fits-all approach even though markets in different EU countries often have incredibly different dynamics. In contrast, when we had the chairman and chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority in front of the Select Committee yesterday, they talked about how we can now have a very agile policy regime.
When we left the EU, the Government ensured legal continuity, as they had to, by incorporating all European financial services legislation wholesale into UK law. Now, though, we can take our time to consider what reforms we want both to EU-originated laws and to laws that we adopted unilaterally when we were part of the EU. We must of course abide by global regulatory principles, as set out by international bodies such as the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, the Financial Stability Board, the International Organisation of Securities Commissions, and the Financial Action Task Force. However, those various principles are at a high level and below them lies an awful lot of detail—and we know where the devil lies. We must continue being a beacon of high regulatory standards and resist any temptation of a race to the bottom, but we should also get the details right and ensure that they are appropriate, proportionate, and do not have unintended consequences. There is no conflict between abiding by globally high standards and being globally competitive.
Reform of imported EU legislation will take many years, if not decades, but the Government have made a start. They have completed the Lord Hill review of stock market listings and the Kalifa review of financial technology and adopted their recommendations, which now need to be implemented. We need to ensure that the prospectus directive is made more proportionate. I personally support allowing two classes of shares to encourage investment in start-up companies. The Government are now consulting on regulatory reform of wholesale financial markets, particularly the second markets in financial instruments directive, MiFID II, and the rules on the capitalisation of the insurance market—Solvency II. If we get the reforms of Solvency II right, that promises to unleash productive investment across the UK, especially in high-growth firms. MiFID II and the European market infrastructure regulation are extraordinarily detailed and prescriptive, and could be simplified without harm. Excessive detail can prevent beneficial innovation. We should avoid gold-plating international standards, unless there are clear reasons to do so. Rules on pre-trade transparency can be counterproductive. The share trading obligation can be safely removed.
Some retail legislation, such as on PRIIPS—packaged retail investment and insurance products—is applied to wholesale markets for little purpose. This week on the Treasury Committee, we heard from representatives of the commodities exchange, ICE Futures Europe, that they are required to produce countless retail key information documents for institutional investors who do not want them and will never read them. It was, they said, a pointless waste of time. Retail and wholesale markets are different and need to be treated differently. We should avoid making our rules extraterritorial unless there is a clear reason to do so. The EU often requires all EU-headquartered financial services companies to abide by EU rules wherever they operate in the world, in a deliberate attempt to set global regulation, but the UK should start with the presumption that UK-headquartered financial institutions need only abide by the rules in the markets where they are actually operating, as long as those markets operate by global standards. For example, when trading in the US, the presumption should be that UK financial services companies just need to abide by US rules.
The Government should also consider reforms to the capital requirements directive and regulation. These are the rules that implement the Basel capital rules for banks into EU and then into UK law. The Basel rules are designed for international banks operating across borders, not domestic banks operating just within one country, but the requirements of the single market meant that the EU ensured that the same capital rules were applied to domestic banks operating just in one country as were applied to international banks operating around the world. The UK should consider following the US rather than the EU and not require non-systemically-important domestic banks, such as challenger banks, to abide by inappropriate global capital rules. This could improve competition among banks without affecting prudential stability.
There is also domestic legislation that the UK could usefully revisit. The Treasury is currently reviewing the ringfencing rules separating retail and wholesale banks, which, in part, duplicates imported EU regulation on bank recovery and resolution. The ringfencing rules can lead to very complex and inappropriate governance structures for retail banks that do not have any significant investment banking operations, and it is certainly worth looking at whether that can be changed.
Critical to the continuing success of financial services will be the process by which we make new rules, which the Government are also reviewing. Our financial services rules will no longer go through the EU policy-making machinery. They will no longer be scrutinised in extraordinary depth and amended at length by the European Parliament’s formidable Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, which I wrestled with many times, and which was once admirably chaired by the UK’s own Baroness Bowles. There is no way that the UK Parliament has the capacity to replicate that function. Parliament must set the objectives and principles of future financial services regulation, but the details should be determined by the regulators, particularly the FCA and the Bank of England.
Dame Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
I agree that, as we are currently set up, the UK Parliament could not even begin to replicate what the European Parliament did with regard to oversight of regulation, but surely, if we, as a Parliament, were properly geared up with appropriate support, we could.
Anthony Browne
I basically agree with the hon. Member, a fellow member of the Treasury Committee.
Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con)
This is a really important point that we discussed in the debate last November prior to the Financial Services Act 2021, which came into force earlier this year. The key point is that we are giving the regulator huge increases of power with almost no appropriate increase in parliamentary scrutiny of those powers.
Anthony Browne
I thank my hon. Friend. That is exactly the point I was about to come to.
This will give the regulators more power, as my hon. Friend said, over issues that will directly affect the lives of voters. That means that they must be made more accountable to voters’ representatives—that is, to Parliament. The Government and the Treasury Committee are considering how that might work, and the Committee has held various hearings on the issue.
One proposed solution is a stand-alone financial services committee such as exists in Washington—the US House Committee on Financial Services, a stand-alone committee that just considers financial services. However, there is a real risk that that would tread on the toes of and undermine the existing Treasury Committee, which must retain oversight of all the Treasury’s functions. Another alternative is a full Committee of both Houses—the House of Commons and the House of Lords—but that would be unmanageable on an ongoing basis. It has worked as a task and finish group, such as the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards, but it would be very difficult on an ongoing basis. I am coming to the conclusion that the Treasury Committee needs—I totally agree with the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) on this—a well-supported sub-Committee, or secretariat, that can do the work in focusing on financial services regulation and holding the newly empowered regulators to account. It could include appointed expert advisers, as well as members from the House of Lords, on an appropriate basis.
Obviously, we would need to agree the governance around that. As the Government have made clear, this is an issue properly for Parliament itself to decide. The Treasury Committee will make its own recommendations in due course. Indeed, if any Members here have other thoughts on it, I would be very interested to hear them.
The regulators themselves are also changing. The Government have proposed giving them international competitiveness objectives, but that must be very much secondary to their principal objectives of financial stability and consumer protection. They must not lose focus on their principal objectives.
Stephen Hammond
My hon. Friend is right that we must not move away from the primary focus, but does he agree—he made the point earlier on the difference between wholesale and retail—that there ought to be a more balanced view between wholesale regulation and those two objectives if we are to remain a global centre internationally?
Anthony Browne
I agree. I support having a secondary objective of international competitiveness and growth. A regulator could decide on policy A or policy B and, from a UK perspective, it could make no difference in terms of consumer protection or prudential stability, but one could mean that we were more able to compete internationally. We asked the chief executive and chair of the Financial Conduct Authority about this in the Treasury Committee yesterday and they went through the details on how that might affect their thinking. But we absolutely must not lose sight of prudential stability. We have had a crisis once and we do not want it again.
We must maintain our support for innovation in financial services, as long as it brings real consumer and economic benefits. We must ensure that the fintech sector thrives. Creating a digital identity ecosystem, which the Government are looking at, will certainly help. As cryptocurrencies grow, it is inevitable that they will need some form of regulation to protect consumers, but it must be done in a proportionate way that focuses on tackling any harms. It is absolutely right that the Bank of England is exploring central bank digital currencies. We do not know whether retail customers want direct access to central bank funding, but it is absolutely right that we try to find out.
Finally, I want to cast our eyes across the world, and look at international partnerships. We are no longer part of the EU, and we do not know what our future relationship with it will be. As I said earlier, I consider any memorandum of understanding as a “nice to have” rather than a “must have”, and it certainly must not shackle the UK’s new regulatory regime. Any partnership would require both sides to agree it, and there seems little political desire for that at the moment on the other side of the channel. Rather, UK-based banks are worried that the EU is considering ways deliberately to make it more difficult to offer services to their EU-based clients, and we have to keep an eye out for that. That makes it all the more important that the UK forms meaningful partnerships with other international financial centres. I have long advocated a close financial services partnership between the UK and Switzerland, a major financial centre. We share a common approach, a global outlook and pragmatism.
Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend give way?
Anthony Browne
I am happy to give way to my hon. Friend and current member of the Treasury Committee.
Felicity Buchan
Does my hon. Friend agree that given their importance to our economy, both in London and throughout the country, we need to ensure that financial services are at the front when we are negotiating trade deals and market access with other countries?
Anthony Browne
I very much agree. I was coming to this point. If we can get those elements into trade agreements, we should aspire to do that. However, often, regulatory agreements between regulators are more appropriate.
Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that in addition to the importance of financial services in trade deals, it is important that we are aware of supporting other professional services that go with them, such as law and accountancy? The legal underpinning and enforceability of our financial services deals is critical going forward.
Anthony Browne
I fully agree with my hon. Friend. I have been focusing obviously on financial services, but there is the wider concept of financial and related professional services, including legal services. As he knows far better than me, London and the UK are a global centre for legal services. That is a huge export industry in its own right and we should do what we can to promote that internationally.
I was just talking about the importance of the relationship between the UK and Switzerland. We have a lot to gain by working more closely together. That is why I am delighted that the Government are working towards an outcomes-based mutual recognition agreement with Switzerland. I emphasise that it is outcomes-based because it is pragmatic and we share that pragmatism. Similarly, we can have an ambitious agreement with Singapore and other jurisdictions, such as Japan and South Korea.
I am pleased that the Government are working closely with the United States to remove barriers to financial services trade between us. We have some agreements and we could have more. The Government are doing the same with Australia, Canada and New Zealand. Coming to the point about trade agreements that my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) raised, I welcome the agreement in principle on the UK-New Zealand free trade deal, which facilitates cross-border data transfer and recognises the importance of allowing firms to offshore back-office functions. Those are both important for financial services.
We can promote financial services through trade agreements and mutual recognition agreements between regulators to the benefit of both sides. The Government must continue to work closely with our partners through the G7, the G20 and the Financial Stability Board to ensure consistent international standards. As the most globalised of all international financial centres, we are more impacted by global inconsistencies on standards than other jurisdictions.
Sir Robert Neill
My hon. Friend makes an important point about co-operation between regulators and agreements between regulators. Does he agree that that is particularly important in the context of dealing with the United States, where much of the regulation takes place at the state, rather than federal level? Therefore, it is not easily embraced in a straightforward, normal type of free trade agreement.
Anthony Browne
My hon. Friend makes an incredibly valid point. I know that the UK Treasury has spent a lot of time wrestling with the relationships with the United States, which is in many ways almost unmanageable, because it has 50 different state regulators, and the federal regulators answer to Congress, rather than to the Government, so agreements between Governments may not have an impact on the regulators themselves.
In conclusion, we are at a turning point for Britain’s financial services industry. In the past decade, we have faced the major challenges of the global financial crisis and Brexit, and we took the steps necessary to forge through both of those. We can now look forward to a new era of financial services, with new opportunities. We need to make sure that the UK is the undisputed leading international financial centre, both globally competitive and serving communities and consumers across our country, and exporting more, creating more jobs, funding more businesses and paying more tax. That is something we should all welcome.
Dame Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne), who has opened this Backbench Business debate and is a fellow member of the Treasury Committee. He has given us a grand tour of a large and diverse sector of the economy that is, as he pointed out, very important. He also pointed out that it is affected by a range of issues at the moment.
The hon. Gentleman gave us some of his ideas on what should be happening post Brexit with some of the more complex of the EU directives that have been onshored—in particular, MiFID—which have been against the grain of how the UK financial services and insurance industries have always tended to work. He hinted at the philosophical difference between EU regulation in these areas and how the UK more traditionally did it; it is the difference between having principles-based regulation, which is not so specific, and the EU way of doing regulation, which tends to be so specific and puts a lot of those specifics in legislation. When I was in the Treasury and in the Department for Work and Pensions as Pensions Minister, it was a battle that we constantly had with the EU in the Council of Ministers and with the Commission.
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)
indicated assent.
Dame Angela Eagle
I can see the Minister is nodding, possibly because he recognises some of those tensions, which always existed when we were in the EU.
When we were in the EU, because of the size of the influence of the UK financial services industry as part of that bloc, we had a very good and effective way of pulling at least a lot of the regulation that went on more towards our way of doing things. One of the worries I have post Brexit, which I suppose is a philosophical and practical worry, is that the EU will now go off and do a lot more of the things that we were able to persuade it not to do when we were a member. The divergence between how EU regulation works and how we may wish our future regulation of financial services to work is likely to grow larger.
It has not been a very friendly divorce to date, and there may well be implications to that, too, in terms of competition for business. We have seen some of that in the wholesale markets for euros and we will doubtless see more of it. The outcome of our way of leaving the EU will challenge some of the agreements that we came to and the influence we were able to have when we were inside the Council chambers, the European Parliament and the European Commission, rather than the situation we find ourselves in now. As the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire said, that can be an advantage, but it can also be a disadvantage. It is an opportunity, but there are also threats and issues that we have to deal with. We have a sharp disjunction with the recent past, after 40 years of that kind of influence, that we will have to deal with in the coming period. We have the inadequacies of the non-existent deal on financial services, which was part of the EU-UK so-called trade agreement, and those are already having an effect.
The hon. Gentleman was right to say that we are in a period of rapid regulatory change, which would have been the case regardless of whether we left the European Union. The fact that we have, and the fact that we have onshored all this regulatory machinery, means that we now have to start looking at how we wish to change all of it.
Even thinking about the sheer weight of work and oversight that will have to be done by the Treasury Committee is quite overwhelming, as the hon. Gentleman acknowledged in the exchange we had during his speech. The Minister must go weak at the knees when he thinks of the detailed work that he will have to put in to deal with the onshoring in the aftermath of Brexit, and whether we want to move quickly or slowly to adapt the laws and regulations that we have imported.
Members of the Treasury Committee have also gone weak at the knees thinking about how they might have some oversight, because of the highly technical nature of much of that regulation. We certainly need to be significantly more tooled up than we have been if we are to have proper oversight of what the regulators are tasked with doing, what philosophical direction the Government wish to go in, and what the practical aspects of that method will mean for our financial services industry and, of course—they have not been mentioned much—for consumers in the UK and for financial stability.
We should not lose sight of those two basic reasons why we have to get regulation right. Consumer protection is a huge issue in financial services, as the hon. Gentleman touched on when he said that financial services are not always the most popular sector of our economy. Perhaps some of those who supply and form part of the industry ought to stop and think about why that is they case and do some self-reflection about it.
Clearly, financial stability is also crucial in an era when markets are becoming more rapid and more global. In the context of highly rapid technical change, financial stability becomes even more important, because innovation outruns the capacity of many regulators to keep up with what on earth is going on in some markets. Those two important issues have to underpin all regulation; the future of the entire financial services industry rests on them.
Regulatory change in a rapidly evolving situation with a lot of flux is inevitably difficult for those who participate in the market and for those who wish to regulate it. It is also difficult for those such as the Minister who want to see how it can be properly harnessed and allowed to be beneficial to our economy while being safe. It is a period of big uncertainty and flex. New technology has the capacity to change things and lead to innovation, some of which might be fantastic and some of which might be awful. That structural issue has hit us greatly through the innovations of digital currencies.
The systems that control financial services have to deal with the practical and philosophical issues that arise, such as whether digital coins are ever stable, what central banks ought to be doing to deal with that, and whether the wild west of Bitcoin and the rest should be left as a gambling thing on the side. Those markets can be volatile—the wild west—but the capacity of software such as open registers and blockchain, and their potential for transparency and in-time and open trading of all sorts of things, could be harnessed for good purposes as well as for the more nefarious ones that feature on the darker edges of the net. On top of that, the demands of climate change will cause a systemic change in the way that things are valued, priced and assessed for value.
That structural change will completely change the context in which the financial services industry has to exist. In the UK, which is one of the most open economies in the world and always has been, we know how important the financial services sector is, and not only to London as a global centre. In 2020, it was worth £164 billion to the UK economy, which is the third-largest sector by size in the OECD. That is 8.6% of economic output, half of which is generated in London but half of which is generated across our regions. Of the 1.1 million jobs, 91,000 are in my region of the north-west. As the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire pointed out, it is one of the few sectors where we have a healthy trade surplus—£46 billion in 2020. It is the fifth-largest economic sector in our economy, and all the more important for that.
As the hon. Gentleman also pointed out, the sector is important for taxation, with £28.8 billion in tax taken from it. According to PwC, it makes up £75.6 billion, or 10% of the total receipts. In the face of such change—technological, structural or the disjunction of Brexit—any Government would want to see how they could remake the environment in which the financial sector can operate and flourish to benefit and protect the sector so that it can benefit and protect our economy. We certainly all have a stake in ensuring that that is the case.
In that area of flux, we have to remember that the regulators, although they could be powerful, are struggling with an increasingly complex and fast-moving environment that they are not always geared up to deal with in detail or to keep on top of. We have seen the travails of the Financial Conduct Authority and how it manages the perimeter, and philosophically the view of caveat emptor—that the buyer should beware in all circumstances. When things go wrong, the reputation of the entire financial services sector is at stake, so it is a difficult balance.
The Financial Conduct Authority gave evidence to the Treasury Committee yesterday, some of which reflected how difficult it is to try to remake a regulator after scandals such as London Capital & Finance, at the same time as operating within all the extra complexity and uncertainty. It has a formidable task. I suspect that being chair of the FCA is one of those jobs where people are told that, if they do a stint, they will get the diplomatic equivalent of the Washington embassy as a reward. The current Governor of the Bank of England is one example of that.
The FCA needs to be strengthened. We as policy makers, and the Minister in particular, have to think about how it can practically do the job. The job cannot be so big and complex that it is undoable. Sometimes, the way that the FCA has to cope means it is difficult for it to achieve a balance and be given a job that it can sensibly do. We know there is a big turnover of staff at the FCA at the moment, and that there is workplace stress and unrest. We know that the head of the FCA is trying to transform that organisation into what he calls a lean organisation that can respond very quickly to what is going on in the market and in the areas it has to regulate. I am not convinced that it has that balance right yet, and I am not even convinced that that job can sensibly be done without more support.
I want to deal with a couple of areas that the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire did not touch on. These are what I would call threats to the reputation of the financial services industry in this country. First, I want to talk about economic crime, which I think poses a threat to the entire sector and its integrity if it is allowed to get out of hand. We know that there are rising levels of economic crime, fraud and scams that have been turbocharged during the lockdown. The sector itself has survived covid and the lockdown pretty well so far, because it could manage remotely—it does a lot of its work remotely in the first place—but one of the things we have all seen, unfortunately, is the rise in fraud and scams. We have also seen, and perhaps it is inevitable when it is one of the biggest global centres of financial services, that London has attracted the attention of international criminals and fraudsters who wish to launder their money through cities like London. We know that, as a major financial centre, it is a target for all of these kinds of people.
The Intelligence and Security Committee, in its Russia report, which was suppressed for far too long and was finally published after the 2019 general election, said that London is considered the “laundromat” for corrupt money. We have seen that kind of magnet effect, which is extremely disturbing, and I do not think that we have yet really got a handle on it. There are regulatory failings, there are legislative failings with the structures we have to try to deal with this, and there are certainly enforcement failings of the laws that we do have.
Sir Robert Neill
The hon. Lady makes some very important points, particularly that last one. Does she agree that now we have left the EU and therefore, regrettably, left some of the justice co-operation measures we had, it is all the more important that we seek, bilaterally and in a broader sphere, to improve and strengthen international judicial and legal co-operation on the admissibility of evidence, rendering of suspects and, above all, dealing with digital evidence being obtained in other jurisdictions and then made available to prosecutors and the courts in the United Kingdom?
Dame Angela Eagle
I could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman, who is a distinguished Chair of the Select Committee on Justice. He is also a practitioner himself, so he knows about the practicalities of these issues. It is hard, in contemplating the extra work that has to be done because of Brexit, to know quite where one starts, but if we do not get it right and if we do not get on with it, this terrible reputation of London having become a laundromat for dirty money will only persist and perhaps get stronger, which will do us untold damage. I urge the Minister responding to this debate to give us some words of comfort that he is getting on with the economic crime strategy. We have an economic crime strategy—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. I hesitate to interrupt the hon. Lady, but I have been very lenient on timekeeping this afternoon because we have plenty of time and not very many speakers, and I have been particularly lenient because she is the only representative of the Opposition Back Benches. However, she is in danger of taking a very large chunk of time: she has spoken for about 20 minutes, which is longer than the person who introduced the debate. I wanted to keep such a balance, so I am not stopping her, but I am hoping, in the interests of being fair to everyone, that she will soon draw her remarks to a close.
Dame Angela Eagle
Madam Deputy Speaker, I am delighted to do so. I suppose that, when one gets let off the leash away from debates with three-minute limits, all the words just come tumbling out, but I would not want to take more than my allotted time.
I hope the Minister will be able to give us some words of comfort, particularly that he will be taking fast action to establish a beneficial ownership register and bring some transparency to what is going on in respect of financial crime.
Finally, I want to mention the issue of the model all too often pursued by some of our financial services, and this is a final philosophical point perhaps. All too often, complexity is seen as an end in itself in our financial services, and as a proxy for competition and a proxy for innovation, when in fact it is merely an excuse for opaque pricing. That makes it difficult for average consumers who want to put their money somewhere, make money, protect their money, or get a reasonable return on their money, and who find it too complex to do so. I do not believe that this is serving customers well, catering, as it does increasingly, for just a few at the top of the earnings distribution rather than the many who have smaller pots of money. I hope that the Minister will reflect in his response about what might be done to reverse that trend. With that final observation, Madam Deputy Speaker, I am happy to draw my remarks to a close.
Madam Deputy Speaker
Thank you. I hope that we do not have to have a time limit this afternoon. If everyone takes about eight minutes, there will be no need for one. If that does not happen, I will have to put on a time limit.
Stephen Hammond (Wimbledon) (Con)
It is an honour and a privilege to follow the two speeches from my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne) and the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle). Both of them gave us philosophical, intelligent and really interesting speeches, and I noted that both of them made the point that financial services as an industry perhaps do not get the respect or the renown they probably should have.
I was reflecting on that when I heard the remark my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire made about the German who said financial services are not recognised. Why is that? I think it is probably for three particular reasons, yet when we look at the contribution to the UK economy, we should really be shouting out against that. The first point is that, for all too many, when we say financial services, they think of banking. They forget all the related professional services, notwithstanding the subdivisions—indeed, financial services themselves are more tightly defined—and just concentrate on banking. They think back to the financial crisis and all the attendant problems that my hon. Friend so rightly pointed out.
The second point is that, when we say financial services, people may expect the hon. Member for Wimbledon to stand up, but they should expect the hon. Member for Wallasey to stand up as well. Although, understandably, financial services account for 16% of London’s total gross value added, the reality is that in the north-west the industry is 6% of the regional economy, in the south-west it is 6%, in the west midlands it is 6% and in Yorkshire and Humberside it is 6%. The smallest contribution of financial services anywhere in the country is actually the east midlands, and that is 3%, but it is none the less 3% of that regional economy. So we should be standing up and saying that this is a UK-wide industry.
The third point—with complete respect to my hon. Friend on the Front Bench, who is establishing his reputation for being perhaps the best City Minister we have ever had—is that there are one or two at the top of this Government who have occasionally thought that fishing was more important than financial services. If one says that the total contribution to the UK economy of financial services was £67.4 billion last year, and for fishing the number is so small it is not worth talking about, correcting that and looking to that in the future would underline the point about the power of financial services. As has already been stated, there is a huge trade surplus.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire talked about the opportunities and the hon. Member for Wallasey talked about the threats from the EU. It is none the less true that during our membership of the EU we established ourselves as the world’s global financial centre, and whether we like it or not 40% of UK financial services exports still go there. So my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary to the Treasury will know that in those very complex negotiations—I will not repeat what has already been said about them—we must have a sensible, diplomatic and economically viable dialogue with our nearest and dearest neighbours.
The tax contribution has already been mentioned several times, and the hon. Lady made the point that PwC estimates that £75.5 billion, or 11% of Government receipts, come from the wider financial and associated professional services sector, including insurance and legal. So there cannot be any doubt that this is a hugely important industry and a powerful industry for the UK, and if we want a globally successful Britain we need a globally successful, renowned and well-regulated industry. It is noticeable that in the last few years we have very slightly slipped in the global financial centres index to second place and we must recognise that there are threats as well as opportunities from leaving the EU. It is of significance that on the first trading day of this year we lost £6 billion of activity out of London, and that is a continual threat. So I say yet again not only that we need those important negotiations to be conducted in a manner that is to London’s benefit but that we equally need to recognise of course that the threat is also now once again from New York, Switzerland, Singapore and Hong Kong. In the global alliances that we strike in financial services it is perfectly possible to recognise that, with some economic diplomacy put into deepening regulatory engagement, we could find ourselves in a powerful international regulatory alliance with the Americans, the Swiss and some of the far-east countries. Andrew Bailey some years ago when I was serving on the Treasury Committee raised this as an opportunity we should consider. Building those new trade and investment ties, and underpinning international agreements with financial services, is key to a globally successful Britain.
I want to briefly talk about two other points. First, as has been said, there is a difference between wholesale regulation and retail regulation. The Financial Services Act 2021 says that the Financial Conduct Authority must have regard to the relevant international standards and the effect of the rules on the UK’s international standing. That is hugely important, particularly in wholesale regulation where we hope to ensure that the UK is an international powerhouse. I accept that that will always be a secondary objective of the rules and the obligations on the regulator, but it must not be deviated from. I hope that my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary will set that in place. In terms of the history of regulation in the UK, a large number of people think the system, while rightly seeking to ensure extensive consumer protection, has come at the cost of overspecification for the wholesale markets to no benefit at all and to the diminution of our standing.
The other point has also been raised, but it is important. The 2021 Act has given a huge increase in power to the regulators in a way that we have seen with very few other regulators, by which I mean the lack of scrutiny in this House. I note that the financial services document “Future Regulatory Framework (FRP) review” has come out and it talks about this, and my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire referred to evidence to the Treasury Committee. Because of the importance of this industry to the country, I urge the House to consider very carefully establishing a Select Committee of both Houses or indeed a standing sub-committee of the Treasury Committee. I do not accept the argument that several have put that there is not the expertise or capability within this House, or that this House is not able to get the necessary resources and capability brought into it to undertake that proper and appropriate parliamentary scrutiny.
Finally, in the last minute of my speech I want to talk about two other matters. We have talked a lot about the past and what financial services has done, but it could do a lot more to help in what this Government and this country want to achieve. If levelling up means anything, it means bringing opportunity to the regions of this country. Financial services is already a powerful industry in the regions of this country, and bringing in those high-paid, high-value jobs also brings in skills. We should be doing all sorts of things to encourage that, not necessarily just within Government; universities should specialise in master’s degrees in financial capabilities and regulation. We should be focusing heavily on developing the UK as a centre of financial skills. That way we would not only drive UK levelling up but bring the talent to make London and the other global centres of this country into the powerhouse of financial services.
Finally, the Government have done a huge amount of good work already in delivering the net-zero economy from financial services. Financial services can do much more in that area; all sorts of things, particularly using the tax system, have been done already, but we can do much more, and the financial services sector must play its role to deliver that objective.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond).
I thank the Backbench Business Committee and the three sponsors of today’s debate for bringing this topic to the House for discussion. The UK’s financial services are a huge asset and truly world class. The UK’s sector is the third largest of the OECD countries in terms of its economic output. Recent rankings put London’s financial market as the second most competitive in the world, only narrowly beat out by New York. It is therefore unsurprising that even within the UK London holds the lion’s share of the glory. The city’s contribution to the UK economy for the sector accounts for 50% of the sector’s economic output, but, interestingly, Scotland ranks just behind London and the south-east; it is a very well-established financial centre. So while London might sit firmly centre-stage, contributions from across the UK should also be celebrated.
In fact, Scotland has a rich history as a thriving financial hub, one that spans over 300 years. The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland was the world’s first professional accounting body, established in 1854. The Chartered Banker Institute—or as it was originally known the Institute of Bankers in Scotland—was established in 1875, making it the oldest banking institute in the world. Today there are around 84,000 jobs in the sector in Scotland, and around 2,000 businesses. The FinTech industry is growing too, with many firms looking to establish homes in Glasgow and Edinburgh. Many cite the excellent provision of local skill and talent as the reason for wanting to do so. It is attractive to foreign direct investment, too.
Like so many of the UK’s industries, the financial sector has not escaped unscathed from the realities of Brexit. Financial services were largely overlooked in the trade and co-operation agreement, so provisions are relatively sparse. According to the Financial Times, there are 90 mentions of financial services in the agreement, but variations of the word “fish” appear 368 times. In December last year the sector lost passporting rights and we moved into market access determined through equivalence. The deal we came away with was not a good one and, as expected, many businesses moved to other European financial centres where they have access to the single market. Jobs and business have been lost and perhaps still will be, but we will not know the true impact for a long while yet.
The sector’s economic contribution is substantial, as we know. A recent study showed that Scottish businesses had an average profit margin of 7.5%, above the UK average and second only to London. Financial services are a big part of the reason that average is so high. The sector’s profit margin in Scotland is 13.6%. Its tax contribution is impressive too, at £28.8 billion in income tax, national insurance, corporation tax, bank payroll tax and the banking levy last financial year. That is 4.1% of all taxes collected last year.
What is next? How do we build on what we have and mitigate the impact of leaving the single market? The Government’s answer seems to be deregulation, although industry experts seem to be not wholly in agreement about the impact that will have. I would be interested to hear what discussions the Minister has had with the sector about deregulation, and how that has informed the Government’s strategy. Have the Government considered the argument for reregulation—a reshaping of the current framework so that it is more suitable—rather than deregulation?
Financial services policy remains reserved to the UK Government, and I urge them not to overlook the sector’s prominent Scottish presence as they review and reform their policies in a post-Brexit context.
Bim Afolami (Hitchin and Harpenden) (Con)
It is a pleasure to speak in such a well-informed and thoughtful debate.
First, on the contribution of the financial services sector, I do not want to repeat what has been said by my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne) and others about the tax paid, the growth or the jobs, but I want to bring up something that has not yet been discussed: the contribution during the acute phase of the covid pandemic in 2020, when about £75 billion was facilitated through the UK financial services sector. To illustrate what that means, in my constituency, which does not have a huge number of businesses compared with many other constituencies, over £100 million was facilitated through the financial services sector for businesses. That is a practical demonstration of the positive impact that the financial services sector can have on the lives of our constituents.
Competitiveness has been mentioned by many Members. I support what the Treasury want to do in adding growth and international competitiveness as a secondary obligation for the FCA and the Prudential Regulation Authority. I support the action in the Budget to reduce the bank surcharge on banks in particular. Had we left the surcharge where it was, from a tax perspective, it would have made the UK one of the most expensive jurisdictions in the world in which to operate a bank, and that is not in the UK’s national interest. I support the work that the Hill review did on listings, the general approach to public markets, the share trading obligation and the double volume cap. On a lot of these technical things, I think the Government are in the right place; we are going in the right direction, we are doing the right things and, as many others have said, the Minister is doing a great job.
On ringfencing, I will make a confession: before I came to this House, I spent some time at HSBC, where I worked in restructuring, and I had a lot to do with ringfencing. I can say from bitter personal experience that it is deeply complicated. It was well intentioned, but a review is overdue. I am glad that the Government are going to look at it. I ask them to look not just at whether ringfencing has done a reasonable job so far, but at the asymmetry of how it is imposed on UK-domiciled banks compared with our competitors, including the sheer complexity and cost associated with it, not just in terms of compliance and what we think of as regulation, but in terms of the IT systems, where people are and how the buildings operate. It costs a considerable amount of money and a huge amount of focus for big banks such as HSBC, Barclays and others. Without prejudging the outcome, I think that review is critically important.
Let me pick up something that my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Felicity Buchan) said about trade deals. The Government, and indeed the country, are right in pursuing our strategy on trade internationally, looking beyond Europe and seeking to strike as many good trade deals as we can across the world. We need to make sure that those trade deals are best in class. What I think of as a best-in-class trade deal today, in the modern world, has to include services, and it has to include financial services and other professional services, not just because that is a good thing for this country but because the nature of modern international trade is increasingly moving towards services rather than goods, particularly for advanced western economies such as our own.
We have a great opportunity to pioneer that at an international level. In particular, our regulators must seek to have many more regulator-to-regulator exchanges across the world as part of those trade deals. A lot of the regulations that are in place for financial services often happen at sub-national level, so it is so important that our regulators do that. I am sure those regulator-to-regulator exchanges will be very good fun indeed for all concerned.
My hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond), who is very experienced in these matters, talked about levelling up and about the positive regional aspect of the financial services sector and the jobs it creates outside London and the south-east. I completely agree, but I think of levelling up as not so much about levelling up places as about levelling up people. It is about people’s opportunities. Alongside all the technical work that we have already talked about, with regulations, ringfencing, the double volume cap, listing, public markets, prospectus directives and all that stuff, the financial services sector needs to do more—and I think it can do more—on levelling up in the United Kingdom.
What does that look like for the financial services sector? It means the industry doing more on alternative routes into the sector—apprenticeships and others. It also means the industry doing more not so much to provide more jobs outside London and the south-east, although that is always welcome, but to help to develop regional clusters around Edinburgh, Leeds, Bournemouth and various other places. There are significant numbers of financial services jobs in those places, but what more can the industry do to develop those regional clusters to give more opportunities to people from all over the country and from different backgrounds?
Let me briefly mention debt advice for those who have found themselves in problem debt after the covid pandemic. I think we all recognise that, for some people, debt has grown significantly. I think there is more that the industry can do to work with people with problem debt and help them get out of that situation, with the help of the legislation that is already in place.
Finally, if my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) were here, I am sure he would talk about small and medium-sized enterprises and access to finance. I do not want to steal his thunder, but we must think about SMEs getting access not just to debt but to equity finance, and about ensuring that underrepresented groups of entrepreneurs—often ethnic minorities or women—get more and better opportunities to raise funds for their businesses. That is the skillset—the core determinant—of a financial services sector: providing funds for people to realise their aspirations as individuals or as part of a business.
I will be doing some more work on this in the new year, as the Minister knows, but I urge the sector to do more on the levelling up agenda in its broader sense, in addition to working with the Government, with me and with colleagues, including the people here, on the technical regulatory aspects that are critical for our international competitiveness.
Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
This has been a really valuable debate, and I hope that it gets as much publicity as it ought to get. I hope, too, that the sector gets as much publicity—and as much credit—as it ought to get.
The sector is massively important to my constituents in Bromley and Chislehurst, as it is in much of outer London. In my constituency, financial and professional services together account for over 36% of the workforce. The sector is by far the largest driver of jobs and of prosperity overall in our area. Of course, we must consider not just the jobs in the City or elsewhere in London, but the other jobs that the income from that work supports elsewhere in the employment chain, and the growth of other businesses in the area. The sector is critical.
It is also worth stressing, yet again, the diversity of the sector. We talked in particular about its overall contribution. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) said, we often think of the sector in terms of banking. Distinctions are rightly made, which I know the Minister is well seized of, between wholesale and retail, but other sectors in financial services such as insurance contribute something like £30 billion to the economy on their own. The London insurance market is massive, and has a very high reputation in both insurance itself and in reinsurance. It is vital that we include access to insurance products in any free trade deals, and keep regulation appropriate and proportionate.
London’s other great strength is the nexus of the financial services sector with other supporting professions, including the law. I declare an interest here and refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. Legal services are themselves worth some £60 billion to the UK economy and are a net contributor to the UK’s balance of trade. So many of our financial services instruments, from derivatives right the way through to other types of contracts down to trading mechanisms, are underpinned by legal services and by the reputation of the United Kingdom as a jurisdiction of choice, because of its reliability, legal certainty and the expertise of its legal community. That is backed up by the accountancy sector, too.
As we go forward looking at free trade arrangements and regulatory deals, which I think we will have to have for the reasons that have been well set out, it is important that we do not lose sight of the fact that the whole basket comes together and contributes overall to that cluster of excellence and critical mass, which so far has given us a great competitive edge. We cannot take that for granted, and that is why some of us were troubled at the lack of reference to financial and professional services generally in the trade and co-operation agreement. We have to build on what we now have and this is a very good example of that.
Reference was made to regulatory reform. The opportunity, for example, that the insurance industry suggested for two specific reforms to solvency II would be of considerable benefit. I hope the Minister will be able to update us on progress on that. Perhaps, too, we can have an update on where we are with the actual implementation of the outcomes of the Kalifa and Hill reviews, and where we are, for example, on the movements that are freeing up and easing listing, to which I know the Government are already committed, and where we might be on variable classes of shares to encourage different types of listing on London markets.
The other point I want to make on legal services and future co-operation echoes the point made by the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle). In maintaining London’s reputation as a reliable and honest jurisdiction, it is important that we bear down on the risk of economic crime. That cannot be done in isolation. Sovereignty takes us only so far when it comes to fighting international organised crime, so it is absolutely critical that, having regrettably lost access to some of the European Union justice and policing mechanisms, we find ways to replicate them either bilaterally or perhaps through future agreements as we, I hope, develop a more constructive relationship with our European partners than is perhaps the case at the moment. It is in nobody’s interest that we have a permanent state of tension between two such significant markets on the world stage. Including legal co-operation is massively important, certainly on the justice side and stretching that out into other jurisdictions, too.
As the Minister has heard me say many times, it is regrettable that the European Union is taking a needlessly obstructive approach to the United Kingdom’s application to join the Lugano convention on the enforcement of civil judgments. It wrongly argues that it is a single market mechanism. I think the Government are right in saying that it is not a single market mechanism. It is entirely separate and this is a regrettable product of the tensions we have had. I hope the Government will not give up on that and will also look at workarounds with other, non-EU countries to maintain high levels of recognition. The enforceability of any contract, including a contract for financial services, is absolutely critical to our remaining the jurisdiction of choice.
My final point is on the contribution the City of London Corporation makes in areas such as green finance. A huge amount is being done. The City Corporation, with the Government, provided the seed funding for the first three years of the Green Finance Institute. That, of course, has been involved in building coalitions of private finance actors. The most obvious of those is the Coalition for the Energy Efficiency of Buildings. The work of the City Corporation in such areas, and in bringing forward and helping to promote and organise a bespoke platform, the Green horizons summit at COP26, shows the innovation of the financial services sector and the City as its great champion.
It was a pleasure to welcome the current Lord Mayor and the Remembrancer of the City to this place only last week at the inaugural reception of the all-party parliamentary group for London as a global city. That co-operation is as important as the way the City has sought to champion the bringing together of professional expertise. The Minister will know, and I hope will never cease to value, the work of organisations such as the Financial Markets Law Committee. It probably has more legal and financial expertise brought together in one room than we will find anywhere else in any developed economy and perhaps anywhere on the globe. Its reports are of the highest quality. It is chaired, as we know, by a former Lord Chief Justice and has a range of high-ranking professionals. I hope that the Government will continue to listen carefully to their suggestions on how to keep regulation proportionate and deal with a system that gives us good access to markets across the globe, while at the same time dealing with the necessary prudential measures from the point of view of the UK economy.
On that note, I hope we can recognise the financial services, and their allied and supporting professions, as the jewel in the crown of the British economy and emphasise that repeatedly whenever we get the chance to promote the UK abroad. We should also promote them to our own constituents and fellow citizens because they do not always get the credit that they should.
Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill), who speaks with great knowledge on these matters at all times.
Like the hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami), I started my working life in financial services. I started out working in the small but perfectly formed share registrars department of the Bank of Scotland, which was taken over by Lloyds TSB. I swiftly moved over to work for Scottish Widows, which, a few months later, was also taken over by Lloyds TSB. I decided that, since Lloyds TSB was clearly so keen to have me on its payroll, it would be churlish not to spend at least the next few years working for them, so that is what I did.
I started out in what was called the quality assurance department. We talk about the diversity of jobs in financial services. In plain English, it would have been better described as the complaints department because, if you wrote a letter or phoned up demanding to speak to the chief executive because your pension fund was not performing quite as well as you anticipated, you spoke to me, or somebody like me, in that department. I am not entirely certain whether it was good training or not for being a Member of Parliament and a councillor, but I have never felt the worse for the experience.
Each day, my colleagues and I went in to provide products and services for a wide range of people, at all different ages and stages of life, as they tried their best to prepare, hedge and insure for various happy, not so happy and inevitable events that we all encounter in our lives. We were not alone in that in Edinburgh because Scottish Widows was one of many life insurance and pensions firms in the city, a legacy of the more than 300 years of Scotland being recognised as one of the leading, most innovative financial centres in Europe.
That industry could not, and would not, exist if it was not for the high quality of life that people can enjoy outside work, for the quality of the public services that underpin that quality of life, and, as the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst said, for the significance and importance of our professional services that underpin the sector. It could not survive if it was not for the support of Government and the quality, experience and adaptability of the workforce. We should not be in the least bit shy about saying that; we are exceptionally good at this and we should advertise that and remind ourselves of it regularly.
Scotland is the second largest financial services cluster in the UK outside London. Financial services are also one of the largest sectoral contributors to the Scottish economy at 9.4% of gross value added, which is equivalent to £13 billion. It employs more than 160,000 people directly in financial services and the related professional services; that is nearly 6% of Scottish national employment. Financial services also represent a disproportionately high share—25%—of UK employment in the life assurance sector and 13% of all banking employment. Together with the professional services sector, that accounts for 40% of Scotland’s services exports. The industry has disproportionate scale and scope.
Another emerging area is FinTech, in which Scotland is also emerging as a leader second only in scale and scope to London—again, we are the second largest outside London. The Financial Services Advisory Board, chaired by Scotland’s First Minister, established the need for an independent organisation to try to maximise the FinTech potential in Scotland. It provided £250,000 to try to leverage additional business contributions and academic contributions to achieve the goal of having Scotland in the world’s top 10 recognised international FinTech clusters.
FinTech is a tremendously exciting development. It is certainly a disrupter, but it is also an enabler. This is part of a landscape on which we have trodden with confidence for centuries. We have centuries of experience and a reputation in this fast-moving environment for probity, trustworthiness, quality and excellent performance, but it is all founded on people and their skills.
In that regard, Scottish Financial Enterprise’s five-year strategy, launched earlier this year, takes on a particular importance. It has four key objectives, including leading us on a journey to net zero, inspiring global leadership in green finance and supporting the transition to net zero. It sees a role in supporting our financial recovery post pandemic. It is about responding to changing customer needs, delivering innovative and, above all, inclusive products that meet the evolving needs of all customers. And to go back to the point made well by the hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden, it is also about delivering skills and inclusion, enabling financial services firms to recruit, develop and retain that pipeline of talent and high-performing, diverse skills that we need to continue with a successful industry.
These are challenging times on a number of fronts for the financial services sector, whether on an economic level, a political level or simply a regulatory front. I am reminded, however, of the history of the organisation that I went to work for, Scottish Widows, which was founded out of the tumult of the Napoleonic wars. Although I am sure that we would all very much prefer never to go back to that sort of degree of conflict and tumult, nevertheless, financial services have shown themselves to be remarkably adaptable and able to rise to the challenges that they face, whether that means meeting their customers’ needs and expectations or dealing with the world around them.
We may have a head start in financial services, but there is nothing to guarantee that, unless we continue to invest, innovate, and above all, talk up the provenance and importance of this vital industry.
Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
I am very grateful to the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne), the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry), who is not in her place, and my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) for securing this very important debate. Not for the first time, I agree with the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) that this has been a very valuable debate, and I hope that it gets the exposure that he mentioned.
Labour wholeheartedly agrees that our financial services are central to the British economy. Our financial services sector is a major driver of our country’s growth. It contributed an incredible £132 billion to the economy in 2019. Financial services are also the UK’s most successful export and have been for decades, worth £60 billion in 2019 alone.
The contribution of the sector will be vital to the UK’s future prosperity. As the OECD recently warned, the UK’s economic recovery is at risk. Earlier this week, the CBI downgraded growth forecasts to 5% as we are surrounded by inflation and supply shortages, with the CBI director general warning that businesses will face
“a cliff edge in 2023.”
Supporting the financial sector to thrive will be fundamental to our economic growth after covid-19 and to delivering the higher growth, jobs and tax receipts that we need to fund public services. That is why we want the Government to do more to support the sector to retain its competitiveness on the world stage. My hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey spoke about how regulatory stability is the foundation for success and innovation in the financial sector. I agree wholeheartedly with that point, which has been made a few times by Members across the Chamber.
We know that the most serious issue threatening stability for financial services today is the post-Brexit regulatory environment. In government, Labour would focus on making Brexit work for the City as well as for the country. I think everyone in this Chamber will be pleased to hear that Labour does not want a rematch—we not do want to reopen negotiations, before any headlines start to fly—but being outside the EU does not change the fact that for many firms in finance it remains an important market. In 2019, an enormous 40% of UK financial exports went to the EU.
We have heard a lot about getting Brexit done, but what we want from the Government now is a proper plan for the aftermath. Regulatory equivalence for the finance sector should have been a priority in talks with the EU, but the Government have failed to achieve that. We feel that the sector is in a state of uncertainty now.
In my role, which I took on recently, I listen to the concerns of our world-class financial and professional service businesses. That is why Labour would seek regulatory equivalence with the EU for financial services and an agreement with the EU on mutual recognition of professional qualifications and conformity assessments across the entire sector. A Labour Government will build on the deal in the national interest through the mutual recognition of professional qualifications for our service sectors. We cannot risk our financial firms losing their competitive edge in the European market.
Labour would protect the UK’s status as one of the most important global financial centres as we shape a new future outside the EU. To achieve that, as Members across the Chamber have recognised, the sector must be ready for the challenges of the future. That will require the Government to provide the space and regulatory landscape for financial services to innovate. That is why Labour wholeheartedly welcomes developments in FinTech, which many hon. Members have mentioned and which will allow companies to experiment with new finance models and create high-skilled jobs for the future across the UK. Deloitte estimates that, with the right support, FinTech could add £3 billion to the economy and create more than 50,000 new high-skilled jobs.
The 21st century requires the Government to play an active role in ensuring that the UK can take advantage of new technologies. Labour would award far more public contracts to British businesses, such as a young entrepreneur who has established a FinTech start-up in Newcastle, as opposed to handing them to overseas firms.
I agree with the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire that the biggest challenge facing the UK is the climate crisis and the transition to a green economy. I also agree with him that the Treasury Committee needs proper support, because it is the most important Committee in the House. Labour has committed to £28 billion a year of capital investment every year until 2030 to support the green transition.
We believe that the financial sector has a vital role to play in attracting green investment. Many innovative companies are already recognising their wider responsibilities. For example, Lloyds, which has been mentioned, is providing discounted financial support for investment in dairy farms to reduce their use of energy. This is a welcome step, but the transformation of our economy will require radical action from the Government. We want to see more ambition in the Government’s announcements on green bonds. Labour would seek to make the UK the green finance capital of the world. That is why we have called on financial institutions and FTSE 100 companies to produce credible climate transition plans by 2023.
The financial sector should serve the people of this country wherever they happen to live—a point that has been echoed by Members across the Chamber. My hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey and the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) both spoke about the importance of recognising the contribution that UK financial services already make beyond the City of London. The sector in Leeds, Birmingham, Edinburgh and everywhere else provides a significant contribution to our national economy.
However, in the past 10 years, regional inequalities have widened. Growth in the financial sector has not been felt equally across the country. In 2019, the financial services sector contributed more than half a million jobs in London and the south-east. That should be celebrated, but there were only 43,000 jobs in the sector in the east midlands and 24,000 in the north-east.
We have heard a great deal about levelling up in recent months, and I think that we can agree with much that has been said about it today. The hon. Member for Wimbledon talked about the UK being a centre of financial services. He also talked about a powerhouse of financial services, and that is what we want to see in this country. The hon. Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami), who has left the Chamber, talked about levelling up people, and Labour shares that ambition.
Our recovery is fragile following the shocks of the pandemic, and our economy is much in need of a boost after a decade of low growth. The financial sector will be critical in delivering the prosperity that we need. I therefore welcome this important debate about the need for the Government to support financial services to enable them to retain their competitiveness on the world stage. I agreed with the hon. Member for Wimbledon when he said that it should not be just him and me standing up and speaking about this important topic; Members throughout the House should be standing up and speaking about it.
Let me end by asking the Minister a couple of questions. Does he accept that his Government should find an agreement on regulatory equivalence with the EU for financial services, and does he agree that UK financial services should be at the heart of all our future trade negotiations to help build a positive future for this crucial sector?
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)
It is a great pleasure to respond to the debate on behalf of the Government. It has been an extremely well-informed debate, and I have enjoyed listening to all the contributions. I particularly thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne), the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle) and the hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry) for sponsoring the debate. They were absolutely right to point out that the financial services industry is critically important to the United Kingdom’s economy, and to champion the UK as an environment that ensures that the sector is able to retain its competitiveness on the world stage.
I discerned five themes as I listened to the debate: the response to the pandemic, the issue of levelling up, green finance, the context for our international relationships, and regulation, about which there have been a range of comments across the wholesale and retail sector.
I have been the Economic Secretary for nearly four years, and in that time I have come to recognise the vast economic contribution that the financial services industry makes to this country—we have heard a great deal about that today—but I have also observed the many hidden contributions that it has made, which have been particularly clear during the pandemic. On the frontline, bank staff have kept branches open and supported vulnerable customers at times that have been very worrying for them financially. In the back offices, people have rolled up their shirt sleeves and worked all hours with us and the regulators to deliver tens of billions of pounds of emergency loans. I have already thanked the industry publicly for what it has been doing, and I am delighted to do so again today at the Dispatch Box.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami) mentioned the £100 million of loans and other support in his constituency, and that has been replicated across the country. The bounce back loans, the coronavirus business interruption loan scheme and the forbearance measures were critical at what was a critical time for our country.
I recognise and acknowledge the sentiments about the financial services industry not always getting a good press. This is not just about banks, although they are critically important for the underpinning of lending to our economy. However, I think we should also recognise, as the Scottish National party speakers did, that the industry is not just about the square mile but about the whole United Kingdom. I visited the constituency of the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier) a few weeks ago to see the bank hub that is active there and informing the industry’s response to the challenge of access to cash.
In places such as Birmingham, Bristol, Glasgow, Cambridge, Edinburgh and Merseyside, this industry is critical. There is not an equitable distribution across every region, but there are hubs of real significance. Two thirds of people employed in the industry work outside London: 37,000 in Northern Ireland, 69,000 in Wales, and 153,000 in Scotland. I am proud that the Government have used that imperative to headquarter our new national infrastructure bank in Leeds and to establish our new economic campus in Darlington.
The sector has also made significant progress on diversity and inclusion, so that the very best people for the job have an equal opportunity to succeed, no matter what their race, gender or background might be. There is a lot more work to be done in that area, and I commend the incoming Lord Mayor of London for his championing of that agenda during his tenure.
I want to address some of the points raised by Members during the debate. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) for his kind words, his focus on the importance of the regional agenda, and his challenge to ensure that we have opportunities across the regions. The opportunity to secure high-paid, high-value jobs beyond Wimbledon and across the United Kingdom is a real imperative. I draw his attention to the Kalifa review into FinTech that was published at the beginning of March, and to the money secured and announced in the Budget for the centre for financial innovation and technology, which will be a key driver of that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami) mentioned levelling up and also raised some specific concerns about debt advice. I draw his attention to the work we have done with the breathing space scheme, which went live in May. I recognise the uncertainty around the maps and the reprofiling of face-to-face and online debt advice. I am taking a close interest in that. We are also trying to innovate when it comes to no-interest loan schemes, which are at the proof of concept phase and could make a massive contribution to assisting many vulnerable people.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) put a stark statistic before us when he said that more than 36% of his constituents worked in financial services and the broader legal and professional services sector. It is a critical sector for our economy. The financial services sector also has a crucial role to play in our response to climate change. The ambition is clear: we want the UK to be the best place in the world for green and sustainable investment. As a Government we have taken bold action in this area to transform the UK financial sector. That has involved introducing new economy-wide sustainability disclosure requirements for businesses, and the kick-starting of a green financing programme with two record-breaking sovereign green bonds: one for around £10 billion on 21 September and a further £6 billion on 21 October, achieving a “greenium”—a premium on what we would have gained from a non-green bond—of around 2.5 base points. We will not be complacent about this. We also need global action on green finance, and the Chancellor recently hosted the COP26 finance day, which saw financial firms with assets of over £130 trillion committing to net zero.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst also drew attention to the role of the City of London Corporation in green finance, and I absolutely endorse his recognition of its contribution and in particular that of Catherine McGuinness, who has been the policy lead through most of my tenure. She has done an excellent job, and her tenure comes to an end next spring. As I have said, the Lord Mayor is also committed to taking on his predecessor’s leadership in that area.
Looking ahead, it is important that we do not rest on our laurels, as the motion recognises. There are obviously strong competitive pressures in the industry, and it is my mission to help to deliver the Chancellor’s vision for an open, green and technologically advanced financial services sector that is globally competitive and acts in the interests of communities and citizens across the UK. In his speech on 1 July, the Chancellor said that we should be proud that people around the world looked to this country for leadership, and we should be. We have an opportunity and a responsibility to lead the world on international standards, FinTech, green finance and much more.
When I took on this role in January 2018, the nature of the international relationship that the UK would have in financial services was uncertain. We have now left the EU institutional framework and, where it makes sense to do so, we are taking advantage of our new freedoms to refresh the UK’s position as the world’s pre-eminent financial centre. We are not deregulating, but we are looking at those international relationships. We have set out a clear, ambitious programme of work to broaden and deepen those relationships. We have signed trade agreements with Japan, Singapore, the European economic area and the European Free Trade Association, and reached agreements in principle on free trade agreements with Australia and New Zealand.
I recognise that in many of these free trade agreements, financial services will not be as prominent because the regulator-to-regulator dialogues that exist on an ongoing basis are so instrumental in unblocking opportunities on both sides in financial services. The Swiss mutual recognition agreement, which we are negotiating at the moment, will be the most ambitious financial services agreement globally in both breadth and depth.
I recognise the uncertainty of the EU relationship. We have co-operated fully, and it will be for the EU to determine what sort of dynamic it wishes to have. I was pleased to visit my counterparts in Madrid last week, and I met several bank leaders over there. The warmth that exists towards the UK in financial services is clear, and I have recently had conversations with other bilateral partners.
We need a regulatory framework that is more agile, that avoids politicisation and that gives decision making to the independent and expert regulators. I take the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon on the need to ensure proper scrutiny of that autonomy. I recognise and appreciate the support for the secondary growth and competitiveness objective that we set out in the consultation, and it is now critical that we clarify in legislation how the responsibility of scrutinising those independent regulators will work. It will be for Parliament to determine how to examine the way in which those regulators meet the objectives we will set out in primary regulation.
Members mentioned a number of initiatives concerning the wholesale markets review. I see broad consensus on the vast majority of issues identified in the consultation document. We are talking about incremental changes informed by deep dialogue with industry.
On the prospectus regime review, I am delighted to say there was extensive support for the proposals in our recent consultation, and I look forward to pushing ahead with our reforms. We are taking forward the recommendations of the Kalifa review on FinTech. We must remain at the cutting edge of technology and innovation in financial services. I recognise that its application both to the regulators and to the financial market’s infrastructure will be significant.
We have responded to the call for evidence on insurance and Solvency II, and we are now working closely with the PRA to identify an optimal reform package across both the risk margin and the matching adjustment. This is complex work, but we are taking it forward with enthusiasm.
It seems to me that the House is largely in agreement on two things. The contribution of the financial services sector to the country is critical, but we cannot take it for granted, and I will never do so in my role. I am proud to be delivering on the Government’s vision for an open, green and technologically advanced financial services sector that is globally competitive and acts in the interests of communities and citizens across the United Kingdom.
I welcome the many varied and well-informed contributions this afternoon. I agree with the motion, and I encourage others to do the same. It would be remiss of me not to welcome the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) to her place as my shadow, and I look forward to discussing these matters with her in future.
Anthony Browne
Madam Deputy Speaker, you were in the Chair on Monday night when we had a rather fractious debate on a different subject, and I think we all agree it is a nice contrast to have a debate on which there is such wide agreement.
To the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq), you mentioned a couple of times that you agree with me on a couple of things, and you almost sounded surprised. To the hon. Member for Wallasey (Dame Angela Eagle), who also sponsored this debate, I agreed with almost everything you said.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. Please say “she said”, not “you said.”
Anthony Browne
This has been a well-informed, thoughtful and good-natured debate, and it was great to hear the hon. Member for Gordon (Richard Thomson) talk about the importance of financial services to Scotland—I also made that point.
Many hon. Members raised points that I did not mention in my opening remarks. The hon. Member for Wallasey mentioned the importance of financial crime, which I thought about mentioning, and she is right that it is a big challenge we need to tackle. My hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) spoke about the importance of legal services and related financial services, which are all part of a package. My hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin and Harpenden (Bim Afolami) talked about the importance of getting the right skills and talent, which I did not address but is obviously completely true. And my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) touched on the importance of access to EU markets, which is critical and unknown at this point. It was good to hear the remarks from the Minister in summing up; it is great to hear that the Government are clearly very supportive of the financial services sector, committed to getting international agreements and making incremental changes that we can all agree on.
I have one last observation to make. My hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon talked about the Minister being known as the one of the best City Ministers ever. I agree with that, but it is a misnomer calling him a City Minister because, as he said, and as everyone else has said, financial services are important for the entire country. So perhaps we need to change the informal name for that job. This has been an important and thoughtful debate, and it is nice to be part of a debate where there is a large consensus on the way forward.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House recognises the importance of financial services to the UK economy; and calls on the Government to provide adequate support to help create the right regulatory and operational environment for that industry to ensure that the UK is able to retain its competitiveness on the world stage.
Consular Support for British Citizens
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)
I beg to move,
That this House regrets that the consular services provided by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) to bereaved families of people who have been murdered, have died in suspicious circumstances, or have been imprisoned or tortured overseas have fallen short of the standard reasonably expected; notes that access to justice and basic standards of assistance are dependent upon a person’s ability to pay; is concerned that there is no legal right to consular assistance and that support is provided on a discretionary basis, which can lead to unpredictable and inconsistent communications from the FCDO; further regrets that consular services in the UK are below the level of support UK citizens should expect; believes that the FCDO’s focus is on what it cannot do to help, rather than what it can do, which adds to the trauma experienced by victims; calls on the Government to improve and standardise communication processes at the FCDO, to publish consular procedures and policies and to revisit the findings of the Fifth Report of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Support for British nationals abroad: The Consular Service, Session 2014-15, HC 516; further calls on the Government to consult with the families affected and to raise the standard of how British citizens are treated by FCDO procedures; and urges the Government to set a world leading example of how a state treats its citizens in their darkest hour of need.
It is a great privilege and pleasure to move this motion on a very serious issue: consular support for British citizens. If the Chair will allow me, I would like to share the experience of someone whose loved one died abroad. You’ve gone to Paris for the weekend. It is your husband’s birthday and you are going to celebrate. You get to Paris and you’re having a lovely time. Your son and daughter and their partners are with you. Between the restaurant and the hotel, your husband is attacked at random. He didn’t see it coming, none of you did, and he was so brutally beaten that he was taken to hospital and put on a life support machine. Your son and son-in-law were also attacked and taken to the hospital. You arrived at the hospital to find you could not understand the language. You were asked to sign a document but it wasn’t in English. You couldn’t read it and you were panicking as it related to your husband’s care. You’re in shock. It’s night time. It’s dark. What do you do? You decide to call the British embassy—they’ll know what to do. But it’s closed because it’s Saturday night and not open again until Monday.
Monday comes and your husband’s life support machine has been turned off. You didn’t get a choice in the matter. The rules are different in France to the UK. You are devastated. Your husband, whose birthday you were coming to celebrate, has been murdered. You manage to contact the embassy on Monday, and they tell you they’re sorry to hear what’s happened but they can’t help you and you’ll need to find a lawyer. They agree to send you a list though, and you get a piece of paper with some names in French and phone numbers. You ring the first one. You try to explain your husband has been murdered, and the lawyer on the other end tells you he is too busy to take the case. Your daughter calls the next one, and they ask for €1,000 up front and all documents in the case. You go to the hospital, where you are handed a report, but you can’t read it because it’s in French. You call the embassy, who say they don’t deal with translation and you’ll need to organise that yourself.
You go to the police station, where no one can tell you what will happen next and whether the criminals who attacked your family will be traced. You tell them what happened, and are asked to sign a document that you can’t read. You ask for a translation, and they cannot help you. You need to get back home because you can’t afford to stay. You don’t want to leave your husband and your son, because he is still in intensive care. Someone pleasant at the embassy agrees to drive you to the airport. They tell you that that’s not part of their job description and they’re doing it as a favour because they feel sorry for you, but please do not mention it to anyone.
You get back to London. Queuing for the flight check-in, you have two suitcases: yours and your husband’s. When you get to the desk, you are told there will be a charge because you have extra luggage. On the flight, someone from the airline announces, “Welcome on board. We hope you enjoyed your trip.” You get home, you call the Foreign Office. Someone asks you to explain what’s happened, and you give them the details and have to re-live it all. They say they aren’t the person who can help but someone will ring you back tomorrow. The next day, no one phones.
You call back and get someone else who asks you to go through the story again. They ask whether you had insurance and whether you plan to get the body home or not. If you do not have insurance, you will have to find the money for repatriation yourself, but you will need to speak to a funeral director about that, and they will send you a bereavement pack—“What’s your email address?” After you have called your insurance company, you call the funeral director to go through organising repatriation. Imagine for just a second that you do not have insurance and instead have to set up a crowdfunding page to ask any generous members of the public for enough to get your partner back so that you can have a funeral.
You were due back to work on Monday. You do not know what your own name is or what day of the week it is, let alone are able to go to work, so you arrange to see your GP, who signs you off sick. You cannot work and your husband was the main source of income in your household. The French lawyer is asking lots of questions and spending a lot of time on your case, and you want justice, so there are legal fees, travel and a lot of stress and trauma ahead. You feel so alone. This cannot be right.
You are at home now and you are watching the news of a young girl who has fallen from a balcony in suspicious circumstances overseas. The news presenter says, “We asked the Foreign Office for comment and they said, ‘We’re assisting the family at this difficult time.’” You wonder what assistance they are getting that you are not. You decide to set up your own charity to ensure that families are supported in future. It is too late for yours, but God forbid some other poor family has to suffer this alone. Let us make sure this does not happen again.
Murdered Abroad was set up in 2001 by Eve Henderson. Death Abroad You’re Not Alone was set up in 2013 by Julie Love, whose son Colin tragically drowned in water that was deemed safe off the coast of a Venezuelan island. The Kirsty Maxwell Charity was set up by my constituents Brian and Denise Curry, Kirsty’s parents, who want to help others who suffer such a traumatic loss of a loved one abroad. The Lucie Blackman Trust was formed after the brutal attack on Lucie Blackman in Japan in 2000. The Jessica Lawson Retreat was set up by her family as a retreat for those bereaved after Jessica tragically drowned on a school trip in France in 2015, and they continue to campaign on water-safety issues. The British Rights Abroad Group was set up by the families of Nazanin Zaghari-Radcliffe and Matthew Hedges to campaign for and represent the families of those held illegally abroad.
All those are services set up by families who are devastated by the loss or incarceration of a loved one, and they are now plugging the Government’s gaps. They do incredible work, and I pay tribute to them. There will always be a place for such charities and organisations, but they should not have to be picking up the pieces of a Government’s failings.
Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)
I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Member’s powerful speech, but I thank her for securing this debate. She knows very well the case of my constituent, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, having spoken in support of her release in several debates. The hon. Lady may be aware that the Government granted Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe diplomatic protection in 2019, but three years on almost nothing has been done to use the protection that was bestowed on her to bring her home. The Government have been unwilling to assert their right to consular access to Nazanin, to challenge Iran’s unlawful behaviour at the International Court of Justice, or to use their right under the Vienna convention to request private consular meetings with the Iranian regime. Does the hon. Member agree that the Government risk undermining the UK’s diplomatic protection by failing to utilise it in my constituent’s case?
Hannah Bardell
I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention and pay tribute to her work on behalf of Nazanin, Richard and their family. I wholeheartedly agree with her and will address some of those points in my speech.
The experience that I just shared with the Chamber is just one of the many devastating accounts that I have heard since I started to work on this issue. Let me take a moment to thank the Backbench Business Committee and all who will speak today and who have supported this work. I give thanks to Eve Henderson of Murdered Abroad, to Julie Love of Death Abroad You’re Not Alone, to Redress, to Miles Manning, to Stewarts Law, to the British Rights Abroad Group and to all who have contributed to the preparation for today and who, in their own ways, advocate for different parts of the broader issue we are debating.
I also thank, if the House will indulge me for just a moment, my constituency team, who have worked tirelessly on this issue. When we set up the all-party group on deaths abroad, consular services and assistance, we did not deploy an organisation to support us because we felt the issue was too sensitive, so my own team has taken evidence and worked on this issue. I thank Marcus Woods, Sabrina Rossetti, Chloe McLellan and Adam Robinson, and specifically Stephanie McTighe, my chief of staff, and Michelle Rodger, my former comms manager. Michelle passed away from cancer in August this year. She believed passionately in this work and in this issue. She is much missed by all in my team.
When we founded the all-party group and took evidence from more than 60 families and 30 organisations, Michelle was very much at the heart of this work. She sat in on every session, diligently recording and taking note of the devastating experiences and making sure that they were properly reflected in the report that we wrote and published at the end of 2019. Why did we do that? It was because, like all Members across this House, I have constituents who have been left devastated by the murder, suspicious death, incarceration or loss of a family member abroad. In their time of most desperate need, they face a lack of support from the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
Julie Pearson was killed in Israel in 2015 and Kirsty Maxwell was killed in Benidorm, Spain, in 2016. They were two devastating constituency cases of young women taken in their prime in the most distressing and violent ways imaginable and the families were left without the support they needed. The families coming forward to get support highlighted the issue to me. I come to this debate and indeed these issues genuinely in the spirit of co-operation, as a critical friend. I genuinely want to work with Government to make the system better for families, consular staff, civil servants and all those whose lives are touched by this issue. It is those families who are really at the heart of the all-party group’s work. I thank all of them for the time that they have spent with my team and me. They have given evidence and shared their traumatic experiences, and they live with a huge gap in their lives.
Family members of those who are killed overseas without travel insurance to cover repatriation are, in many cases, left to crowdfund to repatriate the body of their loved one. Every time I see one of these crowdfunders pop up, my heart sinks because I just know, from having spoken to the families that we have worked with, what they are facing. If a loved one is murdered overseas, it is estimated that it could cost anything up to £60,000. Criminal injuries compensation is available only if the murderer was in the UK, or unless the murder abroad was by means of a terrorist attack. To be clear, there are around only 300 suspicious deaths abroad every year. Obviously, that number has been significantly different recently because of the pandemic, but as things open up—or do not open up, depending on where we will be—we have to recognise the challenges in front of us.
The House and those watching may be interested and glad to know that terror attack victims are given an immediate payment of around £3,000 and then, I believe, more payments further down the line. Repatriation is handled and paid for by the Government. I recognise that we have not taken evidence from victims of terror attacks, and I understand that many have raised concerns with the level of support in what we can only imagine are some of the most devastating of circumstances.
From the many families that we have spoken to, we have heard of spiralling costs because of the need to pay for the translation of documents, the cost of legal representation, accommodation and travel. Dame Vera Baird, in her 2019 report, “Struggling for Justice”, raised many of these issues and the need for financial support for victims’ families.
I ask the Government to please ensure that murder victims overseas get parity with terrorist victims and that the criminal injuries compensation scheme is amended accordingly. If we can provide those services when someone is killed in a terrorist attack, why can we not offer them to those who are killed in suspicious circumstances abroad? Those services are there, let us extend them. I ask the FCDO and the Ministry of Justice, which fund the victim support homicide service, to please make transparent the assessment about who gets help and what that looks like, because, at the moment, families fall down the gaps of eligibility far too often and are re-traumatised by the process of just seeking help. The FCDO states in its guidance:
“There is no legal right to consular assistance. All assistance provided is at our discretion.”
It does prompt the question, given that these are our citizens—our ain folk—why would we not offer that service on a mandatory and consistent basis. What are the arguments for not offering it? The former Minster for Asia, Mark Field, said:
“Consular assistance is central to our work at the FCO.”—[Official Report, 13 March 2018; Vol. 637, c. 306WH.]
Those two things—that consular assistance is central to the FCDO’s work and that it has no obligation to provide it—makes it seem as if the FCDO is somewhat conflicted within itself about what support it offers to its own citizens. I ask the Government whether they will enshrine in law a right to consular assistance, and if not, why not. Our citizens need clarity and they need transparency. After all, the first duty of any Government should be to protect their citizens.
A lot has been made of global Britain and Britain’s greatness. It is not so great, however, when it comes to helping its own citizens. We have evidence that families in their darkest hour are left without the right help, resource or support—as, indeed, are consular staff—to help them to deal with the death or detainment of their loved ones. Only this week, we heard of the gross failings of the FCDO during the evacuation of Afghanistan. In 2019, it was reported that the number of Foreign Office staff had fallen by more than 1,000 in the last 30 years. In a 2015 report, the Foreign Affairs Committee said that budget cuts and low pay at the Foreign Office were endangering the UK’s global role and could have a “disastrous and costly” effect on the Government’s ability to make informed judgments on critical issues, and
“the cuts imposed on the FCO since 2010 have been severe and have gone beyond just trimming fat: capacity now appears to be being damaged.”
Fewer people are under greater pressure and doing more of the work, with less resources; that is terrifying.
The staff need the help and support to do their job properly, Minister, please make these changes, for the families of loved ones, but also for the staff in the Department’s own service. The bereavement pack that the Foreign Office provides does not say that people killed in suspicious circumstances abroad may well fall through a gap because even the murder and manslaughter team at the FCDO will not be able to take the case, so it will be left with a general country casework team that is staffed by junior members of the Foreign Office, who may not have the relevant experience or resources to support a family. It must be incredibly difficult and traumatic for those staff who are dealing with such cases.
In 2014, the Foreign Affairs Committee review recommended that the Foreign Office needed an access to justice unit, but that access to justice unit was renamed and became the murder and manslaughter team, purely because it was deemed too difficult to deal with cases of suspicious death. If it is too difficult for a Government Department that deploys thousands of bright minds, where does that leave an individual family who fall through the cracks? Will the Government revisit this access to justice unit or a similar unit dedicated to cases of suspicious death overseas?
I get how difficult these issues are; I worked for the US Department of State in its Edinburgh consulate, and saw at first hand how hard being a consular officer was. I also saw prisoners being visited regularly and checked on, regardless of their crime—because it was the right thing to do. When a US citizen died, I saw families met at the airport, not as a favour to keep under the radar but because it was the right thing to do. I saw staff co-ordinating with local police and taking a compassionate and trauma-informed approach.
The families we have met and taken evidence from— I would dearly love to name them all individually, but I just do not have time—have touched my team and me for ever. I invite the Minister to spend some time in their company to understand and hear from them, and I suggest that consular staff do the same in the course of their training. My team had vicarious trauma training following the evidence sessions that we held, as that was recommended and necessary. I fear for the consular staff and the staff retention at the FCDO, particularly in the murder and manslaughter team, who are doing the very best they can in some of the most difficult circumstances. Who is looking after them and training them, and does it work for families? Only recently, I heard of a family not being called back. There is clearly a staffing issue and an issue with levels of service.
We have experienced and trained police, senior investigating officers and homicide teams, yet they are not being connected with families who need the benefit of their knowledge. There are lawyers and police officers offering their time, pro bono, to help in these cases. The help is here in the UK and it is possible, but we are not doing more to join these people up. Doing so costs nothing, but makes a huge difference. Will the Government work with the all-party parliamentary group to explore working with professionals in this area across these islands, and join them up with those who need the benefit of their knowledge? Lawyers lists need quality control and people need more support.
For those imprisoned abroad and held illegally, many of these issues are similar and deeply distressing. Many of my colleagues, including my hon. Friends the Members for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes) and for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady), have worked on issues and fought hard for their constituents, as has the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq), who is not in her place now. A legal right to consular assistance is so important to these people.
I want to pay tribute to the founding members of the British Rights Abroad Group, who have experienced their loved ones being held abroad. Richard Ratcliffe and Daniela Tajeda have fought valiantly for their loved one. Nazanin is still, as we have heard, being held in Iran away from her daughter and family. Although Daniela’s husband, Matthew Hedges, is now home from being held in the UAE, his experience of illegal incarceration was horrific. I have spent time with Daniela. I have heard what Matthew went through when he was held in a windowless room and force-fed drugs that have left long-term mental and physical damage. Daniela was left to fight for Matthew alone with very little support from the UK Government. She was advised not to go to the press but then left completely isolated. That was a completely unacceptable situation. I genuinely believe that if she had had the right consular support, she and Matthew would not have been as damaged and as traumatised as they have been.
There are more than 2,000 British prisoners abroad. More than half of them are currently being held without trial, like Jagtar Singh Johal, a constituent of the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn, who has been held prisoner in India for nearly four years on unfounded terrorism charges, and Billy Irving, who spent four years in an Indian prison after being wrongly accused of carrying unlicensed arms and ammunition while he countered piracy—with the British Government’s authorisation and support.
There is so much to say and so much to do on this issue, with so many lives lost and impacted, and so many still fighting for justice for their loved ones. I want to give others a chance to speak, but I also want to be very clear with the Government and with the families: I, and my team, will continue to fight on this issue, and we want to work with you to make it better. We will not give up the fight on this issue for those families and for those staff.
Duncan Baker (North Norfolk) (Con)
I start by expressing my gratitude for the opportunity to take part in this debate. I thank the hon. Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) and the Backbench Business Committee for bringing such an important issue to the Chamber. It is really important to be able to discuss it and the specific cases that we have probably all come across.
I want to raise the case of one of my constituents, Dr Ding Col Dau Ding, a British citizen who died in South Sudan in 2015. His brother is a doctor working in the NHS. They lived in Cromer on the North Norfolk coast. The circumstances surrounding his death, and possible murder, remain, more than six years later, unclear and unanswered. Dr Ding was a highly qualified medical doctor and brain surgeon also working in the NHS, and was by all accounts an extraordinary man. I know that his passing is felt as strongly today as it was six years ago. His friends and family have, for many years now, sought answers and justice, but they have neither.
The British Embassy in Juba was seemingly making progress, with the former ambassador expressing his own concern over the death of Dr Ding. However, the efforts to ascertain the facts surrounding the death of a British citizen have plateaued since that ambassador’s end of tenure in 2017. I hope that by raising this case today on the Floor of the House, much like other Members, Dr Ding’s case can now be revisited with renewed vigour and a concern to mirror that of his family and friends. I am sure I speak for everybody here when I say that to lose a son, a brother or a loved one is one thing, but to do so in the absence of understanding and justice is a burden that no family should bear.
I therefore ask the Minister to unequivocally assure me that everything possible can be done to help Dr Ding’s family and friends to receive the answers and the justice that they deserve. Will she agree to meet me and the Ding family? I want to ensure that everything possible can be done to support the late Dr Ding’s family and friends and to help bring them very much needed closure.
Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP)
First, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) for securing this debate. It is a tremendously important issue that we need to discuss. If we can work on a cross-party basis, we need to impress on the Minister, if nothing else, the seriousness of these types of case and how they stand out from the bulk of our casework.
My constituent David Cornock’s son was murdered in Thailand in 2019. He did not commit suicide, as the official police report suggested. The official police report was extremely unconvincing and made no effort to be anything other than that. Much like my hon. Friend’s constituent’s experience, there is an immediate and natural assumption to turn to the Foreign Office, thinking, “They will know what to do. They’ve been here before. How could I understand how to navigate this myself? Who would? Who could?” They turned to the Foreign Office and at every turn, the door was very politely closed, saying, “There is nothing we can do”, “That is not our responsibility”, and, “Here is a list of lawyers.”
When I heard my hon. Friend talk about the list of lawyers, my heart sank, because I have been through the list of lawyers merry-go-round with my constituent. On it were 10 lawyers in Thailand—six did not respond, two claimed they could not speak English, and the other two wanted £25,000 up front. I accept that it is hard for the Foreign Office to find lawyers in every single country around the world, but it should accept that, too, and stop offering the list. Offering false, empty help is worse than no help at all, and that is the message I want to get through to the Minister.
The Minister will take to her feet, and I know what she will say. She will tell us that she understands. She will tell us that these are very trying cases, not just for the families, but for any MP who has to try to support their constituents in these testing matters. If that is what she will say—I am sure it is—she should take a look at the service provided now and change it, because we live in a society where people can travel to all corners of the Earth if they have the means. The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office needs to update its systems and processes to make sure that things are realistic.
Just before I came to this debate, I read the guidance for going to Thailand, and I have to say that it is nothing like my constituent’s experience, which frankly is exceptional, but not unheard of on the Thai islands. There is nothing in the guidance about investing in property and being murdered for it so that the property can be embezzled by malign authorities that operate outside the rule of law, such as it is there. There is plenty about someone getting their drinks spiked or their pockets picked, but let us get to the big issues. Those are serious issues, but not as serious as a staged suicide, a completely disregarding police force and an investigation that would not pass muster anywhere in the world.
Hannah Bardell
As if I have not already said enough, I feel compelled to intervene specifically on the issue of Thailand. We took evidence from a number of families whose loved ones died in Thailand. The level of corruption and lack of support were galling. They felt that things had moved on a little bit, because the advice on the Foreign Office website had improved a little, but there is clearly a gulf, I am sure my hon. Friend would agree, between that advice and the real experiences of our families in Thailand.
Dave Doogan
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why I go back to my insistence that the Foreign Office accept the request to look again at how it seeks to support—that is with a very small “s”—people in these circumstances. It would be far better not to compound people’s distress and devastation at the death of a loved one by giving the impression of being a helpful organisation when in actual fact, I am sorry, it is anything but—certainly not in the experience of my constituent. Honesty needs to be rewoven through the support that the FCDO provides. The trauma of repatriating one’s loved one’s body, the difficulty of death certificates and the impossible merry-go-round of post-mortems—those things are challenging in any respect, but in this context they are utterly horrifying.
I will wrap it up there. I hope I have conveyed the seriousness with which I and other hon. and right hon. Members view this issue. I hope that the Minister can assure us that something can change about this process.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I commend the hon. Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell). All hon. Members present bring examples to the Chamber of such things happening to constituents. She has every reason to be proud of her staff, especially that staff member who did much work and gave much commitment. We are all proud of that staff member too because of what she has done.
It is an emotive topic because of the issues that it pertains to, which each of us have as local and elected representatives. I well remember a young constituent, Daniel, coming into my office with the news that his father had been found dead in Spain under suspicious circumstances. He had no idea what to do. That goes back to the point that other hon. Members have made, including the hon. Member for Angus (Dave Doogan), that it is about knowing what to do. I felt, as my constituent did, that the British consulate would be able help, but it could not.
Daniel did not know what questions to ask or who to ask them of and, importantly, he had no clue about how to get his dad home. His pain and uncertainty were difficult to see, and harder still because we had no ready-made pathway to access to help him and his family. My office worked with the British consulate, and the people there were absolute professionals, but perhaps they did not have the knowledge or expertise. Such things do not happen all the time, but when they do, we must be able to respond. Undoubtedly, however, their hands were somewhat tied and their roles were ambiguous.
I know what the hon. Member for Livingston wants to do, and what I, other hon. Members and the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West), want to do through the debate. We look to the Minister for an encouraging response that will give us some support and confidence in how the process will work from now on. We need to improve it. With that in mind, there is a piece of work to be done to define roles and to provide the services that people need in time of trauma.
Let us be honest: my constituent Daniel was in a really dark place and he did not know what to do. The consulate was very helpful but it did not get us out of the situation; the hon. Member for Livingston and the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) also referred to that. I am thankful for the work done by the Kevin Bell Repatriation Trust in Newry, which stepped into that breach and got Daniel’s daddy home. It took care of the paperwork. As the MP working on behalf of my constituent, I needed that charity, because it had done that many times. When we were seeking support and reaching out to try to find somewhere, it was there. It liaised with the Spanish authorities and basically handled the case for that terrified mourning young man.
I dread to think where the family would have been without that charity, so I am thankful that it operated in Northern Ireland and helped to do what our consulate was unable to do. It had my thanks then and has them in abundance now for all it does to help people in that way. There have been others who have unfortunately died in suspicious circumstances or as a result of bad health about whom we have needed help from the consulate, and in many cases, it was charities and other people who reached out to help. I am conscious that when it comes to this issue, we see the families first hand and know the pain that is in their heart. We know the anxiety and worry that they experience as they think, “What are we going to do now?”
In her introduction, the hon. Member for Livingston eloquently and powerfully told the story of her constituent and what she was able to do with her staff to try to help. The story I have told about my constituents forms the basis of my plea to Government, and ultimately to the Minister. I understand that the consulate cannot be accountable for the actions of every UK citizen on holiday, and nor could we expect it to be, but there are situations in which we simply cannot abandon our citizens to do it alone. That is the thrust, I believe, of this debate and why we look to the Minister for a response.
Families want to bring the bodies home, to search for answers and to get justice in these horrific, traumatic and very grieving circumstances. They do not have the money, the know-how and often the presence of mind. In all honesty, in Northern Ireland, we have had the disappeared—those who the IRA murdered and buried—and those families looked to have a completion of their grief if at all possible. We do not have the facilities within constituency offices to provide the help that is needed. I believe there is a breach and a gap that need to be filled by the consulate, rather than by charities that may or may not have the scope and capacity to step in.
Families want their loved ones home. They want to be able to lay them to rest, they want to be able to have some sort of a closure, they want to be able to have them buried, and under these incredible circumstances, they are under incredible pressure. In deep grief, they need help, they need compassion and they need tender care. They need help through the process step by step, as they try to deal with something that is incomprehensible and that they never expected on the holiday trip that was taken. Therefore, I believe it is important and central at this time that every effort is made.
I very much look forward to the Minister’s response. I know her to be a compassionate and understanding lady. I also know that she will be anxious, as we all are, to have a response that can give succour and support to our constituents, but also look to the future and to others who might find themselves in this imponderable, incredible and difficult situation.
I understand that there is not a never-ending supply of finance in this case, but I would suggest that qualified embassy staff need to be trained for that effort and to that level. It is a need that we must meet. We must find the finance to train the staff in how to deal with these cases in each embassy, or on a cross-embassy basis if there are others.
In her introduction, the hon. Member for Livingston referred to having a phone number to phone the embassy, but nobody was there. I am not being critical of the embassy, but on a Saturday night and over a weekend—normally, that is when these things happen, unfortunately—I think there has to be some sort of answering machine or something in place so that people can ring the number, ring another embassy or whatever it may be, and just someone can be available to help out. Again, I look to the Minister to see just how that can be done. Perhaps lessons can be learned from dealing with other consulates and embassies of our friends and allies to ensure that there is always the know-how to look into these cases.
The hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) was here earlier, but is not here now. I do not think that any of us in this House are not touched by the story of her constituent Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and how she was given protection, which unfortunately did not continue. It is not the Minister’s fault. It is the Iranians’ fault—let us be honest—but at the end of the day, consular care and protection have to mean something, and we have to have that in place as well.
Can the Minister inform the House how improvement in consular help can be achieved through training and through knowledge in the Department, so that we can learn something from all the grief our constituents have told us about and all the things we feel almost overwhelmed with, and learn how to deal with those things in a way that means we can give support, succour and comfort to those people?
The hon. Member for Livingston made a telling point that I want to reiterate. She referred to her staff. They were handling all these cases for constituents. All those things they were doing had a dramatic effect on the staff too. Who as an MP has not taken a story home from one of their constituents and worried about it for over two days? We have all done it because we want to help people and our staff want to help people. So counselling for the staff, and for consular staff who have to reply and respond, is important. The hon. Lady referred to that and I ask the Minister to deal with that in her response.
I am proud to use a British passport and will be prouder still when I renew my passport and can wave the navy blue British passport which demands entry in the name of Her Majesty. I know I will not be abandoned as long as I have that passport, yet too many of our constituents have felt abandoned and too many families feel that they have to face this alone. That is why we must ask for change and become better at what we do through our Minister and the British consulate. I believe we can and should do more to ensure that help is available in these dire circumstances for all our citizens. It is for our citizens who tomorrow might face this.
Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)
It is always good to follow the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), and I hope his new blue passport will open up doors on the issue we are discussing today—even though the passports are made in France.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) and their staff—their team; I hate the word “staff”—for the immense work they have done on behalf of the all-party group on deaths abroad, consular services and assistance, of which I am also a member. I also thank the all-party group for coming together in a cross-party sense to discuss an issue that crosses the desks of Members of this House more regularly than ever before. Importantly, I also thank the families that gave evidence to the all-party group. I want to specifically concentrate on the families of my constituents: Lisa Brown, believed murdered in Spain, is still missing and Jagtar Singh Johal is being arbitrarily detained in the Republic of India, now for a fourth year.
Let me take Lisa’s family’s case first. I have been part of it since her sister and brother first came to me and my team. Their experience is in some ways not dissimilar to that of the vast majority of those who seek Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office support for someone believed murdered and missing abroad. There was limited information via a consular office in a location with a high percentage of UK nationals either living there or on holiday. There was scrabbling around for translators and lawyers. All the while the family were dealing with the trauma of a missing sister presumed murdered who has a young son left behind. Sadly, the case of Lisa is still open. During this time Lisa’s mother sadly died without the answers she and the rest of Lisa’s family have required.
Then there is the case of Jagtar Singh Johal, with which I hope the Chamber is well acquainted, who was abducted in the streets of the Republic of India, with an accusation of torture against the state of India, an ally and a member of the Commonwealth. No charges have yet been placed, there is consistent postponement by Indian judicial authorities every time the case comes to court, and there has been the familiar “We can’t do this and we can’t do that” approach over a broad swathe of the period of his detention.
Like many others, I lost count of the number of consular staff who were moved during the last four years of Jagtar’s detention, but let me put on the record once again my thanks to those staff in the FCDO who have gone beyond the call of duty to support my constituent and his family. They are not paid appropriately, they have been moved from pillar to post and—I have to be very clear—there has been a lack of political leadership on this issue. I have also lost count of the number of Prime Ministers, Foreign Secretaries and Under-Secretaries we have had, not only in Jagtar’s case but in every other case that the report mentions. In the last four years, we have seen three Prime Ministers, five Foreign Secretaries and three Under-Secretaries. That demonstrates the issue of political leadership.
I pay tribute to the families: to Lisa’s family and to Jagtar’s family. What all the families in the report understand—my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston alluded to this, and I hope the Minister takes it in a cross-party sense—is the requirement to consider the enshrinement in law of the right to consular assistance. Murder victims and those considered murdered overseas should get parity with victims of terror, and the criminal compensation scheme should be amended accordingly.
The FCDO and the Ministry of Justice here in England—again, my hon. Friend alluded to this—should make targeted assessments of who gets help and what that looks like, to assist the families and, more importantly, to inform the future provision of consular services and plan the delivery of the improved service that Members have alluded to. If we do not gain the facts, we cannot improve the service. We heard earlier from the hon. Member for Wrexham (Sarah Atherton), talking about their Committee’s report on the treatment of women in the armed forces, that if we do not do the groundwork and understand what is going on, we cannot make change. In addition, the Government should publish an introductory range, but not an exhaustive list, of what basic assistance families and individuals can gain from the FCDO online process—of what basic assistance people should expect.
There must also be timely reviews of local legal representatives and translation services. Members have alluded to people picking up the phone to someone who not only does not speak English but wants €25,000 up front. There need to be consistent reviews, at least twice a year, but we would leave it to the appropriate officials to recognise what needs to be done to improve the basic access to information and legal and translation services.
Fundamentally, we must provide a substantial budgetary increase for consular support teams, not only in Whitehall and in embassies, but in those consular offices where large numbers of UK and Northern Ireland nationals are traditionally found either living or holidaying, such as on the eastern coast of Spain.
Hannah Bardell
My hon. Friend’s point about tourism hotspots, and Spain particularly, is really important. I went to Madrid with my chief of staff, Stephanie, and met the ambassador and the staff in the embassy and the consulate who deliver the services. They could see the value and the opportunity in improving services and communication and in having a proper link-up. That is one of the recommendations that we want to put in place—a protocol to ensure that people travelling from the UK to Spain have a higher level of service, because so many tourists go there from Britain.
Martin Docherty-Hughes
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, which makes my point. If the United Kingdom Government want to be global Britain, they should be the global Britain of the 21st century, not buccaneers going into the Caribbean or the Indo-Pacific. This really is about recognising what is happening to citizens on the ground on a regular basis. As my hon. Friend the Member for Angus (Dave Doogan) alluded to, it is not irregular to hear of these cases anymore. It is not regular, but it is not irregular and we, as Members, face these tasks on a more regular basis.
Finally, let me pay tribute not only to the family of Lisa Brown and Jagtar Singh Johal, but to all the families mentioned in the report. I hope the Minister will understand that it comes from a place of wanting to work together, so that no other family is left without access to appropriate support, that no other person is left in a hospital dead with their family having to have crowdfunders to bring them home, and that families are met if they are going to visit someone in prison, whether it be in the Republic of India, Iran, Australia or the United States. I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston for securing this debate.
Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)
It is a real delight to be here this afternoon contributing to this debate and to hear the way the hon. Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) introduced her poignant remarks relating to her constituent. We heard about the important work of the all-party parliamentary group on deaths abroad, consular services and assistance, and the work the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes) has done not just through the APPG but on behalf of his constituent, who is now very well known to those of us who have been here since 2015—I believe the hon. Member was in the same intake as me—listening to Jagtar Singh Johal’s story. I hope the Minister can give us some enlightened news in that regard.
Quite rightly, whenever citizens face difficulty or are caught up in a crisis in any part of the world, they look to the embassy and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office for support. We heard from the hon. Member for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) about the need we, as Members of Parliament, have for the reassurance that our constituents are being looked after when they are in trouble. We firmly believe that the Government always have a moral duty to support and protect UK citizens abroad, particularly in times of crisis. The hon. Members for Angus (Dave Doogan) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon) spoke movingly about their constituents and their concern.
For much of the time, the support given by embassies through the FCDO is timely and appropriate. That is due to the commitment and dedication of FCDO and consulate staff. I know all Members will join me in thanking them for their tireless work day in, day out in very stressful circumstances to help our constituents. That said, we know of some cases where we feel even more could be done. My hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) has a very well-known case. She and my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East (Janet Daby) still have constituents in prison in Iran. We know well the stories of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori, but there are others. The Minister will be aware of them.
During the pandemic, many of these difficulties were made even worse. I want to refer briefly to some of the findings that came out of the work we did in Parliament. The Minister has changed since the Foreign Affairs Committee’s report was published, so I want to ensure that the current Minister is on top of it. The operation during spring 2020, which we all remember very well as constituency MPs, was considered by the report to be
“too slow and placed too much reliance on commercial providers”.
Other countries appeared to be quicker to respond through their embassies and consular arrangements. They seemed to be more organised and more speedy. The consular service provided little or no financial support to those who were stranded, and many citizens were unable to gain access to the information they needed in a speedy manner. It went on to state that:
“The failure of the FCO to provide clear advice on what would happen on arrival to the UK caused many travellers a great deal of unnecessary anxiety”,
and that:
“The FCO placed too much reliance on this generic advice and this approach disadvantaged those with medical conditions and those stuck in remote areas.”
Finally, the FCDO had not established a system for logging and recording the location and contact details of UK citizens abroad.
It was therefore very troubling to see some familiar themes when British citizens were trapped in Kabul. We must not confuse Afghan applicants who wished to apply to settle in the UK due to the dreadful situation in Kabul with UK citizens who are still finding their way to the UK—I believe there are some. Will the Minister clarify how many she thinks are still making their way to the UK from Kabul and Pakistan? That underlines the importance of good administration and basic organisation.
We do not need to rehearse what we heard in the Foreign Affairs Committee this week, because we can all ascertain it from the transcript, but there are some themes. The whistleblower mentioned that he felt that only 5% of the people who had written to MPs had had any assistance. It was clear, tragically, that some of those left behind had been murdered by the Taliban. It is not clear from his evidence, which is about 40 pages long, whether he was referring specifically to Afghan individuals or UK citizens, but in either case, it shows how important speed and organisation are.
Another important point in the whistleblower’s evidence is that he believes that
“the FCDO’s institutional approach amounted to a failure to abide by the values set out in the Civil Service Code.”
I will say no more about that because, first and foremost, Parliament is about us as Members, rather than the civil service, but I wonder whether the Minister will take that away.
The 25-year-old man who wrote that document appeared to be quite traumatised because he had wanted to reply to thousands of emails from Members of Parliament. There are some echoes of not just the consular cases that Members are raising, but of what was talked about in the Foreign Affairs Committee on Monday afternoon. I hope that the lessons that needed to be learned in spring 2020 following the repatriation of UK nationals to the UK, in which many of our offices were intimately involved, have been learned, but the debate this afternoon suggests that perhaps some of them have not been.
I have another question for the Minister about the legal position. The motion refers to the clarification of what a Britain citizen can expect. Will she outline what she believes the legal position to be? Can a British citizen expect translation, medical services and so on? That may help us as MPs to understand what we can expect from the FCDO. I do not think this is active Government policy at the moment—otherwise, we would not be seeing these cases—but will the Minister outline whether she or the Foreign Secretary are developing a case whereby there is a legal right for our constituents to expect a level of service when they are abroad? How does that compare with other countries? We all want to see an increase in the support available to citizens to ensure that when it is needed, it is appropriate.
In conclusion, I will pick up two points. The first, which all Members have spoken about, is the traumatic nature of this debate, and I want to put on record, as we all have, the importance of our parliamentary staff. I thank your team, Madam Deputy Speaker, and Mr Speaker, because, in this House, every time we have a crisis, he writes to our staff and reaches out. That offer of support for them is really powerful, because so much of what our staff here do is very intense. During the Afghanistan crisis, many of our staff worked day and night and gave so much, so could you pass back to Mr Speaker’s team how much that means to me and to all of us as employers, Madam Deputy Speaker? It was really moving to hear the hon. Member for Livingston mention her member of staff. Could the hon. Member pass on from this House to the family how much we appreciate all the hard work that she did before she tragically passed away? It is not easy working for elected Members, but we all know that it is so important for our leadership role.
My final point relates to a reflection by the commentator Rafael Behr, whom I am sure the Minister reads regularly because he is a foreign policy commentator as well as being a number of other things. He wrote that sometimes he feels, in observing the current Government, that there is
“the thrill of power without…the burden of office.”
I mean this in a spirit not of anger but of thoughtfulness and contemplation: I think we need to turn that on its head so that we put the burden of responsibility first and the thrill of power second.
The Minister for Asia (Amanda Milling)
I thank the hon. Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) and congratulate her on securing this debate. I pay tribute to her and the all-party group that she chairs for all their work. I also echo the words of the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West), about our staff—the staff of the hon. Member for Livingston who work to support the APPG, but also parliamentary staff, who have to deal with some very difficult cases. Cases where people die abroad or are detained abroad are really difficult, as we know from discussions today and on many occasions in this House, so I thank the hon. Member and our staff for all their work.
I am very grateful for colleagues’ contributions to the debate. I hope in my remarks to cover a number of the issues that they have discussed, but I am also happy to follow up on individual cases.
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s role supporting British nationals overseas is an essential public service. Over the past decade, we have regularly reviewed and sought to improve the professionalism, scope and form of our services in line with the Vienna convention on consular relations by comparing our consular services with those provided by comparable countries. At the recent spending review, the Foreign Secretary identified consular services as one of our four key priorities. We are committed to providing a modern, round-the-clock service, including a wide choice of digital services, which I will come to later.
Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)
I have two constituents who are imprisoned in the UAE. I am in detailed discussions with the Minister for the Middle East and North Africa. I appreciate that there is a limit to what the present Minister can say at the Dispatch Box, but can she reassure me that the FCDO is doing everything in its power to assist my constituents, Mr Albert Douglas and Mr Billy Hood, and is treating the cases as the highest priority?
Amanda Milling
I can obviously provide that reassurance. I know that my hon. Friend has had discussions with my ministerial colleague, but I will happily have further discussions with her after this debate.
Our service will continue to provide empathetic support to meet the needs of vulnerable British people and their families. At the same time, it will help British people living and travelling abroad to take responsibility for their own safety and will strengthen the resilience of our consular network and its ability to respond to global crises. When British nationals need assistance overseas, our highly trained consular staff are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Our staff make an assessment of an individual’s vulnerability in order to tailor the assistance that they receive. We have more than 200 consular posts worldwide, with more than 700 consular staff across the network. We track and review the quality of our services through both qualitative and quantitative measures, and it is testimony to the hard work of our staff that the most recent overall satisfaction score remained at well over 80%.
I am grateful to Members for putting on record their recognition of the hard work of those consular staff. Inevitably, as parliamentarians, we often hear about the most difficult cases, in which constituents may be unhappy with the services that they receive, but I too want to place on record my thanks to the staff, who, in the overwhelming majority of cases, have got it right and have been able to provide the support that an individual needed.
Dave Doogan
The Minister has referred to the most difficult cases, but it is important for the Department to recognise a pattern of events. My constituent was told that he had to petition the Attorney General of Thailand to get the case reopened. When I asked the Department whether it could give me another example of a UK national successfully petitioning the Attorney General of Thailand, it was unable to do so. It is generic; it is not acceptable. Given that the Minister’s predecessor and the former Secretary of State refused to meet me, I wonder whether she would like to meet me and my constituent.
Amanda Milling
I will go on to talk more broadly about the services that we can provide and some of the limitations, but I am happy to follow that up after the debate.
We are able to support more than 20,000 new consular cases, as well as about 8,000 long-running cases. Sadly, that figure includes 4,000 deaths and between 40 and 60 homicides. About 5,000 British nationals are arrested or detained overseas each year, and providing non-judgmental support for prisoners is a large part of our role. Our contact centres receive about 500,000 inquiries each year, and more than 85% are resolved in the first call. Over the last 18 months, fewer British nationals have been travelling overseas because of covid-19. However, British nationals still need our support, and despite the variety of local lockdowns and other measures, we have continued to provide our core services throughout, adapting to reflect the limited ability to hold face-to-face meetings. In 2020 we handled more than 3,000 cases involving deaths abroad, although many of our staff around the world were working through lockdown themselves.
Members have rightly spoken of the impact that a death overseas can have. My thoughts go out to all those mentioned in today’s debate, and all those who have lost loved ones.
Hannah Bardell
The Minister has given statistics, and has talked about the number of cases that have been resolved on first contact. That is welcome, but I think it important for the House and those watching the debate to know that among those cases are cases of lost passports and people needing new passports—administrative details, as opposed to the very difficult casework that we have been discussing. I think that those cases need to be separated in the statistics, not least out of respect for the families of the loved ones we are talking about.
Amanda Milling
That is an important point. When we are talking about deaths abroad, we are talking about incredibly complex cases. I hope that later in my speech I will be able to set out the services that we provide and explain why we provide them in the way that we do—so that we can tailor the service to the situation and the individual’s circumstances.
Any unexpected death is deeply upsetting for the families concerned, let alone a death that takes place in violent or unexplained circumstances. Anyone who has lost a loved one will want to understand what happened and why that person died. I recognise that from my constituency work and the hard work of other Members on behalf of their constituents. My own constituent Robert Spray tragically died in Bulgaria in October 2019 while in police custody. Consular officials have supported the family and continue to request information from the Bulgarian authorities to support the UK coroner, as the family desperately tries to get answers.
Our experienced consular staff have detailed knowledge of their country and region and can provide information and support to help families to navigate the local processes. They do their very best to ensure that the wishes of the bereaved families are followed. This can include providing advice on local burial and cremation options or on transporting the body and personal belongings back to the UK, and providing lists of local and international funeral directors who can assist. We have dedicated teams who provide expertise in particular circumstances, including, since 2015, a murder and manslaughter team.
As much as our staff want to support families seeking to understand how a death has occurred or to secure justice, there are limits to what the FCDO can do in cases abroad. Investigations into deaths, either through natural causes or in suspicious circumstances, remain the responsibility of local authorities. We cannot investigate the cases ourselves, and we cannot direct local authorities on how to do their job.
Hannah Bardell
I understand the point that the Minister is making about foreign jurisdictions. This is something that has been debated widely across British society and, without getting too specific, in a number of very high-profile cases. However, there is a precedent of the British Government—whoever has been in power at the time—putting pressure on foreign authorities, working with them and sending police from the UK to investigate crimes abroad. Families have rightly asked me on numerous occasions what makes their loved one different.
Amanda Milling
I am grateful to the hon. Member for making that point. I should have said at the start of the debate that I was grateful to have had the opportunity to meet her to discuss a range of issues, and I look forward to working with her and the all-party parliamentary group. As I have said, in this instance, there are things that remain the responsibility of the local authorities, but I am grateful for the opportunity to work with the APPG.
Jim Shannon
The Minister has outlined the position of the Department, but my constituent would have liked, following the death of his father, to have had a contact—someone to give him advice. We could not get that. This is not a criticism, but the advice just was not there. Is it possible to ensure that such advice is available for our constituents?
Amanda Milling
We always seek to hear feedback from those who have to use the FCDO’s services, and I would be more than happy to discuss the particular case to which the hon. Gentleman is referring after the debate at another point.
We have to be clear about what levels of service the FCDO can and cannot provide. We are not funded to pay for legal, medical or translation costs, but the consular staff will signpost sources of help.
Martin Docherty-Hughes
If there were clarity about the basics of what the consular service can do, it would be a start. It could be put online and regularly reviewed.
Amanda Milling
Hopefully some of the improvements that we are continuing to make in the service will address some of the points that have been raised today.
One of the points that was raised earlier related to lawyer lists. Our posts overseas maintain lists of English-speaking lawyers who are qualified to act in an overseas jurisdiction. That is published on gov.uk. We welcome feedback, but we cannot provide specific recommendations. That said, we are considering how we can make these online lists more accessible and easier to navigate.
I mentioned how consular staff can signpost sources of help and, for example, we work closely with and fund specialist organisations that provide assistance we cannot provide, such as counselling, legal advice and support with translation and repatriation. This includes the Victim Support homicide service, Prisoners Abroad, Glasgow and Clyde Rape Crisis, and travel care providers and chaplaincies at major UK airports. We publish full details online of what the FCDO can and cannot do to support British nationals abroad. We will publish a refreshed and updated version next year.
When British nationals are detained overseas, their health and welfare is our top priority. We make every effort to ensure prisoners receive adequate food, water and medical treatment and that they have access to legal advice. When we hear about a detention or arrest, our consular staff attempt to contact the individual as soon as possible. How frequently we visit will depend on the nature and context of the case, but we are aware that our visits are a lifeline for many detainees, and that our staff are the only visitors that some will receive.
However, we do not and must not interfere in civil and criminal court proceedings. It is right that we respect the legal systems of other countries, just as we expect foreign nationals to respect our laws and legal processes when they are in the UK.
Amanda Milling
I will make progress, if the hon. Lady does not mind.
We can and do intervene on behalf of British nationals where they are not treated in line with internationally accepted standards or if there are unreasonable delays in procedures.
We take allegations of torture or mistreatment incredibly seriously. Although we cannot investigate allegations ourselves, with the consent of the individual we can raise the allegations with local authorities to demand an end to the mistreatment and to demand that the incidents are investigated and the perpetrators brought to justice. Our priority is always to serve the best interests of the individual. Any decisions on the action we might take in response to allegations of mistreatment are made on a case-by-case basis and only with the individual’s consent.
Martin Docherty-Hughes
Given that there is clear evidence that my constituent Jagtar Singh Johal has been arbitrarily detained, why will the Government not agree that this UK citizen is being arbitrarily detained by the Republic of India?
Amanda Milling
We take all allegations of human rights violations seriously, and the Foreign Secretary, ministerial colleagues and senior officials have raised Mr Johal’s allegations of torture and his right to a fair trial with the Government of India more than 70 times.
There is no legal right to consular assistance. As colleagues will know, the UK is party to the Vienna convention on consular relations, a multilateral agreement setting out how states will co-operate in support of their nationals overseas. Our ability to provide consular assistance remains, at all times, dependent on states respecting the Vienna convention, and it must be done in accordance with the laws of that country. Even if a right to consular assistance were enshrined in domestic law, our ability to provide it overseas would continue to remain wholly dependent on the co-operation of host states. It would not help many of our most complex cases.
As I set out earlier, we continually seek to improve our consular services. We welcome feedback, and we use it to improve our services and to provide the best possible assistance. We have learned lessons during the pandemic about how we can operate remotely. We are not complacent about the overwhelmingly positive feedback we receive, and I acknowledge that there are always areas where we can improve. We have a dedicated learning team, who ensure that our staff have the knowledge and skills they need to support British nationals. We have, for instance, included testimony from bereaved families in our training modules on how to support people bereaved through murder and manslaughter. It helps staff to understand the perspective of somebody needing that assistance. We also have a robust complaints process for those who feel that we have not provided the service that they needed. I want to reiterate our openness to working with others, particularly the all-party group, to ensure that British nationals receive the right support, tailored to their circumstances.
To conclude, our consular staff at home and abroad work extremely hard to support British nationals in distress and their families, often in difficult circumstances. We take every single consular case seriously. Our trained and expert staff work with empathy and aim to offer the help that is needed, be that advice or practical support. They are not lawyers, medics, police detectives or social workers, but what they try to do is ensure that British people have the information and support they need to help them deal with the situation they face.
Hannah Bardell
I am incredibly grateful to all who have spoken, including the hon. Members for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon). I failed to mention the Kevin Bell Repatriation Trust in my substantive speech, and I apologise for that, because it is an organisation that we hold in great regard and would like to work with more. I will reach out to the hon. Gentleman on that. We also heard from my hon. Friends the Members for Angus (Dave Doogan) and for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes), and the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West). They have all spoken passionately about devastating cases in their constituencies.
I have to say to the Minister, gently and kindly, that I know she has come into this role recently, that this is a huge brief and area, and that she has a pre-written speech—we all understand how this works—but there will be families at home watching this who will be furious. That is not in any way to insult her or her staff, but I am concerned that they have not grasped the gravity of this and the gaps, to put it bluntly. She talked of detailed experience of local staff. I am sure that many do have detailed experience, but I am afraid that in many cases, such as those we have heard about today, they fail to share that experience or they fail to have the support and resource to share that experience. She spoke of a service that operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week, but many, many families we have met and dealt with would beg to differ on that. That may be the definition of what a service is, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Angus said, an offer of false, empty hope is worse than no hope at all—I would agree with that. I know that the level of service and support is aspirational, and staff want to give the very best service, but there is a long way to go. I am glad that the Minister does want to work with us, because we want that too; as I said, I want to be a critical friend. However, fundamentally, when we talk about the Vienna convention, we have to remember that the UK has an opportunity to lead the way on this, but it is falling far behind. As we well know, diplomatic and trade relations play a serious role, and post Brexit we are in a dangerous and difficult place. We need to do much, much better for the families of these islands.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House regrets that the consular services provided by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) to bereaved families of people who have been murdered, have died in suspicious circumstances, or have been imprisoned or tortured overseas have fallen short of the standard reasonably expected; notes that access to justice and basic standards of assistance are dependent upon a person’s ability to pay; is concerned that there is no legal right to consular assistance and that support is provided on a discretionary basis, which can lead to unpredictable and inconsistent communications from the FCDO; further regrets that consular services in the UK are below the level of support UK citizens should expect; believes that the FCDO’s focus is on what it cannot do to help, rather than what it can do, which adds to the trauma experienced by victims; calls on the Government to improve and standardise communication processes at the FCDO, to publish consular procedures and policies and to revisit the findings of the Fifth Report of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Support for British nationals abroad: The Consular Service, Session 2014-15, HC 516; further calls on the Government to consult with the families affected and to raise the standard of how British citizens are treated by FCDO procedures; and urges the Government to set a world leading example of how a state treats its citizens in their darkest hour of need.
Vulnerable Asylum Seeker Services: Stockton
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
I am grateful to Mr Speaker for granting me this Adjournment debate. Before I start I would like to put on the record my thanks to local organisations Asylum Matter North East and Justice First for the vital work they do supporting asylum seekers in our area, and for the constructive and helpful engagement we have had over the years, which has ensured that problems such as the one I am about to discuss with the Minister are brought to my attention.
The asylum accommodation system has been run by the Home Office through private contractors for the past 20 years, without enough investment in local communities or adequate consultation with them. The outsourcing of these contracts with little oversight from or accountability to the Home Office, coupled with poor planning and ever-lengthier delays in decision making, has meant the accommodation system has lurched from crisis to crisis. The backlog of asylum claims waiting to be dealt with is at a record high, with 67,547 people waiting for even an initial decision and more than 125,000 either waiting for a further decision or due to be removed from the UK. A total of 37,562 applications were made in the year to September, which is more than were made in any 12-month period since the year to June 2004.
As a result of the Government’s failure to deal with processing in a timely fashion, on multiple occasions the Home Office has had to rely on contingency accommodation which, as the Minister knows, means the use of hotels, hostels or other institutional settings on an emergency basis. There are currently around 6,000 asylum seekers in hotels but, contrary to the views of some, they are not living in five-star accommodation.
Stockton’s experience of hosting supposedly “short-term” contingency hotel accommodation over the past two years has demonstrated how unsuitable this institutionalised accommodation is for people seeking sanctuary. Despite the huge efforts of people and organisations across Stockton to welcome and support the women and children accommodated, I have no doubt that they have suffered both physical and mental health harm.
I wish to paint a picture for the Minister of the current circumstances of some of the most vulnerable women in the country, who we as a nation are forcing to live in appalling conditions. I will focus in particular on certain asylum accommodation in my hometown of Stockton. Because of the vulnerabilities of many of the women who find their way to Stockton, I will not closely identify where they are accommodated, although I expect the Minister will be aware of the one establishment that I am going to discuss more fully.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Kevin Foster)
For the benefit of the House, I confirm that I am aware of the place to which the hon. Gentleman refers but, like him, I think that in this forum it is best not to specifically identify the property.
Alex Cunningham
That is very helpful.
Some of the women housed in so-called hotel accommodation in Stockton are pregnant and some have their young children with them. I am told that many of these women are particularly vulnerable because they are victims of human trafficking, brought here by the very worst of people and exposed to sexual exploitation. They are modern-day slaves, abused, beaten and controlled, with little hope of the kind of life we would want for ourselves or our children. It is important, then, that when they escape their abusers and are able to claim asylum, we honour our duty of care to them—a duty to protect them and keep them safe, to provide somewhere for them to live while their asylum applications are being considered, to ensure they are able to eat, and to give them access to the healthcare that many of them so desperately need.
Let me return to the image I was illustrating. The place in which these women are being accommodated is totally unsuitable and is the subject of much concern among those who work with asylum seekers in our area. I remember that, before it was used as asylum accommodation, it was a low-budget hotel, part of a large chain that has long since abandoned it as few people wanted to spend the night there. I dropped by again on Friday and saw the security man guarding the door at the front and the tatty grounds that double as an outside and play space for the residents and their children.
I confess that I have not been inside the building, but for years I have heard at first hand from those who have. The rooms offer only a very few square metres of accommodation and do not even have a private toilet, never mind a shower or proper washing facilities. The shared facilities have become a particular source of concern during the pandemic as, realistically, no person in the accommodation is able to self-isolate. There is nowhere to cook and no proper place to do the washing. The residents have to rely on the food provided, which they often find they are unable to eat, whether for cultural or dietary reasons. I have heard there are frequent complaints about the inability to access nutritional food, which is important for all but especially vital for pregnant women.
In addition, as the Minister will know, pregnant women deal with all manner of difficulties throughout their pregnancy and can experience nausea and problems with certain foods, which makes the lack of cooking facilities even more problematic. Indeed, there have been reports of pregnant women suffering from malnutrition in the accommodation and of women with babies having to use the communal toilet areas to sterilise their babies’ bottles. I have been told about rubbish piling up without being regularly cleared, which means flies and other pests are attracted to the complex. This particular accommodation is also especially poorly situated. It is a mile or more from the nearest homes, nearly two miles from the nearest school, and half a mile from the nearest shop. It is in the middle of an industrial estate, which means that any kind of integration into a wider community is extremely difficult.
In a recent submission on asylum service providers in the pandemic, Tees Valley City of Sanctuary said:
“The size of rooms vary, and double rooms can be so small as to have bunk beds. There are bathrooms shared by around 10 women, no communal areas, just two small rooms where meals are served and a small reception foyer. There is a car park with a few picnic tables outside. This means that during the pandemic there is virtually nowhere for the women to meet with each other or anyone else if they are to keep to rules about social distancing.”
Organisations in Stockton report that the women in the hotel are at serious risk of deteriorating mental health. People do not know how long they will be there, and where they will be sent next. Many women, once they have spent months in Stockton and managed to make some contacts and friends in the town, are then sent elsewhere in the country with very little notice.
Does the Minister agree that this is no place for vulnerable women to be placed—a slum hotel in the middle of an industrial estate with food that they cannot eat and completely shut off from the rest of society? Is he content that vulnerable women who have been abused are even safe in the accommodation that I have described? The fact that anyone has been housed in such a place is truly disgraceful, let alone the vulnerable victims of heinous organised criminals.
This experience mirrors that of communities across the UK. We have seen clearly over past years that putting people in institutionalised accommodation—be that hotels or barracks—causes them harm. People seeking asylum belong in our communities, where they can rebuild their lives. They should not be warehoused and isolated.
Before I discuss my further concerns about what is happening to young women and their children in our asylum system, I am pleased to say that, after much haranguing of Mears, which provides this particular accommodation on behalf of the Home Office, it has finally served notice on the owners of the so-called hotel and will quit using it by the end of next month. I received news of this development just after Mr Speaker granted me this Adjournment debate.
We have been in a similar place previously. I met people from Mears many months ago and they agreed with me then that the accommodation was not fit for purpose—accommodation that had been approved by the Home Office for housing extremely vulnerable women, as I have described. They said that they would stop using it within three months, but, nine months later, not only was it still in use, but more vulnerable young women had been accommodated there. That is certainly a failure on its part, but it is also a failure on the part of the Government who authorised the use of such a building in the first place.
Can the Minister explain to the House what criteria the Home Office uses when approving a hotel for this sort of use? Does anyone ever attend and check these places to see whether they are fit for purpose? It is deeply concerning and upsetting that the Government have overseen such schemes. I could go on for some time about the issues with this specific accommodation, but what I really want are solutions for these young women, who deserve so much from the country in which they have found themselves stranded. To anyone out there who would suggest that these vulnerable women and children should be removed from the country, I say that they need to understand that that would be all but impossible. Indeed, many of these women would find themselves back in the hands of the very gangs that forced them to travel here in the first place. The Minister knows that and so do I.
I recognise and understand that any Government need to get value for money for the public services that they provide and that of course includes asylum seekers’ accommodation. It is true that providers can only work within the budget provided, but what checks are in place to ensure that they are delivering on what they have promised? What checks does the Home Office do when agreeing a contract with a new provider to ensure that they have enough capacity to fulfil it?
I was not the only person who celebrated when G4S and its subcontractors, Jomast, lost the contract to provide accommodation and other services across the north of England, including in Stockton. I well remember the plastic plates provided to people, and will never ever forget the bed quilts that were so thin that a whole one could be stuffed into a pillowcase with plenty of room left. It was left to charities, such as Justice First, to provide people with quilts to keep them warm at night. I pay tribute again to the amazing work of all those who work to support asylum seekers in the Tees valley, such as Justice First, but it is not right that such basic provision has to come from charitable donations rather than the Government.
I remember the awful scandal, when Jomast painted all the doors of houses with asylum seekers in residence the same colour, with a job lot of paint. On the face of it, that was a simple oversight, but the trouble and abuse that those people got as a result was horrendous. Even when the issue was pointed out, Jomast would not change the doors, and we had to push and push and push until it eventually agreed to repaint them.
Along with people across the sector, I was keen to hear how Mears would handle and fulfil the new contract. I always remember one of its executives telling me how the company differed from those it was taking over from, and that it ran housing services, not prisons. I understood exactly what was meant by that and I shared the high hopes of many that things would get better, and they did—to a point. But Mears appeared to have overstretched itself. It did not have sufficient accommodation to fulfil the need and could not reach agreement with a third party that had the required supply. I know that that was about quality rather than price; I understand that Mears wanted to do better, and to end the need for people who were often from different countries and cultures to share bedrooms. I am pleased that over time good progress has been made, but more needs to be done, particularly for the group of people I have been talking about this evening.
Another concern that is regularly raised with me is that there is a lack of transparency and accountability in these accommodation centres. Some organisations in Stockton have flagged that they are aware of people living in deeply inappropriate accommodation, such as the type that I have described. They report that the systems by which people living in asylum accommodation can complain and resolve issues is via Migrant Help, and that the Home Office is opaque and difficult to access and navigate.
People have to log an issue or the need for a repair with Migrant Help. However, organisations and people seeking safety in Stockton report that the current waiting times for Migrant Help to answer the phone are far beyond contractual requirements, and that some requests for repairs are not recorded or passed on to the accommodation provider. Too often, this translates into people being left in limbo, unsure how to resolve urgent issues, and being forced to continue living in inappropriate or even unsafe accommodation.
Despite these clear issues, information about how the providers are performing and meeting the terms of the contracts in Stockton, regionally and nationally remains closely guarded by the Home Office. Only three key performance indicators are published for each provider, making scrutiny and accountability almost impossible. Some contracts are run by multi-billion-pound companies, and while they make a profit, people in the asylum system are left in severely substandard accommodation. Will the Minister commit to the regular publication of detailed performance management information on both the asylum accommodation and support services contract, and the advice, issue reporting and eligibility contract? This should ensure that the performance management regime is open and accountable, and designed to assess whether services are genuinely meeting the needs of people in the asylum system.
I am pleased to tell the Minister and you, Madam Deputy Speaker, that the borough of Stockton-on-Tees is welcoming to refugees and asylum seekers, and I am proud that it is. Our churches run drop-ins, organisations such as Justice First provide all manner of support, and our schools and health services have done a grand job in giving education and support to many. Although there is a small number of people who take issue with our area’s refugees and asylum seekers, generally our people want fairness and justice. They want to see individuals, families, women and children treated with compassion, to be given a chance and to be safe.
As the welcoming and dedicated people of Stockton have shown, local communities, charities and faith groups often step in to support people seeking asylum when Home Office provision falls short. Again, as we have seen in Stockton, statutory duties and safeguarding obligations mean that at times local authorities are obliged to step in, and many have dedicated staff in their teams to support and welcome people seeking asylum. Despite this, no funding is allocated to dispersal areas to support them and their communities.
The Home Affairs Committee has on multiple occasions recommended that the Home Office must give due regard to the financial and capacity constraints placed on dispersal authorities and provide dedicated funding—in part to give non-participating local authorities the confidence that they would be supported if they opted to become a dispersal local authority. Will the Minister consider the costs and impact of local dispersal with a view to directly funding areas that take in new arrivals in order to support them and their communities? The experience of women and children asylum seekers in Stockton brings into sharp focus the cruelty of the Government’s plans in the Nationality and Borders Bill to massively expand the use of institutionalised accommodation by setting up “accommodation centres”. I worry that these centres will enact more harm on people seeking sanctuary on an unprecedented scale.
While I recognise that Mears has said that it will deliver on its promise to me and cease to use the accommodation I have described, I ask the Minister for some help to ensure that this time Mears does deliver and that this dreadful accommodation in Stockton is taken out of use by asylum seekers once and for all. I ask him to mount a review of the quality and delivery of accommodation and services to the vulnerable women and children I have spoken about, not just in Stockton but across the country; to reassess the criteria for approving accommodation for use by Home Office contractors with a view to improving standards so that accommodation as poor as this cannot be approved again; to urgently address the long-standing structural issues in the management and monitoring of contracted provision, and significantly invest in improvements to the current stock of dispersal housing; and, finally, to give hope to these women and children that while we may not be able to provide all that they want, we will make sure that they are safe, secure, fed and healthy for as long as we need to fulfil that duty of care to them. It is what we would do for our own.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Kevin Foster)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) on securing this debate on services for asylum seekers in his community. As he has demonstrated, he is a passionate advocate on this issue and the work being done by his local community to support those who we, as the Home Office, look to support. I welcome any opportunity to hear the views of the House on this important subject, not least given the vulnerability of those involved. I will come on to talk about the specific issue he raised but, like him, I will not reference the exact locations, given the vulnerable nature of these service users. I am sure that he appreciates that that is not about me not wanting to be open with the House, but because it is not appropriate in a public forum to confirm those types of details.
Before I turn to some of the specific points raised, I want to emphasise that the United Kingdom has a proud record of helping people facing persecution, oppression and tyranny, and we stand by our obligations to help those fleeing persecution. Support is provided to destitute asylum seekers until their claims are finally determined, and to failed asylum seekers if they are destitute and unable to leave the UK immediately due to circumstances beyond their control. The support provided includes accommodation, an asylum support allowance, and access to our advice, issue reporting and eligibility provider, Migrant Help. Many local authorities play an important role in supporting asylum seekers, including, as has been well outlined, Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council, through participation in the asylum dispersal scheme and provision of key support services. I gratefully acknowledge all the Members of this House who represent their local communities and actively work with their local councils in this area of work, not just by talking in the House about supporting those seeking asylum but by actually doing it in their own area and local community.
The asylum system does face some challenges, and the pandemic, combined with the arrival of a significant number of small boats, has increased the numbers of people within the system. That has meant that, in addition to delays in the time it takes to consider a claim for asylum, the demand for support has increased at a time when local authority housing services are already stretched. To put this in context, published data in September 2021 showed that there had been a 35% increase in demand for accommodation since the start of the pandemic, resulting in more than 68,000 service users being provided with accommodation while their claims are considered.
We cannot let this go on. Therefore, through our new plan for immigration, we will seek to increase the fairness and efficacy of our system so that we can better protect and support those in genuine need of asylum while deterring illegal entry. It is particularly vital that we put an end to dangerous and unnecessary sea crossings from safe and democratic countries with functioning asylum systems. As the tragic loss of life in the channel last month has underlined, we need to do everything we can to stop people making perilous journeys with sometimes tragic consequences.
As I touched on, the demand on the asylum accommodation estate has meant that we have had to secure contingency hotel accommodation across the United Kingdom, including in Stockton, as has been highlighted in this debate. Hotel accommodation should only ever be a short-term measure to meet our immediate statutory need and not part of our long-term plan for accommodating service users. We are therefore working closely with our accommodation providers to increase the amount of dispersed accommodation available to us to allow us to exit the hotels we are using as a contingency for this purpose.
Kevin Foster
Recent conversations have been positive, and we are exploring all the options to ensure that people are moved on from hotels as quickly as possible, including through the very welcome conversations we have had with our local partners in Stockton. We have also been working collaboratively with colleagues across Government, particularly in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, to identify empty homes across the UK that could be utilised for this purpose now and potentially as affordable accommodation more widely in future.
Furthermore, we are taking a number of steps to increase the part local authorities play in helping us meet our statutory obligations towards asylum seekers of all ages. I make clear from this Dispatch Box that it is only right that we all do our bit, and not just a small number of areas. We have therefore recently issued the relevant notice to mandate all local authorities to participate in the national transfer scheme, to ensure that the responsibility for caring for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children is shared fairly across the entire United Kingdom. I am grateful for the continued and invaluable support of local authorities across the country, which continue to provide crucial placements to vulnerable young asylum seekers. It is right we do all we can to protect unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, many of whom have been exploited by people smugglers during their journey.
The high number of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children over recent months, alongside limited local authority participation in some cases, has placed unprecedented pressure on the national transfer scheme. Out of necessity, and with the children’s best interests in mind, we accommodated these children on an emergency and temporary basis in hotels while placements with local authorities were vigorously pursued. Intake remains very high and the situation remains extremely challenging. Hence, as I have already outlined, the Government have now taken the decision to mandate local authority participation in the scheme, although we are still in the period when local authorities can make representations about their individual circumstances.
Alex Cunningham
I place on record that coming from an area where we have almost the maximum recommended number of people, in Middlesbrough and Stockton, we very much welcome the fact that the Government have taken the step to mandate all other areas, because we are at saturation point, as I think they say. It is only right and proper that other communities also welcome refugees.
Kevin Foster
I thank the hon. Gentleman for those comments. There are other parts of this policy area where we will not agree, so it is pleasing to hear that this is one where we do. My own local authority has participated in the voluntary rota and is taking its share. As he touches on, it is only right that all local councils are doing their fair share unless there are circumstances that mitigate against their being part of it, and are not, for example, not taking part and therefore requiring others to do even more than their fair share of this work.
We have not taken this step lightly, but we believe it acts in the best interests of the children concerned. The main focus of the mandating is to end the use of hotels for accommodating unaccompanied asylum-seeking children. For clarity, we aim to return to a voluntary scheme in future, but only when the use of hotels is ended and the system is on a sustainable basis in terms of capacity and likely participation in a voluntary rota.
Alongside the moves to increase participation in the national transfer scheme, we are also working to increase participation in the asylum dispersal scheme to ensure that the local authorities working with us, including Stockton, are not unduly pressured as the high demand continues. We continue to work with local authorities to identify opportunities to increase the number of areas that accommodate asylum seekers across the UK, and we have produced a change plan designed in conjunction with local councils and the local government associations across the UK to achieve a more equitable distribution of service users across the UK.
We are in the process of reviewing the change plan through a number of dedicated forums, and I look forward to confirming more details of the changes we plan to make shortly. Those changes will recognise the points made by local authorities that have been part of the system for a long time—in many cases, they first volunteered to be part of it in 1999 or 2000—about funding and the wider impact of having larger numbers in certain communities. As I say, we are very much engaging with them and look forward to confirming some changes that we believe will address many of the points that have been raised and will actively encourage other authorities to take part.
Despite the challenges that we have faced, we have consistently met our statutory obligations towards destitute asylum seekers. We expect the highest standards from our service providers, including while utilising hotels, and we monitor them closely to ensure that they meet those standards. Where essential living needs are not already provided for in hotels, a cash allowance is provided. Extra assistance is provided for those who can show that they have exceptional needs, and additional support is also available for special cases—for example, further top-ups are available for families with pregnant mothers or very young children.
All asylum seekers have access 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to the advice, issue reporting and eligibility service provided for the Home Office by Migrant Help, through which they can raise any concerns regarding accommodation or support services and get information about how to obtain further support.
Alex Cunningham
The Minister heard my concerns about the level of service provided by Migrant Help, including the time it takes to answer the phone and that it often does not even pass on particular complaints. Will he review what is happening there to ensure that it delivers the standards that he expects?
Kevin Foster
I am happy to agree with the hon. Gentleman again on those points, and I am happy to review that. We welcome feedback about how the service is performing, particularly from Members of Parliament who represent constituencies where a larger number of service users are likely to be accessing it. We certainly encourage hon. Members to come forward if there are particular problems or issues. I appreciate that some service users may not necessarily want to approach the Home Office directly, but we welcome it when they make representations to alert us to issues via a local Member of Parliament.
I turn to the specific situation in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. While I am at the Dispatch Box I take the opportunity to thank Julie Danks, the managing director of Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council, for the progressive and collaborative approach taken in working with us to help to understand the local issues and to raise the standard of services delivered.
I will not name it, but one of the hotels that we have been using in Stockton has been used exclusively for women and women with children, as the hon. Gentleman pointed out. We have agreed to move away from that hotel and to move women with children as a priority to our community-based dispersal accommodation. Single women will also be moved to an alternative location within the community. I thank the council again for the constructive engagement that we have had about providing an alternative to the use of that particular hotel.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman understands why, for obvious reasons, given the vulnerability of those people, I will not go into the details of those arrangements on the Floor of the House. I would be happy to brief him separately about the arrangements being made, if he is not already aware of them. I hope that that is acceptable to other hon. Members present and that they understand why I make that offer separately rather than detailing them in this speech at the Dispatch Box.
We believe the changes we are putting in place will significantly improve access to the specialist support services available for all those in need. As background, our standard services include health and wellbeing screenings, an on-site resident welfare manager during business hours, appropriate contacts available outside business hours to ensure any urgent issues are resolved, and an induction pack in a number of languages that is made available on arrival. Alongside our standard support services, a range of on-site activities has also been available in the facilities we have used, and these include classes for mothers and babies, playgroups for toddlers, language lessons and careers support, recreational activities and wellbeing classes. Pregnant women have been supported and then, where possible, moved into mother and baby units close to the hotels we have been using. However, as I have touched on, we do want to move away from the hotel to which the hon. Gentleman referred in particular.
While I am at the Dispatch Box, I would really like to highlight the community and charity organisations in the area that have been helping to support us. One of them, working in collaboration with our contractor, has provided additional items for service users and a range of activities and classes to help women access services and support. We will continue to work with all partners to ensure that mothers with young children are supported locally and are able to access local networks and services. We do not underestimate the importance of these services and the value they provide, especially to women with babies, who may find the first few months of motherhood challenging, and those with young children trying to adjust to life here in the UK. In all cases, we will seek to ensure that relocation of any individual is appropriate, and decisions will be taken on a case-by-case basis.
Let me conclude by again expressing my gratitude to the hon. Gentleman for raising this important issue in the House. Again, I really want to thank all in Stockton—MPs, councillors and the wider community—for the commitment they are showing. I do encourage more local authorities from across the UK to engage with the Home Office, through the strategic migration partnership, to increase dispersal and relieve overall pressures on the system and the need to use hotels as contingency accommodation.
As I said earlier, the United Kingdom has a proud record of giving refuge, sanctuary and support to some of the world’s most vulnerable and oppressed people, and the communities of Stockton North have provided us with invaluable support in doing just that. However, we cannot do this without the support—the active, engaged support—of local communities, and I believe the hon. Gentleman can be proud that this is something his community has provided for many years, is continuing to provide to this day and will I am sure go on providing for many years to come. With that, and having paid tribute to those who are doing their bit, we would now encourage others to step forward in this way and do theirs as well.
Question put and agreed to.