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Suzanne Webb (Stourbridge) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Alex Burghart)
Between 2010 and 2020, under this Conservative Government, the number of women accepted on to full-time STEM undergraduate courses in the UK has increased by 49%. We are utterly committed to ensuring that more women and girls study STEM through funding programmes that boost uptake, such as the Inclusion in Schools physics programme.
Suzanne Webb
Would my hon. Friend be able to let me know exactly how many women are taking up STEM apprenticeships? I ask this question specifically because the electric vehicle revolution in the west midlands is leading the way, and I am keen to see women taking up such opportunities so that they can have a long-term career in high-quality, high-paid jobs.
Alex Burghart
I thank my hon. Friend for her question and I look forward to visiting the west midlands to see that with my own eyes, because apprenticeships are exactly the sort of first step on the career path we are looking to provide for our young people. Women now account for more than half of all apprenticeship starts across the country and our apprenticeships diversity champions network is working with employers across the country to make sure we see the improvement we need.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)
The under-representation of women in STEM is informed by a variety of factors. What assessment have the Government made of how careers in niche areas of STEM such as photonics can be better advertised and incentivised for women?
Alex Burghart
We are always doing whatever we can to encourage more women and girls to study STEM. I am delighted to say that the number of women on full-time STEM undergraduate courses has gone up by 49% since 2010. The percentage of women on full-time STEM undergraduate courses has gone up from 34% to 42% since 2010, and A-level science entries are up 36% among girls. Girls now account for more than 50% of all science A-level entries, and women now account for over half of all STEM undergraduates. Those are significant increases since the Conservatives came to power in 2020, and I look forward to taking that from strength to strength.
Sarah Atherton (Wrexham) (Con)
Wockhardt in Wrexham made the AstraZeneca vaccine ready, setting the scene for Wrexham to be at the forefront of opportunities. Does the Minister agree that now is the time to encourage young people, including women, into STEM opportunities, and that Wrexham, with Glyndŵr University and Coleg Cambria, is just the place to do that?
Alex Burghart
It looks like I shall be going to Wrexham as well. I am delighted to say that, under this Government, women and girls are driving the STEM revolution that is powering the new economy.
Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Rachel Maclean)
The Law Commission published its comprehensive review of hate crime laws on 7 December. Recognising the complex issues that the Law Commission has identified, the Government will carefully consider those recommendations and provide a further response as quickly as possible.
Helen Hayes
Women and girls in Dulwich and West Norwood and across the country are desperate to see action on the sexual harassment they experience daily on our streets and in public spaces. The suggestion from the Prime Minister that these offences should simply be prosecuted under existing laws demonstrates that he is as out of touch with the public mood on this issue as he is on everything else. The Law Commission recommended that the Government undertake a review of the need for a specific offence of public sexual harassment. Will the Minister confirm that the review will be undertaken swiftly, so that new legislation can be brought forward without further delay?
Rachel Maclean
I can reassure the hon. Lady and the whole House that the Prime Minister takes all forms of sexual harassment against women and girls extremely seriously. That is why we are focusing on the Law Commission’s recommendations, which involve a number of complex issues, as she will understand. If there are gaps in the specific laws that tackle this appalling crime, the Government will act.
Jess Phillips
To follow up on the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes), a kite was flown in The Telegraph saying that the Government were absolutely going to put in place a public sexual harassment law, as has been called for, as has been suggested by the Law Commission and as was talked about in the violence against women and girls strategy that was published six months ago. Now the Minister is standing in front of us and saying, “We are still looking at it.” Was what the Home Office official told The Telegraph right, or is what the Minister is saying right? The Government committed to this law six months ago, so when can we expect it?
Rachel Maclean
I am happy to put on record the official position, regardless of what has or has not been reported in The Telegraph, which unfortunately I have not read. We are responding to the Law Commission’s review as quickly as possible, as I already said to the hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood.
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
Our Streets Now, Plan UK and a variety of organisations from Girlguiding to the Soroptimists all agree with the Law Commission that hate crimes would best be prosecuted as a specific law. Will my hon. Friend reassure the House that she will look for a legislative vehicle to make that possible quickly?
Rachel Maclean
I thank my right hon. Friend for raising this issue again and for representing the views of many across the country. She should be in no doubt that we take these horrific crimes seriously, and that is why we published the violence against women and girls strategy, which sets out a number of measures to keep women and girls safe. We are working at pace to work through the complex issues identified by our legal friends so that we are in a position to bring forward a response swiftly.
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)
With regard to the wider strategy on tackling hate crime, Home Office statistics show that there are about 124,000 hate crime incidents. Under the category religion, there was a real rise in Islamophobia and antisemitism. What will the Government do in their strategy to address those two real issues concerning our society?
Rachel Maclean
I thank my hon. Friend very much for making representations on the important issue of the persecution of religious faiths in this country. The Government take these issues extremely seriously, and that is why we will publish a refreshed hate crime strategy. We are also investing in a number of measures to keep communities safe, wherever they may worship. Freedom of worship in this country is a vital principle that we all believe in.
Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (James Cartlidge)
Transgender women can be allocated to women’s prisons only following a rigorous risk assessment, with particular consideration given to the type of offence they have committed and the risk that they pose to others. The result is that well over 90% of transgender women in prison are held in the men’s estate, and there have been no assaults or sexual assaults carried out by transgender women in the women’s estate since we strengthened our approach in 2019. Just to emphasise, there is an exemption to the Equality Act 2010 requirement not to discriminate against transgender people in relation to single-sex spaces where doing so is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. Prisons can and do rely on that exemption.
Tim Loughton
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Does he agree that the protection of women is of paramount consideration when dealing with the placement of transgender offenders in the prison system? On what basis would a male-born prisoner with a record of sex offences against women who now identifies as a transgender woman be placed in a women-only prison?
James Cartlidge
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Just to be clear, the safety of all prisoners is of fundamental importance to the Ministry of Justice and Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, and we are particularly aware of the vulnerabilities of many female prisoners. Transgender women who want to move to a women’s prison will be risk-assessed by an expert multidisciplinary panel chaired by a senior prison manager. The panel will consider an individual’s offending history, their anatomy, their behaviour in custody and their use of medication related to gender reassignment, as well as the risk posed to individuals.
Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Guy Opperman)
Under the 2021 spending review there will be delivery of targeted support for disabled people, including £1.1 billion of investment in helping them to get into work, £2.6 billion of funding for new school places for children with special educational needs and disabilities, and much more on health and other matters.
Karl Turner
In the autumn statement the Government snuck out a £70 million stealth cut to benefits. I was grateful for the opportunity to speak to the Minister before questions, and I know he is not the Minister responsible, but can he confirm that disabled people will be involved in the process and say how it will affect them? If he cannot, will the Minister responsible write to me?
Guy Opperman
Yes, the Minister for Disabled People will write to the hon. Gentleman, but I can confirm that we will spend the record sum of £58 billion this year on benefits to support disabled people and people with health conditions. The hon. Gentleman will be aware of the health and disability Green Paper and the strategy published in the summer of last year, which will be responded to in this House in the summer of this year.
Anneliese Dodds (Oxford East) (Lab/Co-op)
The Conservatives are simply unable to get a grip on the cost of living crisis, and disabled people are paying the price. After failing to act in the Budget, yesterday the Conservatives voted against measures to slash the cost of fuel, which would have disproportionately benefited disabled people, who are more likely to be in fuel poverty. Indeed, the Conservatives seem to have little understanding of the reality of disabled people’s lives. Can anyone on the much enlarged Treasury Bench inform the House what percentage of disabled people currently live in relative poverty?
Guy Opperman
I will get the Minister for Disabled People to provide the precise stats for the hon. Lady, but I repeat the point that funding for disabled people and people with health conditions is at the record level of £58 billion.
Anneliese Dodds
I find it astonishing that no one on the Government Front Bench appears to be aware that 27% of disabled people in our country live in relative poverty—that is up by 1 million more disabled people since 2010. The situation looks set to be exacerbated by the Chancellor’s £70 million stealth cut to disability benefits in the Budget, of which the Minister seemed to be unaware when it was raised a moment ago. Were the rest of the Women and Equalities team consulted about that stealth cut?
Guy Opperman
The hon. Lady will understand that only the Minister who is asked the particular question can answer. The practical reality is that the spending review has shown that £58 billion is a record sum. It is an increase of nearly £5 billion in real terms since 2010.
Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)
Yesterday, the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy assured me that he has had extensive conversations with the Chancellor about the cost of living crisis that we have just heard about, but what we need is action. Not only have disabled people on benefits lost the £20 a week universal credit uplift, but their benefits are lower in real terms than they were before the pandemic and many face the future with real dread. Disabled people should not bear the brunt of the cost of living crisis, so what discussions has the Minister had with his Treasury colleagues about tackling the toxic blend of Tory cuts, tax hikes, soaring inflation and surging energy bills that is affecting disabled people across the UK?
Guy Opperman
The hon. Lady will know that there is the household support fund, the winter fuel payments, the cold weather payments and the increase in the state pension by 2.5% for this year and by 3.1% next year, and that there is everything from the energy price cap to the freeze in fuel duty, which all go to assist anybody affected.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
The Minister for Equalities (Kemi Badenoch)
The covid disparities report that I published last year summarised the unprecedented measures we have taken to promote vaccine uptake and includes recommendations to improve vaccination rates further for harder-to-reach groups that the Prime Minister has accepted in full. We have worked with faith leaders and other trusted local voices to overcome vaccine hesitancy and provided more than £23 million in funding to support the community champion scheme, which we have just extended to support the booster campaign.
Dr Huq
Behind the boasts of jabs in arms that for a while were distracting from the death figures, until we hit 150,000, are the Government not as worried as I am that the Office for National Statistics is finding vaccine hesitancy among the black British population more than five times higher than among the white population? Among the over-50s, just 44% of Caribbeans and 42% of Pakistanis have been boosted, as opposed to 77% of white British. When are the Government going to admit that their “Take me to your leader” model of community relations just is not working?
Kemi Badenoch
I have to say—and I really do not say this lightly—that the hon. Lady has form in pretending that the Government are doing absolutely nothing, when we are doing so much to encourage vaccine take-up in ethnic minority communities. She will know that in her own constituency of Ealing Central and Acton we have spent £485,000 on the community champions scheme. The hon. Lady will not stand up and let her constituents know what we are doing to encourage vaccine uptake. Perhaps she should focus on the positive things that the Government have done, including in her own constituency. There would be less vaccine hesitancy if Opposition Members stopped scaremongering.
Simon Baynes (Clwyd South) (Con)
Dame Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)
The Minister for Equalities (Kemi Badenoch)
The Government continue to support women in enterprise by implementing the recommendations of the Rose review. Our start-up loans company has advanced more than 35,000 loans to women since 2012, worth nearly £300 million, and that represents 40% of all loans.
Simon Baynes
My constituent Kerry Mackay from the Ceiriog valley has overcome hardship and just been named one of the top 100 most inspirational and dynamic female entrepreneurs in the UK for her business ScrubbiesUK, which makes environmentally friendly cleaning pads. Will the Minister congratulate Kerry and look at ways to raise awareness of the business mentoring and training schemes that were pivotal to her success and that of her business?
Kemi Badenoch
Kerry Mackay is inspirational and I congratulate her and all her colleagues at ScrubbiesUK. She is an exemplar for small businesses, leading the way to help the UK tackle plastic pollution and reach our climate goals. I am glad to hear that she benefited from Government mentoring support, and I will ask the relevant Business Minister to write to my hon. Friend with more details. In the meantime, I hope that people like Kerry Mackay will raise awareness of this opportunity through their own networks, which is often the most effective way to spread the word.
Dame Caroline Dinenage
Covid particularly impacts on women in business, and the sectors in which they are predominant need to be protected by the Government. What more can we do?
Kemi Badenoch
My hon. Friend makes an important point. Some of the sectors most impacted by covid, such as the arts and hospitality, include a high proportion of women-led businesses. She will be aware of the targeted measures to help these sectors that were announced just last month by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, including one-off grants of up to £6,000 per premises for the hospitality sector and £30 million through the culture recovery fund. That support will help female entrepreneurs to keep trading through the current difficulties and make the most of future opportunities as they look forward to the end of the pandemic.
Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Rachel Maclean)
The abhorrent crimes of spiking also speak to broader issues of violence against women and girls, which is taken extremely seriously by this Government. The Home Secretary has already asked the National Police Chiefs’ Council to urgently review the extent and scale of the issue, and she is receiving regular updates from the police. The hon. Lady will know that we are delivering a pilot £5 million safety of women at night fund, which focuses on preventing violence against women and girls in the night-time economy, keeping them safe in public spaces at night.
Judith Cummins
Many girls and women are afraid of enjoying a night out or going to a music festival for fear of being spiked, raped and assaulted. What work is the Minister doing with venues such as bars, nightclubs and music festivals to prevent that from happening and to ensure that appropriate safeguarding measures are in place, and what is the assessment of the scale of the problem at those venues?
Rachel Maclean
The hon. Lady raises a really good point. Those in the night-time economy play a key role and are taking their responsibilities seriously. The Government work very closely with them, and we are providing funding and helping them provide training to their staff so that women can feel safe at night. It is vital that the funding we are providing is being used by local authorities to provide, for example, testing kits and taxi marshals to get women home safely at night. Police are also ramping up their forensic capabilities. There is a lot of work going on.
Mark Jenkinson (Workington) (Con)
The Minister for Equalities (Mike Freer)
The Government’s proposals will protect freedom of speech. The proposals will not affect a parent’s right to express their views and raise their children with their values. Parents, clinicians and teachers will, of course, continue to be able to have open and challenging conversations with young people or others about their sexual orientation or whether they are transgender or not.
Mark Jenkinson
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that answer. There have been instances of parents being reported to social services for not simply affirming their child’s new trans identity. Will my hon. Friend assure parents that their right to not simply affirm their child’s new identity will be protected in the face of the ideological capture of some of our public services?
Mike Freer
Parents and carers will, of course, have the right to express their views on how a child identifies.
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)
The Minister for Women and Equalities (Elizabeth Truss)
We are five months away from Safe To Be Me, the UK’s first ever global LGBT rights conference. Everybody should be free to be themselves, but that is not true in too many parts of the world. We will work with friends and allies across the globe to turn the tide on authoritarianism, spread freedom and end the criminalisation, persecution and violence experienced by far too many LGBT people.
Rob Butler
Aylesbury has a sizeable Pakistani diaspora. We have seen excellent campaigns locally and nationally to encourage uptake of vaccines among this community, but in the town’s central wards fewer than half of the people have had the booster so far. What steps is my hon. Friend taking across Government to encourage vaccine take-up among ethnic minority groups, especially those who do not have English as their first language?
The Minister for Levelling Up Communities (Kemi Badenoch)
My Department has been working across Government to promote vaccine uptake among ethnic minorities. We have worked with trusted local voices such as faith leaders to spread messaging, and we publish key information and advice via community TV and radio stations, translated into a range of languages including Urdu and Punjabi. In May, I met the high commissioner for Pakistan to consider other ways we can reach out to diaspora groups to promote vaccine confidence and uptake. I should say that between April and October 2021, the largest increase in vaccine uptake among the over-50s was in the Pakistani and black ethnic groups.
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
Department for Work and Pensions data show that four in five black people have less than £1,500 in the bank. More worrying is that approximately one in four black British, British Bangladeshi and British Pakistani people have no savings at all. Energy bills are going up, food prices are up and taxes are up. The increased cost of living will hit minority communities hardest. What action will the Minister take to ensure that minority communities are not pushed into greater hardship this winter?
Kemi Badenoch
We have put, on average, £1,000 a year more into the pockets of the lowest earners through changes to universal credit, increasing the minimum wage next April to £9.50 an hour, and helping with the cost of fuel bills. Our multibillion plan for jobs, which was recently expanded by £500 million, will help people across the UK to find work and to boost their wages and prospects, and this will disproportionately benefit people in minority ethnic groups.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
In May 2020, Professor Sarah Gilbert, with help from the Downing Street team, was working on the AstraZeneca vaccine. What more can my right hon. Friend do to encourage more women in biomedicine?
Elizabeth Truss
My hon. Friend is absolutely right about Sarah Gilbert’s achievements. She was part of our Gender Equality Advisory Council, working across the G7 to give women more opportunities and to enable more entrepreneurship, ideas and innovation around the world.
John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Guy Opperman)
The DWP has launched 50Plus Choices, which specifically addresses the issues the right hon. Gentleman raises. I will get the Minister responsible for that matter to write to him.
Scott Benton (Blackpool South) (Con)
Outcomes for people in Blackpool in education, health and employment are among the worst in the whole country. I welcome the equality data programme, which is examining how factors such as social background and geography contribute to inequality. How does the Minister expect the programme to reduce the inherent inequalities that have disadvantaged people in Blackpool for decades?
Elizabeth Truss
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Where one lives often has a bigger impact on outcomes than anything else. For example, the wage gap between London and the north-west is, on average, £5.22 an hour. We are examining the drivers of those disparities, and we have appointed Katharine Birbalsingh to lead the Social Mobility Commission and help to propose the policies that will sort this out.
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)
Kemi Badenoch
I am keen to hear what the APPG thinks the solutions are to this issue. The hon. Lady will know that collecting ethnicity data is a sensitive issue and it is not something that all people want to do, but I am happy to work with her and the APPG to learn about how we can come to some resolution.
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that increasing diversity in the STEM sector is not only good for the individuals who will benefit from well paid, creative and rewarding jobs, but brings a wealth of talent and creativity to an ever more important sector?
Elizabeth Truss
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We need all the talent in Britain on the pitch, which is why it is so important we get more people into STEM, particularly girls and women.
Mr Speaker
Before we come to Prime Minister’s questions, I would like to point out that the British Sign Language interpretation of proceedings is available to watch on parliamentlive.tv.
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con)
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
I know that the whole House will want to join me in paying tribute to Jack Dromey. His working life was devoted to his trade union members and, in recent years, to his constituents in Birmingham, Erdington. I was deeply saddened to hear of his death, and my thoughts are with Harriet, the family and all those who knew him as a friend.
Mr Speaker, I want to apologise. I know that millions of people across this country have made extraordinary sacrifices over the last 18 months. I know the anguish that they have been through, unable to mourn their relatives and unable to live their lives as they want or to do the things they love. I know the rage they feel with me and with the Government I lead when they think that in Downing Street itself the rules are not being properly followed by the people who make the rules.
Though I cannot anticipate the conclusions of the current inquiry, I have learned enough to know that there were things that we simply did not get right, and I must take responsibility. No. 10 is a big department, with the garden as an extension of the office, which has been in constant use because of the role of fresh air in stopping the virus. When I went into that garden just after 6 o’clock on 20 May 2020, to thank groups of staff before going back into my office 25 minutes later to continue working, I believed implicitly that this was a work event, but with hindsight, I should have sent everyone back inside. I should have found some other way to thank them, and I should have recognised that even if it could be said technically to fall within the guidance, there would be millions and millions of people who simply would not see it that way—people who suffered terribly, people who were forbidden from meeting loved ones at all, inside or outside—and to them, and to this House, I offer my heartfelt apologies. All I ask is that Sue Gray be allowed to complete her inquiry into that day and several others, so that the full facts can be established. I will of course come back to this House and make a statement.
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Dr Davies
My constituent Carol Ridgway faces eight weeks of stress and worry as she waits for an urgent appointment at the local breast clinic in north Wales. Despite the pandemic, 85% of patients in England wait only two weeks for their urgent suspected cancer referrals. What can my right hon. Friend do to ensure equality of healthcare across Britain?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I am sorry about the case that he raises. Health of course is a devolved matter, but I thank our NHS colleagues across the whole of the UK. I point out that the Welsh Government will benefit from an additional £3.8 billion of funding this year, plus a further £270 million to support the response to covid.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
I join the comments about Jack Dromey. We will, I think, be doing tributes in due course in relation to Jack.
Well, there we have it: after months of deceit and deception, the pathetic spectacle of a man who has run out of road. The Prime Minister’s defence that he did not realise that he was at a party is so ridiculous that it is actually offensive to the British public. He has finally been forced to admit what everyone knew—that when the whole country was locked down, he was hosting boozy parties in Downing Street. Is he now going to do the decent thing and resign?
Mr Speaker
Order. I think someone will be going for an early cup of tea. Can I just say that the question has been asked? I want to know the answer and your constituents want to know the answer—[Interruption.] I do not need any extra help either.
The Prime Minister
I appreciate the point that the right hon. and learned Gentleman is making about the event that I attended. I want to repeat that I thought it was a work event. I regret very much that we did not do things differently that evening, as I have said, and I take responsibility and I apologise. As for his political point, I do not think that he should pre-empt the outcome of the inquiry. He will have a further opportunity, I hope, to question me as soon as possible.
Keir Starmer
Well, that apology was pretty worthless, wasn’t it? Let me tell the Prime Minister why this matters. Yesterday in this Chamber, hon. Members told heart-wrenching stories about the sacrifices that people across the country were making. The House and the whole country were moved by the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) as he talked about his mother-in-law dying alone. He was following the rules while the Prime Minister was partying in Downing Street. Is the Prime Minister really so contemptuous of the British public that he thinks he can just ride this out?
The Prime Minister
I heard the testimony of the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and I echo the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s sentiments. It was deeply moving; nobody who heard that could fail to have been moved. I know that people up and down the country made huge sacrifices throughout the pandemic and I understand the anger—the rage—that they feel at the thought that people in Downing Street were not following those rules. I regret the way that the event I have described was handled. I bitterly regret it and wish that we could have done things differently. I have and will continue to apologise for what we did, but he must wait for the inquiry that will report as soon as possible.
Keir Starmer
When the Prime Minister’s former Health Secretary broke the rules, he resigned and the Prime Minister said he was right to do so. When the Prime Minister’s spokesperson laughed about the rules being broken, she resigned and the Prime Minister accepted that resignation. Why does the Prime Minister still think that the rules do not apply to him?
The Prime Minister
That is not what I have said. I understand the point that the right hon. and learned Gentleman makes. As I have said, I regret the way things happened on the evening in question and I apologise, but if I may say to him, I do think it would be better if he waited until the full conclusion of the inquiry—until the full facts are brought before this House—and he will then have an opportunity to put his points again.
Keir Starmer
This just isn’t working, Prime Minister. Everyone can see what happened. It started with reports of boozy parties in Downing Street during lockdown. The Prime Minister pretended that he had been assured there were no parties—how that fits with his defence now, I do not know. Then the video landed, blowing the Prime Minister’s first defence out of the water. So then he pretended that he was sickened and furious about the parties. Now it turns out he was at the parties all along. Can the Prime Minister not see why the British public think he is lying through his teeth?
Mr Speaker
Order. It was what the public think, not what the Member is saying. [Interruption.] I certainly do not need any help from round here. If somebody wants to help me, they can help somewhere else.
The Prime Minister
It is up to the right hon. and learned Gentleman to choose how he conducts himself in this place, and he is wrong—[Interruption.] He is wrong. I say to him that he is wrong in what he has said—[Interruption.] What he said is wrong in several key respects, but that does not detract from the basic point that I want to make today, which is that I accept that we should have done things differently on that evening. As I have said to the House, I believe that the events in question were within the guidance and were within the rules, and that was certainly the assumption on which I operated, but can I say to him that he should wait—he should wait—before he jumps to conclusions, and a lawyer should respect the inquiry? I hope that he will wait until the facts are established and brought to this House.
Keir Starmer
So we have the Prime Minister attending Downing Street parties—a clear breach of the rules. We have the Prime Minister putting forward a series of ridiculous denials, which he knows are untrue—a clear breach of the ministerial code. That code says:
“Ministers who knowingly mislead Parliament will be expected to offer their resignation”.
The party is over, Prime Minister. The only question is: will the British public kick him out, will his party kick him out, or he will he do the decent thing and resign?
The Prime Minister
I just want to repeat: I know it is the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s objective and he is paid to try to remove me from office—I appreciate that and I accept that—but may I humbly suggest to him that he should wait until the inquiry has concluded? He should study it for himself, and I will certainly respond as appropriate and I hope that he does, but in the meantime, yes, I certainly wish that things had happened differently on the evening of 20 May, and I apologise for all the misjudgments that have been made, for which I take full responsibility.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister is a man without shame. The public want answers to their questions. Hannah Brady’s father Shaun was just 55 when he lost his life to covid. He was a fit and healthy key worker. I spoke to Hannah last night, Prime Minister. Her father died just days before the drinks trolley was being wheeled through Downing Street. Last year, Hannah met the Prime Minister in the Downing Street garden. She looked the Prime Minister in the eye and told him of her loss. The Prime Minister told Hannah he had “done everything he could” to protect her dad. What Hannah told me last night was this: looking back, she realises that the Prime Minister had partied in that same garden the very day her dad’s death certificate was signed. What Hannah wants to know is this: does the Prime Minister understand why it makes her feel sick to think about the way that he has behaved?
The Prime Minister
I sympathise deeply with Hannah and with people who have suffered up and down this country during the pandemic. I repeat that I wish things had been done differently on that evening, and I repeat my apology for all the misjudgments that may have been made—that were made—on my watch in No. 10 and across the Government, but I want to reassure the people of this country, including Hannah and her family, that we have been working to do everything we can to protect her and her family.
It is thanks to the efforts of this Government that we have the most tested population in Europe, with 1.25 million tests being conducted every day. We have been working to ensure that this population—our country—has the most antivirals of any country in Europe. It is because of the efforts of the Government, and of officials and staff up and down Whitehall, that we have driven the fastest vaccine roll-out in Europe and one of the fastest in the world. That is the reason that we now have one of the most open economies, if not the most open economy, in Europe and the fastest growing economy in the G7. Whatever the mistakes that have been made on my watch, for which I apologise and which I fully acknowledge, that is the work that has been going on in No. 10 Downing Street.
Antony Higginbotham (Burnley) (Con)
The Prime Minister
We are investing in education up and down the country. I am delighted that Burnley College was successful in its proposal to become an institute of technology, and that Burnley is home to the growing University of Central Lancashire campus, which makes it a fantastic place to study in Lancashire.
Mr Speaker
I call the leader of the Scottish National party, Ian Blackford.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)
May I add my remarks to those already made about Jack Dromey? He was a feisty fighter for workers’ rights, and an inspiration to many of us on both sides of the House because of the way in which he conducted himself. We will miss him, and I send condolences to Harriet and to the rest of the family.
The Prime Minister stands before us accused of betraying the nation’s trust, of treating the public with contempt, of breaking the laws set by his own Government. A former member of Her Majesty’s armed forces, Paul, wrote to me this morning. His father died without the love and support of his full family around him, because they followed the regulations, Prime Minister. Paul said:
“As an ex-soldier, I know how to follow rules but the Prime Minister has never followed any rules. He does what he wants and gets away with it every time”.
The Prime Minister cannot “get away with it” again. Will he Prime Minister finally do the decent thing and resign, or will his Tory MPs be forced to show him the door?
The Prime Minister
I thank the right hon. Gentleman. I want to offer my condolences to his constituent who wrote to him, and just to remind him of what I said earlier. With the greatest respect to him, I think that he should wait until the inquiry has concluded.
Ian Blackford
It is an open and shut case: this was an event that should not have taken place. It broke the law, Prime Minister.
What is so galling about that response is that the Prime Minister feels no sense of shame for his actions. The public suffered pain and anguish at being kept apart from their families, and all the while the Prime Minister was drinking and laughing behind the walls of his private garden. The public overwhelmingly think that the Prime Minister should resign. Trust has been lost; the public will not forgive or forget. If the Prime Minister has no sense of shame, the Tory Back Benchers must act to remove him. They know that the damage is done. This weak and contemptuous Prime Minister can no longer limp on.
The message from the public is clear: remove this unfit Prime Minister from office, and do it now.
The Prime Minister
Again, I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his political advice, which I will take with a pinch of salt since it comes from the Scottish nationalist party. I think that most people looking objectively at what this Government have delivered over the last 18 months would agree—and I renew my contrition for the mistakes that have been made—that we have delivered the fastest vaccine and the fastest booster roll-out in Europe, and the result is that across the whole of our United Kingdom we have a record number of people back at work.
Simon Fell (Barrow and Furness) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, we are certainly looking at reducing the isolation period, and we hope to bring you more about that, Mr Speaker, as fast as possible. We will certainly look at all MACA requests, but more fundamentally what we can do to alleviate the pressures in my hon. Friend’s hospital is to fix the health and social care divide. That is what this Government are also doing, after a generation of neglect.
Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance)
Today’s apology is too little, too late. If the Prime Minister were sincere, he could have apologised at any stage over the past 18 months, rather than waiting until he was found out. My constituents in North Down, and people across the UK, feel betrayed by the Prime Minister. We have had more than 150,000 deaths from covid over the past couple of years, and we have seen standards in public life trashed. For once, can the Prime Minister do the honourable thing and resign, for the sake of the public health message, and for standards in our democracy?
The Prime Minister
I can only repeat what I have said: I understand the hon. Gentleman’s feelings about the effect of this pandemic on the country, and I certainly grieve for everybody who has died and who has suffered. On his political point, can I propose that he waits for the inquiry to report?
Suzanne Webb (Stourbridge) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes indeed, and I thank my hon. Friend for that. It is notable that the Opposition do not like to dwell on these points, but it is an astonishing fact that we have 420,000 more people in work now than before the pandemic began, and youth unemployment is at a record low.
Steven Bonnar (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (SNP)
The Prime Minister
I thank the hon. Gentleman from the SNP, and I repeat the point I made earlier: I do not think that he should pre-empt or anticipate the inquiry.
Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con)
The Colne Valley regional park runs through my constituency and that of the Prime Minister. Will my right hon. Friend join me in paying tribute to the volunteers who tirelessly work to preserve that precious green space, and will he work with me to create better protections for that park moving forward?
The Prime Minister
I certainly will, and I join my hon. Friend in thanking the wonderful volunteers. I will do what I can to assist her in protecting that beautiful green space.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
Mr Speaker
That would be inadvertently misleading the House.
The Prime Minister
No, Mr Speaker, because I immediately said in my answer to the question that of course we have to be concerned about inflation at all times. What I said, I think on TV, was that some of the predictions then about inflation had not proved well-founded, but clearly inflation is a serious risk. It is going up, we need a strategy to tackle it, and that is what we have.
Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)
My constituent Grant Bailey went back to Afghanistan in September. He disappeared in December, around Christmas time. We think the Taliban have him. Can my right hon. Friend advise me and his family whether he knows anything about this man, who has him, and what is being done to get him home?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for raising the case with me. I will organise a meeting for him with the relevant Minister as soon as possible to establish what we can do to help Grant.
Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab)
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
This Friday, my private Member’s Bill, the BBC Licence Fee (Abolition) Bill, gets its Second Reading. It will abolish the BBC licence fee and require the BBC to be funded by subscription. In this day and age it is ridiculous to have a state broadcaster, it is ridiculous that people are forced to pay a fee just because they have a television, and what is totally wrong is that people who believe the BBC to be institutionally biased have to subsidise it. Will the Prime Minister, if he is free on Friday, come along and support the Bill?
The Prime Minister
I have the highest respect for the media judgment of my hon. Friend. Though I understand some of his strictures about the BBC, I would also say that it is a great national institution. But I will study what he has to say with interest.
Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I welcome the point that the hon. Gentleman makes in the partisan spirit with which I think it was intended. I do not agree with him, but can I suggest respectfully that he waits until the inquiry is concluded, which I hope will be as soon as possible?
Alberto Costa (South Leicestershire) (Con)
Washing machine manufacturers are considering installing microfibre filter systems in all new washing machines. Will the Prime Minister ask his Ministers to look at—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. We have a slight problem. Some Members want to catch my eye, but the longer this question takes, the less time there will be for other people to get in.
Alberto Costa
People are laughing at plastic pollution, Mr Speaker. Will the Prime Minister ask his Ministers to look into the viability of my Bill, which has cross-party support and seeks to introduce inexpensive microplastic filters on all new washing machines?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for his campaign. I believe that we should tackle microplastic pollution, and I am glad that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is looking at the introduction of legislation for microfibre filters on washing machines as a cost-beneficial solution. I will ensure that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs keeps him informed of how we are doing.
Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I believe the hon. Member does a serious injustice to the efforts of local councils up and down the country to look after people coming from Afghanistan and I think he does an injustice to the efforts of the UK. We are proud under Operation Pitting to have already evacuated 15,000 people from Afghanistan. We have allocated £286 million in assistance for people in Afghanistan and we are continuing to offer safe passage to this country from Afghanistan.
Paul Holmes (Eastleigh) (Con)
The Prime Minister will be aware that Eastleigh was formed as a railway town and, from producing locomotives and carriages to building gliders for the D-day landings, Eastleigh has a proud railway heritage. Given that pedigree, its excellent transport links and the need to level up the south, does he agree that Eastleigh would make the perfect home for the new headquarters of Great British Railways?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is a great champion for Eastleigh. As I told the House earlier, further details of the competition to identify the new Great British Railways headquarters will be announced in the coming weeks.
Navendu Mishra (Stockport) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
One of the first things that I did when I became Prime Minister was to uprate local housing allowance so that people on social rent would be able to afford where they live more easily, as a key component of tackling the cost of living. We are also building record numbers of homes. I was very pleased to see a huge increase in the number of people able to get the homes that they need, but the hon. Member’s point about renters is also very important, and that is why we are tackling the rights of renters as well.
Jack Brereton (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Con)
£56 million through the levelling up fund and £40 million through transforming cities—that is just some of the investment that we have recently secured for Stoke-on-Trent. Will my right hon. Friend agree that, after decades of neglect, this Conservative party is the only party that is levelling up opportunities in Stoke-on-Trent?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend, who is a fantastic champion for Stoke-on-Trent. In addition to all the things that we are supporting in Stoke-on-Trent, I am delighted to say that it will become home to the Home Office as well.
Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)
The Prime Minister
What we are doing is offering financial and technical support to businesses, which are responding magnificently. As we come out of the pandemic, as I said to the House earlier, we are seeing record numbers of people in work and youth unemployment at a record low.
Alicia Kearns (Rutland and Melton) (Con)
The motto of England’s smallest county, Rutland, is “multum in parvo”—much in little—and never has that been more true than in the last two weeks, with the greatest Roman discovery in 200 years and the discovery of an ichthyosaur, the greatest fossil discovery in 100 years. Will my right hon. Friend please support us to build a new tourism industry and two heritage museums in Rutland to preserve these amazing discoveries in our county?
The Prime Minister
I am agog. I long to come to see these extraordinary additions to the cultural heritage of Rutland. I thank my hon. Friend for drawing it to my attention, and I look forward to making a visit as soon as I can.
Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
We are supporting measures to retrofit homes up and down the country to improve insulation. We are also supporting people with the costs of their fuel, and we will continue to do that through the warm homes discount, the winter fuel allowance and all the other payments we make.
Virginia Crosbie (Ynys Môn) (Con)
Can the Prime Minister confirm to me and my Ynys Môn constituents that the UK Government are committed to at least one freeport in Wales? Will he update the House on how discussions are progressing with the Welsh Government?
The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities is indeed talking to his counterparts in the Welsh Government about establishing a freeport in Wales. I urge our friends in the Welsh Government to agree those plans as a matter of urgency.
Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
We will do everything we can to support people throughout the recovery from the pandemic, we will support disabled people and we will continue to increase our support for families up and down the country. The hon. Lady requests that we publish the research, and we will do so as soon as we can.
Mark Jenkinson (Workington) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for his continued support for new nuclear. Following the Third Reading of our landmark Nuclear Energy (Financing) Bill this week, will he put his weight behind my efforts and those of my Cumbrian colleagues to bring large and small new nuclear to Cumbria?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is right that one of the disasters of the Labour Administration was that, over 13 years, they allowed a total collapse in our nuclear power, which is one of the reasons why we have a shortage of energy. That is why we are now investing in small modular reactors, as well as investing in the big projects.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I am grateful, as ever, to the hon. Gentleman—I think a former member of the Conservative party, as I understand it—for his party political advice. I do not agree with him. I have come to this House to make amends, to explain what happened on 20 May and to apologise. I really think, with all humility, I must ask him to wait for the result of the inquiry, when he will have abundant opportunity to question me again and to make his party political points again. Until then, I am going to ignore his advice.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
Hundreds of respondents took part in the Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke Bus Back Better survey, in which 80% said they would use the bus more if services were improved. The Conservative-led Stoke-on-Trent City Council has submitted a fantastic Bus Back Better bid for £90 million to improve our infrastructure and our services, so will the Prime Minister make our day in Stoke-on-Trent and announce that that money is coming soon?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for his fantastic championing of Stoke-on-Trent. I also thank him for volunteering to serve as a teacher again during the pandemic—a wonderful thing to do. I will certainly see what we can do to satisfy his request for more buses in Stoke as fast as possible.
Ed Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)
I join the tributes to Jack Dromey, an outstanding trade unionist and Member of this House.
After another shameful week for the Prime Minister’s Government, this has been a shameful attempt to apologise to the House today. Can the Prime Minister explain why the only person to have resigned so far following this scandal is Allegra Stratton, a woman, while he, the man who sanctioned and attended at least one party in 10 Downing Street, still sits in his place? Advisers advise and Ministers decide. So will the Prime Minister, for the good of the country, accept that the party is over and decide to resign?
The Prime Minister
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question. I respect the point he is making, but I must say I disagree. I would ask him to wait and see what the inquiry says. I will be very happy to talk to him then.
Vaccination Strategy
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Miriam Cates (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Con)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Minister to provide an update on the Government’s vaccination strategy.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Maggie Throup)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her question. We have built three lines of defence to give us the best chance of living with covid-19 and avoiding strict measures: vaccination, testing and treatments. Vaccination is the most important of those three, especially in light of the new omicron variant. Recent data from the UK Health Security Agency shows that unvaccinated people are between three and eight times more likely to be hospitalised with covid-19, so every jab counts in keeping people out of hospital and saving lives.
Since omicron began making its way around the world, our strategy has been to massively expand vaccination. We set the highly ambitious target of ensuring that everyone eligible for a booster would be offered one by the end of December, and we met that target. Some 80% of eligible adults in England have now had the booster, including 87% of people over 50. That means that, per capita, we are the most boosted large nation on the planet. In addition, more than 1.4 million young people aged 12 to 15 have already had their first dose since the vaccine was rolled out to that age group in September, with thousands still getting jabbed every day. As of 10 January, eligible children aged 12 to 15 are being offered a second dose in their school. The vaccination effort is a vital part of ensuring the safe return of pupils to the classroom after Christmas, and the continuity of in-person education, which we know is so important for their development.
Throughout our vaccine programme, we listened to the advice of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, whose clinical expertise is second to none. As we have done so, our vaccination strategy has been highly successful, allowing us to live with fewer restrictions than many other places around the world and keeping our children in education settings, where they belong. Once again, I underline my thanks to everyone who has made our national vaccination programme possible, including the JCVI, the NHS, our vaccines taskforce, the vaccinators and all volunteers across the country. I am sure that the whole House will join me in thanking them for everything that they have achieved.
Miriam Cates
I thank the Minister for her statement. The UK’s vaccine roll-out has indeed been enormously effective, but in September the JCVI expressed concerns about a child vaccination programme because of uncertainty regarding the magnitude of potential harms. Following advice from the chief medical officer, the Government pushed ahead with the mass vaccination of healthy children on the basis that, although the benefits to children’s health were marginal, it may reduce transmission and keep kids in school. Around 50% of 12 to 15-year-olds have now been jabbed, so what assessment has been made of the effectiveness of the vaccination programme in keeping children in face-to-face education?
Now that the omicron variant is dominant and more evidence is available, the benefits and risks of vaccinating children may have changed. What assessment has been made of the risk of hospitalisation of healthy children due to omicron compared with delta? Evidence is emerging that vaccination has minimal impact on omicron transmission, so what reassessment have the Government made of the potential future impact of child vaccinations on reducing transmission in schools? Given a recent Centres for Disease Control and Prevention study showing that the risks of myocarditis in young people following vaccination may be greater than previously thought, and compounded by multiple doses, will the Government urgently review the potential harms of vaccinating children?
This weekend, the NHS put out a press release encouraging more children to get jabbed, including the line:
“Young people can get their life-saving protection”.
It also said:
“Vaccines will protect young people from Omicron”.
Where is the evidence for those claims, and does the Minister believe that that communication meets the commitment not to put pressure on children? Lastly, given the evidence on transmission, will the Government push ahead with the compulsory vaccination of NHS staff, and will they insist on a booster dose for all staff every few months? If not, where is the evidence that compulsory vaccination of staff will increase patient safety in the long term?
Maggie Throup
My hon. Friend is quite right to raise some of her concerns. We need to start from scratch, remembering that it is the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, which is the highly thought of regulator, that has deemed the vaccine to be safe for this age group. As a result, the JCVI provided its recommendations, and our chief medical officers across all four nations added to that. The vaccine has already been given to millions of 12 to 15-year-olds in a number of countries, including 8 million in the United States. Data from those countries shows that the vaccine has a good safety record. I am completely confident that the JCVI would not make those recommendations if there were any doubt at all. That is why all eligible 12 to 15-year-olds are able to book their second jab. It is the best way to protect young people and make sure that they are kept in education. We all know that face-to-face education is one of the most valuable things for young people, and we will do whatever we can to keep them in that position.
We must recognise that myocarditis occurs as a result of covid infection as well. We need to get the balance right to ensure that we are doing whatever we can to protect the majority of young people and make sure that they are kept in education in a timely manner. I think it is right that we continue to follow the scientific evidence and the clinical advice, as we have done throughout this pandemic.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Miriam Cates) for securing this urgent question; you, Mr Speaker, for granting it; and the Minister for her statement.
Our incredible NHS has moved heaven and earth during the vaccine roll-out and has achieved an extraordinary amount in the face of profound challenges. As the Minister makes clear, it is only through vaccination that we can begin to contemplate building a world beyond covid. I would therefore be grateful if she explained what assessment she has made of the current vaccine take-up rates, which have dropped to the lowest level since mid-October, and what plans she has to ramp them up again.
Will the Minister also clarify what action the Government will take to drive up vaccination rates among 12 to 17-year-olds, following media reports of children having to wait until February and travel 50 miles to get an appointment for their first covid-19 vaccination? Will she advise the House on what steps she is taking to persuade those who have yet to have the vaccine to do so as soon as possible, and what action her Department is taking to tackle the raft of misinformation about the vaccine that continues to circulate on social media and beyond, doing real damage to public health messages? I would also be grateful if she gave an assessment of the impact on vaccination rates of the introduction of NHS covid passes.
Over the course of the pandemic, immunocompromised, immunosuppressed and clinically extremely vulnerable people have been badly let down. They are crying out for further clarity, and recent reports highlight that more than 300,000 housebound people are yet to receive their booster. Will the Minister take this opportunity to provide the vital clarity that people need and set out the Government’s booster vaccination strategy for housebound, clinically vulnerable and clinically extremely vulnerable people?
Lastly, will the Minister outline what further steps are being taken to vaccinate the world? As the development of omicron shows, delay with regard to global vaccination has stark public health consequences here at home. With reports of the UK discarding hundreds of thousands of vaccines over the past few months, can she reassure the House that assisting with vaccinating the world remains a priority for her Department and this Government?
Maggie Throup
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his measured approach. We have seen throughout the pandemic that everybody working together gets us where we need to be, which is making sure that people are safe.
The hon. Gentleman asked a few questions about the current vaccine programme and the uptake rate. I am delighted that about 80% of people over 18 have now been boosted, which is a fantastic achievement. Over 90% of the population aged 12 or over have had their first dose and 83% have taken up the offer of a second. I reiterate that the offer of a first and second dose is always there. If people have not yet come forward for their first dose, it is not too late: they can go to a walk-in centre or make an appointment through the national booking service or their GP to get that all-important vaccine.
With regard to 12 to 17-year-olds, the school-age immunisation service has started to roll out again this week. People can also take the out-of-school offer through the national booking service or the walk-in sites. The hon. Gentleman mentioned a case where somebody had to travel 50 miles. We did look into that situation, and it was not quite right. We have been in touch with that member of the public, and the situation has been resolved.
Housebound patients are the responsibility of the primary care network or the clinical commissioning group, depending on the local scenario. Every housebound patient has been offered their booster vaccine now, but if the time was not quite right, or any Member has taken up such a case with their CCG and not had a solution, I would be happy to take the case up on their behalf.
The hon. Gentleman talked about the ambition not just to vaccinate the UK but to make sure that people globally are protected. I am delighted to announce that, as of the end of last year, we donated 30 million doses, partly through COVAX and partly through bilateral agreements, which is a great achievement, and we have a commitment in place for 100 million doses by the end of June this year.
Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con)
This country has one of the best vaccination programmes in the world and the very best in Europe. We should remember that the foundations were put in place when, at the height of the first wave, the then Health Secretary bought 400 million doses of vaccine that we did not even know would work. That has meant that we are now emerging sooner and more broadly than nearly anywhere else. But that success was also because a lot of GPs in the NHS were diverted away from their normal work into the vaccination programme, and that has come with costs in terms of the other treatments they are not able to deliver. When will we see a workforce plan that takes account of the new responsibilities for vaccination that the NHS will have? When will the budget for Health Education England be agreed, because two and a half months before the next financial year we still do not know what it is? Will the workforce plan have independent forecasts so that we can make sure we are training enough doctors and nurses for the future?
Maggie Throup
I thank my right hon. Friend for his question. He has made it his ambition, as has the Department, to ensure that we have the right workforce in place. He raises a really good point about the vaccines and how we continue to administer them—not just the covid vaccine but the flu and other vaccines that we have throughout our lifetimes. We have learned an awful lot from rolling out the covid vaccine programme, and like my right hon. Friend I commend the vaccine taskforce for having the foresight to look beyond what some other countries did, to make sure we had the vaccines in place when we needed them.
We do need to look again at how we maximise what has been such good will. In terms of the vaccinators who have come forward, some were not trained as vaccinators before. As I travel around some of the vaccine sites, I meet people from all backgrounds who have taken up the challenge to come forward and become vaccinators. The other day, I actually met a builder who is now a vaccinator, and he is loving every minute of it. I also thank the volunteers who have come forward and made sure that this programme has been so effective. It is about bringing together what we have learned in this programme over the last year to make sure that we can roll out other programmes in an effective manner.
Steven Bonnar (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (SNP)
Once again Scotland has set an example for the UK, and I want to take this opportunity to thank all those NHS and frontline key workers involved in the excellent vaccination roll-out programme. We lead the way on first and second doses administered, and we rank second worldwide for the most successful booster roll-out programme, with over 80% of our adult population given their third vaccine. The rest of the UK also has one of the highest vaccination records in the world, along with most of Europe. Is it not well past time to begin a serious campaign of vaccine sharing and the vaccination of those who have so far been left behind in our global community?
Secondly, when the booster roll-out does wind down, will the UK Government commit to shifting the momentum from domestic vaccination to vaccination sharing with the poorest countries? While we welcome the 30 million doses that have been donated, they are a mere drop in the ocean in terms of what is actually required. Lastly, will this Tory Government finally show a shred of compassion for the plight of those around the world?
Maggie Throup
The hon. Gentleman makes a good point about ensuring that rural communities have access to vaccines, and that is exactly what we have done through our programme. We have made sure that walk-in centres have been stood up, as well as other ways for people to access vaccines such as vaccine buses, so that community pharmacists can deliver in rural settings and among hard-to-reach groups. Whether in rural or urban areas, it is important that we use every possible route—for example, working through community groups, local leadership and faith groups—to put everything in place to ensure that everyone has access to the life-saving vaccines.
I reiterate what I said to the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne), that to date we have donated 30 million doses to COVAX and bilaterally. We will continue to fulfil our commitment to donate 100 million jabs globally by the end of June this year.
Ms Nusrat Ghani (Wealden) (Con)
I was not expecting to be called, Mr Speaker. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Miriam Cates) on securing this important urgent question. Reflecting on what the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt), said about workforce planning, I know that in my constituency, Wealden, and across East Sussex, there is huge concern about accessing healthcare and treatment. Will the Minister explain what risk assessment has been done of how, if unvaccinated staff—as many as 88,000—leave the NHS, treatment will be made available and how my constituents will be able to access day-to-day healthcare and treatment?
Maggie Throup
I think my hon. Friend is referring to vaccination as a condition of employment. I should like to inform the House that already over 93% of the NHS workforce have had their first jab, which is incredible. It is the will of the House, expressed before Christmas, that we implement this policy. Peer-to-peer conversations are going on to make sure that people have the right information they need to take up the offer of a jab, which not only protects them but protects their patients, who are some of the most vulnerable people in society.
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)
I pay tribute to the hard-working staff at St Thomas’ Hospital in my constituency, who have helped many Members of this House to receive their booster jab, and to the many volunteers throughout Vauxhall. The Minister outlined that 90% of people have had their first dose and over 80% their second. With the emergence of omicron, we have seen that unless everyone is vaccinated, we are not safe. We are not safe until everyone is safe, but around the world there are still places where people are not receiving vaccines. Will she outline what work the Government are doing to make sure that there are enough vaccines globally to ensure equitable access for everyone?
Maggie Throup
I also pay tribute to the staff at St Thomas’ Hospital. I visited the vaccination centre there and was really impressed by the way it is set up, with the paediatric side as well, and by all the volunteers who were there making sure that everyone felt comfortable about going forward. Some of the people there had thought for quite some time about taking the plunge and getting their first dose, so I thank the staff for their work.
The hon. Lady makes a good point when she says that we are not safe until everyone is safe. I reiterate our commitment to COVAX, not just through donating vaccines but financially as well. Just over a year ago, the first AstraZeneca vaccine jab in the world was given to a gentleman in Nottinghamshire. As a result of our collaboration with Oxford University and AstraZeneca, those jabs continue to be delivered at cost throughout the world. That is a really good outcome of the Government’s investment.
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
Given its success, I believe we should now place our faith in the vaccination strategy and not in further controls. When I voted against plan B before Christmas, I said that more and more regulation creates more and more hypocrisy. Despite what is going on in Russia and the cost of living, we spent most of Prime Minister’s questions debating the fact that the Prime Minister wandered out of his house, where he lives and works, and had a drink with colleagues. The truth is that the Government should learn a lesson from this. We must sweep away every last vestige of telling people how to live their lives. We have had enough of it. The British people have had enough of it. These controls are actually making things worse—for example, forcing staff to isolate and putting our NHS at risk—so please, let us free the people.
Maggie Throup
I reassure my right hon. Friend that we will not have the restrictions in place for a day longer than necessary. He is aware that the current plan B restrictions will be reviewed on 26 January.
Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)
Many hon. Members have constituents whose long-awaited treatments and operations are being cancelled because hospitals are full of the unvaccinated. We in England have one of the most indulgent approaches to the unvaccinated. Why does the Minister not follow the example of New Zealand, Australia and the rest of Europe and do much more to incentivise people to get vaccinated?
Maggie Throup
I reassure the right hon. Gentleman that we are doing what we can to ensure that people get vaccinated. Some of the stats speak for themselves: people are eight times more likely to be hospitalised if they are unvaccinated and more than 60% of those in ICU are unvaccinated. We are not a nation that forces people to do things unnecessarily. The behavioural insights team across Government has been looking at different ways to get those who have not come forward yet to get their jab and at the pros and cons of different ways of doing that. At the moment, I think we have the right approach, which is explaining why it is important for them to come forward to get a jab.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
The question of my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Miriam Cates) was about whether there was a reassessment of the strategy on the basis of what we know now about omicron that we did not when the strategy was set out. Will the Minister answer that, particularly in respect of the policy of sacking NHS staff who are not vaccinated, given that we know that the rationale has disappeared because it does not stop people from catching it or from infecting others?
Maggie Throup
My right hon. Friend makes a very good point, but I go back to the MHRA, which is globally recognised as one of the best regulators and has advised that,
“the benefits of vaccination still outweigh any risk in most individuals.”
With regards to myocarditis, to which I think he was referring as well, it is greater in those children who have been infected with covid than in those who have been jabbed. I must stress, however, that instances of both those circumstances are extremely rare. The JCVI continually reviews all the data.
Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)
It is clear that the Government need a new strategy for driving up vaccinations among the unvaccinated. Around the country, there are practical examples of things that are working that they could roll out nationally. Will the Minister commit to looking at ideas such as vaccine tracing; the offer of an on-the-spot vaccination when somebody comes into contact with any part of the NHS; and the offer of free cabs for those who are struggling to get to a vaccination centre because of the cost or caring arrangements? Those things are working already, yet they are not being rolled out nationally.
Maggie Throup
I reassure the hon. Lady that many different measures are being put in place across the whole country depending on what works in different specific areas. For example, there are pop-up clinics in mosques and temples; there have been all-female clinics that help different communities; and there have been clinics in restaurants in certain parts of Bradford. There is a wide range of measures because, as she rightly indicated, there is not one solution for everybody. The fact that more than 90% of people have already had their first dose is a huge success, but the last few are the hardest to reach. That is why we are putting in place different measures to ensure that we do the right thing for individuals in different places and look at what will work for individuals across different communities.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
When what is at stake is the balance of health risk for children right across Wycombe and every constituency in the whole country, is my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Miriam Cates) not absolutely right to ask my hon. Friend the Minister to task the JCVI and the medical officers with a reassessment of new evidence? My hon. Friend just said at the Dispatch Box that evidence is kept under continuous review—and she nods—so why can she not please say at the Dispatch Box that she will ask the experts to revisit the new evidence, just to check that the balance of health risk for children is still appropriate and that she is satisfied with the responsibility, which she bears, for the decision that has been taken?
Maggie Throup
My hon. Friend is quite right that we do bear responsibility. I do not take these decisions lightly at all and neither does my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. That is why the JCVI and the CMO continually review not just the UK data but the national data for every age range, every vaccine and every eventuality. The CMO will have heard my hon. Friend’s request and I am sure he will be completely focused on making sure that the JCVI continues to monitor the situation in the specific way my hon. Friend asks for.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
First, I congratulate everyone in Sheffield—including GPs, the hospitals and the city council—who worked brilliantly together to deliver thousands of vaccines in the run-up to Christmas.
I want to ask about people with compromised immune systems, and I declare my own interest in that. Having the third dose, followed by a booster, is absolutely right, but to begin with there was a lot of confusion about whether the consultant or the GP should be responsible for contacting people. I think it has just about been sorted out, but I have received an email today from my constituent Jeanette, who says that although everyone in her situation should have received a letter offering the availability of new treatments, she got a letter but her husband did not; that although everyone should have been sent a PCR test in the post, she did not get one; and that although she was told to ring 119, when she did so she could not find the option to complain that she had not received a PCR test. Will the Minister have a look at who is responsible for the availability of new treatments and the sending of PCR tests, and at what happens when things do not happen properly?
Maggie Throup
I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising this important part of our strategy to make sure we can react quickly in respect of those with certain conditions. Giving them ready access to the antivirals is the third part of our strategy to combat coronavirus. GPs and hospital consultants should link up to make sure that the right conditions are considered. I advise the hon. Gentleman’s constituent initially to contact her GP to make sure that she fits the category. If she has received the letter but no PCR test, she should contact 119—Test and Trace—
Maggie Throup
Or she should go online to find out whether there has been a mismatch in the data. If she has received the letter saying that she should receive the PCR so that she can do one if she has symptoms, we just need to make sure that she gets one delivered to her home.
Derek Thomas (St Ives) (Con)
It is great news that the Minister reports that 93% of NHS staff have received the vaccine—that is fantastic—and I commend every effort made to encourage NHS staff and all those involved in the delivery of care to receive the vaccine, but what will the Government do if, in a few weeks, a critically high number of people in the NHS have still not had the vaccine? Will they all face being sacked or moved in April? How would that protect the NHS?
Maggie Throup
As my hon. Friend said, to date over 93% of NHS staff have had their first jab. I want to put out a plea. We already have vaccination as a condition of deployment in the care sector and we did not see the cliff edge that so many people predicted. In terms of my own personal circumstances, my father was in a care home for over seven years and his carers became his family. We always do the best for our family and want to make sure that they are protected in the same way that we are protected, and that carries through to NHS staff as well, and to those in other Care Quality Commission-regulated organisations. It is about patient safety: at the end of the day, we are looking to make sure that every patient is kept safe.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
I must say that I am amazed at the Minister’s complacency about the potential loss of staff as a result of the vaccine mandate. The care sector has lost 54,000 people who refused to take the vaccine, with the result that hospital beds are blocked, care packages are not being given and care homes are under pressure. The social care sector is an indication that we cannot force people to take the vaccine, and the Minister’s own assessment is that up to 88,000 staff could resist taking it. In the past week, 40,000 people in the NHS have been off work because they had to isolate, and we have seen the chaos that has caused. How does she intend to deal with the chaos of 88,000 staff not being available because of the vaccine mandate?
Maggie Throup
I do not recognise the data given by the right hon. Gentleman. We have already invested £465 million in a recruitment and retention programme for care home staff. It is important to recognise that caring is a worthwhile career. The carers I have met are really dedicated and get a lot from it. I come back to the fact that it is important to keep the most vulnerable in our society safe, whether they are care home residents or patients who are acutely ill in hospital.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
My sources in the NHS tell me that last week they received either from the Department or from NHS England instructions effectively on how to go about firing people from the NHS in April if they have not been vaccinated. That caused them considerable concern. The Government’s own analysis, prepared by the Minister’s own Department, is not of the position now; it is of the expectation of where we will be in April. Analysis from her own Department, signed off by her, thinks that 73,000 NHS staff and 38,000 domiciliary care workers will leave.
I want people to be vaccinated, but we know that the protection against infection wanes quite quickly from 10 weeks onwards, which means that we are not protecting others. I want people to be vaccinated, but I—and public health professionals—think that the best way is to persuade them, not threaten them with the sack. If people have not had their first jab by 3 February they will be unable to be fully vaccinated by April, so may I urge her, even at this stage, to come back to the House and reflect on whether threatening people with the sack if they do not get vaccinated is the right policy?
Maggie Throup
I completely agree with my right hon. Friend that persuasion is the right way to go. That is why the uptake went up tremendously among care home staff and since we implemented the policy for the NHS the uptake among NHS staff has increased tremendously as well, which is really encouraging. We want it to be a positive choice, and we want people to understand that they are protecting not just themselves and their families but the patients they care for, ensuring that they are safe. Those one-on-one conversations are ongoing to ensure that people understand that, from the perspective of patient safety, this is the right choice to make.
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)
With rates of infection high among teenagers, many are simply unable to get double vaccinated yet as they were infected in the period when they would have been eligible and had to wait 12 weeks to get the jab. Unfortunately for families hoping to travel in half term, they cannot access a covid recovery certificate through the NHS app or through 119, despite contracting covid being the reason that they are not double vaccinated. Families are facing the prospect of cancelling their travel plans for half term, which will have an impact not only on our constituents but on the travel industry. I know that the Department is considering a solution, but will the Minister give some clarity that that will be achieved before half term, to give people the confidence to make travel plans?
Maggie Throup
The hon. Lady makes a very good point, and it is not the first time the issue has been raised with me. We had that situation in the run-up to Christmas, and we are obviously now in the run-up to half term and Easter as well. I assure her that measures are being considered to see how to resolve the situation.
Mark Jenkinson (Workington) (Con)
I thank my hon. Friend for her efforts to save us from vaccine-only passports, leaving the option for testing on the table, given what we know about the impact of vaccination on transmission and that fact that with compulsory vaccination the Government’s central assumption is the loss of more than 100,000 healthcare workers. She has set out that patient safety is paramount to her. Does she therefore share my concern that we risk lulling healthcare workers and patients into a false sense of security? Is it not the case that daily healthcare worker testing is a much safer option to rely on for the protection of patients?
Maggie Throup
My hon. Friend makes a good point about daily testing, which is being carried out with certain cohorts of the workforce. The UKHSA continues to monitor the best way to ensure that the workforce, whether in the NHS or other parts of industry, protect one another as they go about their work tasks.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Having turned 60 yesterday—[Interruption.] It is very difficult to believe, isn’t it, Mr Speaker, but you are not saying I am misleading the House, obviously. Having turned 60 yesterday, I feel I ought to ask a question about the elderly. Quite a lot of people in the elderly group who have had their booster vaccines will have had them in September and October of last year. I had mine at the beginning of November. What will our policy be from now, because, as the right hon. Member for Forest of Dean (Mr Harper) pointed out, the immunity that comes from the booster runs out somewhat after 10 weeks?
Maggie Throup
I wish the hon. Gentleman a happy birthday for yesterday. He does not look a year older than 59—just one day older. He makes a good point. The JCVI, which provides advice for Ministers, has considered that question. Towards the end of last week, it felt that a fourth dose or a second booster was not appropriate at this time and that it was important to focus on first boosters and people coming forward for their first and second doses. But I reiterate that the JCVI continues to keep the question under constant review and, should the situation change, it will provide that advice.
Mr Speaker
I am going to hand over to my colleague in the Chair, but before I do so, to help the Minister I remind Members that we still have some nurses who can give injections at a pop-up in the House of Commons.
Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)
I declare my interest as a consultant paediatrician working in the NHS and as a volunteer vaccinator. I am very proud to be part of the vaccination programme that has undoubtedly saved so very many lives.
I want to focus on children. I have worked in hospital over the past month and have been looking after children who have had positive tests. That is not unexpected because the virus is high in the population and of course we test everybody. However, I have not been looking after children who were admitted because of covid. In September, we heard that the decision on whether to offer children vaccines was finely balanced. Indeed, the JCVI referred that decision to the chief medical officers, who finally decided, on the basis of educational disruption, to offer children vaccines. Given that omicron is less harmful than the variants we were considering at the time, has the Minister asked the JCVI and the CMOs to consider whether these vaccines are still, on balance, better for children than not—except, perhaps, in the context of travel?
Maggie Throup
I thank my hon. Friend for her role in vaccinating probably thousands of people by now. Everybody has played their part, using their skills and their time to roll out the vaccination programme in such an amazing way. I assure my hon. Friend, who obviously has an awful lot of expertise and knowledge, that JCVI continually looks at the data. We hear announcements from the JCVI and think they are just about what it has considered on that particular day, but I assure the House that it continually looks at the data to make sure that we move forward in the right manner.
Ms Anum Qaisar (Airdrie and Shotts) (SNP)
As vaccination uptake increases, conspiracy theory-inspired groups have hardened their language and threats against those involved in vaccination delivery have also increased. Some groups—I will not name them, because what they do is so despicable—are attempting to disrupt vaccinations, and even to attack testing facilities. The threat posed by conspiracy theorist anti-vaxxer groups is real and cannot be ignored. What assessment has the Minister’s Department made of how to counter those groups and safeguard the vaccine roll-out?
Maggie Throup
Misinformation costs lives. It is totally inappropriate, and there is no place for it in our society. As the hon. Lady rightly highlights, testing centres have also been attacked, which I am sure is under police investigation. I reassure her that we have a unit that considers such issues all the time, and numerous online presences are taken down on a regular basis. As she will imagine, various police investigations are under way.
Dr Andrew Murrison (South West Wiltshire) (Con)
When the facts change, we are entitled to change our minds, and since we passed the regulated activity regulations in December we have had further evidence to suggest that the transmissibility of covid declines after 10 or 12 weeks, as has been mentioned. In light of that, has the Minister gone back to challenge the JCVI on its advice about whether we should compulsorily vaccinate health workers, particularly given that it now appears that the risk they pose to patients declines after a very short period, and especially given that we have the alternative of regular lateral flow testing, which will tell, more or less in real time, whether healthcare professionals pose a threat to their patients?
Maggie Throup
It is important to go back to some of the stats I set out earlier. Those who are unvaccinated are eight times more likely to be hospitalised, and more than 60% of people in intensive care units are unvaccinated. If we can stop people getting the virus in the first place, it will not be transmitted and people will not catch the disease and be hospitalised. It is important to note that it was the will of the House to introduce that policy in December. As I have said repeatedly, the JCVI keeps all the data under constant review, which obviously has an impact on Government policy.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
I wish to follow the question raised by the right hon. Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison), because the reality is that the facts have changed, and depleting efficacy, as well as transmissibility, is presenting a challenge for the Government and their longer term management of covid. Rather than forcing NHS staff to have their first vaccine by 3 February, which will present a massive risk to the NHS—the Government’s own assessment is that between 64,000 and 115,000 NHS and healthcare staff will be sacked—will the Government go back and review the issue, and ask the JCVI what the best strategy is for managing the pandemic from this point forward?
Maggie Throup
We have our plans in place. We have our vaccination programme, our testing, and our antivirals. Part of the purpose of the vaccination programme is to ensure that some of the most vulnerable in our society are protected. As I said earlier, having the vaccine as a condition of employment is about patient safety and ensuring that people who are in hospital or care homes are protected from this deadly virus.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
I have been a big advocate of the vaccination programme, and I got my jabs as soon as I could. Will my hon. Friend address a key issue of concern? The time gap between the different vaccines has been adjusted at various times and, as the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) mentioned, those who are extremely clinically vulnerable had their booster a long time ago and its effectiveness is waning. We know that Israel is already administering a fourth dose to the extremely clinically vulnerable. Will the Minister take that point to the JCVI, so that it can look specifically at the extremely clinically vulnerable and see whether they need a fourth dose?
Maggie Throup
Those who are clinically extremely vulnerable or immunosuppressed have already been offered a booster, so they have already received four doses. As I said earlier, at the end of last week the JCVI determined that at this stage it was not appropriate for others to have a booster or a fourth dose.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The Titanic Exhibition Centre, which is the largest vaccination centre in Northern Ireland, is to close on Sunday 16 January. Has the Minister made an assessment, in her Department, of the impact that the closure of mass vaccination centres will have on the booster process throughout the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?
Maggie Throup
As I understand it, the location of vaccination sites in the devolved nations is the responsibility of those nations. I can only speak for England in that regard, so the hon. Gentleman may wish to take the matter up with the Minister of Health in Northern Ireland.
Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)
May I take this opportunity to put on record my thanks to my daughter, and to all her colleagues across the NHS who have worked on the frontline throughout the pandemic, caring for those who have sadly needed hospital treatment?
I have been very supportive of the Government’s approach to the pandemic and their actions, but I tend to agree that as the facts change, we should change our approach. What we have learnt about omicron is that the rationale behind mandatory vaccination has now shifted from protecting others to protecting oneself. Should we not revisit that, given the figures that the Minister has been quoting about the vaccination status of those in hospital and in intensive care units?
Maggie Throup
When we protect ourselves by having a vaccination, we protect others. My hon. Friend mentioned omicron, but we have seen other variants before, and we will no doubt see more in the future.
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
Before Christmas, the JCVI issued the welcome guidance that five to 11-year-olds who are either clinically vulnerable or living with someone who is immunosuppressed should be vaccinated against coronavirus, but since then we have heard very little. Can the Minister tell me when the roll-out to five to 11-year-olds will start, whether it will take place in schools or in vaccination centres, and how those who are immunocompromised will be identified—this is very important to those who are living with someone in that position—given that their GP records will not show their condition? I declare a personal interest.
Maggie Throup
The fact that the hon. Lady has asked that question demonstrates that this is quite a complex matter. NHS England is looking into it, to work out the best way to roll out the vaccine to that particularly vulnerable group of five to 11-year-olds.
Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Alba)
I often pay tribute in this place to the leadership on vaccines of Dame Kate Bingham. Speaking about the cancellation of the Valneva contract in Livingston, Dame Kate described the decision as “short-sighted”, “problematic” and “inexplicable”. She also said that it
“set aside the need to build resilience”
and “capability” through the
“flexible state-of-the-art”
technology that Valneva offered. Moreover, it would help us to tackle vaccine hesitancy and our international responsibilities, owing to the lack of cold chain problems. Will the Government listen to the sage advice of Dame Kate, and reinstate the Valneva contract as a matter of urgency?
Maggie Throup
I, too, pay tribute to the work of Kate Bingham. Without her leadership, we would be in a worse position in regard to vaccines.
The hon. Gentleman has raised the issue of Valneva in the past, and, as I have said in the past, I cannot comment on commercial decisions.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
I join the Minister in thanking all those who rushed out the booster programme in December, but some of our constituents have been confused by the two booking systems, the one for the GP centres and the national booking system. Will she commit herself to trying to establish a single booking system by the time we get round to the autumn boosters, or whatever we are going to have, so that we can see full capacity in all the sites that patients can use in one location?
Maggie Throup
My hon. Friend makes a very good point. I think what we have achieved in the last year is incredible, and we know that we can improve things such as booking services, which is one of the areas I am sure we will be looking at. My hon. Friend makes the point that sometimes people were not aware that slots were available through their GP and thought they had to go through the national booking service. These are lessons to be learned. We have achieved an awful lot in just over a year, and I am sure we will be looking into that as a matter of urgency.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
I congratulate the United Kingdom Government on one of the most successful and leading covid-19 vaccination programmes anywhere in the world. As we go forward, can I seek assurances that those who are immunocompromised and immunosuppressed, such as blood cancer patients, will have a real focus from the Department of Health?
Maggie Throup
I would like to reassure my hon. Friend that that will be the case. I have met a number of the charities concerned in this area, and I will continue to have meetings with those who represent the patients to hear their views.
Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)
The House was asked before Christmas to vote for the mandatory vaccination of health workers on the basis of the argument that it would stop transmission. We now know that this is almost certainly not the case. I think we are almost at the end of this session, and it would be tremendous to hear a commitment from the Minister that she will formally request the JCVI to review the evidence behind this policy. The only argument she is giving for it is that it will help protect health workers, but that has to be a decision that they take for themselves. Rather than sacking compulsorily what may be over 100,000 health and social care workers, surely before the deadline is upon us we should reconsider this policy.
Maggie Throup
It is quite clear that the vaccine does reduce transmission. It is a matter of protecting the individual, but in these settings there are also some very vulnerable people who can ill afford to get more seriously ill. It is only right that we look at every aspect of this. It is not just about the omicron variant; it is about other variants in the future.
Andrew Lewer (Northampton South) (Con)
We have already heard from my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison) and others the expression attributed to John Maynard Keynes, but actually by Paul Samuelson:
“When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?”
Decisions about recommending vaccinations for 12 to 15-year-olds were regarded as very finely balanced in any case with delta as the predominant variant. Now we have omicron, that so-called fine balance, with all the complications of children’s benefit versus societal benefit and the small but real risk of myocarditis, has clearly altered. Will my hon. Friend ensure that she reflects on that very wise quotation in this instance?
Maggie Throup
I refer back to the fact that the MHRA confirmed that the Pfizer vaccine is safe and effective in 12 to 17-year-olds, and that followed the rigorous review of the safety, quality and effectiveness of the vaccines in this age group. Obviously, the JCVI then made that recommendation, and the CMO has backed it up. It was based on those experts that this decision was made.
Afghanistan: Humanitarian Crisis
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Clive Lewis (Norwich South) (Lab)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs if she will make a statement on the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (Vicky Ford)
Afghanistan is facing a serious and worsening humanitarian crisis. It is affecting well over half the population, with 23 million people facing acute food insecurity. This is now the world’s most severe food security crisis. The UN has this week requested nearly $4.5 billion for 2022—the largest humanitarian appeal on record, reflecting the magnitude of the humanitarian challenge ahead.
The UK has been at the forefront of efforts to address the situation, working with the UN Security Council, the G20, the G7 and countries in the region. The Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary and other Ministers have all been working extensively with world leaders. In August, the Prime Minister announced that the UK would double its assistance for Afghanistan to £286 million this financial year, and we have now disbursed over £145 million. That will support over 3.4 million people in Afghanistan and the region, providing emergency food, healthcare, shelter, water and protection. We are working at pace to allocate the remaining funding in response to the developing crisis and the new UN appeal. Further details were in the ministerial statement on 15 December. I thank the British people for donating £28 million to the Disasters Emergency Committee appeal in December, of which £10 million was doubled by UK aid match funding. That has helped to provide lifesaving support.
We were particularly concerned about the impact of the situation on women, girls and other marginalised groups. Last month I, alongside the Minister of State with responsibility for south Asia, Lord Ahmad, met organisations representing women, LGBT+ and religious minorities to discuss support for their needs. In allocating UK aid, we want to ensure that women, girls and other marginalised groups have equal, safe and dignified access to assistance and services. We have pressed the Taliban to respect humanitarian principles.
Our partners report that aid is getting through. We continue to monitor the situation very carefully, especially in the winter months. Aid workers face challenges getting money into Afghanistan due to the banking system. We are working closely with multilateral organisations, banks and non-governmental organisations to address those challenges. We welcome the decision by the World Bank board in November to transfer £280 million to support the humanitarian response, but it is vital—it is vital—that the World Bank produces options to allocate the $1.2 billion remaining in the fund. It is important that donors across the world step up to the challenge, including by responding to the UN’s call for additional funding.
Clive Lewis
Afghanistan, as has been heard, is facing an escalating and multi-faceted humanitarian crisis. In response, the United Nations launched its largest ever single country appeal, in part because the crisis in Afghanistan embodies a new breed of 21st century international crisis, where the hazards of war collide with the hazards of climate change and a global viral outbreak. This has created a nightmarish feedback loop that punishes some of the world’s most vulnerable and destroys their country’s ability to cope. So far, the UK’s response has been woeful. It took five months for the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme to be put into place, while our aid commitment to Afghanistan in 2021 was lower than what was delivered in 2019.
A heavy dose of realpolitik is now needed to address the immediate crisis before us. Let me ask the Minister for more detail on how the Government will square the circle of dealing with the Taliban and playing their part in supporting Afghanistan and humanitarian aid. Let me also ask the Minister what plans her Department has to deal with the multi-faceted nature of this crisis. The $4.4 billion the UN has appealed for is only a stop-gap. It will not stop escalation. But if we do not meet the appeal, it will be £10 billion next year and a lot more suffering.
After two decades of military intervention costing at least £27.7 billion, the UK must now step up to the plate to meet the $4.4 billion requested. The UN cannot deliver at the scale and speed needed by working alone, so will global Britain now show global leadership? Will the Secretary of State agree to help those in urgent need, including 1 million children who face starvation, by convening a conference, as former Prime Minister Gordon Brown is calling for, with the United States, the EU and other willing partners to agree new financing to fully cover our obligation to this appeal?
Vicky Ford
As I said in my opening remarks, the situation is enormously serious. Indeed, it is now the world’s most severe food security crisis.
On the issues relating to supporting Afghan resettlement, of course everybody in this Chamber has had huge praise for all those who worked during Operation Pitting. It was incredibly challenging, but those on the ground, including the ambassador and his team from the Foreign Office, did amazing work. Since the evacuation, as the Minister for Afghan Resettlement, my hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins) made clear last week, we have helped a further 1,500 to enter the UK, including female judges, human rights defenders and LGBT Afghans. At that stage, of course, she announced the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme.
On getting more aid into the country, as I said in my opening remarks it is incredibly important that the world steps up to this challenge, especially towards meeting the UN appeal.The Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary and other Ministers, including the Minister for the region, are working closely with world leaders, including in the US, the EU and the UN. Indeed, my colleague the responsible Minister is in regular co-ordination with all key international agency leads at the UN, including those for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, UNICEF, the World Food Programme and the International Rescue Committee. We will make more announcements in response to the UN appeal in the coming weeks, but I restate what I said in my statement about the importance of the World Bank giving options to unlock the $1.2 billion that remains in the fund.
Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)
I very much welcome my hon. Friend’s comments about co-operation with international organisations, particularly the Nobel prize-winning World Food Programme, which has done so much important work not just in the region, but around the world. What work is she doing with others in the region, including countries such as Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and even Iran, to get support together for those who are in the most vulnerable position that we have seen in generations?
This is not just about the misery that we are seeing in Afghanistan, where some people are even forced to sell their children. It is about a humanitarian response from the most generous country—from the United Kingdom—to people who are in desperate need and whom I hope will be supported not only to stay in their own homes and have a future, but to turn to opportunities that will build an economy and build the future that has been so cruelly torn away from them in recent months.
Vicky Ford
I thank the Chair of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs for his close interest in the subject and for mentioning the plight of children. We are deeply concerned by the forced marriage practised in Afghanistan, particularly for children, and we are very aware of the risk that more women and young girls could be sold into marriage as the humanitarian situation worsens.
My hon. Friend asks what we are doing about international engagement. Since August, our international engagement has been focused on securing a co-ordinated humanitarian response, agreeing a co-ordinated approach to the Taliban-led regime and, as far as possible, preventing economic collapse. We have played an active role in seeking to build a shared new international approach since the Taliban takeover, working with the UN Security Council, the G20 and the G7 and engaging with other countries in the region. For example, the Foreign Secretary recently travelled to India, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, where she discussed Afghanistan and the importance of international co-ordination.
In October, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon—the Minister of State for south and central Asia, the United Nations and the Commonwealth—attended the annual open debate on women, peace and security at the UN Security Council, where he made it clear that the rights of Afghan women need to be front and centre. The Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary and many other Ministers discussed Afghanistan with world leaders in the margins of COP26. We all urge the need to address the acute humanitarian situation. We are continuing to work very closely with countries across the world and across the region.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I call the shadow Foreign Secretary.
Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) for securing this hugely important urgent question.
As we stand here today, the situation in Afghanistan is more perilous than ever. Since the withdrawal of British and NATO forces in August, the country has entered a catastrophic free fall. It is by no means an exaggeration to say that the country is hurtling towards a humanitarian cliff edge that places millions of Afghans, including millions of children, at risk of starvation.
The facts are truly horrendous. More than 90% of the country’s health clinics and hospitals are without the funds that they need to stay open. Basic public services have been decimated, with teachers, doctors and nurses going unpaid. When you listen to those facts, Madam Deputy Speaker, you could be mistaken in believing that the situation in Afghanistan can get no worse and become no more perilous. Tragically, that would be misguided. With 97% of the Afghan population soon to be living below the poverty line, almost 23 million people are teetering on the edge of starvation. A further deterioration will have dire consequences for the people of Afghanistan and impact not the just the region but the UK, with more desperate people seeking sanctuary outside the country. We must ensure that our sanctions regime and our understandable desire to place pressure on the Taliban regime does not become an impediment to supporting the very people we seek to help. Whether we like it or not, some form of engagement is necessary if we are to support the people of Afghanistan.
After the chaos of withdrawal, after Brits and Afghans were left behind, after slashing aid to Afghanistan just last year only to U-turn and restore it, and after the damning whistleblower revelations, the Minister will understand why there is a chronic lack of confidence in the House about the ministerial leadership of her Department. Will the UK convene an urgent pledging conference, as suggested by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, to try to pressure the international community to meet the enormous need? What dialogue have the UK and other allies had with the Taliban—perhaps via the UN—over humanitarian access? Has the Minister met non-governmental organisations and civil society to discuss how the Government can better support their efforts?
The need could not be more urgent; nor could the situation be more grave. As a proud outward-looking country, we cannot turn our backs on ordinary Afghanis now. It is our moral imperative to act—and act swiftly—to help Afghanistan in its time of greatest need.
Vicky Ford
We are very concerned about the rapid economic contraction and the impact that that is having on the people of Afghanistan, especially as the cost of essential products is rising and people are struggling to withdraw funds. The World Bank predicts a 30% fall in GDP. It is a serious issue, and preventing humanitarian catastrophe in Afghanistan is in everyone’s interests. That is why we have already disbursed more than £145 million of humanitarian support. The details on where all that support has gone were in the December written ministerial statement. Further money has been pledged from the UK, and Ministers will make further announcements in response to the UN appeal in the coming weeks.
I believe that working with the UN through that appeal—the largest appeal that it has ever launched—is critical. Our funding is going through the Afghanistan humanitarian fund, the World Food Programme, the International Committee of the Red Cross, Red Crescent, and other UN organisations, all of which are trusted partners. As regards sanctions, the UK led the way on the sanctions carve-out to ensure that delivery of humanitarian aid to Afghanistan could continue. At present, we are hearing on the ground that aid is getting through. However, it is of course a particularly difficult time, because we know that winter is coming.
Ms Nusrat Ghani (Wealden) (Con)
I would like first to raise the point that when children and young babies are sold into sexual and domestic slavery, we must not refer to that as marriage. I ask the Minister not to do so going forward.
What a shameful legacy we leave behind in Afghanistan, with millions on the brink of starvation. What conversations has the Minister had with Pakistan, which I think is already taking the most Afghan refugees? Will she ensure that we are working with people to create an understanding of what it is to live in a liberal democracy and not fuelling radicalisation in any way?
The Minister knows about the amount of work that I have done with many colleagues across the House to try to rescue Afghan women and girls, and Afghan female MPs in particular, but the Afghan resettlement programme is not working for the people whom I am trying to help. What assurances can she give that we will enable more women who could be killed by the Taliban to survive so that one day they can go back home and even help with the aid programme?
Vicky Ford
My hon. Friend makes a very good point about children. She asks what we are doing with other countries in the region, including Pakistan. My colleague the Minister for south and central Asia, Lord Ahmad, is in regular contact with other neighbouring countries, and £30 million was allocated to help other countries in the region respond to the impact of the crisis on themselves.
We are committed to ensuring that at least half the aid reaches women and girls. Just before Christmas I met NGOs and organisations representing both women’s and girls’ organisation and LGBT organisations, and their feedback from the ground was incredibly helpful. The Minister for Afghan Resettlement made a statement on the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme last week, and she mentioned that three cohorts of LGBT people have already come to the UK under the scheme. We will continue to prioritise those women who are most at risk, but we need to recognise that, although we are doing a huge amount to help resettle people in this country, we need to support people on the ground, which is why we are working with world-leading organisations to focus always on the most vulnerable, including women and girls.
Chris Law (Dundee West) (SNP)
Even before our chaotic withdrawal, it was known that the people of Afghanistan faced a humanitarian crisis this winter. In September the UN estimated that only 5% of Afghans had enough food to eat each day, so the UK Government cannot say that this famine has caught them by surprise. With 1 million children at risk of severe malnourishment and 23 million people threatened with starvation, less than 25% of UK aid money pledged to Afghanistan in 2021 had been disbursed by the beginning of December, which is shocking.
With the UN launching an appeal for nearly £5 billion in aid for Afghanistan, will the UK Government ensure that all the funds pledged urgently reach those in need? Can the Minister confirm what new money the UK will donate, above and beyond the previous announcements? Will the UK Government finally recognise that their ideological cuts to aid have cost countless lives not only in Afghanistan but across the world, and will they reverse that decision?
Vicky Ford
To correct the record, because it is important that we make accurate statements, between April and December 2021 we disbursed over £145 million-worth of aid, £135 million of which went into lifesaving humanitarian support inside Afghanistan, including for food, health, nutrition, shelter, water, sanitation and landmine action. Another £10 million went into neighbouring countries to support new and existing refugees.
We are working quickly to develop plans to allocate the remainder of the £286 million to ensure that it reaches the people who need it most. We will be making further announcements in due course. We made a written ministerial statement just before Christmas, and we are working with NGO partners, including the Afghanistan Humanitarian Fund, the World Food Programme, the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and other UN organisations. Those partners on the ground are distributing the aid that is needed. The important thing is that the world needs to step up to this challenge. This is the biggest challenge, which is why the UN has launched this appeal today.
Several hon. Members rose—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I want to try to get everybody in. It is therefore important that questions are short and to the point. We do not want a list of several questions; we want one question so that the Minister is able to reply accordingly.
Mark Logan (Bolton North East) (Con)
In my new role as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Afghanistan, I look forward to co-hosting a meeting with the Minister for Afghan Resettlement at 2.30 pm alongside the all-party parliamentary group on women, peace and security.
Further to the question asked by the hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) on the UN appeal for $4.4 billion, since the end of Operation Pitting in August 2021 what commitments and, indeed, how much aid have this Government already provided to Afghanistan?
Vicky Ford
Between April and December 2021 we disbursed over £145 million, including £135 million of lifesaving humanitarian support inside the country and £10 million to neighbouring countries.
Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)
The Taliban takeover caused an economic meltdown in Afghanistan. Banks ran short, millions lost work or went unpaid and the currency nosedived. Perversely, markets still have food, but the problem is there is no access to cash. People are starving, babies are malnourished, women are not allowed to work to feed their families and there is no money to heat homes. My Committee is clear: the Government must urgently fund emergency organisations such as the World Food Programme. Of the £286 million pledged, so far only £81 million has been disbursed. Can the Minister also update us on what steps are being taken to unfreeze assets and ensure that financial transactions linked to humanitarian aid are excluded from international sanctions, specifically including paying local aid workers? Then, can the Minister please monitor what the Taliban does with that?
Vicky Ford
There were a number of different questions. Just to be clear, £135 million of our aid has gone, to the end of December. No funds are going directly to the Taliban; they are going through the other organisations and trusted partners that I mentioned. The hon. Lady is absolutely right to mention the issues to do with getting money into Afghanistan and the banking system. We are working really closely with multilateral organisations, banks and NGOs to address these challenges. On the funding available to meet this crisis, it is really important that it is all unlocked, which is why I refer again to the importance of unlocking that $1.2 billion within the World Bank. Obviously we are a major shareholder in the World Bank. I spoke to our team at the World Bank just before Christmas. It is really important that we unlock that. Perhaps the hon. Lady would like to work with her colleagues in other Parliaments across the world who share her passion to encourage other members of the World Bank to focus on looking at the options for unlocking that vital cash.
Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) on securing this incredibly important urgent question. We have heard rightly from the Minister about the urgency of the humanitarian crisis, but there is also a learning crisis in Afghanistan, and all the progress made in getting children into education has gone back to the beginning. What can the Minister tell us about the Government’s efforts to ensure that teachers are getting paid, to sustain education for the generations to come in Afghanistan?
Vicky Ford
As ever, my hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise the issue of girls’ education. We are absolutely committed to girls’ education across the world and we absolutely believe that all girls in Afghanistan have the right to education at all stages—both secondary and primary. We continue to provide emergency education funding through the UN system, and multilateral funding, including for Education Cannot Wait and the Global Partnership for Education. It is currently holiday time in Afghanistan. The schools are due to reopen in March. One of the key partners that we work with on providing education in Afghanistan is Save the Children, and I have a long-scheduled meeting with the head of Save the Children immediately after these exchanges this afternoon. I am more than happy to speak to my hon. Friend immediately after that meeting.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)
The Taliban are a wicked regime responsible for murdering some of my friends. None of us wanted them in power, but Afghans have no choice. While humanitarian aid is desperately needed, it will never be enough. Millions are starving, the state has collapsed and the economy is in freefall. Further to the question just a moment ago from my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), how does the Minister plan to unfreeze state assets, lift sanctions and get the Afghan economy turning again?
Vicky Ford
I completely agree with the hon. Member’s sentiment. None of us wanted to be in this situation; it is absolutely dire. The impact on the people of Afghanistan and especially those in vulnerable groups, women and children is heartbreaking. We will continue to focus on getting the aid and getting the international response. It is very important that the UN has launched that appeal today and we will continue to work with it on all sides.
We were very clear in our leadership in making sure that sanctions should not end up blocking that humanitarian aid, and I know that the Minister responsible will continue to ensure he is doing all he can with partners across the world and British leadership to ensure that that aid gets through. That is the immediate issue this winter, as well as continuing to press the Taliban to ensure that they keep their promises that girls can go back to school and that marginal groups will be respected.
Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)
I am looking forward to co-chairing the meeting on Afghanistan in about 15 minutes alongside the chair of the Afghanistan all-party parliamentary group, my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton North East (Mark Logan). The tragedy is that Afghanistan produces much of its food, and the markets are well stocked; however, the collapse of the Afghan economy means that people are unable to afford food, particularly during the winter months, before they can go to their farms in the countryside. My question is very similar to the previous two. What can we further do to help the Afghan economy to recover?
Vicky Ford
There are multiple causes of the crisis; my hon. Friend is absolutely right on that. I know that she has travelled to the country in happier times. We are working really closely with the World Bank and the UN to find solutions that will enable international non-governmental organisations to access currency in Afghanistan, which is absolutely crucial. We will make further announcements in response to the UN appeal in the coming weeks.
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)
The situation is absolutely desperate and every penny counts, but how those pennies are spent matters. Yesterday, I spoke to an NGO working out there on the ground that said that, although of course it welcomes any money that it gets, the UK Government’s rigid, bureaucratic approach means that the money has been delayed. The timelines to spend it have shrunk, so it is not spent as effectively as possible. The NGO has noticed that those inefficiencies have got much worse since the merger between the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development, just as the Liberal Democrats and others warned at the time. What we need now in responding to this dreadful crisis is not just more money but flexibility and timeliness in how it gets to our partners on the ground. Will the Minister commit to speaking to NGOs having those problems, and will the money be paid on time?
Vicky Ford
My colleague, the Minister for the region, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, is in regular connect with NGOs. We have already disbursed over £145 million, which is going into life-saving humanitarian support. It is going to key partners, not directly to the Taliban, which is important. It is also really important that we help to unlock the funding that is currently sitting in the World Bank. That is a key pot of money that needs flexibility to get to people on the ground. The hon. Member is right to raise the need to unlock bureaucracy; I would point to that as a particular concern in that area. We are working very quickly on plans to reallocate the remainder of the £286 million, but we want to ensure that it reaches the people who need it the most. We are also ensuring that no funds are going directly to the Taliban.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
At the start of the withdrawal, I had 656 constituents with families trapped in Afghanistan. Very sadly, the vast majority are still trapped in Afghanistan and want to leave. Therefore, the Afghan resettlement scheme has come as a big disappointment to all those families. What action will my hon. Friend take to enable those families who want to leave Afghanistan, and who assisted the UK and the USA when we were there, to leave and fulfil what they want to do, which is to live a proper and decent life?
Vicky Ford
The Afghan citizens resettlement scheme was announced by the Minister responsible, my hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins), just last week. She pointed out that it is coming into place this year. We have announced an aim to settle 5,000 people in the first year of the ACRS. She also announced that, in the light of the emerging situation and the success of evacuation efforts, we will exceed that aim. The first to be resettled included women’s rights activists, journalists and prosecutors, as well as Afghan families of British nationals.
I would encourage my hon. Friend to work with the Minister for Afghan Resettlement on any individual cases that he has, but I would also say, as this question points out, that we need to support those in the country; it is not going to be possible to resettle every single case.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I am sorry—this is terrible. Every single element of this was not only predictable but predicted repeatedly for 18 months and longer. Operation Pitting was a disaster. We did not actually prioritise the right people, or we have no confidence that we prioritised the right people. We have abandoned lots of people, as the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) said. All of us have constituency connections with people who are stuck in Afghanistan, and the Minister has no means of enabling them to get to safety. We have abandoned them to a future where there is not enough food, there is not enough money to pay the bills, there is no electricity and most of the hospitals are not working properly. We have a complete disaster, and part of the blame for that lies at the Government’s door.
Vicky Ford
During Operation Pitting, we worked at great speed. Our armed forces on the ground worked at great speed and in great danger to evacuate around 15,000 people to the UK. That was the second largest number evacuated by any country, behind only the United States. We are supporting people in Afghanistan.
Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)
With a large Afghan community as well, I am hearing every day stories of relatives who are murdered, who are disappeared, who are hungry and who are suffering from medical emergencies. That includes the husband and two children of a constituent of mine who are trapped in Afghanistan. It is simply not the case that the relatives of British nationals in this country are getting the assistance that they were promised and need. Please will the Minister take the desperate pleas of ourselves and our Afghan communities back and make sure they are heard in Government so that we can assist those people who may have a claim to come here?
Vicky Ford
I agree that this is a really serious and difficult situation, especially for the people in Afghanistan. That is why we have been focusing on working with others on getting humanitarian aid in. Since the end of Operation Pitting, the UK has supported nearly 1,300 people to leave Afghanistan, including 700 British nationals and eligible dependants. We will continue to work to ensure that those still in Afghanistan are able to depart the country safely if they are eligible. I would encourage the hon. Lady to continue to work with the Minister for Afghan Resettlement on individual cases.
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) for bringing forward this urgent question. Children facing starvation in a manner that was, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) said, entirely predictable and predicted deserve the attention of the most powerful people in the world. So can I ask the Minister a direct question that has already been asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich South and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) but that has not been answered? Former Prime Minister Gordon Brown has asked our Foreign Secretary to bring together an Afghan rescue conference so that those powerful people can do something about this issue. Is the answer yes or is the answer no?
Vicky Ford
Our Foreign Secretary, our Prime Minister, the Minister responsible and all members of the UK Government have been working with our international partners and showing international leadership on this issue. It is right that we work with the UN on it. The UN has today announced its appeal—the biggest appeal ever—and we will be making further announcements on that appeal and how we continue to work with the UN, which is the right organisation to be working with, in the coming weeks.
Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)
Frankly, what we are hearing today just is not good enough. We know that the situation is utterly dire in Afghanistan. Could I request that the Minister takes away what she has heard from both sides of the Chamber today and comes back to the House as soon as possible in the next few days with a statement about how the UK is stepping up its leadership on the humanitarian crisis and about what it will do to expedite the evacuation and resettlement of at-risk Afghans who are relatives of our constituents—I have 400 cases outstanding—to make sure there is a strong, clear message about how they could be evacuated for their safety? They are still at risk and they are now falling prey to the worsening humanitarian situation.
Vicky Ford
This is the most serious food crisis in the world. This is not the time for party politics. The UK has been leading the international efforts on this issue. The UN has just launched the world’s biggest-ever appeal. We have been working, with UK leadership from the beginning, on this incredibly difficult situation with our partners at the UN and at the World Bank. We are leading the pressure to unlock the money from the World Bank, which is key to this issue.
I encourage the hon. Lady to please get behind the UN and behind the UK Government’s efforts to bring the world together to help the people of Afghanistan, because that is vital for the people of Afghanistan right now.
Vicky Ford
There is no one working harder to get on with the job and to support people around the world than this Government. I find Members accusing us of not getting on with the job from a sedentary position really offensive to the people of Afghanistan.
A written ministerial statement updated the House just before Christmas. I have said from this Dispatch Box that the UK Government will come back with further statements in response to the UN appeal in the coming weeks. That is the right thing to do and it is right that we are working with the UN, other international partners and key NGOs. In terms of doing my job, as soon as I leave the Chamber I am going to meet Save the Children, one of our key partners on this issue, because it is really important that we continue to work with our key partners.
Claire Hanna (Belfast South) (SDLP)
The unfolding crisis in Afghanistan is nightmarish in its scale and complexity and the Social Democratic and Labour party entirely supports the pathway set out today for an international conference to intensify and galvanise global support.
We have heard about the efforts on the ground and know that only a tiny proportion of those affected will be able and seeking to leave Afghanistan, but the scheme is clearly inadequate. I am aware, from responses I have received, that the Northern Ireland Executive are ready and willing to accept a large number of refugees; will the Minister advise the House as to what discussions have been had with them? In the light of the comments from several Members, can she ensure that there will be a pathway to referral to the scheme from MPs’ offices?
Vicky Ford
I will certainly get back to the hon. Lady about a pathway to referral to the scheme from MPs’ offices. The Home Office leads on that, rather than me.
I say again that this is a really serious and worsening crisis. It is the largest humanitarian appeal ever made on record with the UN. We need to work with our partners at the UN and the World Bank to unlock funding for the humanitarian crisis and that is what the Government are doing. We will be getting on with that job.
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)
I have to say that the Minister’s response to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) was unfortunate, because there is real cross-party concern on this issue. The Minister was right in her opening remarks to highlight the generosity of the British people, because they recognise our special responsibility to the Afghan people in the face of the unfolding catastrophe following our chaotic withdrawal. She has set out what the Government are doing, but clearly it is not working. What further plans do the Government have to address the appalling situation in Afghanistan?
Vicky Ford
I think I have been very clear: we are working with the UN and other international partners and we want to unlock the World Bank funding that will make a considerable difference. We need to continue to work with trusted partners to make sure that the funding that we and others have pledged gets to those on the ground who need it most. We are also working with NGOs and other banks and, if it is possible, to tackle some of the issues in the payments system that are causing such complexity. We are working with our education partners and other NGOs and will make further announcements in response to the UN appeal in the coming weeks.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
When something is not working, we have to look at it again, and that is why an international conference is necessary, to bring greater leverage to the situation and to achieve the outcomes we all want. One group of people that the Minister has not referred to is the democratically elected Members of the Afghanistan Parliament, who are now spread around the world. They know their communities in the same way that we know our communities. Will the Minister open up a dialogue with the very people who know whole communities across Afghanistan, to ensure that they have a say on the future?
Vicky Ford
The hon. Lady makes a very good point about speaking to many of those who have represented Afghanistan and who are now situated across the world—[Interruption.]
Vicky Ford
The situation is enormously difficult, and being heckled by the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) from a sedentary position is very hard. My right hon. Friend the Minister for Asia has a great deal of contact with experts on this issue—[Interruption.]
Vicky Ford
About 15,000 people were brought to the UK. Many of them are still in hotels, but many more have moved into homes. We have the second largest resettlement scheme in the world, and it is really important that we continue to work with my hon. Friend the Minister for Afghan Resettlement on any individual issues that constituents may face.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) was right to praise the Minister for acknowledging the generosity of the British public, but I warn her that the anger and disappointment felt by people in this country at the failures of the British Government threaten to undermine everything that she has said to the House this afternoon.
Faith and community groups in my constituency are anxious to continue supporting the humanitarian effort towards Afghanistan. What work are the Government doing with faith and community leaders in this country to support their efforts and those of their members and communities?
Vicky Ford
I thank the hon. Member for again raising the issue of the generosity of the British people. They have been enormously generous, especially in response to the appeal just before Christmas, which was, of course, match funded with up to £10 million of additional funding from the UK Government. It is truly life-saving aid.
The hon. Member makes a very good point about outreach to faith and community leaders in the UK. I will certainly raise with my colleague Lord Ahmad what more we can do, especially in explaining to the people of the UK, who have such generous hearts, what we are doing in the country in this very difficult situation.
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)
A constituent has been to see me a number of times, desperately worried, in tears, heartbroken and concerned about her sister, who worked in the special forces with the UK and NATO and is at risk. For obvious reasons, I will not name my constituent or her sister. I have raised the issue with the Ministry of Defence, which wrote back to me on 18 November and said that it was confirming her eligibility. My office has raised the issue with the Home Office as well. Will the Minister please look into this particular case? I am very happy to send her all of the details straight after this statement, because I am desperately worried that the situation is getting worse.
Vicky Ford
This is heart-wrenching. We all have cases involving families who have been separated and of constituents who have come here from Afghanistan and are very concerned about the impact this is having and the risk to their families in Afghanistan. I point again to the fact that the Minister for Afghan Resettlement announced a new scheme just last week. The hon. Lady should raise her case with the Minister responsible. If she would like to send it to me, I will forward it to her. It has to go through that scheme, which is one of the most generous in the world, with 5,000 people this year, but it cannot be every single person.
Anna McMorrin (Cardiff North) (Lab)
The World Health Organisation predicts that 1 million Afghan children under five will die of starvation this winter alone; another 2.2 million will suffer acute malnutrition. The progress achieved by the people there over 20 years has been irreversibly wiped out as a result of this humanitarian disaster. Fears of misuse of donor funds and of validating the Taliban remain valid, but given the urgency of tackling the crisis, does the Minister agree that the UK Government must do more? If this is truly not a time for party politics, will she, as my colleagues requested, say yes to the international conference of 68 nations that Gordon Brown has suggested?
Vicky Ford
The hon. Lady is right to raise what the WHO has been saying. This is the most severe food crisis in the world. That is why the UN has launched its appeal, and it is right that when we are working and engaging with other countries, we engage with that appeal. I cannot make further announcements today, but I have said that Ministers are expected to make other announcements in response to the UN appeal in coming weeks.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Minister for her answers. The United Nations revealed yesterday that it needs £5 billion in aid for Afghanistan to avert a humanitarian catastrophe. There have been 40 years of constant suffering. Viewing this morning, as everyone has, the pictures and stories on TV and other media showing young children and women in pain and starving to death was terribly upsetting—it is hard not to be upset by those pictures. How can the Minister ensure that the humanitarian aid gets to those who need it the most and need it right now?
Vicky Ford
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question and his constant interest. As I said, we want to make absolutely sure that the aid gets to those who need it. That is why our funding is being channelled through the Afghanistan Humanitarian Fund, the World Food Programme and other UN organisations, and the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Red Crescent. They are the right organisations to work with to ensure that aid gets through. Aid is currently getting through, although obviously the winter is a concern.
Points of Order
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Chris Law (Dundee West) (SNP)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I raised the issue of the supply of funding for the Afghanistan crisis being less than 25% by the end of November/beginning of December. Looking back on the record to a reply given by the Minister for the Middle East, North Africa and North America, he said the figure was £70 million, which is indeed less than 25%. I appreciate that the sum might have been increased during December, but it still falls 50% short of the funds allocated for 2021. Will you advise me and the Minister on how to set the record straight?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for the point of order, but as he knows, it is Ministers, not the Chair, who are responsible for their words in the Chamber. Those on the Government Front Bench, including the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, will have heard what he said, and I am sure that the hon. Lady will seek to correct the record if a mistake has been made.
Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. My constituent, a survivor of child abuse, has worked with the National Crime Agency during recent prosecutions, but she has been waiting since July for a decision on a family permit application to the EU settlement scheme. I wrote to the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, the hon. Member for Torbay (Kevin Foster), who is the Immigration Minister, on 2 November, but have not received a reply.
I have raised the matter on multiple occasions with UK Visas and Immigration, but again, replies have not been forthcoming. My constituent was told that a decision was made on 20 December, and UKVI confirmed that to me, but she has still not been told what the outcome is. It completely ruined Christmas and new year for her and her children. I have chased up the case repeatedly, but I cannot get that decision. This is torture for my constituent. Madam Deputy Speaker, can you provide guidance on what I can do, what mechanisms are available to me, to get that decision, so that this woman can have some peace in her life?
Madam Deputy Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving me notice of her point of order. I am obviously disappointed, as I am sure she is, to hear that her letter and representations have not received a response. I would hope that a response would now be forthcoming speedily, especially as there are Ministers and Whips on the Front Bench who I am sure will convey that back to the Home Office.
In terms of how the hon. Lady might pursue the matter further, she may wish to discuss the issue with Clerks at the Table Office, who can offer advice. I also know that if issues of delays with Ministers are raised with the Leader of the House at business questions, he agrees to take them back to Ministers, so that might be another route that she might wish to pursue through business questions.
Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I have informed the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland of my intention to raise this point of order. In July last year, he released a Command Paper on the troubles in Northern Ireland and the related legacy issues. In his statement to the House, he said that he would be
“introducing legislation by the end of the autumn”,—[Official Report, 14 July 2021; Vol. 699, c. 390.]
but no legislation came forward. At the last oral questions, just before Christmas, I asked him where the legislation was and he replied:
“We have not had pauses”.—[Official Report, 8 December 2021; Vol. 705, c. 366.]
This week, a Government briefing to the PoliticsHome website about that legislation said that
“a government source told PoliticsHome that they needed more time to ‘get it right’ and that the legislation might not make it onto the statute books until late spring or early summer.”
That strikes me as a clear breach of the ministerial code, which is clear in its intent. Ministers should talk about legislation and how legislation will be handled in this place by talking to this place in an oral or written statement, preferably an oral one so that we can cross-examine it at the Dispatch Box.
Can you confirm, Madam Deputy Speaker, whether you or Mr Speaker have been informed of any intentions for that legislation? If not, it is a discourtesy to Mr Speaker, to the House and certainly to all people in Northern Ireland, for whom anxiety has been provoked by talk of the legislation.
Madam Deputy Speaker
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving me notice of his point of order. He raises a number of issues. Decisions about when to make written or oral statements are obviously for the Government rather than the Speaker, but as he will know, Mr Speaker has repeatedly made it clear that substantial policy announcements should be made first to the House. I would expect the Government to observe that in relation to this important issue.
With regard to breaches of the ministerial code, if the hon. Gentleman wished to raise that, it would obviously be a matter for the Cabinet Office. I will ensure that Mr Speaker is aware of his point about possible changes to policy, but I hope that the Government Front-Bench team have heard that and will feed it back to the Northern Ireland Office.
Digitally Altered Body Images
Wednesday 12th January 2022
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Digitally Altered Body Images Bill 2021-22 View all Digitally Altered Body Images Bill 2021-22 Debates Read Hansard Text
A Ten Minute Rule Bill is a First Reading of a Private Members Bill, but with the sponsor permitted to make a ten minute speech outlining the reasons for the proposed legislation.
There is little chance of the Bill proceeding further unless there is unanimous consent for the Bill or the Government elects to support the Bill directly.
For more information see: Ten Minute Bills
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con)
I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to require advertisers, broadcasters and publishers to display a logo in cases where an image of a human body or body part has been digitally altered in its proportions; and for connected purposes.
To set the tone for this speech, I will describe an advert put out about a year ago by Dove called “Reverse Selfie”. It starts with a young girl looking at her phone. On that phone, there is a picture of her. She may be in her late teens or early 20s. It starts to scroll backwards. She sees the comments underneath the photo of “you look amazing” suddenly disappearing, with all the likes slowly drifting away. Suddenly, the filter changes and so does her hair colour. The size of her face, including her nose, changes. Blemishes on her skin suddenly reappear.
The process goes further. The girl puts the phone down and lies backwards and there behind her is a picture of her family that reappears on the wall—she has scrubbed it off—and a picture of her favourite teen band. Furthermore, the image shows make-up, including lipstick, coming off. Finally, what is left in front of us is a girl no older than 13 or 14. The advert finishes with a pertinent line: “The pressure of social media is hurting our girls’ self-esteem.” This is an all-too-common story happening up and down the UK to our daughters, our sons, our granddaughters and our grandsons. The advert is only a minute long but it encapsulates perfectly the problem facing our media-hungry society.
Don’t believe me? One in five adults feel shame about their body. In teenagers, it is one in three. The Women and Equalities Committee inquiry into body image found that concerns about the way we look start younger, last longer and affect more people than ever before, with 61% of adults and 66% of children feeling “negative” or “very negative” about their body image. NHS England data released over the summer showed that there were 2,682 admissions of children under the age of 17 with a primary diagnosis of eating disorders between April 2020 and March 2021—an increase of 34% on the previous year. This issue is here, stark and getting worse. I have seen it in my own practice as a GP before being in this House, and I fear the numbers will only increase from the 1.25 million people who have suffered with eating disorders and the 1 million people in the UK using steroids, many in pursuit of achieving an image that is simply unattainable no matter what they do. The problem is palpable, prolific and pervasive.
The growth of influencers’ collaborations and sponsored posts, particularly on social media, has added to the ever-growing list of tools advertisers have at their disposal, often featuring images that can be secretly edited. This, combined with the amount of time we spend endlessly scrolling through social media, has created a perfect storm for physical and mental health. Constantly seeing altered images warps our sense of reality and drives an aspiration that can never, ever be achieved. Even the social media companies know this, as the Facebook leaks have shown. We are setting up a generation to fail, and it is hurting us all.
It comes as no surprise that the Women and Equalities Committee has reported on body image, the Advertising Standards Authority has opened an inquiry and a call for evidence on the issue, and the Health and Social Care Committee will, in the coming weeks, open its inquiry into body image. The UK is waking up to the issue, as have other countries across the world, with legislation in place in Israel and France and currently being brought forward in Norway. Body image is an issue that is multi-faceted and covers multiple Government Departments, with no silver bullet. We all understand that it requires a layered response from the likes of the Education Department, together with the draft online safety Bill and the assessment of risk. All these are rightly being looked at.
My Bill is a simple stepping stone—a brick in the foundation to help tackle the problem. I am proposing a new law in Parliament that calls for commercial images featuring digitally altered bodies to be labelled with a logo where the body proportions are artificially doctored. To put it simply, if someone is being paid to post a picture on social media that they have edited, or advertisers, broadcasters or publishers are making money from an edited photograph, they should be honest and upfront about it. This is not about stopping people touching up their wedding photos or removing the red-eye on a post; it is targeted at those with significant, far-reaching influence and those with commercial intent.
This area is already regulated by the Advertising Standards Authority and there are some similar precedents already in place. We have the “P” for product placement on TV, disclaimers on political adverts, and “Not actual video game footage” notices on adverts for video games. In more recent times, the ASA has done a significant amount of legwork on what is commercial and who the rules apply to, and the use of #ad on posts. The ASA advises:
“In most cases, the use of #ad (or similar) is the clearest way of communicating the commercial nature of social media content. Alternatively, a platform’s own disclosure tools, such as Instagram’s Paid Partnership tool, can also help to distinguish advertising from other content…If an influencer fails to sufficiently disclose that a post is in fact marketing, then not only are they breaking the CAP Code, they—and the brand they’re working with—may well be breaking the law.”
My proposal is simply a translation of current practice into the digital world of body image.
Some detractors will wag their finger and say that this is the nanny state in action, but if anything it is the opposite. Those who put forward that position know full well that a perfect market needs perfect information, and this Bill is a step towards that. It does not ban changes; it simply empowers the individual to know that what they perceive is not reality, thus giving them information and, importantly, choice. However, the Bill would provide backup for the Secretary of State, should the industry not take action itself. Others argue that the evidence is not clear. They argue that logos and labels do not work and that in some cases labelling can even worsen outcomes. I would simply argue that the evidence is relatively scant and thin, as most would concede, and that the precautionary principle applies here, given the scale of the problem.
Having my Bill in place will primarily prevent people and companies from feeling the need to doctor images in the first place. This is already evident from the many social influencers and companies that are shunning tools and filters because they see the negative connotations being perpetuated across society and see that brands are actively choosing to dissociate themselves from digital enhancement. But alas, many are still caught up in the arms race for the perfect selfie, which is why this Bill has a place.
In closing, I find myself in a very strange position. I actually do not want to see such a logo on an image, ever. Why? Because I hope that we can foster a society that aims for body positivity without physiques that are impossible without digital manipulation. Failing that, or until then, the Government must consider primary and precautionary measures to help to curb the dramatic rise in poor mental wellbeing, the mass individual self-loathing that we have across the UK and the serious mental health disorders such as anorexia and bulimia that are becoming florid. I believe that my Digitally Altered Body Images Bill is a small but fitting way to start this journey.
Question put and agreed to.
Ordered,
That Dr Luke Evans, Jeremy Hunt, Julian Knight, Neale Hanvey, Dr Lisa Cameron, Simon Jupp, Caroline Nokes, Jim Shannon, Wera Hobhouse, Dean Russell, John Cryer and Steve Brine present the Bill.
Dr Luke Evans accordingly presented the Bill.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 25 February, and to be printed (Bill 227).
Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Bill (Programme) (No. 2)
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 83A(7)),
That the Order of 24 November 2021 (Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Bill (Programme)) be varied as follows:
(1) Paragraphs (4) and (5) of the Order shall be omitted.
(2) Proceedings on Consideration shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion three hours after the commencement of proceedings on the Motion for this Order.
(3) Proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion four hours after the commencement of proceedings on the Motion for this Order.—(Gareth Johnson.)
Question agreed to.
Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Bill
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Government amendments 1 and 2.
Amendment 9, in clause 2, page 2, line 40, at end insert—
“(6) Notwithstanding subsection (5), the provisions of this Act shall extend to a business tenancy irrespective of whether the property comprised in the tenancy is occupied by the tenant.”
This amendment broadens the definition of business tenancy to cover arrangements in which the property is not occupied by the tenant.
Amendment 13, in clause 7, page 5, line 19, at end insert—
“(2B) The Secretary of State must ensure that bodies approved under subsection (1) have sufficient numbers of arbitrators (whether alone or as a member of a panel of arbitrators) required to conduct arbitrations under this Part.”
This amendment would require the Secretary of State to ensure that the approved arbitration bodies collectively have sufficient capacity to hear all arbitrations under this Part.
Amendment 10, in clause 9, page 7, line 7, leave out from “beginning” to the end of line 8 and insert “25 March 2022”.
This amendment revises the period for a reference to arbitration to be made in order that it is consistent with the Code of Conduct.
Government amendment 3.
Amendment 14, in clause 11, page 8, line 21, leave out “supporting evidence” and insert
“any evidence relevant to the proposal.”
This amendment would require a formal proposal put forward under this section to be made on an open-book basis.
Amendment 15, in clause 17, page 11, line 13, after “practicable” insert
“and no later than 14 days”.
This amendment would require awards in arbitrations which do not have an oral hearing to be made within 14 days.
Amendment 16, in clause 19, page 12, line 6, replace “may” with “must”.
This amendment would require the Secretary of State to make regulations specifying limits on arbitration fees.
Amendment 11, page 12, line 13, before “When” insert “Subject to 6A,”.
This amendment is consequential to Amendment 12.
Government amendments 4 to 6
Amendment 12, page 12, line 19, at end insert—
“(6A) When the arbitrator makes an award under section 13 or 14, the arbitrator may also make an award requiring that a party at fault pays costs which it has caused the other party to incur.
(6B) For the purposes of 6A, a party is at fault where the arbitrator considers that the conduct of the party before or during the proceedings is unreasonable or improper.”
This amendment would empower the arbitrator to make an adverse costs award where the arbitrator considers that a party has acted unreasonably or improperly.
Government amendments 7, 8 and 18 to 21.
Amendment 17, in schedule 2, page 19, line 6, leave out sub-sub-paragraph (a).
This amendment would extend the debt claims over which a party could apply to the court for the proceedings to be stayed to claims made before 10 November 2021.
Seema Malhotra
It is a pleasure to speak to new clause 1 and amendments 9 to 17, which stand in my name and in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury).
A process for resolving commercial rent arrears is very much needed, as dealing with the financial pressures brought on by covid is vital for landlords and tenants alike. Against that backdrop, Labour broadly welcomes the Bill, but we believe that the Government can and should do more on business support. That context is important because covid is not over. Business costs continue to rise, and they are also driven by rising fuel costs and inflation. Economic forecasts for the next three to five years project low growth, high inflation and high taxes. Managing financial pressures and supporting viable businesses to do so—that is the helping hand that we need in place as businesses navigate the uncertain road ahead and as some sectors recover faster than others.
To access the opportunities that we seek to ensure that the Bill provides, we need to be sure of the consistency, affordability and accessibility of arbitration and to ensure that the system operates effectively and fairly. On that basis, we have tabled new clause 1 and our other amendments in a positive spirit, to continue the dialogue that we had at the earlier stages of the Bill, because we support it and want it to work as effectively as possible.
On consistency, the Minister will appreciate that there will be retail and hospitality businesses with numerous landlords, and landlords with numerous tenants; businesses may therefore be party to more than one case under the new system. Predictability and consistency will be vital if those businesses are to have faith in the system, so our new clause 1 would require the Secretary of State to conduct a review of awards to assess whether clauses 15 and 16 have been interpreted consistently. The review would need to be conducted
“no later than three months following the day on which this Act is passed”,
and where the Secretary of State identifies material inconsistencies, he would need to publish or amend guidance to arbitrators as necessary. We believe that such a review would be welcomed by landlords, tenants and arbitrators and would ensure that the system is well understood.
On the accessibility and affordability of the new scheme, the definition of “business tenancy” in clause 2 has important consequences. Only tenancies in which the tenant is in occupation of the property fall within the Bill’s scope and can therefore access the arbitration scheme that it establishes. Let me give the House two examples of circumstances that could fall outside the Bill because of that definition.
First, Sir Paul Morgan, a specialist in property arbitration, has set out the case of a tenant who leaves a property unoccupied because of covid restrictions and does not now intend to reoccupy it when the restrictions end. As Sir Paul explains, the tenant may have a viable business but may not wish to reoccupy the particular premises for which the rent was due. Under the Bill as it stands, there would not be a business tenancy in such a case and the tenant would not be able to claim the benefit of the Bill in relation to that property, where the company was a tenant of that property during the period that is protected.
Secondly, there might be a situation where there is a head lease and a sub-lease on the property, for example where there is a franchising arrangement and the franchisee is the sub-tenant. In such a situation, the head lessee does not occupy the property and therefore could not benefit from the reliefs under the Bill, whereas the sub-tenant could.
Labour’s amendment 9 would fill those gaps, broadening the definition of “business tenancy” to cover arrangements in which the property is not occupied by the tenant. Unless the Minister can confirm that in the examples I have given it is intended that the leases would fall outside the new regime, I very much hope that the Government will recognise the gap and support our proposed changes.
We have tabled amendment 10, in relation to the period for reference to arbitration, in the same spirit of constructiveness. Clause 9 establishes a six-month period for a tenant or landlord to make a reference to arbitration, for which the clock starts on the day on which the Act is passed. We recognise and support the need to act quickly, but want to ensure that the full six months is available to tenants and landlords. The code of conduct suggests that the arbitration scheme will be operational on 25 March 2022, but what happens if the legislation passes before that date? Will that mean that parties have less than six months to make a reference? What if the legislation is not passed until a later date? Presumably, the current code of conduct would then need to be amended and existing protections extended. Amendment 10 reflects the suggestion by Bill Chandler of Hill Dickinson LLP that the date for referrals to open be fixed as 25 March 2022 irrespective of whether the legislation is passed. I would be grateful for the Minister’s feedback on that and on the importance of these questions in relation to improving accessibility to and the clarity of the new regime.
Let me turn to the question of cost. The scheme will be a success only if it is affordable. In Committee, the Minister acknowledged the importance of affordability and suggested that he was working with relevant bodies that may be appointed to agree cost schedules. Could the Minister update the House on those discussions? Clause 19 gives the Secretary of State the discretion to specify ceilings for arbitration fees in secondary legislation. Given the concerns of stakeholders and the financial pressures they are facing, the Secretary of State should be required to set a limit on arbitration fees, and that is the intention of amendment 16.
On county court judgments, the Minister will know that many commercial tenants were deeply frustrated that the temporary protections introduced to assist businesses struggling to pay their rent did not include protections against county court judgments and High Court judgments. UKHospitality and others have been calling for this protection for months. While it is welcome that the Government have finally listened to industry and to Labour, and improved the provisions that would stay any debt proceedings made after 10 November, choosing this cut-off date has had some perverse consequences.
As we heard in Committee, the result of this arbitrary date means that any landlord who started proceedings before 10 November is now arguably in a better position than those who held off and pursued negotiations with their tenant. Surely this cannot be the Minister’s intention. As the British Retail Consortium explained, the more aggressive the landlord, the better the position they are now in on county court and High Court judgments. That is why we have tabled amendment 17, which would remove this arbitrary cut-off date. As a result, a party could apply to court to stay any debt claim that is made by a landlord and relates to protected rent debt, pending a resolution whether by negotiation or arbitration. We see this as an issue of basic fairness. Labour does not believe that landlords or tenants should be punished for in effect doing the right thing and seeking to negotiate a settlement.
I turn now to Labour’s amendments designed to ensure that the new scheme operates effectively. First, on arbitrators and arbitration bodies, arbitral bodies and their members will be absolutely critical to the success of this arbitration scheme. The Government have taken a market-based approach to the running of the arbitration scheme, which will have a list of approved arbitral bodies, rather than a single provider. In Committee, we heard the concerns of stakeholders who wanted to understand what skills and expertise would be required of arbitrators. While some thought that financial and accounting qualifications were critical, others suggested that legal qualifications would be paramount given the complexity of the cases. I would welcome any update on the Department’s discussions with stakeholders and about the approval of suitable arbitral bodies.
As well as ensuring that arbitrators are suitably qualified, it is vital that there is sufficient capacity. The Government’s impact assessment assumes 8,200 cases going to arbitration in its central scenario. While the appointed arbitral bodies will maintain their own lists of arbitrators, in a system where the Secretary of State may appoint several bodies, it is the Secretary of State who ultimately must ensure that there is sufficient capacity. The intention of amendment 13 is to make that an explicit and ongoing duty on the Secretary of State to ensure that the arbitral bodies appointed have sufficient numbers of arbitrators to hear and report on all cases as quickly as possible. If the impact assessment’s estimate is too conservative, our amendment would require the Secretary of State to appoint additional arbitral bodies to work with those bodies already appointed to increase their list of approved arbitrators.
Stakeholders have also made it clear to me how vital it is that there is consistency across the new system in how different arbitrators interpret the legislation and any guidance under it. For example, an arbitrator must dismiss a reference to arbitration where it determines that the tenant’s business is not viable. As such, how arbitrators interpret viability is of central importance.
On the conduct of parties, it is welcome news from stakeholders that the vast majority of landlords and tenants have already reached agreement on their covid rent arrears. The British Retail Consortium estimated in December that 80% to 90% of its members had reached agreement. For the minority of businesses that are yet to reach agreement, the arbitration scheme provides a lifeline for an independent and binding arbitration. However, we believe that the Bill could be improved to further ensure a fairer arbitration process.
Clause 11 requires a reference to arbitration to include a formal proposal for resolving the dispute. The other party may then put forward their own counter-proposal. Both must be supported by supporting evidence. However, a requirement to submit supporting evidence is not the same as full disclosure on an open book basis. As the Property Litigation Association makes clear, parties are not required to provide any evidence which might be adverse to their proposal. This lack of an obligation to make full disclosure prevents the other party from making an informed counter-proposal and, arguably, ultimately the swift resolution of the dispute. That is why our amendment 14 revises clause 11 and requires a formal proposal to be accompanied by all evidence relevant to the proposal, whether helpful to that party or not.
We are pleased to see the Government table Government amendment 4. Although a 50-50 split is fair in most cases, it is right that the arbitrator has the power to change how the arbitration fees are split, particularly if one party has acted unreasonably. However, we believe that the Bill should go further than that as it is vital that tenants and landlords are incentivised to approach the arbitration process fairly and in the spirit of resolution. That is why we have tabled amendment 12, which would provide the arbitrator with the power to make an adverse cost award, where one party has caused the other to incur costs by acting unreasonably. As Sir Paul Morgan said in his written evidence, that would be nothing new. In the case of many tribunals where the general rule is that each party will bear its own costs, the tribunal is typically given such a power.
On swift resolution, the regime is intended to deliver swift resolutions for disputes, yet the Bill does not do everything possible to secure them. While clause 17 requires the arbitrator to make their award within 14 days in a case in which an oral hearing is held, where no oral hearing is held the arbitrator is required to make their award as soon as reasonably practicable. My understanding from debate in Committee is that the likelihood is that most arbitration hearings will not be oral hearings, but on the basis of paperwork. Can the Minister explain the logic here? Why is there no backstop requiring the arbitrator to make their award within a specific timeframe where there is no oral hearing, which, as I say, we understand is expected to be the majority of cases. Labour’s amendment 15 intends to ensure that awards are made within a specific timeframe irrespective of whether there is an oral hearing.
In conclusion, in the current climate viable firms risk going to the wall. We believe that the Government can and should do more. From business rates to energy costs, the Government have let down British businesses and the impacts are now a part of a cumulative rise of cost pressures on businesses. In the context of commercial rent debt, we welcome the relief this Bill offers to commercial tenants facing the risk of eviction, bankruptcy or debt enforcement, and we welcome the prospect of resolution on covid rent arrears offered to landlords and tenants that have not been able to reach agreement. That is why the Opposition have taken a constructive approach to scrutinising this legislation, and I hope that, in recognising the spirit in which our amendments have been tabled, the Minister will respond favourably on the points we have raised today.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Paul Scully)
Before I respond to the Opposition amendments, I would first like to thank the hon. Members for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) and for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) for their continued constructive engagement with the Bill and for their contributions to date.
The Bill is key to ensuring we support viable businesses that will continue to thrive and contribute to our economy in a way that does not risk the insolvency of their commercial landlords. We remain committed to these principles. The arbitration system is designed to be a quick, effective and impartial solution for rent debts that cannot otherwise be resolved, and we currently expect that all applications for arbitration will be made within six months and that cases should be resolved as soon as practicable afterwards.
Requiring a review of the arbitration process within three months of the Bill being enacted could slow down the process by adding additional steps and requirements for arbitrators that have already proved their suitability for the role. It might also delay the resolution of cases while arbitrators await the findings of the review before making awards.
Under the Bill’s existing provisions, the Secretary of State can already request a report from approved arbitration bodies covering the exercise of their functions under the Bill, including details of awards made and the application of the principles set out in the Bill in the arbitrations they oversee.
Additionally, there is a requirement for arbitrators to publish the detail of awards made, including the reasons behind them. This will show how arbitrators have applied the principles of the Bill in coming to their decisions. We will carefully monitor the position, and if there is a need to revise the guidance, such as to clarify or add new information for arbitrators, the Secretary of State is already able to do so.
I believe that requiring a review would not benefit the aims of the Bill or, indeed, the people who would want to use the new arbitration system to resolve rent disputes, and I therefore hope new clause 1 will be withdrawn.
On amendment 9, as hon. Members will be aware, the Bill defines a business tenancy as a tenancy to which part 2 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 applies—that is to say it is a tenancy comprised of property that is or includes premises that are occupied by the tenant for business purposes. I reassure hon. Members that the Government intend such property to be considered occupied even if it has been mandated to close for some time in full or in part. A tenant will still be in occupation if they are operating their business remotely and intend to return, so I do not believe amendment 9 is necessary. I hope it will be withdrawn.
I should say that we also anticipate courts will take a pragmatic view of occupancy, given the underlying rationale behind the Bill to introduce a system of binding arbitration for businesses that have built up rent debt as a result of Government-mandated closures.
On amendment 13, the operation of approved arbitration bodies follows a market-based policy approach, leaving it to arbitration bodies to manage their internal capacity processes. Our engagement with arbitration bodies suggests that this is the right approach. Looking purely at the number of arbitrators disregards the fact that an arbitrator will be able to take on more than one case at a time. Although the application process will contain a question on the number of arbitrators available, we recognise that this will provide an under-representative picture of capacity in the market, so I am not able to accept the amendment.
On amendment 10, I am grateful to the hon. Members for Feltham and Heston and for Brentford and Isleworth for seeking to ensure consistency between the Bill and the code of practice. I reassure them that the Government’s intention under both the Bill and the code is for the Bill, including the arbitration system it establishes, to come into force as soon as possible. We want the arbitration system to start as soon as possible given its importance to supporting resolution of protected rent debt and a return to normal market operation. The aim remains to bring the Bill, including the arbitration system, into force by 25 March 2022. That is reflected in the code of practice, as updated on 9 November 2021. I am happy to consider whether clarification would be useful within the code. The code outlines the processes and principles that we are seeking to introduce through the Bill. It has given, and continues to give, businesses the opportunity to negotiate in line with those principles until the Bill comes into force.
The March timing is linked to the expiry of the moratorium on forfeiture and the restrictions on use of the commercial rent arrears recovery regime. The Government have been clear that they intend such measures to remain in place until the Bill is passed, if that is earlier than their expiry.
I turn to amendment 14. Clause 11 as it stands must be read with section 34 of the Arbitration Act 1996, which states:
“It shall be for the tribunal to decide all procedural and evidential matters”.
That provides arbitrators with the discretion to call for further evidence where that is considered necessary. There is also no express limit in the Bill on the types of evidence that parties can put forward to support their proposals. We are aiming for a quick and efficient process to restore businesses to normality. The aim of requiring supporting evidence is therefore to help focus participants’ minds on the most pertinent evidence that will support their proposals. It will have to be sufficient to show why the proposal is consistent with the principles and should be adopted. That will help arbitrators to resolve cases quickly. A widening of the clause could lead the paper-based arbitration process to become lengthy, inefficient and costly for the parties, who must meet their own legal and other costs.
I turn to amendment 15. As I have previously explained, clause 17 establishes the timeframe for making awards, requiring arbitrators to make an award as soon as is practicable, or within 14 days in the case of an oral hearing. While we expect that most cases will be resolved quickly, the clause also provides arbitrators with the necessary flexibility to take additional time to make decisions on more complicated cases. One or both of the parties may each simply submit one formal proposal that is final, or one or both may decide to submit revised proposals as final proposals. They may also agree to extend the time limit for submitting initial or revised proposals. That means that it is hard for an arbitrator to know exactly when final proposals have been submitted and when the clock on the 14-day time limit would start running.
Arbitrators may need to request further information after receiving proposals. It would therefore be impractical to impose a time limit. Imposing a 14-day time limit for issuing awards following an oral hearing, as the Bill does—although the time limit can be extended—is less problematic because the arbitrator will have seen the final proposals and had time to consider them before the hearing. They also have an opportunity to ask questions about them during the hearing, which would conclude on that set date.
On amendment 16, I agree that fee levels are an important consideration. The Bill adopts a market-based approach. Arbitration bodies are best placed to decide on fee levels given their experience in costing arbitration schemes to make it affordable for all and attractive enough for arbitrators to want to take on cases. The Secretary of State’s powers are intended to be used only when circumstances determine that to be appropriate. Setting a limit on fees at this point could reduce the number of arbitrators able to act, which could undermine the arbitration mechanism in the Bill. There is no evidence that such a limit is needed. However, if it is, the Secretary of State is prepared to exercise the power as appropriate based on the available evidence.
On amendments 11 and 12, I agree that it is important to encourage behaviour in line with the code of practice and the Bill’s general principles. A key aim of the Bill is to restore businesses to normality as quickly as possible. We have carefully designed the process with arbitrators to make it quick and cheap to navigate, and accessible without further support. The amendments, however, could result in prolonged arguments on costs, appeals and enforcement, delaying a return to that normality that we all seek. They could also encourage the use of legal and other support where that is not needed, lengthening the time to resolution and potentially increasing costs for all parties.
The amendments could create a situation in which one party’s viability or solvency could be endangered through having to pay costs other than arbitration fees. Widening the discretion to include other costs could also lead to an uneven playing field, especially for smaller businesses who could end up paying high legal costs for larger companies. Under the Bill, the arbitrator has discretion to deviate from the general rule of evenly splitting the costs of arbitration fees between parties where appropriate, based on the circumstances of the case, such as when one party has not reasonably co-operated.
On amendment 17, the Bill as drafted allows for a stay of debt claims that include ringfenced debt and are issued between 10 November 2021 and the Bill coming into force. The Bill enables ringfenced debt under those claims and under judgments made in respect of such claims to be subject to arbitration. I understand the concern about the date, but it is not an arbitrary date, because 10 November 2021 follows the Bill’s introduction and the Government’s announcement of the policy. The Bill seeks to introduce proportionate measures that address the interests of both landlords and tenants, whereas the amendment would allow for arbitration of protected debt which was subject to earlier proceedings or judgments when the parties could not have known that this was proposed at the time when the proceedings were issued, so reopening those situations.
Let me now deal with the technical amendments tabled by the Government and the substantive amendment that we are tabling at the request of the Northern Ireland Assembly. Amendments 1 and 2 are technical amendments to make it clear that the definition of “service charge” in clause 2 covers both fixed and variable costs, as well as costs incurred by the landlord insuring against loss of rent. That has always been our intention, and the amendments help to make it clear, ensuring that all relevant costs and charges are within the scope of the arbitration process.
Technical Government amendments 3 and 8 make it clear that the provisions of clauses 10 and 24, in so far as they relate to company voluntary arrangements or certain restructurings, apply to limited liability partnerships. That is in addition to their usual application to companies. These are minor clarificatory amendments to improve the technical drafting of the Bill.
Amendments 4 to 7 are minor and technical, and clarify the operation of arbitration and all hearing fees and expenses. Amendments 4 and 7 make it clear that the general rule is that the party that has paid fees is to be reimbursed half the amount by the other party, but where appropriate, the arbitrator may determine a different proportion, including zero. Amendment 5 makes a small correction to clause 19(6) to make it clear that except for reimbursement of arbitration or oral hearing fees, a party must meet its own legal or other costs. Amendment 6 makes it clear that costs incurred in connection with arbitration are not recoverable under an existing clause in the lease. Allowing cost recovery via the lease concerned would undermine the specific provisions in the Bill on fees, expenses and costs. It would also put the party able to rely on the lease terms at an advantage, as they could be more confident about investing money in their case, in the knowledge that the costs could ultimately be recovered from the other party. In addition, allowing this could potentially put the viability of the other party at risk, even when an arbitral award had been handed down in that other party’s favour.
I turn now to amendments 18 and 19. The Northern Ireland Department of Finance and Department for the Economy have requested the removal of the existing delegated power for them to make regulations for purposes corresponding to the purposes of the Bill, set out in clause 28. This decision was taken for several reasons, which include the availability of existing dispute resolution facilities, plus a lack of compelling evidence that rent debt in Northern Ireland is on a scale to require additional measures. The rationale for the policy in England and Wales remains strong, and this is where our evidence of rent arrears threatening jobs and business insolvency is focused. The removal of clause 28 necessitates an amendment to the Extent provision in clause 30(2), which currently refers to this provision.
Amendments 20 and 21 ensure that clause 24(4) extends to Northern Ireland in relation to company compromises and arrangements, but not company voluntary arrangements. That reflects the territorial extent of the Companies Act 2006 referred to in this provision.
I commend the amendments to the House.
Seema Malhotra
On the basis of the Minister’s comments, particularly those relating to ongoing review, and other comments relating to the amendments, I beg to ask leave to withdraw new clause 1.
Clause, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 2
“Rent” and “business tenancy”
Amendments made: 1, page 2, line 19, leave out sub-paragraph (ii) and insert—
(ii) which is a fixed amount or an amount that varies or may vary according to the relevant costs (or a combination of the two),”.
This amendment clarifies that the expression “service charge” includes any amount payable under the terms of a tenancy for something mentioned in clause 2(2)(c)(i), whether it is a fixed amount or a variable amount (or a combination of a fixed part and a variable part).
Amendment 2, page 2, line 22, leave out from “costs”” to “in” and insert
“includes costs incurred by the landlord in connection with insuring against loss of rent or”.
This amendment clarifies that the costs of insurance against loss of rent are within the expression “service charge”, in addition to insurance costs relating to the demised premises and any common parts.
Clause 10
Requirements for making a reference to arbitration
Amendment made: 3, page 8, line 12, at end insert
“(as well as to companies).”
This is a drafting amendment to make clear that clause 10(6) (which applies provisions of the clause to LLPs) operates in addition to the rest of the clause
Clause 19
Arbitration fees and expenses
Amendments made: 4, page 12, leave out lines 14 to 18 and insert
“(subject to subsection (5A)) also make an award requiring the other party to reimburse the applicant for half the arbitration fees paid under subsection (4).
‘(5A) The general rule in subsection (5) does not apply if the arbitrator considers it more appropriate in the circumstances of the case to award a different proportion (which may be zero).’”
This amendment clarifies that the rule in the current clause 19(5)(a) (that the party paying the arbitration fees is to be reimbursed half of the amount) is the general rule, although the arbitrator is able to determine a different proportion, including zero, where appropriate.
Amendment 5, page 12, line 19, leave out “Otherwise” and insert
“Except as provided by subsection (5) and section 20(6),”.
This corrects a small error in clause 19(6). The word “Otherwise” at the start of clause 19(6) currently refers back to clause 19(5), but it also needs to take account of the provisions of clause 20(6) which makes provision corresponding to clause 19(5) for oral hearing fees.
Amendment 6, page 12, line 19, at end insert —
“(6A) Legal or other costs incurred in connection with arbitration (including arbitration fees) are not recoverable by virtue of any term of the business tenancy concerned.”
The amendment clarifies that arbitration costs are not recoverable under a tenancy term enabling recovery of enforcement costs relating to a breach of covenant under the tenancy. The parties’ rights and obligations in relation to arbitration costs are governed by clauses 19 and 20.
Clause 20
Oral hearings
Amendment made: 7, page 12, leave out lines 36 to 40 and insert
“(subject to subsection (6A)) also make an award requiring the other party to reimburse the applicant for half the hearing fees.
‘(6A) The general rule in subsection (6) does not apply if the arbitrator considers it more appropriate in all the circumstances to award a different proportion (which may be zero).’”
This amendment clarifies that the rule in the current clause 20(6)(a) (that the party paying the oral hearing fees is to be reimbursed half of the amount) is the general rule, although the arbitrator is able to determine a different proportion, including zero, where appropriate.
Clause 24
Temporary restriction on initiating certain insolvency arrangements
Amendment made: 8, page 14, line 37, at end insert
“(as well as to companies).”
This is a drafting amendment to make clear that clause 24(4) (which applies provisions of the clause to LLPs) operates in addition to the rest of the clause.
Clause 28
Power to make corresponding provision in Northern Ireland
Amendment made: 18, page 15, line 33, leave out clause 28.
The responsible Northern Ireland minister has informed Her Majesty’s Government that the powers to be conferred by clause 28 are no longer needed. This amendment would omit the clause, which would otherwise require the approval of a Legislative Consent Motion in the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Clause 30
Extent, Commencement and Short Title
Amendments made: 19, page 16, leave out lines 14 and 15.
The reference in clause 30(2) to clause 28 is no longer correct if clause 28 is left out of the Bill. The rest of clause 30(2) (which provides that Part 4 of the Bill extends to the whole of the UK) is reproduced in Amendment 20, so the whole of clause 30(2) can be omitted.
Amendment 20, page 16, leave out lines 18 and 19 and insert—
“(a) in section 24—
(i) subsections (1), (2)(c) and (3), and
(ii) subsection (4) so far as relating to a compromise or arrangement under section 899 or 901F of the Companies Act 2006,
(b) Part 1 so far as relating to the provisions mentioned in paragraph (a), and
(c) this Part.”
This amendment and Amendment 21 secure that clause 24(4) extends to Northern Ireland in relation to company compromises and arrangements, but not company voluntary arrangements. This is for consistency with the extent of the legislation covering those matters.
Amendment 21, page 16, leave out line 21 and insert—
“(a) in section 24—
(i) subsection (2)(a), and
(ii) subsection (4) so far as relating to a company voluntary arrangement,”.—(Paul Scully.)
See the explanatory statement for Amendment 20.
Third Reading
Queen’s consent signified.
Paul Scully
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
It is a pleasure to lead the Bill on Third Reading. I thank Members on both sides of the House for their support and for the many insightful contributions we have had throughout the Bill’s passage—I say that slightly tongue in cheek, because the Bill has gone through in good time. That is because of the collaboration we have had and the understanding of the need to pass this legislation with good speed, but there has none the less been some really constructive scrutiny. I am especially grateful to the shadow Ministers, the hon. Members for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) and for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury), for their positive engagement throughout.
These debates, and indeed the continued challenges presented by the ongoing pandemic, have emphasised just how important it is that we continue to support tenant and landlord businesses in navigating the impacts of the pandemic. The Bill does that by facilitating the resolution of certain pandemic-related commercial rent debts and supports landlords and tenants on the road to recovery. It is a purposefully focused and narrow Bill, addressing rent debt accrued by businesses mandated to close if that rent debt is attributable to a protected period as set out in the Bill.
The Bill establishes a temporary binding arbitration scheme for such rent debt, which will be delivered by independent arbitral bodies. There has been welcome debate about the specifics of the scheme, especially around the fees, as well as about the ability of arbitrators to determine the viability of businesses. We will continue to assess the impact of the cost of arbitration on businesses, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, to ensure that the binding arbitration scheme is not prohibitively priced. Guidance will be published for arbitrators, with comprehensive input and engagement from arbitrators themselves. Arbitral bodies will be empowered to deliver the scheme with confidence.
Following agreement on Report, we have made some technical amendments to better achieve the aims of the scheme. Those minor changes include clarifying certain provisions, including the definition of “service charge”, but we have also made a more substantial amendment in removing the delegated power for Northern Ireland to introduce similar provisions to those in the Bill. That was done at the request of the Northern Ireland Executive. They initially looked at this and wanted to be included, but as they looked further they realised that sufficient provisions were already in place. However, we are grateful for their engagement on the Bill.
The outstanding commercial rent debt still poses a significant threat to commercial tenants and landlords in England and Wales. I welcome the recognition from both sides of the House of the need for the Bill.
I thank the Clerks of the House for expertly steering the legislation through the House. I also thank my private office—Rhianna Patel and Guy Brindle—and the officials who have worked on the Bill: Charles McCall, Carl Creswell, Jessica Barnaby, Radhika Sundaram, Hamza Shoaib, Geraldine Haden, Jane Chelliah-Manning, Matthew Beese, Henry Hutton, Louise Dobrin, Sarah Machen and Jahan Meeran.
This Bill demonstrates the Government’s commitment to supporting the orderly resolution of commercial rent debt accrued during the pandemic, and I am pleased to have supported its passage. On that basis, I commend it to the House,
Seema Malhotra
As we move on to Third Reading I would like to thank the Minister for his engagement with us and for meeting us outside the formal Committee and other stages of the Bill. I also thank the Whips on both sides, the civil servants, the Clerks of the House, all those who gave evidence, Parliamentary Private Secretaries and all colleagues who contributed to proceedings on the Bill.
Labour supports the Bill. Where we believe that it could be further improved we have laid out our arguments, and I hope that such debate will be helpful as the Bill is taken forward in the other place. Labour recognises the need for a fair arbitration system to deal with these difficult rent arrears. No otherwise viable business should face an overwhelming burden from rent arrears incurred as a result of a very difficult time during lockdown and through no fault of their own. Neither should those businesses feel that they are on their own without due arbitration, without a burden-sharing process and without a Government and a Parliament on their side. At the same time, we recognise that commercial landlords also need a clear and predictable mechanism through which to seek to recoup levels of rent arrears fairly, recognising the ability to pay as viable businesses navigate the ups and downs of our economic recovery.
Crucially, the guiding mechanism of any arbitration system must ultimately be fairness and must be in the long-term interests of British businesses and jobs. By ensuring that the arbitration process must aim to preserve viable businesses and do so fairly, while also preserving landlords’ solvency, the Bill offers a balanced arbitration process. As such we support it.
The timing of the Bill, however, was somewhat disappointing, because we called for action over rent debt and wider business costs earlier last summer, ahead of the end of restrictions; indeed, I met with UKHospitality, the British Beauty Council, the Federation of Small Businesses, the Night Time Industries Association and many others. The Minister will have had such meetings too, and heard of the huge ongoing burden that businesses were facing over rent payments; yet it seemed to take the Government months after we, and other stakeholders, made that call to produce the Bill and to set out the arbitration process for rent arrears. In that time, the covid pandemic continued to hit businesses hard, in sometimes predictable and sometimes unpredictable ways as new waves were coming through, particularly those on the frontline of our high streets and communities.
Rent debt remains a heavy burden for those businesses and their commercial landlords. Indeed, the Bill’s impact assessment notes that, according to the Treasury analysis, the total amount of deferred rent liabilities may be at around £9 billion by March 2022. It is likely that businesses and landlords could have been helped by the legislation being introduced a little earlier, but we move forward, and as the Bill moves forward the issues around affordability and accessibility should be further tested. The Minister alluded to that in his speech on Third Reading.
Businesses up and down the country have had a very tough Christmas period, despite the period of October to the new year being called the golden quarter for many hospitality and retail businesses, in which they hope enough revenue can be made, particularly in December, to make up for and steer through the fallow months of January and February. That period has been incredibly difficult this time around. UKHospitality found that the average hospitality venue lost over £10,000 in the weeks leading up to Christmas, with Christmas day takings down 60% compared with those in 2019. A December survey—the period between some of the stages of the Bill—by the Night Time Industries Association found that the outstanding business debt from their members was, on average, around over £200,000 per unit.
Businesses need help with their rent debt, but they will not be able to access it if the cost of arbitration in the Bill is too high. It is vital that the Government continue to listen to the views of Members of this House, and Ministers should ensure that arbitration fees are capped. It is also vital that all viable businesses can access the arbitration process, including those that no longer occupy their premises. I heard what the Minister said in relation to how the courts might interpret that in the context of the intentions behind the Bill, but that issue may well be raised further in the other place. The Government must ensure that there are enough arbitrators, as we have raised, to deal with all cases, and that the arbitration system works consistently and fairly.
We recognise that, as the scheme comes in over March and into April, businesses will also be hit by the hike in national insurance contributions, as well as the ongoing labour shortages, supply chain shortages, rising prices and rising inflation. It is why, in the context of business cost challenges, we continue to believe that the hike in national insurance contributions will be the wrong move at the wrong time. It will be right when viable businesses, we hope, start to recover, and when the arbitration process comes in and they are expected to repay any rent arrears. It is critical that any arbitration system that is created is administered within the context of a wider supportive environment for businesses. I hope that the Minister will keep that under review, and perhaps raise the issue with his Treasury colleagues.
Labour supports the Bill, which addresses a commercial issue on which we have called for action. It provides a fair system for helping landlords and tenants to find a solution to rent arrears under a binding arbitration system. Its measures must be kept under review so that the outcomes that it is intended to achieve are supported, and the process does not otherwise become one that loses the confidence of those it is there to support. On that basis, I wish colleagues in the other place every success in their ongoing scrutiny of the Bill as it moves forward.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.
Glue Traps (Offences) Bill (Money)
Queen’s recommendation signified.
Resolved,
That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Glue Traps (Offences) Bill, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of money provided by Parliament of:
any expenditure incurred under or by virtue of the Act by the Secretary of State or another public authority; and
any increase attributable to the Act in the sums payable under any other Act out of money so provided.—(Jo Churchill.)
Glue Traps (Offences) Bill (Ways and Means)
Resolved,
That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Glue Traps (Offences) Bill, it is expedient to authorise the charging of fees and other charges under the Act.—(Jo Churchill.)
Speaker’s Committee for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg)
I beg to move,
That, in pursuance of paragraph 2A of Schedule 3 of the Parliamentary Standards Act 2009, Ms Theresa Middleton CBE be appointed as a lay member of the Speaker’s Committee for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority for a period of five years from 27 January 2022 to 26 January 2027.
Schedule 3 to the Parliamentary Standards Act 2009, as amended by the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, provides that three lay members should be appointed to the Speaker’s Committee for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority. On 26 January 2022, Mr Shrinivas Honap’s term as a lay member of SCIPSA will come to an end. I would like to thank him very much for his very distinguished service, which he continues to this House as a lay member of the Commission.
When vacancies arise, the statute requires that members be selected by Mr Speaker through a process of open and fair competition. Therefore, in line with the statute, a process has been conducted on merit, and on the basis of fair and open competition, to find his replacement. Subject to the agreement of the House today, Ms Theresa Middleton CBE will become the new lay member of SCIPSA.
An explanatory memorandum is available to Members in the Vote Office. Hon. and right hon. Members will note that Ms Theresa Middleton is a recently retired director at Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, for which she had worked since 1999. She has extensive financial and programme management experience, particularly of large and complex transformation projects, having been director of a major HMRC tax transformation project.
The recruitment board felt that Ms Middleton’s experience, temperament and professionalism would make her an asset to SCIPSA, that she would be able to provide challenge with confidence, insight and authority and that her experience and expertise would complement the skills and qualities of the existing lay members. Subject to the agreement of the House today, we wish Ms Middleton well in this role, and I commend the motion to the House.
Thangam Debbonaire (Bristol West) (Lab)
I rise briefly to support the motion. As the Leader of the House has outlined, there has been a fair and rigorous process. It has been done entirely in accordance with statute. I just wish to add for the record our thanks on behalf of the Commission and the House to the board members who conducted the recruitment competition, chaired by Clerk Assistant Sarah Davies. We thank our former colleague, Sir David Crausby, Diana DeCoteau, head of reward and employee engagement, and Isabel Doverty, independent panel member. I know that a fair and rigorous recruitment process takes time, thought and effort, and I wish to add for the record our thanks to them. I look forward to working with Ms Middleton soon on SCIPSA.
Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)
I echo what has been said and offer my thanks to those involved in the recruitment process and to those who have given their service. I also pass on our best wishes to Ms Middleton, who seems to be an eminently suitable appointee for the role.
Richard Thomson
I had just finished, but I will find something else to say.
John Spellar
I thank the hon. Member for giving way. I have no knowledge of or animus towards the individual concerned, but once again it is the great and the good. She is someone who has just recently retired from HMRC. How cosy that they all slot into these positions. It is never truck drivers who are keeping the country going, or nursing sisters who are keeping the health service going, or those from a whole range of occupations—it is always out of the quangocrats and retired civil servants. I would hope that the Scottish National party and our own Front Benchers would be saying, “We need a broader range of people in public appointments, and not just the same merry-go-round of the great and the good”—however good they may be, and who knows whether they are great.
Richard Thomson
I feel like I have been given an unexpected opportunity to hold court, which I shall not take. Nevertheless, the right hon. Gentleman is correct: we are very much of a bias towards the good, rather than the great, and it is perhaps unfair to load all those concerns on to this particular appointment. I am sure the Leader of the House will have plenty to say in response to that. All public appointments, in our opinion, should be drawn from the truest possible breadth and depth of the talent that is available.
Question put and agreed to.
Business without Debate
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Delegated Legislation
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
With the leave of the House we shall take motions 7 and 8 together.
Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 118(6)),
Civil Aviation
That the draft Transport Act 2000 (Air Traffic Services Licence Modification Appeals) (Prescribed Aerodromes) Regulations 2022, which were laid before this House on 15 November 2021, be approved.
Enterprise
That the draft Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Act 2015 and Pubs Code etc. (Amendment) Regulations 2021, which were laid before this House on 30 November 2021, be approved.—(Andrea Jenkyns.)
Question agreed to.
Adjournment
Resolved, That this House do now adjourn.—(Andrea Jenkyns.)
Draft Air Traffic Management and Unmanned Aircraft Act 2021 (Airspace Change Directions) (Determination of Turnover for Penalties) Regulations 2022
(2 years, 3 months ago)
General CommitteesRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chair
Before we begin, I encourage Members to wear masks when not speaking. This is in line with current Government guidance and that of the House of Commons Commission. Please give each other and members of staff space when seated and when entering and leaving the room. Members should send their speaking notes by email to hansardnotes@parliament.uk. Similarly, officials in the Gallery should communicate electronically with Ministers.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Air Traffic Management and Unmanned Aircraft Act 2021 (Airspace Change Directions) (Determination of Turnover for Penalties) Regulations 2022.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Rees. These regulations have a snappy title, if ever there was one. They are made under the powers conferred by the Air Traffic Management and Unmanned Aircraft Act 2021, which, for ease, I will refer to as the ATMUA Act.
The regulations are about airspace, which must be managed so that it can be used safely and efficiently. British airspace has not had substantial changes since the ’50s and is an ongoing programme of work. Airspace changes can include proposals to, for example, amend airport flightpaths at lower levels, change the classification of particular airspace or alter flightpaths at higher altitudes.
In 2018, the Civil Aviation Authority published its airspace modernisation strategy, which sets out the ends, ways and means of modernising airspace. The CAA is currently consulting on a review and refresh for that strategy. The consultation opened on 10 January 2022, and I encourage all Members with an interest to contribute. The programme of airspace modernisation is under way and includes the wholesale redesign of the UK’s airspace to unlock the benefits of modernisation, which will help to make journeys more environmentally friendly. It will also increase capacity, manage noise impacts, increase resilience and improve access for other airspace users.
The regulations are necessary because airspace change usually relies on individual sponsors. That might be an airport or another sponsor, such as an air navigation service provider, or ANSP. Airspace change relies on individual sponsors bringing forward their own proposals and choosing if, when and how to progress on airspace changes. Before the passing of the ATMUA Act, if an airport or ANSP declined to participate in an airspace change proposal, neither the Department nor the Civil Aviation Authority had any means to ensure co-operation and co-ordination between different airports and airspaces. That meant that one airport or ANSP could hold up progress for everybody, so the modernisation programme, and the benefits to which I have alluded, would be delayed.
Happily, these regulations give the Secretary of State powers—in practice, delegated to the CAA—under sections 2 and 3 of the ATMUA Act to direct a person who is involved in airspace change, who is usually someone corporate, to progress or co-operate in an airspace change proposal, where doing so assists with progressing the CAA’s airspace modernisation strategy.
Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)
Are there any circumstances where the refusal to follow an enforcement order could put lives at risk?
Robert Courts
That is an interesting question. I think my right hon. Friend is asking whether there is likely to be a safety impact from the refusal of an airspace provider to follow a direction. It is conceivable, but the more likely risk would be to efficiency. Our airspace has not really been amended since the 1950s, when we were dealing with very different types of aircraft in the airspace system from those that we have now. That means that we get issues such as stacking, which leads to wasted fuel. This measure provides an environmental and cost benefit. It is more about that efficiency than safety, although clearly any airspace issue conceivably has a safety impact. My right hon. Friend makes a good point.
The powers that the ATMUA Act gives to the CAA will help to deliver the advantages that I referred to: quicker, quieter and cleaner journeys, and potentially more capacity to make use of our motorways in the sky. If the directed party does not comply with a direction, the CAA can issue it with a contravention notice, which may be followed by an enforcement order. I stress that that is not the first port of call, which would of course be guidance and working closely together. The Secretary of State would first have to consider that it is a strategically important part of the airspace work. There would be guidance, a request for co-operation and directions given together. Next would be a contravention notice, and then finally an enforcement order.
If that enforcement order is contravened, there is the power to impose a financial penalty consisting of a fixed amount, not exceeding 10% of the person’s turnover and/or a daily amount not exceeding 0.1% of the person’s turnover. That is laid out in the ATMUA Act. These regulations set out how a person’s turnover is to be determined, so that there is certainty for everybody. The regulations are intended to deal with the wide variety of persons and the different kinds of bodies involved in airspace change—for the most part, that means corporate persons. There has to be an appropriate level of penalty for non-compliance to ensure that it is both proportionate and transparent.
Under regulations 2 and 3, turnover is limited to the sum of all amounts received in the course of a person’s business and excludes capital receipts and loans made by a third party. Only one year of turnover is used in the calculation, and where the most recent available turnover does not equal 12 months, turnover is calculated on a pro rata basis. It is transparent, proportionate and intended to ensure that the person has the correct amount for the enforcement order. The regulations apply to England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. They are intended to ensure that we have effective and proportionate management of the CAA and the airspace modernisation programme risk. I commend the regulations to the Committee.
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Rees. I note that I am beginning to see more of the Minister in these Committee Rooms than I actually see my wife! I will try to make amends for that in the next few days. I mean no offence to the Minister. As much as we all like him, we are back here again in Committee debating a statutory instrument; I am almost getting déjà vu.
The CAA regulates the UK’s aviation sector. Its primary duty is to maintain a high standard of safety in the provision of air traffic services. That is, of course, something that we are keen to maintain. The regulations set the formula for working out what penalty should be paid by any airport operator, any air navigation service provider or any other person or body concerned with functions engaged with air navigation. I welcome them, but wish to put on record that over the past two years the aviation industry has been desperate to understand the formula used to work out what is in store for it. I appreciate that it is an ever-changing landscape—or airscape—but the impact on the sector has been huge, and I ask the Minister to consider that going forward.
The ATMUA Act gives the Minister powers to direct those concerned with air navigation to co-operate with the airspace modernisation programme. That is really important. As I have often said, we have an analogue airspace in a digital age, and it is vital that we modernise it to ensure that it is fit for the modern age. Doing so will add a sense of confidence to the aviation sector as it comes out of the pandemic and the problems it has had for the last two years.
The Minister is right to say that this issue is about not just safety, but the environment as well. I grew up under the flightpath of Manchester airport in Wythenshawe in my constituency. I remember in the ’70s and the 80’s the BAC One-Elevens, the Tridents and the Concordes. I even saw the space shuttle do a low pass on a jumbo jet. We could not hear ourselves think. Fortunately, in this country we have an industry—with Rolls-Royce and all the other providers—that has improved our aircraft to the nth degree to make them of lower emissions and lower noise. We have to keep that going. We are the third-largest aviation sector on the planet, and we need to keep that up.
Previously, one single airport declining to take part in the programme could delay the whole programme, meaning that others in the sector could not benefit from the opportunities afforded by the scheme. The powers afforded under this statutory instrument would enable the Secretary of State to direct co-operation or eventually impose financial penalties, which I am pleased to see are proportionate to the turnover from the previous year of the business concerned. As I have previously said, income and turnover have been much lower than average due to the pandemic, so it is right to apply this formula. I am also pleased that financial penalties will be a last resort. Let us do this by carrot, rather than stick.
I note that rather than a full consultation there has been an agreement on the wider policy framework. I am keen to be kept up to date with reviews on the monitoring of these new powers and penalties. The Opposition are happy to support the regulations.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
Apologies, Ms Rees, for missing the start of the Minister’s speech. I will not detain the Committee too long. The Minister knows how strong my views on airspace modernisation are, because I have challenged the Government on issues such as the fact that the Airspace Change Organising Group is not on the Jet Zero Council. I agree with many of the remarks of the Labour Front-Bench spokesperson, the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East. This is a proportionate measure, so we will not be opposing it.
My only question is on the 10% of turnover. Turnover at the moment is being used to pay off debt for a lot of these airports. Will there be further, bridging support for these companies over the next two to three years?
Robert Courts
I thank hon. Members for their points. I am particularly grateful to the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East for having placed this debate in its historic context. He is right that we are on a scale of aviation history here. He referred to some of the iconic aircraft of the past; he is right to draw attention to the fact that the average aircraft flying today may look similar to what was flying around when he and I were younger, but they are approximately twice as efficient and half as polluting, and that progress is continuing.
The airspace work that we are doing is critical. I know that the hon. Members for Wythenshawe and Sale East and for Paisley and Renfrewshire North both feel strongly about it, and they are right to. The transition from an analogue to a digital airspace age, as the hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East rightly put it, is a critical part of bringing our aviation industry into the 21st century. There are many reasons why we need to do this: efficiency, the environment and noise levels. It is important that we remember the historic context in which we are operating.
The hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East asks me to be aware of the effect that the last couple of very difficult years have had on the sector. I am acutely aware of how difficult it has been, as are the Government, which is why I was keen to say that these penalties will be used as a last resort. There are many other steps that we would go through before, but it is right that we have penalties to use if need be.
The Government have recently provided £5.5 million of support to the future airspace implementation plan to help bring the process along. We will continue to work with the sector to see what support might be required and how we can best help. The hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East asks if he can be kept in the loop. I am, of course, happy to involve him and all hon. Members in progress on airspace.
I agree with the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire North that airspace modernisation is critical. He asks me to consider what the aviation industry may need. I refer again to the future airspace implementation plan money that we have already provided. In the last week, we have changed some of the travel rules, and that will help to get the aviation industry flying again, which is exactly what we all want. It will lead us to better times ahead. I will, of course, continue to monitor this programme and the sector as a whole. If we can help, we will endeavour to do so.
Question put and agreed to.
Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Bill
Wednesday 12th January 2022
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Act 2022 View all Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Act 2022 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chair
Before we begin, I remind Members that they are expected to wear a face covering and to maintain distancing as far as possible. I remind everyone that the House asks that they have a lateral flow test each day before coming on to the estate. Please switch electronic devices to silent. Hansard colleagues would be grateful if Members emailed their speaking notes to hansardnotes@parliament.uk.
Today’s selection and grouping is available online and in the room. No amendments have been tabled. We will have a single debate covering all nine clauses and the schedule.
Clause 1
Marriage: increase of minimum age to 18
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill
The Chair
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Clauses 2 to 9 stand part.
That the schedule be the Schedule to the Bill.
Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)
It is an absolute pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir George, and to bring the Bill through Committee. I have been working on it for more than four years, so it is good to be at this stage with Government and cross-party support. This is a groundbreaking piece of legislation that will affect millions of young people over time. I am delighted to be at this stage.
I will deal with clauses 1 to 9 and the schedule together. The provisions end child marriage in England and Wales. They do so first by removing the ability of parents or a court to consent to 16 or 17-year-olds entering into a marriage or civil partnership. Secondly, they extend existing forced marriage legislation by making it a criminal offence to arrange the marriage of an under-18 even if violence, threats or another form of coercion are not used. Those provisions are targeted at unofficial, non-binding marriages that are beyond the reach of the change to the legal age of marriage. Together, the changes will end child marriage in this country.
The number of people marrying legally in England and Wales at 16 or 17 is small and continues to decline. Of nearly 235,000 marriages in 2018, only 134 involved one or both persons aged 16 or 17. Despite the low numbers, there remains undeniable concern that our law should not allow children to enter marriage under any circumstances. Research has shown that child marriage is often associated with leaving education early, limited career and vocational opportunities, serious physical and mental health problems, developmental difficulties for the children born to young mothers and an increased risk of domestic abuse.
On Second Reading, I set out some of the harrowing and inspiring stories of child marriage that have been shared with me since I began this project. In particular, the story of Payzee Mahmod, who was subject to child marriage in this country, is a powerful reminder that overall statistics are not the most important metric in this discussion. Every single child matters and ought to receive our protection. Protecting children is our obligation and our priority. The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child recommends that there be no legal way for anyone to marry before they turn 18, even with parental consent.
The fact that it is possible to marry at 16 sets the wrong example, both at home and abroad; having laws that enable child marriage weakens our voice in discussions with other countries and damages efforts to end child marriage globally. This is an area where we should lead by example, and the Bill will enable us to do that.
Setting the age of marriage at 16 was a decision made in 1929, when life was very, very different. Children often went to work at 14, as my mother did, and life expectancy was 20 years lower. Now, children in England must remain in education or training until they are 18, and couples are choosing to marry much later. We must celebrate the improvements we have made to quality of life and ensure that our laws align with that.
Increasing the minimum age of marriage to 18 is a necessary condition for ending child marriage in this country, but not a sufficient one. It will ensure that legal marriages cannot happen before the parties turn 18, but it can do nothing about those marriages enacted in traditional and some religious settings that are not recognised by the law of England and Wales, but are regarded just as much as a marriage by the parties, their families and their communities. Those marriages can have all the disadvantages for the children involved that legal ones do, and arguably more; not only can the parties be under the age of 16, but they fail to benefit from the legal protections inherent in marriage law.
In 2020, the Government’s Forced Marriage Unit provided advice and support in 113 cases involving the actual or potential marriage of a child aged 15 or under. The charities I work with have supported girls as young as seven who have been married in religious or cultural ceremonies in the UK. The Bill therefore extends the offence of forced marriage to cover all attempts to make a child under the age of 18 enter into a marriage, whether or not that marriage would be legally binding.
The offence as it stands covers cases where a parent or other third party uses violence, threats or another form of coercion to cause a child to enter into a marriage. It does not cover situations where a parent or other third party causes a child to enter into a marriage if coercion is not used. The Bill closes that loophole by making it an offence to cause an under-18 to enter into a marriage in any circumstances.
The distinction between the marriage of a child that involves coercion and one that does not is often false. Children may not realise that they have a choice as to their marriage partner. They may not realise that they can resist, or they may be too afraid to do so. In such cases, the parent would have no need to use coercion. This is not just a theoretical gap; we have heard from the Forced Marriage Unit, the police and charities of cases where marriages have been arranged for children who are in this position. Ultimately, children can be put in the impossible position of either “consenting” to a child marriage, or testifying against their parents. That is why it is so crucial that we automatically categorise any marriage involving a child as a forced marriage—to close this loophole and ensure that all children are protected from all forms of marriage.
Having given that background, I turn to the clauses. Clause 1 increases the minimum age of marriage in England and Wales to 18. It amends the Marriage Act 1949 so that a marriage solemnised where one party is under the age of 18 is void. It also removes all provision for 16 to 17-year-olds to marry with parental or judicial consent. It applies both to civil ceremonies and religious ceremonies that take place in registered religious buildings such as churches and mosques. The clause does not make specific provisions relating to marriages that take place abroad. However, it is anticipated that, following the changes made by the Bill, the common law in England and Wales will not recognise marriages that take place abroad involving under-18s where either party is domiciled in England and Wales.
The Bill will not change the age of marriage in Scotland or Northern Ireland, as marriage is a devolved matter. Therefore, the age of marriage will remain 16 in Scotland, and 16 in Northern Ireland with parental or judicial consent, although I believe that Scotland is looking at moving the age to 18 and Northern Ireland is considering it by consulting.
Clause 2 expands existing forced marriage legislation to ensure that it is always illegal to arrange the marriage of a child, even where no force or coercion is used. Subsection (2) amends section 121 of the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, “Offence of forced marriage”, by inserting a proposed new subsection (2A) which would criminalise any conduct that is for the purpose of causing a child to enter into a marriage before their 18th birthday.
Clause 2(3) would amend section 121(3), under which, as it stands, it is an offence to deceive someone into leaving the UK so as to force them into marriage. The clause would expand the scope of that offence to encompass the new, non-coercive behaviour in proposed new subsection (2A). It would therefore be an offence to deceive a child into leaving the UK for the purpose of causing them to marry, even when no actual coercion was involved upon the child’s arrival in the foreign country.
Clause 2(4) would insert proposed new subsection (5A) into the 2014 Act to clarify that “child” means a person under the age of 18. Subsection (5) would extend section 121(6). Subsection (6) of that existing section provides that the offence of forced marriage is committed even if the perpetrator uses coercive behaviour against someone other than the person whom they intend to force into marriage. Clause 2 would provide that that applies equally to the new, non-coercive behaviour under proposed new subsection (2A).
Clause 2(7) would insert proposed new subsection (7A), which would exclude from the new offence conduct that causes 16 and 17-year-olds to enter into a marriage in Northern Ireland or Scotland. That reflects the fact that in Scotland it remains possible for 16 and 17-year-olds to marry in all circumstances, and in Northern Ireland if their parents or a court consent.
Aside from the Scotland and Northern Ireland exemption I have just set out, clause 2 would inherit the existing provisions of the forced marriage offence in terms of definition of marriage, territorial scope and sentencing. The offence therefore applies to any religious or civil ceremony of marriage, whether or not it is legally binding, and carries a maximum sentence of seven years.
Clauses 3 and 4 are both concerned with amendments to the Civil Partnership Act 2004.
Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on this important Bill. I welcome her to the club of someone who will have a private Member’s Act amending the Marriage Act 1949.
May I ask for two points of clarification? I am pleased that she has applied the measure to non-formal religious marriages. First, will she clarify whether the marriage of someone of 15 or 16 in Scotland or Northern Ireland who gets married without coercion, but with the approval of parents, will be recognised in England and Wales? Secondly, given this important legislation, does she now think that there are other areas of this whole grey area of what constitutes a child—16 or 17, up to 18 —that the Government need to look at as well?
Mrs Latham
The answer to the first question is yes, such a marriage would be recognised, because it took place in part of the United Kingdom, and the law is devolved. The answer to the second question is yes, I think that the Government need to look at everything to do with a child’s rights up to the age of 18. Perhaps the Minister will take that back to Government for them to look at all sorts of things that happen at all sorts of different ages, so that we know where children can and cannot do things. I think that would make it much simpler. I am sure that my hon. Friend will be pleased to know that the measures affect the Civil Partnership Act 2004, too, so the effect on heterosexual marriages and civil partnerships will be equal, which is really important.
Clause 3 increases the minimum age of civil partnerships to 18 in England and Wales, and it amends the 2004 Act so that 16 and 17-year-olds are no longer eligible to enter a civil partnership. It also removes all provisions for 16 and 17-year-olds to enter a civil partnership with parental consent.
Clause 4 amends the Civil Partnership Act so that where two people register as civil partners in Scotland or Northern Ireland, the partnership will be void if at the time of registration either of the two people were domiciled in England and Wales and if either was under 18. The clause also provides that if two people convert their marriage into a civil partnership under Northern Irish regulations, it will be void if either of the two people were domiciled in England and Wales and if either was under 18 when the marriage was solemnised. I think I was unclear with my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham. Two under-18s who live in Scotland can still be married, and the marriage would be recognised in this country, but if either of them is domiciled in England, the marriage would not be recognised.
Finally, clause 4 also contains the only amendments in the Bill that extend to Scotland and Northern Ireland, and it therefore forms part of the law of Scotland and Northern Ireland. It amends section 217 of the Civil Partnership Act so that where a person domiciled in England and Wales registers an overseas relationship, that relationship will not be treated as a civil partnership if either party was under 18.
Clause 5 gives effect to the schedule, which makes minor and consequential amendments to existing legislation. The amendments that are set out in the schedule are required as a result of the changes to the law made by clauses 1 to 4. The amendments, which affect the Marriage Act 1949, the Marriage (Registrar General’s Licence) Act 1970, the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 and the Civil Partnership Act 2004, repeal and amend provisions relating to marriage and civil partnership of under-18s, which are no longer necessary or appropriate.
Clause 5 also gives the Secretary of State a power, by regulation, to make further consequential amendments. Regulations made under the clause may include transitional or saving provisions, and may amend, repeal or revoke secondary and primary legislation, which, for these purposes, includes the legislation of the devolved Administrations. The Ministry of Justice and the Home Office believe it necessary to take such a power to avoid any implementation difficulties or legislative inconsistencies—beyond those addressed in the schedule—that may otherwise arise. Amendments to primary legislation in the exercise of that power will be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure. Amendments to secondary legislation will be subject to the negative procedure.
Clause 6 sets out the territorial extent of the Bill. The Bill extends to England and Wales only except for clause 4(3) and clauses 5 to 9, which also extend to Scotland and Northern Ireland. The substantive changes made by clauses 1 to 4 relate to the legal age of marriage and civil partnership in England and Wales only. However, as I have mentioned, one amendment that extends to Scotland and Northern Ireland is required. It relates to the recognition of an overseas relationship where one of the parties was domiciled in England and Wales when the overseas relationship was registered.
Subsection 6(2) provides that clause 5 relating to the power to make consequential amendments, clause 6 itself, clause 7 on commencement, clause 8 on saving provision and clause 9 containing the short title all form part of the law of the United Kingdom.
The matters to which the provisions of the Bill relate are not within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Parliament or the Northern Ireland Assembly, and no legislative consent motion is being sought in relation to any provision of the Bill. If there are amendments relating to matters within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament, or the Northern Ireland Assembly, the consent of the relevant devolved legislatures will be sought. Marriage law is not a devolved matter for the Welsh Parliament.
Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir George. I am so pleased that the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire has campaigned with such tenacity on this issue. She has had knocks from every side, but she has kept on going because she knows that it is the right thing to do. I am in awe that she has got the Bill to this point, and all power to her. I would also like to thank the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation, Karma Nirvana and the Girls Not Brides campaign for their ongoing work to help victims and put an end to child marriage.
This is a big problem. Internationally, 12 million girls are married before the age of 18 each year. That is 23 girls every minute. The UK signed up to the UN definition of a child being someone up to the age of 18, but child marriage is still prevalent in this country. Currently our laws allow for a legal marriage to take place from age 16 with parental consent. However, Karma Nirvana’s executive director, Natasha Rattu, says that in her experience many children are pressured into these marriages by family members. Last year, over a quarter—199—of the 753 cases dealt with by the UK’s forced marriage unit were of children under 18, and 113 of those forced marriages were of children under 15.
It is often difficult to apply the parameters of forced marriage to child marriage. Child marriage violates girls’ rights to health, education and opportunity. Girls are highly likely to experience sexual and domestic violence in a child marriage and they often struggle to find a way out. If the UK wants to be a global leader on women and girls’ rights, we must begin by banishing this horrendous practice from our own communities once and for all. Between 2007 and 2017, 3,096 marriages involving children aged 16 and 17 were legally registered in England and Wales, according to the Office for National Statistics. However, we must also discuss the importance of tackling unregistered child marriages. That is why I am so supportive of this Bill.
In the last year, Karma Nirvana has offered support in 76 cases of child marriage. Only 5% of those were registered and an overwhelming 95%—72 out of 76—were non-registered and religious marriages. These marriages are never reported, which presents a really significant barrier to protection and safeguarding. It is so important that this Bill covers any marriage involving a child who lives in England and Wales, or who is a UK national—here is the crux of it—even if the marriage does not take place in this country. It also covers those who officiate the marriage, so no more turning a blind eye with this Bill.
For years I have worked to try to improve safeguarding for all children, both nationally and internationally, which is why I am delighted that this Bill will provide a huge step forward in preventing child abuse. I am proud that England and Wales will soon be able to set an example for other countries to follow—I urge the rest of the UK to do the same.
Internationally, there is still a long way to go but there is some progress. In the USA, for example, in 2017 all 50 states allowed minors to marry in some cases. Since 2018, six states have banned all marriages before 18, but most states allow teens to marry at 16 or 17 if parents and a judge consent. Nine states still have no minimum age for marriage at all. We need to ensure that more protections are in place and that the general public are aware of the laws, so that victims of child marriage can be identified and supported, and I thank the hon. Member for Mid Derbyshire so much for the work she is doing to make that a reality.
Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir George. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire on getting the Bill to this stage. It is a landmark piece of legislation and a very important Bill.
I will focus my comments specifically on legal marriage. One of the reasons why my hon. Friend’s Bill is so important is that the current legal position on consent to marry is, at best, bizarre and contradictory, and at worst, an historical anachronism. I will lay out why that is, in relation to the operation of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and how it applies to children in this situation. As well as implementing my hon. Friend’s Bill, we really need to take forward how that Act operates.
Looking at adults, the law on consent is codified in the Mental Capacity Act 2005, which lays out what criteria one needs to show in order to demonstrate that one has the decision-making capacity to make a decision. Marriage is one of the decisions that falls within scope, along with decisions to do with sexual relations and medical treatment. There are two types of adults in this world: those with decision-making capacity for a specific decision, and those without. When capacity is lacking and a decision and action has to be taken, the clinician or whoever is involved has to assess the decision-making capacity and then make a decision in someone’s best interests. There are provisions for what is effectively proxy decision making—such as lasting power of attorney, and some situations where people take part in clinical research—but even then the person making those decisions has to act in the person’s best interests.
In general, if someone is lacking capacity and a decision needs to be made, the person acting on behalf of an individual has to make a decision in their best interests, so a best interests framework operates. However, the Mental Capacity Act 2005 states that some decisions are far too personal for someone to make a decision on behalf of someone else in their best interests. I realise that I am going into a technical wonderland of best interests, but a good example is found in medicine. Let us say that someone has been hit by a car and is unconscious. When they come to hospital, the doctors need the powers to treat them. In the context of someone who is unconscious, it is not possible to assess their decision-making capacity, so a decision has to be made in their best interests. Problems arise when there are more complicated decisions and when people are awake, conscious and able to contribute to discussions.
The Mental Capacity Act excludes a certain set of decisions. Where people lack capacity, others can make decisions on their behalf—adoption and marriage are a couple of examples. Of course, parents are able to make a range of very personal choices and decisions for their children, particularly around medical treatment, but even in medicine there are limits on how much parents can consent. When children are detained under the Mental Health Act 1983, there are certain medical interventions for which parental consent alone cannot be relied on, because it is deemed to be too personal and too complex. Electroconvulsive therapy treatment is one of them, and I believe that in the context of serious interventions for children with long-lasting consequences, there are situations where clinicians may want to go to court to get extra back-up and reinforcement because of the nature of the decision.
We have a weird dichotomy, because the Mental Capacity Act states that if an adult lacks capacity, there are decisions that no one can make on their behalf, with marriage and adoption being two examples. However, if someone is a child between the age of 16 and 18— admittedly with decision-making capacity—parental consent can be used to enter into a contract such as marriage. I think that is completely bizarre and it needs to be changed.
Marriage is a big decision, and one that we expect to be a long and lasting decision. Of course, it is not an irreversible decision because of the divorce laws that we have, but I do not think there is a situation so pressing as to not allow a decision to enter into marriage to be delayed until the age of 18. I realise that is not necessarily an uncontroversial point of view—people have different views on it, such as those with strong religious beliefs—but fundamentally I think it is absolutely right that we move marriage to the age of 18. That is because the backdrop to this is a recognition that we see people under the age of 18—children—as inherently vulnerable. Although someone between the ages of 16 and 18 may have decision-making capacity, they are still not necessarily fully mature. They are still potentially more vulnerable than an adult, and we include in our law legal gatekeepers, the thresholds that we determine one must pass to become an adult. The Bill is very important in exemplifying that a child, even someone with full decision-making capacity at the age of 16 or 17, is still someone whose potential vulnerability we have concerns about, and has not moved into adulthood.
Sarah Champion
I agree with the arguments that the hon. Gentleman is making, but for me this is also about the fact that the state has a legal, mandatory duty to take care of someone under the age of 18. It is reneging on its duties unless this Bill is enacted.
Dr Spencer
I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention, and I see where she is going with her mention of the duty. As always, we will get into a bit of a debate over the duties of the state to protect the most vulnerable in our society, under-18s. One could fiddle around with this, and we could start getting into debates about the right to personal freedoms under article 8(2) of the European convention on human rights, but she has made a strong point.
The hon. Lady has helped me to move on to my more substantial point in this debate, because although children are of course vulnerable and the state has a legal duty to protect them, there is another range of people who are quite vulnerable and who this Bill does not cover: those who have marginal decision-making capacity to consent to marriage. I have done lots of decision-making capacity assessments in my career as a doctor and as a subject of my previous academic research. I admit that I have never made an assessment of capacity to marry, but in general, while the decision about whether somebody has decision-making capacity is very binary—yes or no—there are people whose assessments lie somewhere in the middle, and whose situation is unclear and complicated. Those assessments go to the courts for determination, and there are people with a range of mental conditions, such as learning disabilities and cognitive impairment, whose capacity to consent to marriage may be marginal and may be queried, and about whom determinations need to be made.
Although the broad criteria for assessing decision-making capacity for marriage are codified in the Mental Capacity Act 2005, there was originally a common law test, and following that Act the courts have continued to interpret it and apply common law tests for marriage. The test that has been used has evolved over the past 20 to 30 years, and it interacts quite tightly with the common law test for capacity to consent to sexual relations, because judges, rightly or wrongly, have looked at those two as being quite closely associated. In previous cases that have gone to the courts, it has been said that the capacity to consent to sex has to be a lower threshold than the capacity to consent to marry, because by definition if a person marries they have to consummate the marriage. Those are not my words, and they are not necessarily my views, but they are how the courts have applied those two common law tests of capacity.
Our judiciary is absolutely fantastic. It is great that we have it, and those judges do fantastic work in applying the capacity test to complex situations, but nevertheless those tests have evolved over the past 20 or 30 years, importing societal values and mores into them. While we are making clear decisions about what we define as childhood and adulthood, there are some very broad-brush legal proceedings in terms of children.
Tim Loughton
My hon. Friend is making some good points about this subject, about which he might like to introduce a private Member’s Bill. We are dealing only with the chronological definition of children, but there is a real problem. We know about the low rape convictions in this country—I apologise that I have to leave this Committee to go to the Home Affairs Committee, which is looking into this matter at the moment—but they are just the cases that come forward. Those who do not have capacity come forward to declare that they have been the victim of sexual offences even less often.
I have tried to allude to the definition of children, their rights and the responsibilities of adults towards them, but this whole area needs to be cleared up. Even if my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge is not lucky enough to be chosen in the private Members’ Bill ballot, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire and I have been in the past, I am sure the Home Office Minister here today will take away these important matters and come back with Government-backed legislation, in due course.
Dr Spencer
I thank my hon. Friend for that brilliant intervention. It was prescient, as I was about the say that there is an even bigger problem in the interaction between civil cases, about people who lack capacity to consent to sex, and criminal cases. That will be difficult to deal with, but we need to do that. There are different thresholds, and it is unclear how civil and criminal cases interact.
There is also the situation where one of the partners in a marriage loses capacity to consent to sex, but sexual relations continue. How do we, as a society, want to think about that? I am sure everyone has deeply held personal opinions on this, but I have heard what I think are awful stories—for example, a person in a couple developed dementia and lost the capacity to consent to sex, but the couple continued to have sexual relations. Social services got involved and it all got pretty horrible. These are big issues.
The last thing I want to do, however, is to hold up the Committee or prevent the Bill from making progress; that is why I declined proposing putting anything in the Bill, but I hope that the Minister has heard the points made, and that we can get something moving, using the Bill as a springboard to the next step in helping people in such situations.
Peter Gibson (Darlington) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir George. I will keep my remarks brief, so we can get on.
I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire; I echo the remarks of the hon. Member for Rotherham on that point. My hon. Friend has expertly guided this vital piece of legislation through Second Reading and Committee. From my experience, I know how rewarding yet challenging this process can be. I congratulate her on reaching this stage.
More must be done to address the practice of child marriage in England and Wales. Official figures for 2017 show that in that year, 183 individuals entered marriage at age 16 or 17. We know, however, that the recorded data do not accurately reflect the number of children marrying in religious and customary ceremonies. I welcome the measures in the Bill to address that. I wholeheartedly support the Bill’s intention of raising the minimum legal age for marriage and civil partnership to 18, and making it illegal for persons to arrange the marriage of a person under that age. I am pleased to be in Committee to support my hon. Friend’s Bill as it progresses. I look forward to it completing its remaining stages.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Tom Pursglove)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir George.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire has, as ever, eloquently set out her case in support of the Bill, an important change that she has championed, as has the hon. Member for Rotherham. I do not propose to detain the Committee for long, but I wanted to place on the record all the work that my hon. Friend has done in this space. With that, on behalf of the Government, I very much commend the clauses to the Committee.
Mrs Latham
Thank you for allowing me a few more words, Sir George.
I place on the record my thanks to everyone who has helped me get the Bill to this stage, including the charities that we have been working with, which the hon. Member for Rotherham mentioned: Karma Nirvana, which has been amazingly supportive; IKWRO; Girls Not Brides; and others. In particular, the story of inspirational Payzee Mahmod made me determined not to give up trying to get the Bill through, and to keep being a pain in the neck for Ministers and civil servants until I got to this stage. I thank those people in particular because they have worked so hard with me.
I also thank Committee members, who have given their time to support the Bill. Private Members’ Bills do not always have support from across the House, but this one does. I commend my colleagues on the International Development Committee, who have been so supportive, particularly our Chair. I really commend my office staff, who have worked tirelessly to support me, and did the research to get us to where we are today. I also thank the Clerks, and the staff who work for the Department and for Parliament. Without their support, we could not have got here.
I thank the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), who has been working tirelessly with the Minister to get us to this stage, and to make sure that we dotted the i’s and crossed the t’s. I thank the Minister for his support, because without it we could never have got to this point.
I feel very privileged to be here today, having just recovered from covid. It was touch and go on whether I would be able to make the Committee, so I am delighted to be here, fit and well. I hope that the Bill will travel through the House of Lords and come back very quickly, and that we get Royal Assent before Easter. If we do, this really important piece of legislation will have been passed relatively quickly. Thanks, everybody. I thank our Chairman, Sir George Howarth, very much for his chairmanship. I am delighted that we have got to this stage
The Chair
I congratulate the hon. Lady. Very few Members of Parliament get a piece of legislation through in their name. Quite aside from the importance of the issue that the Bill covers, her achievement in getting something on the statute book—as I am sure she will in due course—is rare, and she should be very pleased with it.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clauses 2 to 9 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule agreed to.
Bill to be reported, without amendment.
Westminster Hall
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Access to Radiotherapy
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Philip Davies (in the Chair)
Before we begin, I remind Members that they are expected to wear face coverings when they are not speaking in the debate. This is in line with current guidance from the House of Commons Commission. I remind Members that they are asked by the House to have a covid lateral flow test before coming on to the estate. Please also give each other and members of staff space when seated and when entering and leaving the room. I call Grahame Morris to move the motion.
Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered access to radiotherapy.
It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies, and if it is not too late I would like to wish you and the Officers of the House a happy new year.
I am delighted to have secured this vital and timely debate on access to radiotherapy services. On occasion, it may seem like groundhog day: we come here on a fairly regular basis and outline the case for more investment in radiotherapy services. However, the covid crisis has brought many of these issues into sharp focus, and indeed there is a growing cancer backlog crisis that the Government really must address.
I also want to thank the Chamber engagement team for its fantastic work. This is the first time that I have had any interaction with the team, but it has been most helpful in engaging the public ahead of this debate. I am immensely grateful to the team for carrying out a survey over the course of only a few days—over this weekend, really. We had over 800 responses, and I thank all the respondents for taking the time to express and submit their views and experiences. I believe that those contributions, a couple of which I will refer to, will significantly enrich the debate. I am eagerly anticipating what I am sure will be comprehensive and compelling contributions from colleagues in the Chamber, many of whom I have served with and been involved with in debates like this previously.
It is only right that I begin by declaring an interest. I have the privilege of serving as vice chair of the all-party parliamentary group for radiotherapy, and I am also one of the vice chairs of the all-party parliamentary group on cancer. I also want to thank Macmillan Cancer Support and Radiotherapy UK, the charity with which I am associated, for their assistance in preparing for today’s debate. I am immensely grateful to colleagues from the all-party groups who have come along today; I know that there are many pressing demands on Members’ time.
The reason the debate is so important is that cancer will affect all of us at some point in our lifetimes. I want to take this opportunity to mention a good friend of mine, Nick Munting, who, as some might know, is a chef in the House of Commons and has very recently been diagnosed with cancer. I wish him all the very best for his speedy recovery.
I have personally had cancer on three occasions—a type of lymphatic cancer called non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Without the care and treatment that I received from the NHS, I would not be here today. I thank the dedicated staff at the Macmillan cancer centre at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle, and those working at cancer hospitals throughout the country, for the excellent work that they do in diagnosing and treating cancer patients. I have received a plethora of cancer treatment. I have had the works: surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy—including advanced radiotherapy.
There is a reason why I am concentrating on radiotherapy today. Radiotherapy is by far the least understood of the three pillars of cancer treatment, with chemotherapy and surgery far more widely understood and referred to in public life. Despite that, one in four of us will have radiotherapy at some time in our lifetime. I want to begin by highlighting the many advantages of this highly specialised treatment and the major breakthroughs that there have been over the last 10 years.
Unlike other cancer treatments, modern radiotherapy is accurate to within millimetres, limiting damage to healthy cells around the cancer. A specialist in the field and a dear friend, Professor Pat Price, explained in simple terms to me, as a layman, the concept of a banana in a box. Imagine that the tumour is a banana in the box. With older, less precise forms of radiotherapy, the whole box would be irradiated and there would be considerable collateral damage to healthy cells. With modern, advanced precision radiotherapy techniques, just the banana would receive the high dose of radiation, and there would be no collateral damage. That significant advance has come about because of digital technologies and advances in this form of treatment. It is especially useful for treating cancers in areas vulnerable to damage, and it requires fewer patient visits than other treatments. Unlike surgery, it does not take up intensive care capacity, and unlike chemotherapy, it does not impact on the immune system.
Furthermore, radiotherapy is the most cost-effective treatment. Typically, a patient can be cured at a cost of about £6,000. If we contrast that with the cost of some chemotherapy drugs, which for individual treatments may run into hundreds of thousands of pounds, there is a cost argument for expanding radiotherapy, in addition to its effectiveness as a treatment. In many respects, it is a silver bullet. It is often referred to as a “Cinderella” service: it is immensely effective, but it suffers from chronic under-investment and suboptimal clinical commissioning. Let me remind the Minister that the UK spends only about 5% of the cancer budget—I do not mean the entire NHS budget; I mean just the cancer budget—on radiotherapy. Compared with what is spent in many other advanced European countries, that is a very small proportion; the European average is about 10% of the cancer budget.
In England, access to treatment can depend on people’s postcode; often, patients in more affluent, urban areas benefit from the most modern equipment, and from ease of access because of excellent public transport provision. In contrast, patients in less affluent, more rural areas, such as mine—Easington in County Durham—do not enjoy the same levels of access. My constituents make up a proportion of the 3.5 million people in England who do not have a radiotherapy centre within the recommended 45 minutes of their home.
That statement of the situation was supported and confirmed by a number of the respondents to the survey carried out by the Chamber engagement team. If I may, I will refer to a couple of their contributions. A lady called Penelope had positive experiences of accessing the service herself, but feared for others who might not be so fortunate. She said:
“In my experience, which involves my father’s radiotherapy last summer, he did not have to wait long, but he lives in Berkshire…near several hospitals, and I think the situation is very different in other areas of the country.”
Similarly, David said:
“My own wait time…before the covid situation was only weeks, and by that time I had already started other treatment regimes as well. I am lucky to be close to a centre of excellence: the University Hospital Coventry and Warwick. This is not normal though, a close friend, now passed on, had to drive from their home near Boston in Lincolnshire to the Leicestershire Infirmary for treatment, when there was a possible ‘slot’. That was a 4-hour round trip as neither the Boston nor Lincoln hospital had”
radiotherapy
“facilities. Lack of facilities meant the cancer spread out of control and he died.”
Radiotherapy is needed in almost half of treatments, but according to Cancer Research UK, only 27% of UK cancer patients actually receive it. I respectfully point out to the Minister that we will never level up the country while access to life-saving treatment depends on people’s postcode—where they live—entrenching already existing regional health inequalities.
Let me also address some of the workforce issues. The radiotherapy workforce are at breaking point. A survey conducted by Radiotherapy UK and the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine in October 2021 found that almost 80% of professionals were considering leaving their position or knew a colleague who was. That was echoed by members of the radiotherapy workforce who submitted their views to the survey. A lady called Lauren said:
“Most radiotherapy staff can travel over an hour as that is their nearest radiotherapy centre. Increasing working hours and increasing workload is leading to more staff wanting to leave the profession in addition to the fact most of us have to travel long distances to find a centre to work at. Due to housing not being affordable in the locations of radiotherapy centres,”
which are often in big city centres. The Minister can address that fairly simply, and we have a solution—investment in IT networks, which I will come to in a moment—that we have put to successive Ministers who have occupied the post.
The tariff system generating income to trusts is based on the number of patient visits. Those perverse tariffs mean that radiotherapy trusts with advanced machines that can treat patients in fewer sessions are incentivised to treat patients less effectively over more treatments. That is a ludicrous, perverse incentive that I am sure the Minister could do something about.
Similarly, trusts seeking to replace ageing machines—the advice is to replace radiotherapy machines after 10 years—are required to conduct 9,000 treatments even to be considered for funding. The pandemic saw referrals plummet and services overstretched, so centres are not reaching that threshold and are therefore blocked from providing patients with access to the latest life-saving technologies. We have poor patient access and exhausted, demoralised staff, with senseless bureaucracy and a tariff system promoting less effective treatment. That is a pretty poor report card.
That was the state of radiotherapy even before the covid-19 pandemic. Holly, a radiotherapy professional, said:
“Currently we are having to delay patients due to poor staffing levels, this started way before the current surge in omicron cases. We have been understaffed for some time, and this has been made so much worse by omicron, we are having to close machines to make sure we have staff to cover”
the covid patients. She added that
“those that are in are getting burnt out by having to work longer, more days and harder each shift, meaning it’s a cycle of being off ill.”
Covid has created a cancer crisis that the current system cannot effectively manage. On that note, I want to pay tribute to the Catch Up With Cancer campaign, which was launched in conjunction with Craig and Mandy Russell, who very sadly lost their daughter Kelly to bowel cancer when her treatment was delayed owing to resources being transferred to the treatment of covid patients. Some of us here today handed in to 10 Downing Street a petition, signed by more than 300,000 members of the public, calling for action on the issue.
Of all the health backlogs, the cancer backlog is the most time-sensitive because, for every month that diagnosis of treatment is delayed, cancer survival rates can drop by as much as 10%. These are life-and-death issues for many tens of thousands of people. Without urgent action, cancer experts predict that survival rates in the UK may fall back to where they were 15 years ago, resulting in tens of thousands of extra cancer deaths. I know the Minister is new to her post, and I do not want to be unfair, but there is a crisis. I have been with colleagues to see a succession of Health Ministers, on many occasions, to set out proposals to improve the position. The lack of action is frankly lamentable, and many thousands of people will pay the price.
Before the pandemic, the all-party parliamentary group for radiotherapy branded radiotherapy “Britain’s secret lifesaver”. Ministers and NHS leaders need to recognise that it could be a game changer; it could have an immense impact on tackling the covid-induced cancer backlog, but to do that, it needs sufficient investment.
The all-party group has put together a six-point covid-19 recovery programme. I urge the Minister to look at that and to implement its proposals, which were developed not by me or other parliamentarians but by experts in the field—radiotherapy specialists and oncologists—who understand their patients and understand the service and how we can improve it.
The first point in our six-point plan is that we need to appoint a Minister in charge of and accountable for the transformation of radiotherapy. We need to invest in IT solutions to modernise radiotherapy. The problem that radiotherapy is available in only relatively few urban centres could be mitigated, to a degree, with modern IT that allowed specialists hundreds of miles away to interpret digital imagery and advise on the appropriate treatment.
We need to replace ageing machines—those that are more than 10 years old—and forget the bureaucratic nonsense about machines having to have done 9,000 treatments, because referrals for treatment have reduced due to covid. We need to invest approximately £200 million in the highly specialised workforce, where staff redeployment will be insufficient to fill the gaps.
We need to improve capacity and access by placing radiotherapy machines in some of the planned new diagnostic hubs. Ministers often respond to debates such as this one by referring to the £130 million that the Government promised to improve diagnostic services. That is welcome, but we need to address not just diagnosis but treatment. Radiotherapy is a quick and highly effective treatment, so I urge the Minister to consider using these machines in the diagnostic hubs.
Finally, we need to raise the profile of radiotherapy, ensuring full awareness among the public of the treatment’s curative and palliative potential. The six-point plan is underpinned by a need for a national strategy. The lack of a cohesive national approach has caused unacceptable inequality and disparities between trusts in different parts of the country.
It comes down to this: every day, every week and every month that the Government fail to take sufficient action, the public suffer, money is wasted and patients die. The Government are in denial about the situation and there is a huge disconnect in ministerial statements. Just last week, I heard the Leader of the House say that the situation had been normalised, but that is far from the truth. We cannot ignore the cancer crisis any longer.
I want to ask the Minister a number of questions, which I hope she will address in her response. I hope she understands the frustration felt by radiotherapy staff, but I want her to make a commitment to investigate the bureaucracy that is holding back radiotherapy trusts and denying patients the most effective treatment. Will she act urgently on that? Is she aware that the Government have not reported radiotherapy-specific data, which we refer to as the radiotherapy datasets, since May 2021? Will she publish the datasets that are available next month? Those will show clearly the levels of treatment that radiotherapy machines have been involved in during this period compared with previous years. That will make perfectly clear the level of the backlog, which estimates from the frontline put at between 50,000 and 60,000.
Will the Minister outline the plan in the event that radiotherapy services find they are no longer able to cope? Finally, will she agree to a meeting with radiotherapy commissioners, the Secretary of State and representatives of the radiotherapy community, in order to address these essential life-or-death issues? It has been useful for me to open the debate, but I know colleagues have issues that they would like to put to the Minister, so with that, I will conclude.
Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) for securing this important debate. The Mount Vernon Cancer Centre in Middlesex provides non-surgical specialist cancer care to a population of more than 2 million in the UK. About a third of the Bedfordshire clinical commissioning group’s cancer patients attend the service to receive radiotherapy. My constituents have to travel more than 50 miles to access treatment. Between 2019 and 2020, 800 patients undertook the three-hour round trip across Bedfordshire multiple times to reach lifesaving care.
A survey undertaken by the Mount Vernon Cancer Centre heard from many patients who have chosen not to have radiotherapy. The biggest factor in people’s decision on whether to go ahead with the lifesaving treatment was the location of the treatment centre. Some patients simply cannot afford to travel so far, others are in too much pain, and some could not find the time due to family and work commitments.
The inaccessibility of radiotherapy is stopping people getting the care they need. One patient with stenosis of the spine found it so difficult to travel that they opted for a watch-and-wait approach rather than radiotherapy. Another reported a journey time of five hours door to door. The average radiotherapy uptake in Luton and Bedfordshire sits at under 35%, which is lower than many other CCGs. There is an undeniable crisis in the accessibility of radiotherapy in the UK, and lives are literally on the line.
Many of us will be familiar with the heartbreaking statistics being shared. Fewer referrals to a specialist doctor mean that the proportion of cancers diagnosed while still highly curable has fallen to 41%. Waiting lists stand at a record level and the backlog of care is only growing. Of course, the pandemic has had a major impact on NHS waiting times, but the cancer waiting time crisis is rooted in underfunding, under-resourcing and understaffing. The pandemic has only illuminated the problems. The 18-week waiting time target has not been met for five years. This is not new, but it is getting worse.
There are proposals for a more local additional cancer care unit, alongside Mount Vernon Cancer Centre, to offer treatment services that are more accessible for those in need, but that requires equipping new centres, recruiting more doctors and tackling chronic staff shortages. Cancer care needs proper investment. Funding is at the crux of whether patients can receive radiotherapy and whether they survive. It is down to the Government to step up and ensure that cancer patients can access the care they need and deserve.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
It is a huge pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I pay tribute to my friend, the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris), for securing this debate and for an excellent speech, which contained some points that I make no apology for repeating because this issue matters hugely.
I lost my mum at the age of just 54. Eighteen years on, of course I still miss her massively; I miss especially the grandmother she would have been. Few issues that we deal with in this place are more personal than cancer. Half of us will have the disease at some point in our lives. Cancer touches absolutely every family.
The good news is that, increasingly, cancer is a disease that need not be a death sentence, partly because of the advances in radiotherapy. Radiotherapy kills cancer cells through radiation targeted at a tumour. It is becoming more and more precise, and is able to cure cancers that would otherwise be untreatable, with fewer side effects, as the hon. Member for Easington set out.
Just over 50% of people with cancer should expect to receive radiotherapy, yet, as has been said, Cancer Research UK estimates that only 27% of cancer patients in the UK actually receive it. The clue to why that is is that the UK spends only about 5% of the cancer budget on radiotherapy. The equivalent average spend of similar countries in Europe, Australia and so on is about 11%. The total budget for radiotherapy each year is £383 million; compare that to the £2 billion spent on cancer drugs every year, even though radiotherapy is eight times more likely to be curative than chemotherapy.
That historic underinvestment—the responsibility of lots of Governments of all colours—is undoubtedly a reason why the UK has some of the worst cancer survival rates in Europe. Lives are being lost needlessly because the UK is so painfully slow at keeping up with and grasping the opportunities that radiotherapy provides. That is why we set up the all-party parliamentary group for radiotherapy, which I am privileged to chair. I send huge thanks to Members from all parties, especially the hon. Member for Easington, to leading clinicians across the country and to the charity Radiotherapy UK, which is led by the rightly much esteemed Professor Pat Price, who has already been mentioned.
We set up the APPG in spring 2018. We booked a room in 1 Parliament Street. A handful of MPs turned up, but 50 or 60 of the leading oncologists in the country turned up and crammed into the room—they would not be allowed in today because of covid restrictions. Why had those people left their massively important jobs for the day, just to come to London for that meeting? It struck me then that it was because there is no radiotherapy lobby. I am not in any way going to criticise pharmaceutical companies, but we know that they are large and they have large coffers. We all get letters most weeks from constituents asking for this drug or that drug to be commissioned, and very often that is right. There is no such lobby for radiotherapy.
Lobbying, in its purest and most fair form, is about being in the room with the people who make the decisions. Radiotherapy has not had someone in the room with the people who make decisions. That is the best I can come up with as an excuse for why this Government and previous Governments, including the one I was part of, have not taken radiotherapy anything like as seriously as it should be taken, why we are investing such a paltry amount in radiotherapy, and why we are so far behind comparable countries.
At the local level, a bad situation is made worse because access to radiotherapy is simply not fair or equal. In south Cumbria, cancer patients have to travel each day all the way to Preston to our nearest radiotherapy centre. The Rosemere unit at Preston is excellent, but dangerously distant. The National Radiotherapy Advisory Group stated that it is bad practice for patients to have to travel for more than 45 minutes for treatment, yet not a single person in my huge constituency reliably lives within 45 minutes of radiotherapy.
Over the years, I have had the privilege of driving constituents to Preston for their treatment. I have seen how people from Kendal, Windermere, Grasmere, Grange, Coniston, Sedbergh and other communities have to make round trips of between two and four hours every day for weeks on end. I have seen their exhaustion and the impact on their health. I have seen people whose lives would have been longer if they had had radiotherapy turn it down, because they physically could not cope with the travelling. I have seen clinicians who have chosen not to refer people for radiotherapy, understandably but sadly, because they knew that their patient’s condition would be made worse by those long, gruelling journeys. In Cumbria, because NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care will not act, those longer journeys mean shorter lives.
For 13 years, we have run a campaign collectively in Westmorland, calling relentlessly for a radiotherapy satellite unit to be placed at Westmorland General Hospital. We also campaigned to bring chemotherapy to Kendal and were successful in that fight. I am proud of everyone who supported our radiotherapy campaign, but we have submitted petitions with more than 10,000 signatures; I have had numerous Westminster Hall debates; I have met countless Ministers from all three parties that have been in government during my time in Parliament; we have marched for the hospital in our thousands; a team walked from Preston to Kendal just to make the point; 1,000 people wrote detailed, personal, heartbreaking stories to explain why we need the unit in Kendal; and we have demonstrated that there is clearly enough demand for at least one linear accelerator at Kendal, drawing patients from the south lakes, Furness and the western dales. With an ageing population in our community, there is also clearly a growing need.
We have the space at the hospital, designs have been done, the bid has been written and rewritten, and the inaction of managers in NHS England and Ministers in the Department of Health is inexcusable. It is a reminder of why rural communities feel so taken for granted and ignored by the Government and by NHS bosses nationally and regionally. Talk of levelling up the north is meaningless when Ministers appear not to realise that there is 100 miles of England north of Preston until the next nearest cancer centre.
Networked satellite radiotherapy units have been a huge success elsewhere in the country and, once they open, have been shown to increase the number of people able to take up that life-saving treatment. Satellites save more lives. Today, I ask the Minister to instruct NHS England to work with our local trusts in Cumbria and Lancashire finally to deliver our long-awaited satellite radiotherapy unit at Kendal. Our community will listen carefully to her response.
Radiotherapy, as the hon. Member for Easington said, provides the Government and the NHS with their best way through the cancer backlog. Owing to the pandemic, 740,000 cancer referrals have been missed. Therefore, at least 60,000 people are out there with cancer, but undiagnosed. That is terrifying. There is also an enormous backlog for treatment, with people dying as a result. In the Morecambe bay area, about half of cancer patients are having to wait for more than the scheduled 62-day limit to get their first treatment. As the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, the right hon. Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt), rightly said, it would take the NHS working at 120% of its existing capacity for two solid years just to get back to where we were in March 2020. The need for an urgent and ambitious boost to cancer care is therefore obvious, but we see next to nothing specific from the Government.
Money was pledged for diagnostic hubs, but just on Monday this week, I discovered that in South Lakeland we will not see ours until next year. Where is the urgency? The Government and the NHS have done so well—commendably—on the vaccine roll-out. Why will they not treat cancer and the cancer backlog in the same way, with a ring-fenced and targeted programme to catch up with cancer?
Radiotherapy is covid-secure and non-invasive, carries no infection risk, does not need intensive therapy unit beds or precious operating theatre time, does not compromise one’s immunity, is curative, palliative and, per capita, incredibly inexpensive. We could massively increase capacity very quickly. It has been the stand-out treatment in covid, often substituting for surgery, and it is the obvious first choice for getting through the backlog of cancer cases.
As an all-party group, we first wrote to the Secretary of State on 1 April 2020 to highlight the key role that radiotherapy needed to play to tackle the covid-induced cancer backlog. Since then, multiple spending reviews and Budgets have been passed with no significant investment in radiotherapy. The oft-repeated £130 million announced in 2016 as part of the long-term plan was spent long, long ago, so I hope that the Minister will not trot that out again. Yet a relatively modest investment of £850 million over three years could have a guaranteed and dramatic impact on cancer survival. I hope the Minister will take up the hon. Member for Easington’s request that she meet us as an all-party group and, more importantly, the clinicians, so that we may talk her through this all-party plan backed by the clinicians, which will help her out and help her deal with the backlog.
The Minister should tackle perverse tariffs that do active harm to cancer treatment, and she could do so at no cost whatsoever to the taxpayer—it is about spending the money differently and less foolishly. Staff are restricted from using centres with more modern, precise kit that can treat patients in fewer sessions; instead, they must treat less effectively and over more sessions because, stupidly, the tariff rewards the number of visits, not the precision or effectiveness of treatment. The Government must be pragmatic and accept the offer from the private sector to centrally commission its capacity—at cost and not for profit—to deliver treatment on the NHS to clear the backlog and to save lives.
We must especially care for, value and boost the work- force. Radiotherapy oncologists, radiographers, engineers and physicists—dedicated, passionate professionals —are close to breaking point. The survey by Radiotherapy UK and the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine, to which the hon. Member for Easington referred, showed that 75% of those professionals believe that their unit could not meet pre-covid capacity with the kit they have. Some 80% reported seeing more advanced tumours than ever before in their careers and, as has been said, nearly 80% had thought about leaving the profession.
In Cumbria and right across the UK, radiotherapy treatment and the outstanding workforce have so much more to offer in the fight to save lives than successive Governments have seen fit to acknowledge. All parties bear responsibility for that. I ask the Minister to be a laser trailblazer and to deploy radiotherapy at its full capacity, so we can end needless deaths and catch up with cancer.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) on securing this important debate, and not for the first time—he is a repeat offender. His determination and laser focus on this issue are really important in trying to save lives.
I hope it is not too mawkish if I say a few words about my own experience of cancer, even though I have not had radiotherapy, because radiotherapy is not normally used to treat my form of cancer—melanoma—although it is for other forms of skin cancer such as squamous and basal cell carcinomas. The timing of my cancer was amazingly fortunate. It was three years ago yesterday that I went to my GP with a dodgy mole—I urge anyone who ever worries about a mole to get it checked out, because my hon. Friend is absolutely right that early detection saves lives. I was very fortunate that my GP sent me straight to a dermatologist, who cut it out for the first time within 10 days. The second bout was two weeks after that.
I was fortunate that all that could happen very quickly. If I had gone to the doctor on my birthday last year or this year, I do not think I would have got the same speedy response. I had a stage 3B melanoma—incidentally, I must say to the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) that satellites are not always good. A microsatellite from a melanoma is a really bad thing. If I had left it another three months, it would probably have been a stage 4, and there are only four stages.
I was also fortunate that two weeks before I went to the doctor, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence allowed the use of immunotherapy for melanoma in an adjuvant setting at stage 3, rather than just at stage 4. I hope the Minister will confirm that NICE is looking at the use of the various kinds of immunotherapy in an adjuvant setting for people with stage 2 melanoma.
I say all that because I was told at the time I had a 40% chance of living a year—three years have now passed so I am very grateful that the immunotherapy I received has dramatically improved my chances of living. I say gently to the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale that, sometimes, the drugs are a really important part of the cancer treatment package. I do not think there is a competition between different parts of the package; there are clearly instances where drugs, chemotherapy or radiotherapy is the right route.
My anxieties are that, first, we have a massive catch-up job to do, and secondly, that I do not think we had the capacity needed to tackle the problem even before we went into covid. We have a growing population in this country, and a growing number of cancers, but last year’s figures show a nearly 10% fall in the number of people receiving radiotherapy. That is not good news in any shape or form. There may be people whose deaths from cancer are unknown to us because they ended up not being diagnosed and then died with or of covid, so they may not appear in the statistics, but they will certainly appear in many people’s family statistics and life experiences.
There are things that the Government could do immediately, many of which have already been laid out by hon. Members. Something needs to be done about the workforce, because every part of the cancer pathway has a shortage of staff. A lot of staff have been redeployed during covid to help run A&E departments. Nurses, hospital orderlies and receptionists from the same teams have ended up being redeployed to other parts of the operation. They have been very happy to do that, but it has meant that, in nearly every cancer discipline—the one I know best relates to dermatology, obviously—there is now a series of vacancies.
A lot of staff are burnt out, exhausted, demoralised and uncertain whether they want to stay in the profession. I think this is the fifth Minister to whom I make the same plea: that she and the Government look at the series of things we could do to enable people who have recently left the profession to come back. That might include financial rewards. We could do more to enable people to stay all the way through to retirement age. A significant number retire early, partly because of that sense of burn-out. They do not necessarily want a financial reward; they would actually quite like a sabbatical of a couple of months or something like that, simply to recharge their batteries so they can come back into the profession and not retire early. We certainly need to do something about the problem that doing extra hours or sessions is now barely worth it for many people, because the financial reward is minimal. A major issue will come up very shortly relating to pensions and pension funds for many doctors in many of these disciplines.
In all those areas, the Government could do far more to increase capacity now, then they have to look at increasing capacity for the future. One of the most important parts of the process is diagnosis. We do not have enough radiologists, radiographers, histopathologists and pathologists in the UK. There is a massive shortage—something like a 10% vacancy rate. We are not even allowing enough people to train this year to fill the vacancies that exist now, let alone the additional vacancies that there will be in five or 10 years’ time, so we are building up a bigger problem for ourselves.
That takes me to my biggest concern of all. Before covid, every winter we were running the NHS at 95% capacity. It is pretty difficult to run anything at 95% capacity, because the moment you have a crisis of any kind whatsoever, you are stuffed. It is a bit like those baggy gym shorts that have an elastic band in them. When someone gets beyond a 34-inch, 36-inch or 38-inch waist, suddenly there is no more stretch in the pants, as you know, Mr Davies—[Laughter]—because you understand the science of elastic bands, obviously. However, I make a serious point. We have run the NHS far too close to complete capacity for far, far too long, and not only in intensive care units, where we have many fewer beds per 100,000 people than any country in the European Union or any advanced country in the world. We also have many fewer hospital beds per 1,000 people than any other advanced country in the world. We need to look at the long-term issues and say to ourselves that, if we really want an NHS that will not be crippled by a pandemic or by winter, we have to invest significantly in the future. Every single time a Minister stands up, they always say very nice things. The Minister who is here today has lots of clinical experience of her own, and we are enormously grateful for the work that she has done in the NHS during the pandemic. However, in the end, warm words butter no parsnips—not that one really wants butter on parsnips. I love a parsnip, although it is odd that we are the only country in Europe that actually eats them—mostly they are fed to cattle, but that is by the by.
The serious point is that we need to invest in every single part of the NHS. The cancer catch-up is a matter of life and death. I think that, if I had gone to the GP yesterday, my life would not have been saved. That is a distressing thing to be able to say to one’s constituents. I hope that the Minister will come up with some answers for us.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
It is a pleasure to speak in the debate, Mr Davies, and also a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). We in this House are very blessed that he is here today because he had early treatment and was able to respond to it. I spoke to him personally at the time, and I know that others did. We are very thankful to God that he is here today and able to participate in this and many other debates in the House on a regular basis. We thank him for that.
I also thank the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) for setting the scene. We are greatly indebted to him for his leadership, for his interest in this subject matter and for every occasion on which he comes forward. We are also indebted to the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) as well. We are all on the all-party parliamentary group on cancer together, so we have regular contact with one another and with others as well. I give credit to both hon. Gentlemen for their leadership and contributions, and to others on the APPG for bringing this forward.
It is nice to see the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Enfield North (Feryal Clark), in her place. I always look forward to the Minister’s contribution. I believe that we will get a response that helps us to address the issues that we are raising today. I believe that we are greatly blessed to have the Minister in her place; she has a particular interest in this subject matter and is eager to secure change.
The debate today is about change; it is about making sure that we can move forward. I probably cannot even quantify—the hon. Member for Easington might be able to—the number of times we have asked about radiotherapy services. We have asked about these services before, met the Minister before and sent letters before, but we do not seem to be getting to where we want to be. That is what the hon. Gentleman said in his introduction. That is where we are.
There is a staggering backlog of an estimated 47,000 people missing a cancer diagnosis in the UK, and Macmillan estimates that the backlog of those waiting for a first treatment stands at 32,000 in England alone. Only last week in my constituency—this is not the Minister’s responsibility, to be fair, as it is a devolved matter—I met someone who was eagerly seeking an early meeting with a consultant and doctor about cancer. It is so important that she gets that; she is very worried about her circumstances. When I became aware of them, I was also concerned. We need to address that issue.
Radiotherapy in particular is one of the mainstays of cancer treatment. Modelling suggests that between 40% and 50% of people diagnosed with cancer should receive radiotherapy as part of their treatment. If it is part of their treatment and they cannot get it, we have a severe problem. The difficulty lies in workforce shortages, to which the hon. Member for Easington referred. They remain the biggest challenge facing the NHS and access to radiotherapy today. The Chancellor’s October Budget, unfortunately, missed a key opportunity to tackle this issue. Can the Minister give us some indication of the discussions that she has had with the Chancellor about what can be done to address the shortfall?
Macmillan Cancer Support says:
“The pandemic has both laid bare and exacerbated the terrible strain the cancer workforce has been under for many years.”
I know that the pandemic has exacerbated that incredibly. It is frustrating to know that the waiting lists that we had in 2019 are the waiting lists of 2021—and now 2022. It is essential that the budget for Health Education England is confirmed immediately, ensuring an increase in funding to train the cancer workforce that the NHS desperately needs.
Too few cancer patients have full access to a cancer nurse specialist, which is crucial in reducing costs and improving patient outcomes. It is very clear that in the reform of the NHS priority must be given to training these nurse specialists and ensuring that the funding is there to pay them for the extra responsibility that they take on and for the workload that they take off their colleagues, the doctors. Perhaps the Minister could give us some idea of what is going to happen in relation to that issue in the reform of the NHS.
Again, I am deeply grateful to Macmillan Cancer Support for the information that it has sent me. It estimates that in order to help meet the Government’s NHS long term plan, we need an additional 3,371 cancer nurse specialists, which means doubling the number of cancer nurses by 2030. In introducing the debate, the hon. Member for Easington mentioned that issue and I mention it again now, not simply to repeat it but to underline gently the importance of having those nurses in place. It is a major ask but not an impossible one, or at least it should not be impossible.
How do we get those nurses? First, we get the finance in place. An estimated total of £124 million is needed to train the next generation of cancer nurses by 2030. Again, what has happened in the discussions that the Minister has hopefully already had, or will be able to have, with the Chancellor? That process must begin with bursaries, which give the incentive and encouragement, if it is needed, to enable not just young students but mature students—those with mortgages and debts to pay, and perhaps children to care for as well—to be able to take the step into nursing. I make that comment because of a particular example that I know of. The dream of one of my constituents was to go into nursing. She worked in a shoe shop and her husband worked in landscaping; both of them had low-paid jobs. When she made the decision to follow her dream and go into nursing, she simply could not make ends meet, which is why bursaries are important.
I know this girl personally, so I know that she has endless compassion. She worked to become an intensive care nurse. She is a clever lady who wanted to make a difference in this world, but simply could not do so. She went into care work during covid and is making a difference in a nursing home, but will she ever become an ICU nurse, as she wanted? She thinks not, but I would like to think that the differences we make in this place and the decisions that we take will enable people such as Sarah to do the good that they want to do in the world, because there are many people out there who just love to help other people. We in this House—you, Mr Davies, and the rest of us here—are MPs who wish to help people; indeed, that is our job.
In 2020, the all-party parliamentary group for radiotherapy reported that a fifth of radiotherapy machines were older than their recommended lifespan of 10 years. NHS England must ensure a sustainable future so that machines are upgraded on a rolling basis and when they need to be. That process must be continuous, so we need an action plan to make it happen. Again, I ask the Minister a question: what has been done to address the need for that additional investment? Unfortunately, it is a fact that this comes down to finance.
Additional investment in radiotherapy would be best spent on upgrading existing machines and software rather than on increasing the overall number of radiotherapy machines or centres. Cancer Research UK has said that even if new centres were built, it would be very difficult to find the staff to run them. We need a co-ordinated and strategic plan that considers all the potential issues for the future, especially in rural areas such as the one that the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale represents. As he often says, in rural areas staff shortages are often the most severe that they are anywhere.
In the long term, consideration must be given to introducing innovative technology to transform care. For example, there are a limited number of magnetic resonance linear accelerators, or MR linacs for short, in the UK. They significantly increase the precision of analysis and therefore the effectiveness of treatment, which is really important. The Government must consider how to manage funding over a long term, to expand access to MR linacs and other cutting-edge technologies. That also includes purchasing new radiotherapy technology to evaluate its efficacy as a cancer treatment.
I will finish with this comment: the fact is that much greater investment is needed. We should remember that radiotherapy is used for half of cancer treatments, so it is critical for addressing cancer. Cancer affects many people and we need to give radiotherapy the priority that it deserves, getting the nurses and the equipment in place urgently. Unfortunately, there are literally millions of people whom radiotherapy can save and thereby extend their life. It seems to be agreed by all those who have spoken in this debate, and I believe that it will also be agreed by all those who will speak after me, that we must do all that is possible to do in this place in that regard.
Feryal Clark (Enfield North) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies.
I start by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame Morris), both for securing this important debate and for being such a consistent champion on this issue. We have heard some excellent contributions and I pay tribute to all hon. Members who have spoken—my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Mohammad Yasin) and the hon. Members for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron)—for raising issues about investment, the workforce and the bureaucracy that surrounds radiotherapy. I pay tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and for Easington, who speak with authority on the issue as a result of their experiences.
We have heard that radiotherapy is a vital tool in our fight against cancer and that it is one of the three pillars of treatment alongside surgery and chemotherapy. The fact that radiotherapy is needed by one in four of us across our lifetime should be a stark reminder of how important today’s debate is. I join my hon. Friend the Member for Easington in paying tribute to the work of charities such as Radiotherapy UK and the Catch Up With Cancer campaign for keeping this important issue on the agenda.
Hon. Members will know the impact the pandemic has had on cancer treatments and the devastating backlog that it has caused. In my own constituency of Enfield North, data from Macmillan shows that 73 people are missing a cancer diagnosis and a further 57 are waiting for their first cancer treatment. The backlog in treatment, coupled with the severe workforce crisis, which every Member has highlighted and which is rapidly stretching across our health service, means that we are facing a situation where outcomes for cancer patients are being put at risk. As we have heard, radiotherapy is a vital tool in our fight against cancer and should play a key part in our work to help overcome the backlog that affects both patients and staff.
As highlighted by all hon. Members, with the pandemic impacting so much of the NHS’s operations, radiotherapy provides a covid-resilient form of cancer treatment by not having an impact on the immune system or requiring admission into intensive care. It is very cost-effective, as mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Easington, with the average cost of radiotherapy care ranging from £4,000 to £7,000, making it cheaper than the often costly options of surgery or chemotherapy. Despite that, radiotherapy has been consistently overlooked when it comes to policy, so it has often faced a lack of investment and understanding by policymakers and successive Governments.
As we have heard, just 5% of the cancer budget in the UK is spent on radiotherapy. That means that despite significant global advancements in radiotherapy technology, patients in the UK are continuing to miss out. Half of all NHS trusts are using machines that are older than the recommended 10-year life span.
Grahame Morris
I apologise for breaking the flow of my hon. Friend, but these are important statistics. One worth remembering is that in over 50% of cancers, radiotherapy or precision radiotherapy would be effective as part of treatment—perhaps not exclusively. Actually, when I had my treatment, I had everything: I had surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy. However, it would be effective in over 50% of cases. It is currently only given to 27% of cases, so even before we start tackling the backlog, there is a huge capacity issue, and I hope my hon. Friend recognises that, and that the Minister will address it.
Feryal Clark
I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention; I absolutely agree with him. As was mentioned, many patients do not even have the luxury of being treated by old technology. More than 3.5 million people in the UK do not have radiotherapy centres within the recommended 45 minutes of their home, as mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford and others. That has led to a situation where, rather than meeting the international guidance of 57% to 60%, just 27% of cancer patients in the UK are given radiotherapy. Patients are receiving a raw deal at every turn in the UK, putting their treatment and their long-term outcome at risk.
It is not just patients who are feeling the strain; radiotherapy staff, like many of their colleagues across the NHS, are feeling undervalued and under-resourced. A workforce survey carried out by Radiotherapy UK showed that 80% of radiotherapy staff were considering, or knew of someone considering, leaving the profession; 90% felt that the Government did not recognise the significant role that radiotherapy plays in reducing the cancer backlog; and 75% felt that they did not have the capacity to reach a pre-pandemic service level. A plan to improve provision of radiotherapy, or any other treatment across the NHS, will not be successful if there is not a robust workforce strategy behind it.
Feryal Clark
Absolutely. I ask the Minister what other hon. Members have also asked today: how do the Government expect to tackle the cancer backlog when staff feel like no-one is listening to them? NHS staff have made immense sacrifices during this pandemic; they deserve to be heard and respected instead of having their concerns ignored.
The staff who remain in radiotherapy are met with barrier after barrier when it comes to improving the experience of patients and the effectiveness of treatment. I run the risk of repeating points, but these are key issues and need repeating. In order to justify investment to fund a new and updated machine, NHS trusts are required to conduct 9,000 treatments per year. During the pandemic, when we have seen referrals plummet and services stretched to breaking point, that target is plainly unrealistic for many trusts. It leaves staff with faulty, unreliable equipment that frequently breaks down, and patients with delays, postponements, cancellations and a much more challenging experience of treatment. I join with many other Members who spoke this morning in urging the Minister to carefully examine the situation, and look at what can be done to remove the bureaucracy that is stopping the advancement in equipment that is evidently needed.
When we know that every four-week delay in treatment for a cancer patient increases the mortality rate by 10%, the lack of investment in such a core pillar of cancer treatment is putting lives at risk. The failure to address these issues will leave the 40% of cancer patients who need radiotherapy as a curative treatment, either on its own or in combination with other methods, in a grave situation. Failure will also have a knock-on effect across all treatment pathways, increasing the pressure on already stretched cancer services as well as primary care providers.
Finally I ask the Minister, do the Government accept that radiotherapy needs an increased level of support to properly fulfil the important role it plays in overcoming the backlog in cancer treatments? Furthermore, will the Minister commit to a plan to improve both workforce numbers and satisfaction, given the increased pressure that the situation is producing on services such as radiotherapy? Cancer patients have suffered so much over the course of the pandemic; they deserve better than this. It is about time that the Government acted.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Maria Caulfield)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I should declare an interest before I start: I am still working as a cancer nurse in the Royal Marsden Hospital in London. I have spent 20 years looking after patients who are having chemotherapy, radiotherapy and surgery, so no one is more passionate than I am about this issue.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) on securing this important debate, raising the profile of radiotherapy and the important work that the all-party parliamentary group does. Very few of us have not been impacted by cancer in some way, whether as a patient—the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) eloquently described their experiences—or as a relative, friend or healthcare professional. We know the devastation that cancer can bring, whether through the diagnosis and living with the disease, experiencing the side effects of treatment or, unfortunately for some, the effects it can have on life expectancy.
I reassure colleagues that during the pandemic, cancer has remained an absolute priority. We have kept cancer services going throughout periods of lockdown. There is no doubt, though, that patients were reluctant to come forward with signs and symptoms, particularly during the first lockdown. We actively encouraged many patients with a cough not to come and see their GP as a first point of contact. Since then, however, an absolute tsunami of patients has come forward—so much so that we are working through more than 10,000 cancer referrals a day.
I encourage Members to look at the data for actual treatment. Data such as that about the 62-day rule shows that the cancer backlog is not necessarily in treatment—in patients waiting for surgery, chemotherapy or radiotherapy—but in the diagnostics procedures. They are where the greatest pressure is at the moment.
Grahame Morris
I appreciate the Minister’s giving way. Statistics are important as a tool to identify where the obstructions are in the system. I completely agree about the importance of early diagnosis, but will the Minister publish the radiotherapy datasets that will be available next month, so that we can see the true nature of the backlog?
The profession—the frontline—tell a story rather different from the impression that the Minister has just given: that there are issues with treatment, and not just with diagnosis. The radiotherapy datasets, which have not been published for over a year but are available, will clarify that position.
Maria Caulfield
I thank the hon. Gentleman. I am not saying that there are no pressures on the treatments for cancer patients, but the greatest pressure is at the diagnostic end. We will be publishing data, but I caution Members on the data for radiotherapy. A lot of the cancer data is based on first treatment and, as Members will know, radiotherapy is often an adjuvant treatment given further down the line. The measurement of access to radiotherapy, compared with treatments such as surgery or chemotherapy, is much more difficult to establish.
I also caution colleagues, a number of whom have said similar things in this morning’s debate. Radiotherapy is a specific specialist treatment. As the hon. Member for Rhondda pointed out, for many cancers it cannot necessarily be given instead of surgery or chemotherapy; it is part of a package of treatment and these are clear, clinical decisions that need to be made jointly by the oncologist and their patient.
Grahame Morris
We have a little bit of time and these are important points. Many of us have been making them, not just to this Minister—who, to be fair, is newly in place—but to her predecessors.
There are points of contention about the effectiveness of radiotherapy, but there have been some incredible advances in recent years. I am not claiming expert technical knowledge, but radiotherapy has been applied very effectively against lung cancers; that was never the case before. There is now a possibility of expanding the service to provide much more effective treatments, for cases which previously could be treated only through surgery and chemotherapy.
Maria Caulfield
I do not disagree with the hon. Gentleman. I may be a new Minister, in post for weeks rather than years, but I have 20 years of oncology experience, and in my experience radiotherapy has a fantastic role to play. It is indeed the case that significant progress has been made, particularly in the field of lung cancer, with stereotactic radiotherapy to specific areas. However, radiotherapy will target a specific area; it will not give systemic treatment, like adjuvant treatment to prevent recurrence or neoadjuvant treatment for metastatic disease, where the disease is in multiple parts of the body. As Members of Parliament, we need to be cautious that we do not give patients the impression that they should be asking for radiotherapy instead of surgery and chemotherapy. There needs to be a discussion with their oncologist and their medical teams as to the appropriateness of radiotherapy. Yes, it is often cheaper than chemotherapy to give. Yes, it is a quicker treatment and sometimes—not always—has fewer side effects. But it has to be a clinical decision. There are important reasons why radiotherapy is given to some patients and not others. That is something that patients really need to have a discussion—
Chris Bryant
We all understand that clinical decisions have to be made. Our anxiety is that clinical decisions sometimes end up being made because there is not enough availability of facilities or staff, or—the third aspect to this—because lots of patients simply are not presenting at the moment. They are not coming in the doors of the NHS because of covid. That potentially means—for instance, in relation to bowel cancers, lung cancers and melanoma—that we will see people presenting much later and therefore there will be a much more dangerous prognosis for them.
Maria Caulfield
I absolutely take that point on board. There are clinical reasons, if a patient has presented later, why radiotherapy may or may not be suitable. Again, they are clinical decisions that a patient needs to be discussing with their oncologist.
The hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) raised the issue of satellite units. Again, I would just be slightly careful. Cancer alliances are mapping out cancer services in their areas, and I am very happy to meet colleagues who would like better provision in their local area, but they also need to meet their cancer alliances, which are looking at service provision locally.
I would just caution Members on the issue of having multiple sites for radiotherapy. These are specialist treatments, needing specialist equipment and specialist staff. I went into oncology more than 20 years ago, when surgery was done by general surgeons. They were doing mastectomies on women and colostomies on bowel cancer patients. Moving surgery into being a specialist field, with specialist provision, has transformed the way that we are able to look after women who are going through mastectomies, and bowel cancer patients, who may not necessarily need a colostomy now, because surgical treatments have advanced so much. There is sometimes a rationale for those services to be offered by specialist units, rather than multiple satellite sites.
Tim Farron
I want to answer a point that the Minister made earlier. Obviously, during the pandemic, radiotherapy has been used as substitutionary treatment for people who would otherwise have had chemotherapy or surgery, because it is a covid-secure treatment. But my main point is with regard to what the Minister just said about satellites. Has she looked at the data and evidence from those satellite centres that have been opened in the last few years?
For instance, at Hereford, we saw a doubling of the number of patients being treated at that new satellite centre. Why? Well, there was an assumption that the parent centre people, from that postcode, were simply transferred to Hereford. No, it turned out that a lot more people, who would not travel or who were not referred because of the travelling distance for treatment at the original place, were then referred for treatment and therefore had a longer life expectancy because of the satellite centre. With more networking capability, it is of course possible now to treat in specialist ways, with the best people, remotely and through these satellite centres. The Christie has just opened its third satellite, so surely, for more rural communities such as mine, and also in east Lancashire, the time has come to ensure that no one is left behind.
Maria Caulfield
There are satellite services—absolutely. We have seen them not just for radiotherapy, but for chemotherapy and even surgery. But it has to be a local decision, because local oncologists have to feel that they are able to support the multidisciplinary team who support the radiotherapy process, ranging from diagnostics through to the treatment itself. That has to be in place, so it does absolutely need to be done on a local basis, but I am happy to meet colleagues if they feel that the case is not being heard locally.
I want to emphasise this point, because a number of hon. Members talked about the commitment to cancer services. Our elective recovery programme has committed £2 billion this year and £8 billion over the next three years to step up activity and tackle backlogs. That will have a knock-on effect in improving radiotherapy access, because some patients cannot have radiotherapy until they have had surgery. Ensuring that we are tackling some of the backlogs to treatment resulting from covid is absolutely important.
There have been huge improvements in radiotherapy over recent years, not just in provision but in technique. We are able to deliver more targeted treatment, resulting in fewer hospital visits, because we can now give radio- therapy to a more targeted area of the body, resulting in fewer side effects from the treatment, and also give fewer fractions of radiotherapy, so that patients can get their total dose much more quickly. That maximises service capacity and minimises patient time in hospital.
Furthermore, we have invested £250 million into two proton beam therapy facilities, one based at the Christie in Manchester and the other at University College London. In addition, all radiotherapy centres in England are now able to deliver stereotactic ablative body radiotherapy. Both these treatments are able to target radiation at cancer cells more accurately, improving patient outcomes. I am really pleased to say that, as part of this year’s spending review, £32 million was made available to support the replacement of 17 linear accelerators aged over 10 years, all of which are on order and will be delivered by the end of March 2022.
NHS England is committed to improving the facilities for cancer patients, and has also offered NHS radiotherapy providers the opportunity to participate in a cloud-based technology called ProKnow. To date, 43 of the 49 radio- therapy providers have joined up. This technology, which will help satellite units, enables clinicians to collaborate virtually within and across organisations, to plan treatments, undertake peer-review assessments and participate in large-scale audits and quality improvement processes, ultimately benefiting patients.
A number of Members talked about the cancer workforce, because it is great to have state-of-the-art technology and multiple units providing radiotherapy, but if we do not have the staff to manage them and provide treatment we shall not make progress. Health Education England is continuing to take forward the cancer priorities identified in the NHS’s long-term plan. It is prioritising the training of 250 nurses to become cancer nurse specialists, 100 chemotherapy nurses and 58 biomedical scientists, and it is updating the advanced clinical practice qualification in oncology.
Further than that, particularly around radiotherapy, Health Education England is investing £52 million in the cancer and diagnostic workforce, increasing the number of clinical endoscopists and training more radiographers in image interpretation. That is all part of the radiotherapy process. As of August there have been an additional 4% of doctors working in clinical oncology, which is the field that manages radiotherapy, and there have been a further 5% working in radiology since August 2020.
We are making progress, but it is not just about the numbers of staff; it is about the skill mix and ongoing staff training. Very often, not being able to expand a role or take on exciting and innovative developments can make staff feel frustrated, but the cancer workforce is growing. Between 2016-17 and 2019-20, the cancer workforce grew by 3,342 full-time equivalents, compared with the ambition of 2,943. We are ensuring that there are more staff coming through into the workforce to deliver radiotherapy.
The shadow Minister touched on the importance of not only recruiting staff but retaining and developing them. I fully take on board colleagues’ comments and concerns. We are committed to investing in radiotherapy equipment, the staff that deliver radiotherapy and the innovation in radiotherapy. We are also committed to making it more accessible to patients, and to reducing the side effects—there are side effects from radiotherapy as well—and to making sure it is a fundamental part of cancer treatment, whether that is in the neoadjuvant setting, adjuvant or for those with metastatic cancer as part of the palliative treatment service.
Feryal Clark
I thank the Minister for all the information about the machines and investment into radiotherapy. Are the figures that she set out for replacing what is already out of date, or is there a plan to increase investment in radiotherapy treatment? As we have all said, radiotherapy accounts for 5% of the cancer budget. Is there a plan to increase that, or is it about replacement and keeping up what we already have?
Maria Caulfield
It is about replacing existing equipment, but also investing in new. Some of the equipment is 10 years old. Radiotherapy has changed a lot over those 10 years, so the replacement equipment can do more than what it replaces. As I pointed out, we are also investing in new radiotherapy equipment, with £250 million into two proton beam therapy facilities at Christie’s and at UCL—new facilities that will be able to provide state-of-the-art radiotherapy treatment. I hope I have reassured Members that we are addressing this as a top priority.
Chris Bryant
Will the Minister give way before she sits down? She sounds very like she is finishing.
Chris Bryant
The Minister may not be able to answer the question today about adjuvant provision of immunotherapy for people with stage 2 melanoma, but if she could write to me, I would be very grateful.
Maria Caulfield
My understanding is that it is available for stage 3 melanoma, as the hon. Gentleman has highlighted, and that it is still in clinical trials for stage 2. It is available within clinical trials. We expect the data to come forward shortly and then a decision will be made. That is where we are with melanoma.
Tim Farron
The Minister is being very kind and I really appreciate it. I have two quick points that I do not think she has mentioned. First, will she take up the request from myself and the hon. Member for Easington for a meeting with the APPG for radiotherapy? We would love to meet her.
Secondly, I do not think she referred to the tariff situation. A lot of the issue is that we need more money. We want the Minister to accept—it is not just her fault; it is the fault of every party in this place, over decades—that we are behind comparable countries and we need to strengthen radiotherapy. The reality is that there are lots of state-of-the-art machines out there, in trusts up and down the country, that are not being used because the tariff is stupid. It incentivises trusts to do second-division radiotherapy, if I can put it that way, because more visits equal more cash, rather than targeted and specific radiotherapy—stereotactic, as she mentioned, for many cancers—because the tariff rewards number of visits, not precision or effectiveness of treatment. Would she look at that? It is free.
Maria Caulfield
I am very happy to look at the tariff situation, but my experience is that when a clinical oncologist is referring someone for radiotherapy, that decision is not based on whether they have smaller numbers of fractions as opposed to traditional courses. I am very happy to meet the all-party parliamentary group to discuss that further. I reassure patients that clinical decisions are what decide the type and the number of fractions that a patient needs for their treatment.
Radiotherapy is a priority cancer treatment and this Government are absolutely committed to investing not just in the equipment, but in the workforce that provides it. I say a huge thank you to all the staff across the NHS, particularly in cancer services, who kept going through all the pandemic lockdowns, made sure that cancer patients got their treatment, and helped to support them and their families through what is a very difficult time.
Grahame Morris
This has been a really good debate. It is one we have had on a number of previous occasions.
I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Bedford (Mohammad Yasin) and for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and the hon. Members for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for their excellent contributions. I also welcome and thank my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield North (Feryal Clark), and pay tribute to her predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris), who did an excellent job and had a terrific understanding of the issue. I also thank the Minister for her response.
It has been an honour to open this debate. Once again, I thank those members of the public who shared their experience, and I thank the Chamber engagement team for their excellent work. It is the radiotherapy patients, their loved ones, the workforce, and, indeed, those who live with the everyday reality of this situation, whose interests we serve and whose insight is so valuable.
I hope the Minister, who has not answered all the questions—I know it is difficult—will have a look at the debate in Hansard and respond to them. I am grateful that she has agreed to have a meeting, but I want her to bring an end to radiotherapy’s status as a Cinderella service and give it the time, focus and investment required to put the UK on a path to ensuring that we have truly world-class cancer services.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered access to radiotherapy.
Direct Ferry Links: Scotland and Mainland Europe
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Philip Davies (in the Chair)
Before we begin, I remind hon. Members that they are expected to wear face coverings when they are not speaking in the debate, in line with current guidance from the House of Commons Commission. I remind Members that they are asked by the House to have a covid lateral flow test before coming on to the parliamentary estate, and to give each other and members of staff space when seated, and when entering and leaving the room.
I will call Kenny MacAskill to move the motion and then the Minister to respond. There will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up, as is the convention for 30 minute debates.
Kenny MacAskill (East Lothian) (Alba)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered direct ferry links between Scotland and mainland Europe.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies.
Connectivity is critical, if not king, in the 21st century. As coronavirus has shown, telecommunications are vital, allowing for home working and for businesses to operate, even during lockdowns. Zoom and Teams have come to the fore, even in this House, and have proven essential for many, but other, more established, physical methods of connectivity are equally vital.
Road, rail and air have shown how essential they are in a globalised world, and have been supported by Governments both sides of the border, even before coronavirus struck. Yet there is one major aspect of connectivity where Scotland has been left high and dry: direct ferry links to mainland Europe. It is not just a long-standing issue, but a long-standing omission. It was a major gap even before the impacts of coronavirus and Brexit, which have simply compounded the existing need.
Road freight has been hit hard, through driver absence and customs nightmares, let alone additional bureaucracy. Trade, which could have gone swiftly and with ease from a safe Scottish harbour, has been struggling to access routes south and, even then, facing delays and backlogs at English ports. The spectre of arterial routes becoming truck parks as lorries backed up and loads rotted in the back would be laughable if it were not so tragic.
At the same time, the cost of fuel has rocketed. Not only have there been challenges with fuel shortages, but profitability has reduced through having to trunk our goods to ports a considerable distance south, whether to the Tyne or Humber—or even far beyond to the channel ports. The former are a considerable distance, but the latter, especially for seafood or other perishable items, already meant an absurd journey, and it is one that has been made so much worse through additional delays and impediments.
There is yet another compelling reason for investing in maritime links, beyond the connectivity they provide. Despite COP26 taking place in Glasgow, little thought has been given to improving maritime links because of their environmental benefit. There are issues with maritime fuel, and action to address that—whether through reducing the pollution from marine diesel or exploring alternative fuels, such as batteries—is essential. However, it is still better for our environment to load freight aboard one ship than to have dozens, if not hundreds, of lorries struggling down congested roads.
These risks were known to be looming on the horizon, as were the opportunities that would be beneficial economically, socially and environmentally. It is not as if many of these events were not foreseeable, even for those who only foresaw sunny uplands for Brexit. Customs delays were always going to kick in and other nations, such as Ireland, prepared, but shamefully that was not done in Scotland, by either the Scottish or UK Governments. As a result, many businesses have paid a heavy price.
It is not as if Scotland lacks access to the seas or is devoid of ports. The nation has the facilities and, historically, the links. Scotland was always linked by sea routes to Europe, which continued even when the major trade moved to the west coast and the Atlantic. Pantiles, on the roofs of many homes in my East Lothian constituency, testify to links with the low countries. Along the shores of the Forth and the port of Leith, where I was born, street names are equally redolent: Baltic, Cadiz and Hamburg, although that name was changed to Hamburgh in the first world war.
More recently, the superfast service that sailed from Rosyth to Zeebrugge was enjoyed by many, benefiting both trade and tourism. That port and the facilities constructed for the ro-ro services still exist. Despite the valiant efforts of the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Douglas Chapman), it currently serves as a safe harbour for berthed covid cruise ships with the ro-ro infrastructure moribund, rather than providing a major link for Scottish trade and tourism. There are other options, including in existing harbours and in the potential for a new port at Cockenzie in my own constituency.
The historic links and the infrastructure remain, so why has there been no progress in launching routes over past years when they would have been welcomed, or now, when they are essential? It is not as if the maritime sector globally, let alone in Europe, has been idle. Other nations have acted, and so must Scotland. Ireland, seeing the problems that Brexit would bring, prepared and added significantly to the services already operating.
Douglas Chapman (Dunfermline and West Fife) (SNP)
The hon. Member mentioned exports and trade. Is it not time that we had a substantial maritime support policy from the UK Government to support trade post Brexit, as he outlined is the case in Ireland? The low countries, which he also mentioned, have a direct support package to increase trade post Brexit.
Kenny MacAskill
I think that is something that should be done by the UK Government, but, as I will go on to say, transport—certainly maritime transport—is largely devolved, which is why my demands are not simply to the UK Government, but to the Scottish Government.
As I was saying, despite distance and sail times being longer, Ireland ensured alternatives to the land bridge that was the previous favoured route for many. That meant sailing to a port in Scotland, Wales or England and then journeying on via the UK motorway network to the channel ports. Not for them a Boris bridge or any other delusional nonsense. Instead, Ireland arranged to sail direct to Europe. Direct freight routes were expanded and passenger services increased, thus avoiding customs backlogs, reducing road journeys, avoiding the difficulties of driver absences through illness or self-isolation, and making environmental gains.
In Ireland, three main operators now offer passenger services. Brittany Ferries, Irish Ferries and Stena Line offer services, with some sailing up to five times a week from Cork, Dublin and Rosslare, heading to Roscoff, Bilbao and Cherbourg, ensuring access to their principal markets and allowing for inbound as well as outbound tourism. Those are not the only routes available across the Irish sea to access Europe. Other services provide for freight only, whether for vehicles with haulage or unaccompanied freight. Since Brexit, services and routes have increased, allowing further options and avoiding the problems that have arisen, especially at the channel ports.
Scotland and Ireland have similar sized populations, and both are dependent on trade and tourism. For both countries, Europe is a big and major market. In several instances, Ireland is a direct competitor, yet Irish maritime links are growing almost exponentially, and Scotland remains tied up in port with increasing paperwork. It is not only Ireland that has been acting to increase maritime links. Countries across Europe have been taking action to address the challenges that they faced—even if not the Brexit-imposed customs debacle—allowing for new opportunities for trade and tourism.
Many have accessed funding from the EU, but all have been financially assisted by government to develop. A tender has been issued to re-establish a ferry link between Greece and Cyprus. Support funding of €5.5 million is being provided for a three-year service, with the possibility of an extension beyond. Other nations have acted similarly. Stockholm in Sweden to Rostock in Germany is to begin this spring. Yes, it is having a state subsidy, but it is saving on CO2 and other costs—and it is not just in the Baltic, but in the North sea, as a Norway to Netherlands service is to commence in April.
So why are we devoid of action in Scotland? Transport is largely devolved, and therefore much of the failure to date and, indeed, the action that needs to be taken rests with the Scottish Government. They have failed to show any sign of urgency, let alone any sign of ambition for the country. Instead, they have remained thirled to a free market dogma that might be expected of London, but which could and should be rejected by an Administration with Scotland’s interests at heart. Although a four-nations approach may have merit in aspects of health policy, with ferries it leaves Scotland isolated, sucking everything into the ports in England and leaving Scotland marooned.
Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Alba)
Does my hon. Friend share my deep regret that a comparative drop in the ocean of investment would be sufficient to move this project forward? The reluctance of the Scottish Government to do so undermines Scotland’s case for independence and the valiant work and efforts of the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Douglas Chapman).
Kenny MacAskill
I absolutely commend the efforts of the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife, and I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Neale Hanvey) that it is a very modest investment that would have significant returns.
However, the UK Government cannot absolve themselves of blame. Their free market dogma has privatised critical infrastructure such as ports, although that is a debate for another day. More importantly, they promised to match or exceed the benefits of EU membership that once applied. The motorways of the sea scheme, which was created to establish maritime links between nations, was once available due to EU membership; it has not been replaced by any scheme, let alone a better one.
Both the UK and Scottish Governments claim they support the establishment of new services but insist that they must be market driven, which means they must be entirely self-funding, with no state support. A new venture is therefore expected to launch without any state ballast—or even a lifeboat to ensure survival—which does not apply to other modes of transportation. No one would dream of suggesting that a haulier was required to provide the road network or that a rail freight operator should build a rail line, even though that is state support—albeit in a different way. Expecting an operator to acquire ships and launch the service without any support is equally perverse. Why should we not give assistance to start maritime links, matching support for road and rails and replicating what is standard in other countries?
The M74 extension, the Aberdeen western peripheral route and upgrades to the A9 are all about improving Scottish connectivity, and they are not left to the haulage sector. Scotland rightly lauded new rail links that have opened—such as Stirling to Alloa and Airdrie to Bathgate, both of which have proven spectacularly successful—while support is being given to reopen new stations, with East Linton and Reston to come. Even aviation has seen support, with bail-outs keeping airlines alive and a route development fund once provided, as I will expand on. Why the preclusion of maritime links?
The UK Government’s market-driven dogma, which neither applies to other transport modes nor is echoed in other lands, might be expected of a Tory Government, but it has shamefully been mirrored by the Scottish Government. Communications from the Scottish Transport Minister have parroted the UK line and ignored the steps that have been taken by other small and even competitor nations, such as Ireland and Norway. As a result, Scotland is losing out.
Two matters make that position particularly perverse. First, Scotland routinely funds ferry services. Considerable financial support is rightly given to back both Caledonian MacBrayne and NorthLink ferries; CalMac receives upwards of £120 million per annum, and even more is provided for boats and piers. Orkney and Shetland services receive approximately £45 million per year in support. No one would question that: it is essential, as they are lifeline services and neither roads nor railways can be provided. It is a sensible provision of public funds.
Why is it legitimate and sensible to support internal maritime links but refuse to do so for external ones? Why should a Government argue that an island nation that has to trade with Europe and encourage European visitors should not support maritime services? Why can maritime services not be supported when, as my hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath said in his intervention, only a fraction of the funds already spent on maritime support would be required and the economic returns would be considerable?
Secondly, Scotland previously operated a route development fund to establish direct air links. That was seen as essential to growing trade and in-bound tourism, as well as, given the environmental impact of aviation, to avoiding an additional flight almost invariably to a London airport. That was supported by all major parties and applied until EU regulations brought it to a halt in 2007. EU regulations no longer apply, so why no Brexit bonus? In any event, as with motorways of the sea funding, the EU and nations such as Ireland and Norway now see the benefit of state support for vital connectivity—and for reducing carbon emissions by reducing road freight and growing unaccompanied trailer use. Scotland is losing out to Ireland and other nations in competitiveness and convenience. Scottish trade and tourism are suffering, and promises from COP26 ring hollow.
Demands on the public purse are many, and resource is limited, especially post covid. However, the UK Government are still able to find funds for High Speed 2, even in a truncated form that will come nowhere near Scotland. Millions were also wasted on seeking to reopen a channel port when ports were available in Scotland and only the ferry service was lacking. That attitude might be expected from a Tory Government thirled to a market-driven dogma and oblivious to Scottish needs, but it is entirely inexplicable for an Administration that claim to have Scottish interests at heart. What does it say when the Administration of Lord McConnell of Glenscorrodale were more radical in providing air routes for Scotland than Nicola Sturgeon’s are in providing maritime links?
Scotland deserves better. It requires connectivity in all forms of transport, as in telecoms. It needs ferry services to Europe. Will the Minister commit to funding an equivalent to the EU motorways of the sea scheme, applicable to all parts of the UK, including Scotland? Finally, the Scottish Government must establish a ferry service route development fund to launch and sustain those routes. Scotland deserves no less.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Iain Stewart)
As ever, Mr Davies, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I start, as is customary, by congratulating the hon. Member for East Lothian (Kenny MacAskill) on securing the debate and making his case so passionately. I also thank the hon. Members for Dunfermline and West Fife (Douglas Chapman) and for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Neale Hanvey) for their considered interventions.
The UK Government fully recognise that quality transport links are essential to economic growth, job creation, social cohesion and many other areas, and we are committed to progressing our work on increasing connectivity throughout the entire UK and beyond. I will come to some of the specifics that the hon. Member for East Lothian mentioned, but I first must correct the impression that he has given that there is no interest or investment in improving connectivity throughout these isles. First, specifically on maritime, there is investment going into Scotland, as we speak, to improve port facilities. If he looks to the other side of Scotland from where he represents, at Greenock, there is considerable investment going into the ocean terminal, specifically to boost the tourist offer. Leaving aside the disruption caused by covid, the demand there is increasing enormously. There is investment going in.
More generally, the hon. Member for East Lothian will be aware that the Government commissioned the Union connectivity review—it recently reported—which looks specifically at key transport links by all modes, whether rail, road, air or maritime, right across the UK and beyond, to complement the EU’s Trans-European Transport Network, or TEN-T. That looks at transport corridors as a whole. It might be that, to improve connectivity or capacity between two points, the right intervention is somewhere else. For example, he referred to HS2. It will benefit Scotland by significantly reducing rail journey times from Glasgow and Edinburgh to London.
Kenny MacAskill
Does the Minister accept that, even in Northern Ireland, much freight is now heading south to the Republic to take direct ferry access to Europe, rather than following the land bridge? Accordingly, even in Cairnryan, Scotland is losing out.
Iain Stewart
I am very happy to respond to that. If the hon. Gentleman reads the Union connectivity review—it is a mark of considerable regret that the Scottish Government, out of pure dogma, refused to engage in the review—a central recommendation was to improve the A75 from Cairnryan to the main motorway network, which is one of the key impediments to freight and other traffic moving between the UK and Northern Ireland. So yes, we are aware of that, and we are taking steps to improve it.
To complete my point on HS2, another recommendation of the connectivity review was to improve connectivity between the HS2 line and the west coast main line, and to upgrade the west coast main line to achieve journey times from Glasgow and Edinburgh to London that mean it will be much more advantageous to travel by rail than by air, improving the environment.
Douglas Chapman
The Minister seems to be getting sidetracked by rail. It is important to stick to the maritime issues. We have seen massive investment, as part of the levelling-up agenda that his Government support, in Tilbury, Teesside and, as my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian (Kenny MacAskill) mentioned, the channel ports, so why are we not getting the same level of investment in maritime in Scotland? Brexit has had a huge impact on Scottish exports. We need to remedy that, and it is up to the Minister to bring forward proposals that will support Scottish exports as we move forward.
Iain Stewart
The hon. Gentleman makes a perfectly fair point. I will come on to some of the specifics of maritime in the next eight minutes. However, it is only right for me to point out that the impression that the Government are not interested in connectivity in all its forms is simply not true.
Iain Stewart
I will give way one last time and then I must make progress or I will not get round to the maritime points.
Neale Hanvey
I thank the Minister for giving way; he is being a good sport. On HS2 and the benefits it may deliver at some distant point in the future, dependent on the project’s development and links, if we are trying to achieve a comprehensive transport strategy, does he not think it would be a useful investment, and small in comparison with the massive investment in HS2, to support the development of maritime connectivity as part of that comprehensive transport link? Will he commit to meet me and my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian (Kenny MacAskill) at some point in the future to discuss maritime strategy in more detail?
Iain Stewart
Indeed. The Union connectivity review is across all modes of transport. I do not think only one single intervention is important. I am always happy to meet the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues. I know the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife has been to see the Secretary of State for Scotland to discuss the specifics of the Rosyth-Zeebrugge route.
Let me make some progress on this. I understand that the proposed ferry link would replace a service that was previously run by DFDS Seaways from Rosyth to Zeebrugge. That started as a combined passenger and freight service in 2002 but was changed to freight-only in 2010 due to insufficient demand. Even after cost-saving measures were taken by the operator, including changing to freight-only and double-stacking the containers, the route continued to make losses, and a fire on board sealed the fate of the service in 2018. I understand the opportunities such a direct ferry link could present, encouraging passengers to use fewer short-haul flights and diversifying the connectivity.
Leaving aside all the other arguments about Brexit—I am sure we could have a fascinating debate about that—it is surely a truism that it is better to have more diversity in transport links, so that if one is constrained for whatever reason, such as industrial action on the continent or whatever, there are alternatives. Indeed, there are services from Zeebrugge to the UK—I think there is a daily service at least from Zeebrugge to Hull. What I cannot do is commit today to one specific route—that has to be a commercial matter. But the infrastructure required is there at both ends so there would be no need for additional infrastructure at Zeebrugge or Rosyth.
The one bit of additional resource that would be required, which is not impossible and I understand discussions have already happened, is to have Border Force manpower at Rosyth to deal with passengers and freight coming in. Those discussions can happen and that could be put in place, but the request must come from the operators who wish to establish such a service.
Let me put this discussion into the broader context of changing international shipping patterns, particularly freight. The hon. Member for East Lothian may not know that I spent seven years serving on the Transport Committee, so this is a subject I have given some consideration to. Looking at the scale and patterns of international shipping, particularly from the far east to Europe, the vessels are becoming larger and larger. Whereas in the past they would come from the far east and serve various European ports and then return, now they tend to come to one port, such as Felixstowe or Rotterdam.
Douglas Chapman
I think there is a case to have a regional ferry port serving a major international port such as Zeebrugge or Antwerp. That is where the links are made: containers and lorryloads of goods are moved to those larger ports to be distributed from there. For the life of me I cannot understand why the receiving port in this case—Zeebrugge—has access to a Brexit resilience fund, while we in Scotland do not have a similar fund to go to. It seems logical that, if we are making a huge change, through Brexit, to our trading patterns, the UK Government should put something in place to help us deal with that.
Iain Stewart
The hon. Gentleman actually finished my point for me. By having that one stop in Europe, there have to be additional feeder services. Felixstowe and Port of London are massively expanding their operations—a lot of the ferries are going though. These are commercial matters. It is not for a Government to say, “We want this route rather than that route.” Through the connectivity review, we are looking at transport connectivity in the round.
I am conscious of time, but I want to mention the environmental aspect. We have the Maritime 2050 strategy; the industry is making considerable advances to decarbonise its operations. That is a UK Government-funded scheme, to help that transition and realise some of the ambitions from COP26 in Glasgow. I understand the tourism point, too. As international travel hopefully returns to normal levels in the near future, that could be an attractive destination and boost the visitor economy in Scotland and throughout the UK.
As the hon. Member for East Lothian said, it is primarily a matter for the Scottish Government if they wish to develop this specific route. My understanding is that the Scottish Government have said it needs to be on a commercial basis, but there is no objection from the UK Government to that sort of route being reinstated. I am more than happy to have discussions with the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues to see what the way forward is. The specifics that we are responsible for, such as Border Force, are not necessarily an impediment. Clearly, there are lead times for recruitment and the other requirements for installing that service, but that is not a block on the project being taken forward.
I wish the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues well in pursuing that ambition, which would be to the benefit of Scotland and the whole of the UK. I am very happy to meet him offline to discuss it further.
Motion lapsed (Standing Order No. 10(6)).
Youth Crime and Antisocial Behaviour
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Mr Laurence Robertson (in the Chair)
Before we begin, I have a few notices. I remind hon. Members that they are expected to wear face coverings when not speaking in the debate, in line with current Government guidance and that of the House of Commons Commission. I remind hon. Members that they are asked by the House to have a covid lateral flow test before coming on to the estate, and to give each other and members of staff space when seated and when entering and leaving the Chamber.
In this debate, hon. Members should not mention any active legal cases. There will be an advisory six-minute limit on Back-Bench speeches.
Matt Vickers (Stockton South) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered youth crime and anti-social behaviour.
It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I thank all hon. Members for attending the debate. It is encouraging to see such wide interest in this issue. Clearly it resonates deeply not just with me and the people of Stockton South, but with MPs and constituents up and down the country.
I chose the wording of the motion carefully and deliberately. This is not just a debate on antisocial behaviour, because often what starts as mindless antisocial behaviour goes on to become crime. In areas of my constituency, that is exactly what is happening. Many of my constituents are rightly angry when abuse, broken windows, missiles and assault are badged as antisocial behaviour. They identify the perpetrators and report them to the police, only to be left feeling that nothing is being done about it.
Often when we talk of youth crime and antisocial behaviour, it can be trivialised, downplayed and dismissed. We tend to assume that it is simply a few young people drinking a couple of cans in the park. That is not to say that that does not happen, but the other side of youth crime is more vile and sinister. In my constituency, there continues to be repeated, sustained and violent abuse of persons and communities, which go on not just for hours, but for days, weeks and months at a time.
Youth crime appears in many guises. In Stockton South we have seen car windows smashed, arson, verbal abuse, emergency workers spat at and pelted with missiles, teenagers beaten and robbed, vandalism and destruction of property. Across the UK there are people afraid to leave their homes after dark, scared to go to the shops, terrified to live their lives. That cannot go on.
It would be wrong to say that we have not made any progress on the issue. Locally, I invited residents to meet me, alongside local police and the council. Together, we have managed to identify individuals who were responsible, put additional CCTV in place and increase police presence in hotspots at peak times. The council’s youth and antisocial behaviour teams have undertaken work with the youngsters in an effort to teach them the error of their ways and redirect their energies.
The number of first-time entrants into the youth justice system is down significantly since 2010, but that is little comfort to those whose lives continue to be made a misery by the actions of this rogue minority of young people. All too often, it feels that the system is stacked in favour of the perpetrators rather than the victims. Today, with her permission, I will share the plight of one of my constituents, though for her own safety she will remain nameless.
This constituent is a mother and a pillar of her community. For about two years, she has suffered abuse and intimidation from a group of youths. Throughout, she has shown both bravery and incredible determination to improve her community. The catalyst for this episode was when she initially reported an example of antisocial behaviour to the police. The youths in question found out she had reported them and labelled her a grass, and went out of their way to ensure she was punished for fulfilling her role as a good citizen.
The abuse has involved her children being attacked and assaulted, stones being put through her windows, and adolescents showing up at her house to intimidate her, filming the abuse, uploading it to TikTok and broadcasting live videos on social media as they try to damage her property. It is abhorrent, disgusting and an utter disgrace. The police have tried to help. They put a van outside her home for a time. Although that temporarily stopped the issue, the second the van left, the abuse started again. The police quite simply do not have the powers or resources to deal with this. It is clear that the system does not work.
I am sure that all Members here today would agree, in the strongest possible terms, that that example and stories like it are far too commonplace. In Ingleby Barwick and Thornaby in my constituency, separate groups of young children have been causing havoc. People have been abused and intimidated in the street, and there are concerns over the prevalence of drug use. When one veteran tried to confront youngsters over their behaviour, he was assaulted and hospitalised—an incident that has rightly disgusted the community in what is considered an affluent area.
I do not believe these children have been born inherently bad. They are not evil or demonic. I also do not believe that because a child is born in one estate or another, they will inherently be drawn to such behaviours. I believe this is an issue that affects children of every class, creed and colour.
Youth crime is a complex matter that requires a multifaceted, co-ordinated and often localised response. The causes of youth crime are diverse: education, family breakdown, poor parenting, a lack of creative output, and poor outlooks and opportunities. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to this problem. However, I believe it is the Government’s moral obligation to take serious steps towards fixing this issue; for it is their duty to ensure that children have the opportunity and ability to get the best from life. It is only through adequately resourcing and empowering all the agencies in this arena that we can make a real difference.
If nothing else, we can easily advocate action on the basis that to combat such behaviour early is to improve the quality of life for many, save police time and money, and free up our courts and prisons. Prevention is better than rehabilitation. It is better that we stop children getting into violent, antisocial behaviour in the first place, than to rely on excessive punishments in an attempt to deter those who will not be deterred.
Often, those who engage in antisocial behaviour do not fear punishment and, worst of all, do not have hope for their own futures. We need all local partners to start collaborating and getting youngsters engaged in youth activities, sports and initiatives to prevent them from turning to antisocial behaviour and crime. We must give youngsters something to do, with a meaningful outlet for their energies.
It shocks me that records on the use of antisocial behaviour powers and orders are not collated nationally, limiting any meaningful assessment or discussion about their use or effectiveness. By collating data nationally, we can ensure that successes and failures in relation to antisocial behaviour can be studied by policy makers, which, importantly, will enable informed improvements to make sure that the orders are fit for purpose and meet the challenges of evolving antisocial behaviour.
Of course, there are differences in how neighbourhood policing works in Thornaby, Twickenham and Tower Hamlets, but good policy lessons can still inspire and enable conversations that lead to material and substantial improvement in the lives of people across the United Kingdom. Creating a national framework would help not only those communities plagued by youth crime, but those children who have been sucked into a cruel cycle of perpetual reoffending.
I also believe that we need to look again at the burden of proof that is needed before civil authorities can intervene to compel educational courses and proactive measures. When sitting around the table with frustrated residents who feel nothing is being done and authorities who tell us that they need a greater catalogue of evidence to take something forward to court, there appears to be an impasse that leaves communities to suffer for longer than need be. Nobody wants to see youngsters criminalised unnecessarily, but neither should residents be left to suffer for months, waiting for enough offences to take place to build a case.
Not only is the burden of proof creating a challenge for authorities, but the speed at which youth crime and antisocial behaviour cases are progressed and resolved is just too slow. The process by which justice and corrective action are administered is in desperate need of acceleration. I believe that this should be central to any plan on youth crime. For the communities affected, the long delays feed into the narrative that nothing is being done and that the system is not on their side.
For youngsters, this can leave them with months of anxiety and an inability to focus on self-improvement. I spoke to someone from the youth offending team, who said that often by the time a young offender reaches them, the youngster has forgotten the details and the context of their offence and what they have done, and is likely to have gone on to commit further offences.
We need those in affected communities to see that action is taken quickly and that those who fall foul of their communities are brought to account. Waiting a year or more for action to be taken is unacceptable. We need to end the perception that youth crime and antisocial behaviour will be met with non-action and that perpetrators have impunity to act at whim.
It is important that we actively take steps to educate parents, who play such a crucial role in shaping their children. The number of parenting orders being issued is thought to be falling. If that is the case, I would like the Government to examine why that is and consider whether there is room for improvement in the relevant legislation.
Scott Benton (Blackpool South) (Con)
My hon. Friend is making a brilliant speech. One of the main problems that we have in Blackpool is that, when parenting orders are issued, often the police are exasperated that the council cannot hold those families and young people to account and make them abide by the conditions of those orders. Does he agree that that is a problem and that we need to see how youth offending teams and local authorities can work with the police to ensure that the orders are adhered to?
Matt Vickers
I could not agree more. Actually, it is about sharing best practice. All these problems require every agency to work in collaboration, which is probably what makes this issue such a difficult one—it is about education, schools, local authorities and policing. The sharing of best practice and the collation of data nationally would help to inform the decisions that are made.
Some families need support in managing their children, but all too often I hear concerns expressed at my surgeries about parents who just do not care what their children get up to. In such cases, there needs to be tough action. I firmly believe that parents should be held accountable if they fail to engage with the authorities in efforts to control and help their children.
To conclude, enough is enough. I ask the Government to consider how we collate records on the use of ASB powers and orders, so that we can make a real and meaningful assessment of their use and effectiveness, and empower our police and local authorities. I think we should look again at the burden of evidence and the speed of our justice system, so that our communities see prompt action and offenders are held to account more quickly. Yes, some families need support in dealing with troubled youngsters, but those families who fail to engage with the authorities to help and control their children should be held responsible, either legally or financially.
It is imperative that we, as a country, start taking this issue seriously. We are talking about our children and our communities—the very fabric of our nation. The Government must act. They must show that they care and have the courage to tackle this problem head-on, whether for the young family who worked hard, saved up and bought a dream home, only for it to become a nightmare, or for the elderly lady who dare not leave her house after dark. Will the Government look again to see what more we can do to prevent a minority of youngsters from making people’s lives a misery?
Alex Davies-Jones (Pontypridd) (Lab)
I am very grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate and to be called so early.
Antisocial behaviour is one of the issues that I am contacted about most by constituents—not just the antisocial behaviour in Downing Street, but the antisocial behaviour affecting all our communities. In communities in my constituency such as Beddau, Tonyrefail, Church Village, Rhydyfelin and Ponty town, instances of graffiti, damage to football pitches, joyriding, drinking, drug taking and threatening behaviour are causing huge problems. For people living under the shadow of such antisocial behaviour, the situation seems to be getting worse rather than better.
Labour’s analysis of official statistics found that 13 million adults across the UK had witnessed antisocial behaviour in the past year, which is about one in five of us. Meanwhile, the number of people who say they never see police out on the streets has doubled. Put simply, people in my community do not feel safe on the streets, which absolutely should not be the case. Although I know that South Wales police, my own local force, is working incredibly hard to respond to the rise in antisocial behaviour, it is massively overstretched and the pressures of the pandemic are only making that situation worse.
When we talk about antisocial behaviour and youth crime, the focus is often, importantly, on the victims. However, we also need to consider what is driving antisocial behaviour and what support is on offer to young people. It is wrong to try to have a meaningful conversation and debate about antisocial behaviour and youth crime without considering the impact of the pandemic on young people.
All of us across the House know that the pandemic and the measures that were necessary to control the spread of the virus, including social distancing and school closures, have had an enormous impact on young people. I have visited schools in my constituency and heard young people of all ages talk about their feelings of loneliness and isolation. More and more of them are struggling with mental health problems.
Criminalising young people is not the solution to this issue. A multi-agency response is vital in supporting young people, and particularly important before a young person even has contact with the police. I would very much like to hear more from the Minister today about what her Government are doing to foster a multi-agency approach to tackling youth antisocial behaviour.
Everyone deserves to feel safe in their community, and when we talk about antisocial behaviour, I think that a lot of the time safety is actually what people are concerned about. In debates such as this, it is possible to be over-zealous in talking about more criminalisation; what people in my community actually want is to feel safe and to feel that they are being listened to.
I have to say that South Wales police really is doing its best in very difficult circumstances. Over the last year, my constituents and I have raised serious concerns about incidents of drag racing, and specifically the use of modified cars. That has been happening across the countryside in my area. I recognise the efforts of South Wales police, which recently launched Operation Buena in an attempt to tackle this problem. I have raised this matter with the Government on multiple occasions. Cars that are modified to backfire loudly are causing huge worry. Constituents of mine have compared it to the sound of a shotgun going off; it really can be terrifying, especially for elderly people. It is vital that steps are taken to bring an end to these modifications that cause huge anxiety to people living in the community. People often feel unable to report such matters to the police, and it is hardly possible to rush out and take down a number plate when someone is speeding past. What does the Minister suggest my constituents do?
Often, the young people who are involved in such behaviour do not understand the impact it has on the community. A constituent wrote to me recently to describe how the problem has become worse because of the pandemic. At a packed meeting in Talbot Green, a young man who had been involved in some of the racing was in attendance. He explained that he was just driving for fun, and that he and his friends really did not have anything else to do—as hobbies go, this one was at least cheap. When he realised the impact on the local people, he apologised and explained he really had not understood the impact of his actions and the anxiety that they caused. That highlights the importance of engaging holistically with young people to ensure that they have meaningful alternative ways to spend their time. We also need to ensure that the police have the right levels of support available to help with the problem in the meantime.
With the UK Government yet to make good on their promise of 20,000 new police officers on our streets, I am worried that it will be some time before we see any progress. If the Government are serious about keeping our streets safe, I urge them to work closely with the devolved nations, local authorities and police forces to tackle these problems head-on.
Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for securing this important debate. I, like many other Members in the House, like to be able to sing from the rooftops all of the good things that are going on in our constituencies, but it would be completely wrong of us to dodge the criminal activities and antisocial behaviour that continue to haunt our constituencies. I am afraid that Keighley and Ilkley is no different. It is only right that we are able to raise these concerns in this place, so that we can lobby hard and make sure that these issues are dealt with.
I am sad to say that Keighley experiences its fair share of antisocial behaviour. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South said, this is not just antisocial behaviour—it goes on further into organised crime and the like. The types of experiences that we are having include recreational drug use, which is a huge problem in my constituency, particularly with young people in parks and public places. I am sad to say that in Keighley, Ilkley and Silsden, young people are taking drugs and leaving used needles and empty canisters behind. These people are treating my constituency—my town of Keighley—like a playground, with no respect whatever for the wider community.
I could go on. Some of the other issues that we are experiencing include: fireworks being let off late at night and at all hours; people using our roads like a racetrack or a game, with modified cars and loud exhausts, and really annoying many of my constituents; and worst of all, such behaviour can turn violent and directly involve innocent members of the public who just want to go about their lives. Too often I receive heartbreaking pieces of correspondence from constituents, telling gut-wrenching stories about going about their own business only to be assaulted and mugged in Keighley by mobs of thugs wearing balaclavas. That happened only this month, and in the last two weeks several constituents have raised these concerns.
What is worrying is that although I have many fantastic independent local businesses right in the centre of Keighley, wanting to encourage people into the town to drive economic prosperity, people are being put off from coming in because of these issues. One constituent, Laura Kelly, who owns a fantastic business in the centre of Keighley, is doing a great job standing up for local businesses and making the case that more should be done about antisocial behaviour.
I am aware that there are many reasons—often complex—why young people could be drawn into committing crimes such as the ones that I have mentioned. They might have had a troubled upbringing, with little family care or support, or have had negative influences around them from an early age. Solving such issues is not easy, but the key thing that we must do is offer young people different pathways to a life out of crime, so that they are not dragged into those circumstances. We must provide a way out for them and their friends, so that they do not get drawn into drug dealing, which is a huge challenge.
Youth services and youth workers play a vital role in helping those in disadvantaged positions. They help provide great services to many of the young people in my constituency. Those services allow people to access a network of new environments, to gain new hobbies, to get involved with sports and to learn more skills, all of which can help them get out of crime.
At this point, I must mention Keighley Albion and the Keighley Cougars, local sports groups—rugby groups—that have tried to get young people out of their day-to-day habits of driving using Keighley as a racetrack, and get them more involved in other activities. I was delighted to hear my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer announce an extra £560 million for youth services in last year’s spending review, but I must make it clear that that money must go directly to those areas and to provision such as youth services, to get it to those who need it most.
As I said, my constituency unfortunately has an undeniable problem with youth crime. It is my sincere hope that if we continue to open up, to talk about such issues, we can show young people a different option out of crime, to move our community forward. I finish by asking the Minister, can we ensure that for those who are convicted of crimes, justice is served quickly, so that my local businesses and residents feel that justice has been served in a timely manner?
Ms Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)
It is an absolute pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson.
I thank the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for giving me the opportunity to talk again about the county lines difficulties that we have in my constituency and elsewhere in the country. Much of the really violent crime and antisocial behaviour committed by young people in my patch is linked to the lines drug gangs. Just before Christmas, I introduced a ten-minute rule Bill, in which I had a number of asks, including a national strategy to end county lines criminal exploitation for good.
I became aware of county lines back in about 2015 or 2016. I was introduced to some mums of children who were being exploited. Have no doubt: those mums were amazing—they are courageous, strong and brave—and they showed me so much to enable me to understand what is happening in my constituency.
One of those women—I will call her Ashley—told me about her son, Kofi. When Kofi was 15, his neighbour started to build a relationship with him, and at first it all seemed okay. The neighbour was often to be found at Ashley’s house, watching TV and playing PlayStation. Slowly, however, Ashley realised that this man was turning her son away from school and away from her. Then, three days before Christmas, Kofi did not come home.
The next night Kofi called her, whispering. Some men had him—he did not know where he was and he was absolutely terrified. When Kofi finally returned, Ashley again called the police, and made him go to the police station, despite threats of violence against both of them. It was an extremely brave thing to do.
What Ashley told them, however, was ignored, and Kofi was treated as a criminal, not a victim. He was 15 years of age. The men who had groomed, exploited, traumatised and threatened him were, as far as Ashley knows, left alone, and no one came to check on Kofi afterwards to ensure that he was okay. Ashley told me that Kofi was never the same after that experience—his trust and hopes had been absolutely crushed. He had no support for his trauma, and the pattern continued.
A year later, Kofi was about to be accepted into the Army, to change his life for the better. But in that moment of hope, historical robberies were laid at Kofi’s door. Ashley believes it was because he was of an age to be sentenced as an adult. Ashley tells me she has seen Kofi’s groomers walking the streets, flashing the cash they made destroying children’s lives.
Five years ago, there was a bit of an excuse for not understanding what the lines were doing to our children; but there is no excuse now. The police, teachers and others have become more knowledgeable but, sadly, our response to the lines is still not based on evidence. The Government do not know how many children supervised by youth offending teams have gang memberships or criminal exploitation noted as an issue. The Government do not know how many of those known to children’s services have criminal exploitation as a risk factor, or how many slavery and trafficking prevention orders have been made to stop the exploitation of children. They do not know how many local safeguarding partnerships even have a child criminal exploitation strategy, let alone the effectiveness of those strategies.
It is only by having a real understanding of the complexity of the lines that we will make progress. We need our social workers and our police to be empowered to work with the people best able to reach the children in trouble. That means trusted community groups and charities who know their patch, but it means parents, too. The mums I have worked with over the years have been so very impressive in their dedication and perceptiveness about what has gone wrong. Social workers, police officers and even teachers sometimes have a bit of suspicious attitude towards the mums, and that has to change.
The Commission on Young Lives is working on this issue and will publish a report in the coming weeks. I want the Government to actively engage with it. If the Minister is able, I would like her to commit to meet me, Barnardo’s and the Children’s Society to talk about a statutory definition of child criminal exploitation ahead of the victims Bill. The role of a parent in a young person’s life is limited, especially once a groomer has got their hooks in them; but they are so often the best ally that we have, and they must be listened to and respected. Family has to be treated as part of the solution for preventing youth crime.
Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. It is surprising to be called so early in the debate. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for sponsoring this debate, which is of relevance to many right hon. and hon. Members in this place.
Sadly, Ipswich has been at the heart of much crime and antisocial behaviour, some incredibly serious, and some seemingly less serious but perhaps connected to the most serious crime. We have had some tragic incidents in Ipswich over the last few years. Tavis Spencer-Aitkens was brutally murdered three years ago outside his father’s home, as a result of county lines and gang violence in Ipswich. Richard Day, an Ipswich man, was killed in the town centre in tragic circumstances.
There are some things we can do that some may say involve us getting tougher with crime, particularly when it comes to sentencing, to make sure that those who commit the most serious crimes are appropriately punished. From time to time Members will see me speaking to that. But it is not just about having a tough approach to sentencing. We also need to spend some time thinking about the lives that a lot of these individuals lead, to put ourselves in their shoes and to imagine that we are them, and that we are in a school where we are not successful, perhaps because we have learning disabilities—we know that the proportion of those in prison with learning disabilities is incredibly high.
If an individual does not feel like a success at school because they are not getting the success that they need, their needs are not being met, and they go back home and potentially there are problems with their home life, and there is nothing to do in their local area—no club for them to join, and they cannot get a sense of belonging from anywhere—the brutal reality is that, for some, joining a gang does give them that sense of belonging. The way to tackle that is to give them a positive sense of belonging. If we put ourselves in their shoes, we want to have the positive pulls and less of the negative pulls.
What I actually want to talk about today is the seemingly less serious antisocial behaviour. We say “less serious”, but in the minds of many of my constituents it is very serious. I lose count of the number of times that I talk to constituents—long-term Ipswich residents who have lived in Ipswich their whole life—who are critical of the town centre. Often I think they can be unfairly critical of the town centre, because we have some fantastic businesses in the town centre that work incredibly hard to make it an attractive destination. Most of the residents’ concerns are to do with antisocial behaviour and not feeling safe in the town centre.
If we are to have a conversation about regenerating our town centre, by all means let us engage in a debate about business rates reform, town deals and levelling-up funds, but we also need to have a conversation about crime and the fear of crime, because if that is deterring people—my constituents—from going into the town centre to spend money, we need to deal with that as well.
I want to touch now on an issue on which not everyone will agree, which is to do with large groups of individuals—more often than not young men—who congregate in and around the town centre, more often than not drinking alcohol, often leaving litter afterwards, and acting in an incredibly antisocial way. Constituents get in contact because they, or often their daughters, have been on the receiving end of inappropriate comments and have been made to feel intimidated while going about their business. That is simply unacceptable.
I often talk to the police and ask, “What opportunity is there to disperse these groups?”, because I think that should be part of the police’s remit, and they often say, “Unless they are clearly breaking the law and it is really obvious, there is nothing we can do.” I would personally like to see the police empowered to play their role in making our public spaces safe, secure environments in which the law-abiding majority feel safe, and that they want to go to.
There is an element here of tolerance, which is important, but I think we should be intolerant of antisocial behaviour. I do not care who it is who is forming in large groups, acting in an antisocial way, making people feel uncomfortable; I do not care where they are from. If their behaviour is not acceptable, it needs to be communicated to them.
There is a number of things that we can do, and I have touched on one of them, which is the police having more of a remit to disperse groups of young men who are having a detrimental impact on the town centre in Ipswich. We also need fair police funding in Ipswich. We know that Suffolk is one of the most unfairly funded police authorities in the country, so we need a commitment to review the national police funding formula as soon as possible. I must stop going on and draw my comments to a close. Thank you for indulging me, Mr Robertson, and allowing me to go over the time limit.
Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) on securing this debate. I know that hon. Members across the House will agree that it is the sense of community—that coming together of people, and the genuine care and compassion that we show each other—that makes our communities great. One benefit of having such an amazing community in Newcastle upon Tyne North is that we have some fantastic community groups, such as the D2 youth project in Newbiggin Hall, the Denton Youth and Community Project in West Denton, and Inspire Youth. Those and many more organisations work incredibly hard to keep young people off the streets and prevent them from falling into crime—something that I know is a major focus for our police and crime commissioner, Kim McGuinness, in Northumbria, who helps to fund many of these projects.
Yet we have to accept that there is a limit to what local agencies can do and what the police can do, despite the bravery and hard work of officers, when we have seen 10 years of devastating cuts to our policing and criminal justice system under Conservative Governments.
Significant pockets of antisocial behaviour simply blight parts of my constituency, in areas where decent people are just trying to get on with their lives. We continue to see significant issues in Newbiggin Hall, with persistent crime and vandalism affecting the day-to-day lives of many people. There are also general concerns about antisocial behaviour across Newbiggin Hall, including motorcycle disorder and drug dealing. West Denton has also seen a significant increase in antisocial behaviour in recent years. In just one week last year, the fire brigade was called out on six out of seven days for fires in the same street. While constituents most frequently raise problems with Newbiggin Hall and West Denton, I know that other neighbourhoods struggle with antisocial behaviour issues. It is unacceptable that any of our constituents should feel unsafe in their own homes, or feel they have to watch their backs when they walk to the shops or worry that their children are sliding into a life of crime, but unfortunately that is the reality for many of my constituents.
The Government have no shortage of rhetoric on crime. Ministers like to tell us how tough they will be and how harshly they will punish the criminals that we manage to catch, but for all the tough talk, the truth is that Conservative cuts to frontline policing and the criminal justice system have caused the proportion of reported crimes ending in prosecution to plummet over the last 10 years. For example, in 2013-14, more than a quarter of violence against the person offences recorded by police in England and Wales ended in prosecution; in 2016, it was around 17%. By 2019-20 and 2020-21, it had fallen to just 6% and 9% respectively.
Tough talk and harsh punishments will not stop these people making our constituents’ lives a nightmare while the Government refuse to give the police the resources to catch them in the first place, and the justice system the ability to see it through. I am afraid to say that this has created an environment where antisocial behaviour can be seen to take place with relative impunity. That is incredibly frustrating for those on the receiving end of it. We know that the police are recruiting 20,000 new officers to partially compensate for past cuts, but Ministers have shown far less interest in replacing the backroom staff essential to supporting their colleagues out on the beat. That means that police officers will still be pulled into administrative duties that do not require a trained police officer.
The first duty of any state is to ensure the safety of its people. After 10 years of various Conservative Governments hollowing out the police and criminal justice system, the British state, for many of my constituents, is simply failing in that duty. We need a Labour Government that will put community safety first. That means more police out there tackling crime, antisocial behaviour and dangerous driving—the things they came into the force to do. It means funding and restoring youth projects and treatment services that prevent crime. It means providing real support and justice for victims.
Jacob Young (Redcar) (Con)
I thank my fellow Teessider, my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers), for introducing this debate on this vital issue. It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, I believe, Mr Robertson.
Antisocial behaviour is a significant issue in Redcar and Cleveland, endangering lives, perpetuating crime, damaging protected habitat and ruining the life chances of young people. A particular element of antisocial behaviour in Redcar and Cleveland is a result of the illegal use of off-road motorbikes, unlicensed and uninsured, incidents of which have been making people’s lives miserable, particularly in areas such as Eston, Normanby, Teesville, Grangetown and South Bank. There have been widespread reports from local people of these off-road bikes being used to ferry drugs between dealers, sometimes sadly exploiting young children in the process, as the hon. Member for West Ham (Ms Brown) outlined in Kofi’s awful story. This exploitation is abuse, tragically ruining the lives of young people, greatly endangering public health and damaging the living environment of the people I represent.
Despite attempts by Redcar and Cleveland Council to block off the unofficial routes that these criminals use, including more than £15,000 spent trying to protect Eston Hills alone, the problem persists. Additionally, efforts by Cleveland police to tackle the problem have been largely fruitless, often hampered by the sheer scale of the task, with police resources spread thin over such a wide area.
Many people feel powerless, to the point where some of my constituents have ceased even reporting incidents of this criminality. There is the feeling that nothing will be done. This must change. I want to make a plea to my constituents who experience or witness this type of antisocial behaviour. It is imperative that they report it. Each phone call helps the police colour their picture and enables them to better pursue the individuals responsible.
Beyond the menace of off-road bikes, another antisocial behaviour problem in Redcar and Cleveland is kerbside gangs. Gangs of youths are causing minor criminal damage, while terrorising estates, and there are vulnerable people, such as the elderly or disabled, living on these estates. I support Cleveland police in wanting to see the courts become more stringent in pushing parental orders, whereby parents can be held responsible for their child’s behaviour, and that goes to the heart of the problem.
Although we have a Home Office Minister responding to today’s debate, and although antisocial behaviour often involves criminal behaviour, this is not a problem that the police or Government alone can resolve. I believe that it is for us as a society to create spaces where young people, especially young boys, are able to find purpose and self-worth. Frankie Wales’s boxing club in Redcar is a perfect example. He helps young boys in Redcar and Cleveland not only to learn to box, but to achieve their potential and value their community, belonging to a positive gang. My hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Tom Hunt) touched on that in his comments.
Alongside his boxing club at Coatham Memorial Hall, Frankie hosts inter-generational events, where the young people he engages with on a day-to-day basis serve local care home residents and elderly people. In so doing, they learn the value of supporting their wider community. This surely is a shining example of the third sector helping to tackle issues of antisocial behaviour in a way that national and local authorities and the police never could. It may be charities, churches or community groups, such as Frankie’s boxing club, the Chris Cave Foundation or the Ladies of Steel youth club in Dormanstown. They demonstrate that it is only by coming together as a society that we can tackle antisocial behaviour. I believe we should do all we can to support them.
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson, and I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for securing this important debate.
I have listened to hon. Members talking about issues that affect a number of our constituents. Left unresolved and untreated, these issues can get out of hand and can, unfortunately, result in dangerous events, including murder. We have to be honest: for a number of our young people up and down the country, the opportunities available to them are disappearing fast. The opportunities that existed in our youth clubs and after-school centres have been cut due to the successive underfunding of our local government. We need to address that if we are going to tackle antisocial behaviour.
Last July, I attended the memorial event for Jahreau Shepherd, a champion mixed martial arts fighter, who was tragically stabbed near Sancroft Street in my constituency. There were a number of his family members there that day. I will not forget speaking to his mother; I heard her pain, loss and suffering from losing a loving son. He had got his life back on track and was an inspirational figure in the community. Tragically, Jahreau was stabbed by his own half-brother, who he had acted like a father figure to, encouraging him to sort out his life and fix up. However, his half-brother suffered from major mood swings and was sentenced for manslaughter with diminished responsibility at the Old Bailey.
As the MP for Vauxhall, which is just across the river from here, I am never heartbroken or struck by those tragic cases that I unfortunately have to hear, because sadly, in my short two years of being an MP, I have had too many of those conversations. I have had to comfort mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, aunties and uncles, and grandparents. Too many have seen the shocking impact of youth crime and antisocial behaviour when it spirals out of control. I have talked to them when they are saying goodbye to their loved ones, thinking about the future that some of those young people could have had, sitting in front rooms and looking at pictures on the wall of those innocent young children—because they are children.
We have to be honest and identify the causes of youth crime among our young people, which are complex and varied. It is not just a matter of victims versus criminals; a case of just lock them up, go hard on them and throw away the key. Many of our young people who tragically fall into this are actually victims of crime themselves, and have gone through such difficult childhoods. Some hon. Members state that we just need parents to be tougher, but those parents are struggling as well. Those parents had complex childhoods and need help. That is the pattern. If we do not fund properly, we will keep seeing this repeated over and over again for generations.
We have to address the issue of childhood trauma, because many of those children, as my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Ms Brown) highlighted, are being exploited. They are victims of older people exploiting them, in some cases children as young as 10. We have to look at how we address that. We cannot keep treating the issue as them versus us. We need to look at how we support some of our young people, instead of trying to push them into a punitive justice system. We need to stop pigeonholing these young people, some of whom are barely out of school.
I am grateful to the many youth workers and youth clubs across my constituency who do fantastic work with our young people and their families, including the Black Prince Trust, Bright Centres and Young People Matter. They are working day in, day out to ensure that those young people do not get caught up in youth crime or antisocial behaviour, but the reality is that they groups cannot do it on their own. They have suffered massive cuts over the past few years. Just last Friday I was with Young People Matter, trying to save the community group it has been operating in for a number of years. The housing association is trying to force it out and the alternative provided is not suitable. Will the Minister recognise the vital work that such groups do? How will the Government support them in delivering the funding so that they can continue working in this area?
Shortly after I was elected in 2019, I was one of the first people on site when a stabbing took place outside Kennington station, just over the border of my constituency, on 7 January 2020. I was one of the first people to help that young boy, who was just 15, by putting pressure on the wound. I said in my maiden speech that we cannot allow ourselves to become desensitised to the issue of violent youth crime.
We have to look at how to get adequate funding for mental health services for our young people. We have seen the devastating impact of covid-19 on mental health services for our young people. Will the Minister please ensure that there is vital support for young people? This is now a priority to help all of us—families, young people, practitioners, the police and the wider community—effectively address youth violence and antisocial behaviour.
Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for securing this debate, although, as a father of two young children, I find it slightly unnerving to be reminded of my parental responsibilities for their future behaviour.
I have been fortunate to listen to some great speeches and, as a result, intend to be entirely parochial in my comments about the needs of my constituency. My constituents, who are worried about antisocial behaviour and youth crime, want to see five things. First, they want more police and, crucially, more sympathetic policing. We are fortunate in having strong local leadership across the three boroughs of which Harrow is part, but we certainly do not have the level of local policing that we had under the previous Labour Government, when each ward and community had a sergeant, three police constables and three or four police community support officers, able to take real local intelligence and use it in a sensitive way to get better police outcomes.
I would like to see stronger action by the British Transport police around the many transport hubs in my constituency. We need to see enforcement activity that people know about, and that helps to offer comfort to people who are worried that they might be victims of antisocial behaviour around those transport hubs. I think particularly about some of the comments that young women have made to me about the sexual harassment that they have faced in one or two of those transport hubs in particular.
A national point that I would make, which is reflected in Harrow, and echoes a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), is about the justice system. Quicker action by the courts to process the cases of young people accused of wrongdoing is essential. I was struck by the report by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of probation, which found that at the end of 2020 the backlog of children awaiting court appearances in England and Wales had increased by more than 50% compared with the same period the previous year. One can understand that in the context of covid a little, but it is striking that the pattern of such backlogs has been increasing since 2010.
The chair of the Criminal Bar Association has made a similar point—that there were cases of 17-year-olds awaiting trial who were not likely to have their cases come to court until next year at the earliest. Those delays can only mean anguish and fear for victims, more uncertainty for those accused children, and the sense that there is somehow impunity for the worst cases of antisocial behaviour.
As other Members on both the Government and Opposition Benches have alluded to, we need more support for schools to support young people who are at risk of being bullied and who are at risk of getting in with gangs, and more support for activities that they can join in the holidays or after school. Too many of those activities, because of austerity over the last 10 years, are no longer available.
On a more general point, we need action on the poverty that too many young people in my community in Harrow are experiencing, which prevents them being able to do their homework when they want to or being able to take part in other activities that my children will take for granted, because their parents simply cannot afford them.
Action is essential going forward. What specific action does that mean? Harrow missed out in the announcement by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner in October last year on getting a dedicated police team for the centre of our area. I hope that will be rectified as a matter of urgency. Harrow town centre has many redeeming features, with many great businesses, but it is still scarred on occasion by antisocial behaviour. Having a dedicated police team for that town centre to mirror the one in the Prime Minister’s constituency in Uxbridge would be extremely welcome.
As I already alluded to, the British Transport police have to take stronger action and be a stronger presence around Harrow-on-the-Hill station and Harrow and Wealdstone station, which young people and older people consistently report as places where they are worried about being attacked or do not feel safe.
Lastly, I want to praise the work of the Young Harrow Foundation and its excellent chief executive, Dan Burke. Working with Harrow Council, Harrow schools, the police and the NHS, he has set out in some detail the concerns of young people in Harrow aged between nine and 18. Some 6,000 of them were interviewed about the challenges they face, and issues around support for their mental health and for more activities that they can take part in during holidays and after school are urgent. More support for those types of organisations, which want to bring funding into my constituency, would be extremely welcome.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Thank you, Mr Robertson, for enabling me to speak in this debate. I thank the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for securing and leading the debate, and for his comments. I have three things to say. First, I support what he is putting forward and his contribution—and the contribution of others as well. Secondly, I want to offer a Northern Ireland perspective, as I always do. The Minister does not have responsibility for Northern Ireland, so she will not have to answer the points of view that I will put forward, but they are to add relevance to this debate and to put forward some ideas for how we can improve. Thirdly, I will refer to one very active organisation in my constituency of Strangford, and suggest to the Minister and others here that that organisation could work alongside the police, community groups and community leaders to address the issues. It has done that in my constituency, which is why I want to talk about it.
To say that I am somewhat concerned about the rates of antisocial behaviour and youth crime is an understatement. The rates have increased significantly because of the covid-19 pandemic, and some of the figures that I will give are quite significant and worrying. Powers must be given to local authorities to help address that. I have heard the hon. Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore) speak a number of times about antisocial behaviour, and not just in Westminster Hall but in the main Chamber. He referred to those who race about in cars, and others have referred to that issue as well. Sometimes they use their Twitter or Facebook accounts to tell people where to be. Back home, the police monitor those sites and are able to be there when the young people arrive. I am sure that has been done. If it has not, it should be, because it is another method of addressing the issue.
Antisocial behaviour encompasses the criminal and nuisance behaviour of all kinds, most notably noisy neighbours, public drunkenness, street drug dealing, littering and loitering, which other hon. Members have referred to. Pre-pandemic, in 2019, the United Kingdom’s antisocial behaviour crime rate was 22 per 1,000 people. For 2020, the first full year of living with covid, that figure increased to 29 per 1,000, so it is quite clear that the pandemic has, as with nearly everything in life, changed things dramatically—and not for the better.
For Northern Ireland, instances of antisocial behaviour and youth crime have also been increasing, according to the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. The rise has been described as “substantial”. In the 12 months from March 2020 to February 2021, there were almost 74,000 antisocial behaviour incidents in Northern Ireland, which is an increase of almost 19,000, or 34.1%, on the previous 12 months. On the mainland, incidents are up 24%. That is quite worrying. Northern Ireland’s figure is the highest rolling 12-month figure since the period of June 2010 to May 2011—some 11 years ago. In addition to this, all 11 policing districts showed high levels of antisocial behaviour. We cannot simply blame the pandemic for the increase in antisocial behaviour and youth crime in society; I believe that it goes deeper. The Minister will obviously respond to the comments that others have made.
Antisocial behaviour has been an issue in my constituency for as long as I have been an elected representative, which is not since yesterday—I first started as a councillor in 1985. I served on the police partnership board at that time. I believe that we made some significant steps in trying to address antisocial behaviour. Not only did we employ officers in the council to liaise and work alongside the police service in Northern Ireland; we also engaged with other community groups to try to address those issues—such factors as family environment, domestic violence and struggles in young people’s education. Others, including the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi), referred to those. Studies found that children who struggle in domestic settings or in school are more likely to be involved in crime and partake in antisocial behaviour. I thank my neighbourhood policing teams and council officers for what they do. Ards and North Down Borough Council policing teams do brilliant work in reducing the rates of antisocial behaviour in Strangford.
I am conscious of time, Mr Robertson, which is going by quicker than I had realised. Street pastors have been significant in my constituency, and have worked alongside the police and the council antisocial officers. They ensure that people who are intoxicated, or whatever it may be, get home. They are there to provide help to ladies who lose their shoes—it happens—or those who need a drink of water, or those who just need somebody to talk to. I am sure the Minister and other hon. Members already know this, but Street Pastors is one of the organisations that can help. It wants to help and, in my constituency, it has.
To conclude, I urge the Minister to undertake discussions with the devolved Administrations to see what we are doing, in order to share and learn, which is what we want to do as well, and to put in place more police to deal with the rise in antisocial behaviour in our constituencies. I encourage the Minister to look at the prison system, to see if improvements could be made to make prison a beneficial time for young people, to educate them and make reoffending an unlikely route for them to go down.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mr Robertson. I thank the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for securing this incredibly important debate.
I start by paying tribute to constituents, families and young people in Liverpool, West Derby who are living through the real-life consequences of austerity. It has decimated the provision of youth clubs, youth workers and the services that helped to shape my life experiences, and those of so many others like me, growing up in Thatcher’s Britain in the 1980s. I owe such a debt of gratitude to the youth workers who guided me and so many others through such a difficult period in our city’s history. The relationships we formed with those youth workers, and their guidance and wise counsel, are the reason I can stand here today participating in this debate. It was interesting to listen to Ian Wright say something extremely similar on TV on Saturday.
That crucial safety net has now been removed, and our communities are living through the consequences. Youth provision is almost non-existent, with vulnerable children roaming the streets, getting into gangs and trouble. We have recently seen fatalities in Liverpool due to knife crime, with children killing children, devasting whole communities and families. Youth centres are shut, and sometimes the only sporting facilities available in my constituency are privatised facilities that charge £70 an hour to families struggling through austerity and now a cost-of-living crisis. Many of our children have not got a chance if opportunities and facilities are not available to all.
I place on the record my thanks to all the service staff, teachers, parents, community groups and police across West Derby, especially Anfield Sports and Community Centre, Action for Children, the Young Person’s Advisory Service and Alder Hey staff, and I acknowledge the work being done by the No More Knives and Real Men Don’t Carry Knives campaigns. These people are doing so much across our city to support young people through such difficult times.
There is a massive effort being made across Liverpool to support and nurture our young children, but we desperately need funding and policy changes from central Government. Since austerity began in 2010 under the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition, Liverpool City Council has seen its funding reduced by 65%. Despite the Government declaring that the age of austerity is over, the cuts to our funding continue, and the consequences for our young people, and the youth services and facilities they need, continue to be felt.
According to research by the trade union Unison, between 2010 and 2019, youth services in the UK suffered cuts of £400 million. That will have meant the loss of 4,500 youth work jobs and the closure of more than 760 youth centres since 2012. It is shameful. According to a February 2021 survey by UK Youth on the impact of covid-19 on youth services, 66% of the 1,759 organisations surveyed said there had been an increase in demand. Despite the greater need for their services, 83% reported that their funding had decreased, while 64% said they were at risk of closure in the next 12 months. Research by the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy found that 80% of young people say that their mental health has worsened during the covid-19 outbreak.
As I have said, we desperately need the funding and policies from the Government to support, nurture and invest in our young people. In her response, will the Minister commit to providing the vital funding that councils need to invest in youth services and facilities for our young people? As I have mentioned, so many facilities have been lost in the last decade, and I do not doubt the positive outcomes they would have had for so many young people had they remained open.
Will the Minister explain the Government’s strategy to support pupils and schools so that young people do not face exclusion and the lifelong damage that can cause? Will she also commit to funding young people’s mental health services, as well as early intervention mentoring programmes and specialist children’s services? This should not be a postcode lottery. We need provisions for our youth and preventive measures put in place as an investment to ensure that all our children have a level playing field and a bright future.
I hear the words “levelling up” a lot from Government Members. Let us put it into practice and restore the youth provision we have lost to all, so that the phrase actually means something to our children.
Mr Laurence Robertson (in the Chair)
We need to leave a couple of minutes at the end for the mover of the motion to respond. I call Sarah Jones.
Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab)
Thank you, Mr Robertson; it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I congratulate the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) on securing the debate, which has been interesting; I agreed with virtually everything he said. Antisocial behaviour has been trivialised, downplayed and dismissed in recent times. He said that we have a moral obligation to ensure that every child gets the opportunities they need to make the best of their life, that this is about more than just policing—it is about schools, local authorities and youth work—and that enough is enough. I think he will get a shock when he realises that his party has been in government for the last 11 years and has caused significant cuts that have driven a lot of the problems we face today.
I congratulate all hon. Members on their speeches. My hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) talked about the impact of covid, which is really important in how we look at this issue. The hon. Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore) talked about youth workers and how important they are, and we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Ian Byrne) just now about the impact of cuts to youth work across the country. My hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Ms Brown) is such a fantastic campaigner on county lines and has been for a long time, and I add to her plea for the Government to look at the issue of defining child criminal exploitation. As it happens, an amendment calling for a definition is going through the House of Lords as we speak, so there is an opportunity in the Lords for the Government to support my hon. Friend’s cause, and we would welcome that.
The hon. Member for Ipswich (Tom Hunt) represents an interesting area; some good progress has been made on county lines in East Anglia. It is one of the only areas in the country where there has been some progress, but there is still a lot to be done. My hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) spoke about the wonderful police and crime commissioner, Kim McGuinness, and the work she is doing. I was up there just before Christmas and worked with her; I went to St James’s Park and saw the wonderful youth work the football club is doing to try to ensure that people have opportunities. The hon. Member for Redcar (Jacob Young) represents an important part of the country; a lot of the problems that are being debated now existed 20 years ago when I was working for Mo Mowlam.
My hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi) spoke movingly, as always, about the really big challenges we face with youth violence, which I have in my constituency as well. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas) talked about those massively long waiting times. We cannot expect our young people to understand justice when the justice system does not work; it makes no sense and it cannot be done. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) spoke about council workers and the importance of tackling antisocial behaviour through local councils. Of course, our local councils have been absolutely decimated, so that is very difficult. Finally, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby told a personal story about how important youth work is. I think we all collectively agree with all of that.
I am pleased to follow so many good speeches. Since becoming an MP, I have spent five years campaigning against knife crime, and in my role as shadow Policing Minister I have been around the country in the past few months, looking at antisocial behaviour and seeing a lot of the issues. We can see how antisocial behaviour, which is defined as low-level but which I do not think is low-level at all, can spread and become more serious crime over time, exactly as hon. Members have said.
Everyone has a basic right to be safe in their community. Sadly, after the past 11 years our streets have become less safe. We have talked about prosecution rates; criminals are literally getting away with it under this Government. Only 6.5% of all crimes—a little over one in 20—lead to a prosecution, and the charge rate has halved over the past five years. Those figures are extraordinary. Criminals can pretty much get away with it.
Sarah Jones
Exactly. Whether people live in the city or in the country, they worry about their kids going out on the streets and getting into drugs. People can go online and buy any drug they want; on the “Today” programme only this morning, Claire Campbell spoke about her son, who died of an overdose after buying drugs online. There is a whole world of problems. Police struggle because they have to become social workers due to the impact of mental health cuts and the like. Serious organised criminals have got a real grip, and the UK is Europe’s largest heroin market—I think that statistic is extraordinary and shows how much work we have to do.
Antisocial behaviour is up 7% in the past year, with 1.8 million incidents recorded. To say that it is ignored by this Government is an understatement. There is no way of measuring the problem because it does not form part of the statistics under the Home Office’s counting rules. The way local authorities treat antisocial behaviour varies: some areas are good, while some are hopeless. I have made a series of freedom of information requests; I will not go into them all now, because they will come out shortly, but one council had 248 recorded incidents of antisocial behaviour and did 150 investigations, which resulted in no enforcement action whatever. Some boroughs really are struggling to do anything, and some are doing good things.
When I was going around the country, I saw a lot of good activity on antisocial behaviour. Rhyl was a particular favourite: for a start, there are more police community support officers on the street there, because the Welsh Government have funded more PCSOs over and above Government funding and they are crucial to preventing antisocial behaviour. There was a wonderful project with people you would describe as hoodlums out on the street, doing whatever they were doing. Youth workers went out to where they were, got involved with them and got them involved in sport. They took them up Snowdon, which was completely out of their comfort zone—they had not done anything like that before—and now they are doing their Duke of Edinburgh’s award. It was a complete transformation—how wonderful.
I went to see the Peel project in Hull. A park had become a horrible place for antisocial behaviour, with drug taking and kids hanging around, but the police gave a local organisation some shipping containers. It put a load of sports stuff in and based a little office in the park, and now the park is now a lovely place where people do sport and come together because there are adults, some structure and some things to do. It is not rocket science, but in so many places it is simply not done because the funding is not there.
Let me move on to youth crime. A 15-year-old boy, Zaian, was murdered in my constituency just before new year’s eve in the park I used to play in. On the same day, another boy became the 30th teenager to be murdered in London last year. Research from the organisation Crest shows that between 2014 and 2019 there was a 56% rise in knife possession offences for 10 to 17-year-olds, which is extraordinary. The organisation says that those who commit robbery and use weapons before the age of 18 are much more likely to have long criminal careers than young people who commit less serious crimes. Arrests of 10 to 17-year-olds make up a growing proportion of arrests for robbery—the statistics go on.
Anne Longfield, who was such a brilliant Children’s Commissioner, brought out a report this week that shows that spending on early intervention has reduced by almost two thirds over the past 10 years. What can we do with a third of what we had before? We know that these problems start young, and the Sutton Trust tells us that 1,000 family centres closed over the same period. Youth services were cut by about 40%—and by much more in some parts of the country—and the number of children given treatment by child and adolescent mental health services was massively reduced and they had to wait for long periods. We know what the problems are.
On top of that we can add the fact that we have so few police officers compared with what we need. Some 50% of PCSOs have been cut, and the Government have no plans to bring any of them back. We are still 10,000 short of the number of officers we used to have and, as was pointed out, a lot of officers are spending time doing other roles because of the cuts to police staff.
Labour says that there is nothing more important than keeping people safe, and we have a plan to provide new police hubs that will be visible in every community as a place where the public can go and talk to the police and other agencies in person. We will have new neighbourhood prevention teams to bring together the police, community support officers, youth workers and local authority staff to tackle crime. These teams would prioritise being visible and would pursue serial perpetrators of antisocial behaviour.
I appreciate that I need to end my speech, but I will just ask the Minister a series of questions. Will she consider bringing back the 50% of PCSOs we have lost? Will she speak to the request from the hon. Member for Stockton South for antisocial behaviour to be measured nationally in a better way? Will she address the request from my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham for child criminal exploitation to become a priority, and will she look at tackling crime and antisocial behaviour with real force from the Home Office? The Home Office too often blames local police forces and does not provide leadership, and often it is not one step ahead of the criminals but one step behind. We need real leadership from the Home Office and cross-Government working to tackle these very significant and increasing problems.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Rachel Maclean)
It is a huge pleasure to serve under your exemplary chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) for securing this important debate. It has been a wide-ranging debate touching on vital issues that affect all our constituents and all our communities. I thank him very much for bringing to my attention and to that of Home Office officials the courage of the individuals in the cases he mentioned. All the Members in this debate have brought personal stories to the fore, and I commend them for doing so and their constituents for coming forward.
We would think from listening to the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones)—it is a pleasure to follow her, and we do have a good debating relationship—that the Government are doing nothing on this, so let me start by saying that this Government have put beating crime front and centre. It is a key part of the levelling-up agenda to tackle antisocial behaviour, youth crime and wider crimes. At no stage do we believe or think that this is low-level behaviour; we never underestimate the impact that it has on communities, public spaces and the law-abiding majority who want to go about their business. We have seen so much in the pandemic that the enjoyment of public spaces is vital for mental and physical health, and we are firmly and fully committed to tackling and preventing crime, youth crime and antisocial behaviour.
In the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South alone, Cleveland police has recruited 194 additional police officers and will be receiving £157 million in funding, which is an increase of up to £7.7 million on previous years. That is replicated around England and Wales. Across the country, we have recruited 11,053 officers towards the 20,000 target, which was set out at the last general election, for England and Wales. Some Members from Wales are here, and I am sure they will welcome that funding from Conservative central Government. The police across the country will receive £15.9 billion for this financial year. I am sure we can all agree that these are significant amounts of public money being dedicated by this Conservative Government to this vital priority.
If we are to successfully address antisocial behaviour and youth crime, it is vital that Government, local authorities, frontline professionals and voluntary sector partners work together. That is at the heart of our plan. I commend all the Members who mentioned the community groups and various charities that are working so hard in this area. I have the same experience in my Redditch constituency. Those groups can do some things that the state cannot, no matter how well-funded and well-meaning it is. As the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Ian Byrne) eloquently said, they can reach people who are out of reach, and it is vital that they continue to do so.
Jim Shannon
In my contribution, I referred to Street Pastors as one such organisation. I am aware that it works in the constituency of the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi), as it does in others. What discussions has the Minister had with Street Pastors about using that voluntary service for the betterment of all the community?
Rachel Maclean
I thank the hon. Gentleman so much for raising that. I strongly support that service with all my heart. I have seen how Street Pastors works effectively, especially in the night-time economy. We have debated violence against women and girls, and the Home Office has funded a number of such schemes and enabled local authorities to roll them out in their local areas.
Antisocial behaviour comes in various forms and guises. It differs from community to community, which is why it is important that there are flexible local powers that can be used, along with local knowledge of an area from local communities and the other agencies in it.
Members will be familiar with the changes that were made following the introduction of the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. A number of tools and powers were introduced at that time. Some of those powers can be issued by a court, and they impose positive restrictions or requirements on an individual convicted of a criminal offence who has engaged in behaviour that has caused, or is likely to cause, harassment, alarm and distress. One of those powers is a community trigger, which is a vital safety net. My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South made a point about the burden of evidence on communities. I encourage him to come back to me to have a detailed discussion with my officials. We are very keen to hear how we can improve that so that these powers work effectively for his community and others.
I do not have a huge amount of time left. I want to focus my remarks on parenting orders, which Members have raised.
Rachel Maclean
I will save the hon. Member the trouble; I will happily meet her. However, I want her to know that the Home Office is working with and funding the Children’s Society on many of the issues that she rightly touched on. Modern slavery is a vital part of the Government’s plan.
A parenting order is not the only way in which we can require families to engage with the authorities and tackle this behaviour at the source. Very often, youth offending teams work with parents on a voluntary basis. The experience is that parents often engage readily and take part in specific programmes, including parenting programmes, and that can have a very helpful, positive outcome. However, when that does not work, youth offending teams can ensure compliance and encourage engagement by issuing warning letters and using compliance panels. Consistent non-compliance without a good reason can lead to a police investigation and proceedings in court. Non-compliance may lead the court to issue a fine of up to £1,000, a probation order, a curfew order or an absolute or conditional discharge.
The hon. Member for West Ham (Ms Brown) raised county lines. I have a huge amount of respect for her, but unfortunately, she did not credit the work that has been going on nationally on county lines. I want to update her: since 2019, the police have closed more than 1,500 county lines, made over 7,400 arrests, seized £4.3 million in cash and drugs and safeguarded more than 4,000 people. Whatever party Members are from, I am sure that they can welcome that achievement.
Rachel Maclean
I am afraid I will not. I have such a lot to say and I have had less time than the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Croydon Central, and other Members.
We are investing £560 million in youth services in England over the next three years, including the youth investment fund, to transform the Government’s offer to young people and to level up opportunities right across the country. To kick-start the youth investment programme, an additional £10 million will be spent this year in key levelling-up areas to enable local youth providers, such as the ones that many Members have mentioned, to invest in projects and expand the reach, number and range of services that they currently offer. I think that we all agree that these types of crimes have complex roots, and they often go back generations. We must tackle the causes of crime as well as having the appropriate powers, enforcement and sentences.
I will touch briefly on the safer streets fund, as it is extremely relevant to many of the issues raised by Members. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South knows this, but may I remind him that Cleveland police have £366,289 from the safer streets fund, and that that project will carry out a variety of crime prevention measures, including 30 new or upgraded CCTV cameras, refurbishment of four alley gates and bespoke target-hardening measures for residents’ homes. It is these basic safety measures that can give confidence to communities that the presence and the security are there.
Overall, across the country, the Government have invested £70 million in the first three rounds of the safer streets fund. This financial year alone, the fund is supporting 107 local crime prevention projects to implement interventions such as improved street lighting, increased CCTV, increased presence of “guardians” to deter crime, and, pivotally, training to change attitudes and behaviours.
Most of these measures are set out in the Government’s beating crime plan. I encourage all Members to read the plan. It is a key manifesto commitment of this Government to get crime down and to set out how we will tackle crime and the causes of crime. It is a targeted approach to places, people and the business of crime underpinned by getting those basics right. The whole plan is supported by an unwavering commitment to the police that we will do everything in our power to combat crime and work out what actually works in keeping our country safe.
We are working with practitioners and experts who deal with this issue day in, day out. In a further strand, which is vital, we are working across the country with partners to establish principles for a strong and effective partnership response to antisocial behaviour. That is why we have undertaken the police and crime commissioner review to equip PCCs with the tools and levers that they need to drive down crime and antisocial behaviour in their areas. As I said at the start, we recognise the damage and distress caused by antisocial behaviour. We recognise the devastation to lives caused by youth crime, both to the perpetrators and the victims, and I am absolutely committed, as are my Home Office colleagues, to tackling this issue head-on.
Matt Vickers
I thank Members for their wide-ranging and insightful contributions. It is clear that youth crime and antisocial behaviour has a huge impact on the lives of people across the country, and it should probably feature in discussions in this place more often. We have heard examples of and gratitude for the amazing police officers, the people who work in our local authorities, the people who work in the voluntary sector, and the people who work in our schools and youth services who do so much to make our communities safer.
We have heard all the manifestations of youth crime and antisocial behaviour whether it is the modified cars, the off-road bikes, or the issue of county lines. We have also heard that it affects businesses as well as the lives of people, and we have heard about the exploitation of young people and the horrific and tragic outcomes that this can have for them and their families. I think that we all agree that we need to open up opportunities for young people who are often the victims as well as the perpetrators.
I thank the Minister for taking the time to hear the many challenges that this issue creates across the country. I welcome the Government’s focus on tackling crime and antisocial behaviour; I welcome the thousands more police officers that we have across the country, including 194 in Cleveland; I welcome the huge uplift in police funding, including £157 million more for Cleveland; I welcome the opportunity to discuss the specifics around some of those antisocial behaviour powers; and I welcome the huge increase in youth services and the safer streets funding, which we are delighted to welcome in Cleveland.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered youth crime and anti-social behaviour.
Access to GP Appointments
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered access to GP appointments.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson.
GPs are at the heart of our health service and our communities, and I thank them all for their dedicated work. They have been at the frontline of one of the most successful vaccination programmes in the world, thanks to which we have some of the lightest covid restrictions and one of the most open economies. Family doctors have also delivered an incredibly rapid adoption of new digital means to interact with patients when lockdown meant that it was vital to be able to give health advice without vulnerable patients having to visit a surgery. This is quite a switch for a health service that just a few years ago was still using about 9,000 fax machines.
Phone or digital consultations are here to stay, and for many they are a great way to get help from their GP, but not for everyone. In particular, many elderly people, people with learning disabilities or other cognitive impairments and those with language barriers may not be able to cope easily with digital communication. They may find anything other than a face-to-face meeting difficult. It is vital that these vulnerable people can still see their doctor, and there has been some real progress in recent months. There are now more appointments in general practice than there were before the pandemic, and, judging by the latest figures, about 65% of those were face to face.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I was interested when I saw this issue on the agenda for Westminster Hall. I am interested in lots of things that are debated in Westminster Hall, but this is one in which I have a particular interest. Does the right hon. Lady agree that for many people who are not comfortable about describing their symptoms over the phone, or eloquent enough to do so, it is essential that they can request to see their GP without having to prove to the receptionist the reason why they need to?
Theresa Villiers
That is of course correct. Phone calls are important in triaging and assessing the extent to which a face-to-face meeting with a doctor is appropriate, but it is essential that those who need face-to-face appointments are given them.
We are seeing some progress, and this has been delivered at the same time as millions of booster jabs. I give credit to GPs, NHS England and Ministers for that recovery in general practice, but it remains the case that many of us will have heard from constituents about problems in getting in to see their GP. I thank the 19,302 people who signed the online petition on Parliament’s website expressing concern about this.
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
The right hon. Lady makes a really important point about constituents trying to get in contact with GP surgeries. I have the same issue with one of my constituents who tried to get in contact with her surgery and had to call every day for three weeks in order to get an appointment. By the time she did get an appointment, she experienced delays in accessing the treatment she needed. Does the right hon. Lady agree that further action is desperately needed to ensure that we have a plan in place to address staff shortages and resource shortages across our NHS and across our GP surgeries so that our GPs can continue to provide the healthcare that is needed?
Theresa Villiers
I agree that we need more general practice capacity and I will come on to explain how we could do that.
There can be no doubt that GP surgeries are under immense pressure. The Royal College of General Practitioners says that the workload has never been greater. A GP in my constituency told me that as well as colleagues leaving the profession, it has become increasingly difficult to recruit new doctors. He said:
“Those of us left behind feel that we are holding up a broken system.”
In GP surgeries, as is the case across the NHS, demand has spiralled partly because, as we grow older as a population, we have greater healthcare need, partly because of pent-up demand from people who felt reluctant to seek help during the pandemic, but also partly because the decision by NHS leaders to push a range of treatments out from secondary to primary care has left GPs dealing with more serious and complex cases than in the past. As a result, one High Barnet GP told me that primary care was in a precarious position even before the pandemic. Of course, delays in accessing GP appointments have been an issue for some years in many areas, including my Chipping Barnet constituency. My concern has been intensified by the predatory demands of developers seeking to build blocks of flats in multiple locations in my constituency. The Mayor of London wants to see over 23,500 new homes built in Barnet over 10 years. That is a massive increase in population, yet GPs are struggling to serve the population we already have.
We have seen the number of doctors in hospitals increase to record levels—and that is a great achievement—but the same cannot yet be said of GPs. I have been campaigning to expand GP capacity in Barnet as part of the Government’s wider commitment to boost primary care. I very much welcome the £250 million announced in October to tackle immediate pressures on the system. This promised new cloud-based phone systems, a reduction in routine paperwork such as sick notes and Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency checks, and additional staff to support GPs. Well, I think we probably all know that better phone systems are urgently needed in many practices, but the need to reduce unnecessary bureaucracy is also pretty obvious.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
My right hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. On patients phoning up trying to get an appointment, does she agree that there needs to be more capacity in phone systems so that people are not waiting on the phone for hours on end to get an appointment with a GP?
Theresa Villiers
I think that is right, which is why it was a good decision in the Government’s October announcement to focus on an upgrade to phone systems. I really hope that the Minister will update us on how that is going and when it will be delivered, so that our constituents can experience it directly.
Returning to the issue of GP paperwork, a Barnet GP told me that
“the amount of bureaucracy and red tape has increased exponentially despite various assurances that this would be cut. Increased regulation and monitoring, whilst important from a governance point of view, seems to have generated endless form filling, policy updating, mandatory training, appraisals and paper chasing.”
When this issue was debated in this Chamber last October, the Minister repeated promises that paperwork and form filling would be reduced. Has that happened? If not, why not? It is far better for a GP to spend time with patients, rather than writing sick notes or ticking boxes.
The third element of the Government’s plan seeks to strengthen the multi-disciplinary teams in general practice, so that, where appropriate, patients can seek other professionals such as nurses, pharmacists or physiotherapists. This is intended to free up GP time for them to see sicker patients. I welcome the fact that 10,000 new staff have been recruited of the 26,000 promised in the Conservative manifesto, and I commend the work of North Central London clinical commissioning group, which is due to recruit 177 more primary care staff under the programme. However, more could be done, for example, to enable pharmacists to take a bigger role, including in prescribing. We must also ensure that GPs have a strong voice in the new integrated care boards, so that primary care is at the heart of NHS decision making. It is vital that part of the massive capital investment that the Government have promised for the NHS goes into improving GP surgery premises, which in some instances are just not fit for purpose or not physically large enough to cope with increased healthcare demand.
Tahir Ali (Birmingham, Hall Green) (Lab)
Many of my constituents, and constituents across the country, are concerned about how quickly they can get face-to-face appointments, especially those mentioned earlier: the vulnerable, the elderly, and those who cannot do online or telephone appointments. The investment in surgeries is most welcome, but we need immediate action to address the shortfall in patients being seen by doctors where they need to attend a face-to-face surgery.
During covid-19, elected Members received an uplift to our budgets to help us to deal with our constituents. The same needs to be done for GPs, who are under huge pressure to deliver services, and that needs to happen now rather than later, because such investment can take time to come through and we do not have time.
Theresa Villiers
I agree that we need action now to make it easier to get GP appointments, and we also need action for the longer term. Even if everything that I have spoken about is delivered, and the October package is delivered in its entirety, we still need more GPs—it is as simple as that.
It is really welcome that this year more people have entered training to become GPs than ever before, because the Health Committee identified workforce shortages as the “key limiting factor” in tackling the covid backlog successfully. In its annual report on the state of health and social care in England, the Care Quality Commission concluded that by mid-2021 there were likely to be fewer full-time equivalent GPs in total per 100,000 patients than there were in 2017.
In July 2021, the then Care Minister commissioned Health Education England to review long-term strategic trends for the health and social care workforce. That review is very welcome, but we need to see it deliver results. As the Health Committee has called for, we need an objective, transparent and independently audited annual report on workforce projections that cover the next five, 10 and 20 years, including an assessment of whether sufficient numbers of staff are being trained.
Damien Moore
My right hon. Friend is being very kind in sharing her time. Does she agree that universities that have medical placements and more capacity should be allowed to extend that capacity, so that we can train more people and have more people entering the profession?
Theresa Villiers
It is essential that we expand the capacity of training places for GPs, and I welcome the new medical schools and the progress that has been made. However, because it takes years to train up a professional, the effect of those developments is not yet being felt in local surgeries.
We need to ensure that the NHS visa scheme is used effectively to recruit skilled GPs from around the world in order to meet immediate pressures, and we have to get better at retaining the GPs that we have. A vital first step in doing that is to implement measures to relieve the stresses on GPs that I have spoken about and to address spiralling workloads.
An effective workforce strategy also needs a better plan to encourage women to stay in the profession. We need to give more thought to how we persuade women who might have chosen to work part-time while caring for children to consider coming back to work full-time.
Also, what about all those retired or non-practising GPs out there? At the start of the pandemic, the Government rushed through legislation to enable retired professionals to return to the workforce to help battle that first covid wave. Clearing the covid backlog and expanding GP services is another great national challenge and we really should try to do more to enlist the talent of doctors who have retired or moved on to other careers.
Theresa Villiers
I will just make a little progress now, because I want to give the Minister time to respond.
That means fixing the problem with doctors’ pensions. I know that efforts have been made in that regard. However, it is still worrying that it seems that once a doctor has been in practice for many years, they can face a big tax bill for their pensions. Of course, the last thing we should do is push GPs into early retirement because of punitive pension taxes. We want them to stay in practice and not retire.
In conclusion, pressure on GP surgeries is leading to appointment delays, which will only generate yet higher numbers of people showing up at accident and emergency departments that are already busier than at any time in the history of our national health service, as graphically shown on Sky News in relation to Barnet Hospital just a week or so ago.
GP services are a crucial gateway to treatment by other parts of the health service. If this gateway gets blocked up, the consequence will be that lives are lost, for example to cancer, because symptoms were not picked up early enough. So this matter is not just one of convenience; it is a matter of ensuring that we are doing everything we can to deliver the best healthcare.
The Government rightly promised 50 million more appointments in GP surgeries every year. It is essential that we deliver on that promise, so that my constituents can get the care they need within a reasonable timeframe. We must see the NHS long-term plan and the Government’s record £33 billion investment in the NHS deliver more GPs in local surgeries in places such as Barnet. It is as simple as that. We cannot carry on as we are. When he recently gave evidence to the Health and Social Care Committee, the Health Secretary said that plans to recruit 6,000 additional GPs by 2024 are not on track. I appeal to the Government to get them on track and to do all they can to expand capacity in GP practices in my constituency and across the country.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Maria Caulfield)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) for bringing the debate to the Chamber. I echo much of what she says, and the Government are delivering on much of it, so perhaps this is an opportune moment to update Members on the progress we are making.
We owe a huge amount of gratitude to general practice staff for their efforts throughout the pandemic, stepping up to run vaccination programmes, continuing with flu vaccinations, looking after house-bound patients and continuing their day-to-day work. They have been absolutely outstanding. Since 30 November last year, more than 52 million covid vaccinations have been delivered by general practice, which is an amazing achievement. They are incredibly busy and have been throughout the pandemic, as reflected in appointment data. In November, general practice delivered an average of 1.39 million appointments nationally per working day, an increase of 6% compared with November 2019. Once covid vaccination appointments are factored in, the increase is greater than 20%. GPs and their teams have been working incredibly hard.
The focus on the booster programme has meant some patients experiencing delays in getting an appointment, but that does not mean that general practice has been closed. GPs and their teams will always be there for patients, alongside NHS 111 and community pharmacy teams. It is important that people do not delay coming forward. We saw patients stay away during the first lockdown, and so unfortunately there was a delay in starting some of their treatment, so it is important that we all get out the message that GP practices are open for business. In my right hon. Friend’s constituency, under North Central London CCG, excluding covid-19 vaccinations, approximately 16% more appointments took place in November last year compared with November 2019, of which 57% were face to face. The crux of the matter that we hear from many constituents is around face-to-face appointments. That is why, in October, the Secretary of State launched the winter support package to tackle many issues my right hon. Friend mentioned. I will just touch on several.
First, we are improving telephone access, because sometimes the problem is that patients cannot get through by phone, rather than their not being able to see a GP. My hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Damien Moore) touched on that. Part of the package is a cloud-based telephony system to help increase that capacity for GPs, who may only have one or two receptionists and a couple of phone lines that get busy pretty quickly as soon as 8 o’clock hits. The improved functionality has the potential to free up existing telephone lines for incoming calls and will be available at no additional cost to practices. We will require GP practices to sign up to this cloud-based telephony system, which will be up and running pretty soon. All those that expressed an interest have been contacted, and we expect many to go live fairly soon. Some practices are already tied into existing contracts, so there may be a slightly delay in roll-out there, but where we can get them up and running, we absolutely will.
Secondly, we are encouraging GPs to offer face-to-face appointments. However, it will not always be a GP that a patient sees. There are a range of healthcare professionals in primary care, from nurses—they do an amazing job, if I say so myself—to paramedics, pharmacists and physios, and the GP is not always the best person for a patient to see. Face-to-face appointments are available, and our message to patients is that they will not always see the GP face to face, but that does not take away from the care that they receive.
On finance, £250 million was announced in the winter support package, which can be used by GPs in a range of ways—whatever suits their local area. For some, it will be a physical expansion of their practice so that they can see more patients. For others, it may be to take on locums, where they are available—that is also a pressure point—or other healthcare professionals or an extra receptionist, or to extend opening times. The money can be used on whatever will help GPs to expand their ability to see patients.
My right hon. Friend touched on bureaucracy and red tape, which is a massive ask for GPs. We have made some temporary changes during the omicron vaccine roll-out period to free up capacity, including extending the sickness self-certification period for people accessing statutory sick pay and suspending requests for medical information from bodies such as the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency. We are bringing forth secondary legislation to allow other healthcare professionals to do some of those checks—statutory instruments are going through the system as we speak—and having discussions with other Departments about moving away from always expecting GPs to do medical reports, whether for the Department for Work and Pensions, the Department for Transport or for schools. Patients can do a lot for themselves and a medical report from a GP will not always be required. We are also improving digital technology so that handwritten letters and reports, which take so much time for GPs, can be digitised and made much easier.
One of the most exciting innovations in the package is the promotion of pharmacists, which my right hon. Friend touched on. We have a community pharmacist consultation service whereby patients who phone 111 or contact their GP can be referred direct to pharmacists, who are taking on prescribing skills so that they can prescribe as well as dispense. We are looking towards a more pharmacy-first model as in Scotland and Wales, where patients can go direct to pharmacists without necessarily going first to the GP, opening up primary care and making it much more accessible. I hope that, through a number of the points that I have addressed, it can be seen that we are moving at pace.
Workforce was touched on, and I am pleased that we are making progress on that. We have already recruited 10,000 of an additional 26,000 staff who will be working in general practice by the end of 2023-24. In the North Central London CCG area, 327 additional staff have been recruited to date, with a further 114 anticipated.
Dr Dan Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) on bringing the debate to the Chamber and draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests as a practising NHS doctor. In 2015, the then Secretary of State said that we would recruit an extra 5,000 GPs to the workforce. Can the Minister update us on how many extra full-time equivalent GPs are working in the NHS?
Pensions is also a real issue that is stopping the current workforce extending their careers as they face punitive tax penalties. Will she please commit to addressing that and raising it with the Treasury?
Maria Caulfield
Absolutely. I was going to come to the number of GPs. I am pleased, as is my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet, that we have 4,000 doctors in GP training places this year, which is an increase from 2,671 back in 2014. We are getting more GPs through the training process. However, in terms of GPs in place, there were 1,841 more full-time equivalents in September 2021 compared with September 2019, so we are seeing increases coming through.
However, there are issues with retention as well as recruitment. I think my right hon. Friend touched on issues with the Home Office and GP trainees once their visas expire. We met Home Office officials just before Christmas and there is better working now between the NHS and the Home Office to help facilitate those who come on a visa and need help to get into the workforce, get their visas extended or their training finished before their visa expires.
My hon. Friend the Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter) made a very valid point about GP pensions. We have discussed that, and we are setting up a meeting with Treasury teams to look at that in more depth. There is no doubt that that is a disincentive to stay in practice, and we will certainly be looking at that further.
I will finish by asking all colleagues to support local GPs. They have had a very tough time. We are taking a zero-tolerance approach to any abuse they receive. That also applies to pharmacists. They have had a difficult time and continued to stay open during the pandemic. Face-to-face appointments were a challenge. We are doing everything we can to support them with the asks to break down some of those barriers. I am optimistic that we will see progress and that patients, who are the most important people in this debate, will see improved access to services in primary care.
Question put and agreed to.
Transport Connectivity: Merseyside
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Mr Laurence Robertson (in the Chair)
Before I call the mover of the motion, I ask Back Benchers to limit their speeches to between four and five minutes in order to get everybody in.
Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered transport connectivity in Merseyside.
It is a great privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I warmly thank my hon. Friends for attending a debate that has such enormous implications for our region. I also thank the Minister and the shadow Minister for joining us. I have no doubt that today’s proceedings will benefit immensely from their expertise.
Draughty trains that creep at a snail’s pace towards Warrington and Manchester, private bus operators that leave those communities most in need cut off and isolated because they cannot turn a profit, and fares that rise year on year—that is the bleak reality that confronts the people of Merseyside every single day. More than eight years since George Osborne revealed his vision of a northern powerhouse, little has changed for the people I represent. Indeed, some things are far worse.
Today, it is quicker to get the train from London to Paris than it is to travel half that distance, from Liverpool to Hull. For all the talk of levelling up and building back better, spending per head on transport in London continues to be double what it is in the north, as it has been for 30 long years. Even as the scale of the climate crisis underscores the importance of getting cars off the road, the parlous state of public transport means that it is simply not an option for people who have to get to work on time, or to hospital, when there are no buses to take them there.
That has been the scandalous situation on Merseyside and across the north for so long that some of my constituents could be forgiven for thinking that things were always like this, and improvements are impossible. Others, however, have written to me, asking why a viable bus route from their home has been axed or why trains to their workplace are better suited for cattle than for people.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making a really good speech. I am pleased he has raised the issue of buses being axed without notice. I had that issue in my constituency some time ago in relation to buses from Irby, which is essentially a small village. That impacted a huge number of people, particularly elderly people, people with children and people without cars. Does he agree that bus services need to be reliable and people need to know that they are going to be there? There is no point calling it a service when it is an intermittent arrangement that private providers can cut or deliver as they choose, according to the profit motive.
Mick Whitley
I agree with my hon. Friend and will try to cover that point a bit later in my speech.
I secured the debate today because I believe that our constituents deserve better, and to talk about some of the steps that we should be taking to change transport in Merseyside for the better. From investing in Northern Rail to improving bus services and empowering local leaders to make a real and lasting change, last year’s integrated rail plan provided the Government with a historic opportunity to make good on the promise of a rail revolution in the north of England.
Transport for the North’s recommendation for a new line connecting Liverpool and Manchester had the potential to transform Merseyside. It would have dramatically cut journey times to our largest neighbour, brought 100,000 jobs to urban areas across the north and contributed a gross value added uplift of £3.4 billion by 2040.
It would not just have been the two big cities that reaped the benefits. Research by the Northern Powerhouse Partnership has clearly illustrated that towns like Birkenhead stand to make enormous gains from improved connectivity between major urban areas. My constituents would have counted among the nearly 4 million people to be brought within 90 minutes’ reach of at least four major northern cities, opening them up to exciting new possibilities.
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on obtaining this debate. In view of what he has just said about the opportunities of the programme proposed by Transport for the North, does he agree that it is deeply disappointing that the actual outcome is a watered-down version of the absolute worst option, which means that the city region itself is going to have to find £1.5 billion to build a new mainline rail hub, which is just not realistic?
Mick Whitley
I totally agree with my hon. Friend. I will try to cover that issue a little later on.
That was why local leaders were so emphatic in urging Ministers to commit to the development of a brand new line: it was a once-in-a-lifetime chance for the Government to show that they were serious about honouring the commitments they made to the electorate in 2019. Those broken pledges have been shunted into the sidings. Instead of pushing ahead with the transformational changes that communities across Merseyside and the north urgently need and deserve, the Department for Transport has pushed ahead with an option that has rightly been rubbished by the metro Mayor, Steve Rotheram.
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech thus far. Does he agree that after 11 years in government, this plan demonstrates the hollowness of the Government’s so-called levelling-up agenda? In the words of the metro Mayor, Steve Rotheram, this is a “cheap and nasty solution”. It is no solution at all.
Mick Whitley
I totally agree with my hon. Friend: my next sentence was going to include the words “cheap and nasty”. This is levelling down, rather than levelling up.
The electrification of the Fiddlers Ferry route and its incorporation into the national rail network was included in the plan. That option on its own will do nothing at all to improve journey times. Instead of improving economic connectivity, this development threatens to cost our city region an estimated £280 million in disruption over the course of six years. At a time when we badly need to cut emissions and take action on air pollution, it will force an additional half a million cars on to the roads each year and critically undermine freight capacity.
We have been told that the costs of any new station in Liverpool will have to be met locally. A new station would serve as an essential cornerstone of any further expansion of the rail network, and would be indispensable in improving travel times on the upgraded line. However, with an estimated cost of £1.5 billion, it is an expense that our region—one of the most deprived in the country—can ill afford.
The Government’s inability to live up to their lofty rhetoric and deliver the rail revolution that the north was promised exposes monumental failings at the heart of their levelling-up strategy. Whether on transport, education or energy, the Government are simply not willing to put their money where their mouth is. The task before us is enormous: we are attempting to address decades of under-investment, managed decline, and neglect of our transport network.
I eagerly anticipate the Minister’s contribution today, and while I have no intention of prejudging his remarks, I am sure that he will point to recent spending announcements from which our city region has benefited. Of course I welcome that additional funding, but the Government still do not seem to grasp the scale of the challenge ahead, as the scrapping of the Liverpool to Manchester line clearly demonstrates. Individual spending announcements and piecemeal policies are not enough; there needs to be a transformational, long-term project with real buy-in from Westminster.
That is all the more important given the devastating impact that local government funding cuts have had on local transport networks. Wirral Council alone has seen its central Government grant fall from £260 million in 2010 to a measly £37 million this financial year, and now—like many local authorities on Merseyside—it finds itself in the midst of a deepening financial crisis. When we look to the future of transport, we must never forget the 10 years lost to Conservative austerity. For transport, as for so many services, this was a decade of destruction that will take a lot more than piecemeal handouts to rebuild.
Moreover, the levelling-up agenda has no chance of success if local voices remain stifled and local leaders remain powerless to take a lead in effecting change. Mayor Rotheram, the combined authority’s transport lead, and the leaders of Warrington Borough Council and Cheshire West and Chester Councils were unequivocal in their repeated warnings that option 5.1 was not right for our region. We must ask why they were not listened to, and why it is that policy makers in Whitehall continue to ride roughshod over local leaders who know the needs of their communities best.
In Merseyside, ambitious plans for a London-style transport network hint at what is possible when local leaders get the financial support and political freedom they need. As Mayor Rotheram has said, we cannot wait for national Government to act, because it will never happen. Instead, the Liverpool city region is forging ahead with plans to fundamentally reform our region’s transport network so that everyone on Merseyside has access to the affordable, accessible and green transport they deserve. The city region has already invested over half a billion pounds in a new fleet of state-of-the-art trains that will begin service later this year. Ambitious plans are also under way for the development of new stations and improvements across the region that will radically expand access to the network. The steps being taken to improve accessibility across the network will be particularly welcomed by my constituents in Rock Ferry, whose local station has for too long been inaccessible to wheelchair users and people with limited mobility.
However, rail is not the only sector in dire need of reform. Trains may connect our towns and cities, but buses bring communities together. Bus services are a vital lifeline for millions of people across the north, especially in areas like Merseyside that have such high levels of deprivation and low rates of car ownership. In the city region, 80% of all journeys taken on public transport are by bus, but since the deregulation of bus services in the 1980s, my constituents have been dependent on a fragmented and privatised system in which bus operators compete against each other while ignoring the needs of the local community.
A recent investigation into the provision of bus services on the Wirral exposed the scale of the problem that my constituents face. Residents reported having to catch two or three buses to travel even relatively short distances, and many expressed frustration at the difficulties they encounter in trying to reach Arrowe Park Hospital, which serves the entirety of our peninsula. Some of the most impoverished communities in my constituency, such as the Noctorum estate, feel all but cut off from the rest of Wirral, while other areas have no bus services at all, as operators deem those routes to be unprofitable.
Covid continues to have a negative effect on provision, with some services having not resumed since the darkest days of the pandemic. Here, again, the combined authority is taking decisive action. Using powers afforded to him by the Bus Services Act 2017, Mayor Rotheram is working to re-regulate the bus network across the city region to guarantee that commuters get the quality of service they deserve. The metro Mayor has also submitted a £667-million bid to central Government to increase services across the network, begin the roll-out of new zero-emission hydrogen vehicles and slash fares.
Navendu Mishra (Stockport) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this important debate. In my own constituency of Stockport and across Greater Manchester, Mayor Andy Burnham has pioneered the bus franchising model, which will deliver lower fares and improved connectivity, and prioritise passengers over private profit. Will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating Mayor Burnham and encourage people to use this model across the nation?
Mick Whitley
My hon. Friend is right to highlight the important work that Mayor Burnham is doing to reform services in Greater Manchester.
Sir George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab)
I congratulate my hon. Friend not only on securing the debate but on the excellent way that he is presenting our case. Would he acknowledge that city region Mayor Steve Rotheram, to whom he has referred a few times, has made it clear that he would be willing, along with Andy Burnham and other local government leaders, to sit down with the Government and try to work out a compromise deal that would be better than what is on offer at the moment? Does he agree that the Minister should be encouraged to take up that offer? The future of our city region hinges on it, in the way that he has described.
Mick Whitley
I totally agree with my right hon. Friend, and I obviously hope that the Minister takes cognisance of the points he made.
Whether in Greater Manchester or Merseyside, local leaders should be commended for working hard to turn the tide and undo the ruinous legacy of 40 years of privatisation. However, I am very concerned that the Government have tied the hands of local government and are still preventing it from taking the bold and decisive action that is needed. In Merseyside and across the north, there is widespread recognition that our transport network should serve public need, not private greed.
However, in England, the Railways Act 1993 continues to prohibit the public operation of train services. With the devolved Governments in Wales and Scotland working to bring rail back into public ownership, surely it is time for combined authorities in England to be given equivalent powers, so that essential services such as Merseyrail can be brought into public hands and run on a not-for-dividend basis.
Given the widespread issues with bus services in Merseyside that I have mentioned, I would welcome an update from the Minister on any steps the Government might be taking to review the Bus Services Act 2017 to allow for the establishment of municipal bus companies. I am conscious that we are pressed for time, and I am looking forward to hearing the contributions of other hon. Members, so I will conclude my remarks.
Conor McGinn (St Helens North) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I know that you are a frequent visitor to the city region, and I was delighted that you were in my constituency at Haydock Park just before Christmas. It is also a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley), who secured this debate, and to be part of this formidable red wall from Merseyside, with even a usurper from across the DMZ in Greater Manchester.
St Helens is often seen as being on the periphery of one city region, but we see ourselves as sitting at the heart of two—Liverpool city region and Greater Manchester—and acting as a key bridge between them. Therefore, harnessing every chance for growth and for local opportunities obviously requires transport connectivity.
We have already made important improvements to our road infrastructure along the A580, known locally as the East Lancs road, at Windle Island and Haydock. Newton-le-Willows station is now the second busiest on the Manchester-to-Liverpool line. It is being transformed into a leading regional transport hub. Six hundred kilometres of new cycling and walking networks are planned for the next decade, with a new 7 km route linking St Helens to Burtonwood and additional capacity on the Sankey Valley cycle route, which I and my family use on an almost weekly basis.
Cross-boundary bus services and links to Liverpool, Manchester, Warrington, Wigan and beyond are a particular issue for us. These are all progressing. We want our services to be enhanced and to see an end to the extortionate prices that are driven by profits for private companies. Wider innovations, particularly in green transport, are helping in our fight against climate change. Having Liverpool city region’s publicly owned hydrogen buses on the route between the city and St Helens will mean the first green bus route in our region.
It is important to say that all this is being done by Labour councils, supported by Labour MPs, and the Liverpool city region Labour Mayor, Steve Rotheram, because we are ambitious for our city region and for our constituents. That stands in stark contrast to the Government. The integrated rail plan published in November was, we were told, a once-in-a-generation opportunity to push this agenda forward and transform transport for us in the north. But what did we get? We got a plan that is not even fit for the present, never mind the future.
The plan betrayed us and our communities again. It will sacrifice direct connections from Newton-le-Willows station in my constituency for the sake of a two-minute improvement on journeys from Manchester to Liverpool. There are no plans to improve local services from Garswood, for example by improving disabled access, or Rainford, and there is nothing about the future of the proposed new station at Carr Mill. The plan says nothing about developing the link between St Helens junction and central stations, which would open whole new possibilities for the town and our whole borough. This all comes as revised rail timetables for December 2022 propose reduced services from all those stations, meaning that we will have more overcrowding and constraints on passenger numbers.
In recent months, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, and the Mayor of the Liverpool city region, Steve Rotheram, came to St Helens for a transport seminar with our local council and colleagues from Wigan and Warrington. We will continue to press for a better deal—the best deal for our region and constituents—because I and my colleagues are focused on transforming transport for our people. We know that that is critical for our economy and our climate, but also for our connections to each other and our places. I urge the Government to catch up and support us in the work we are doing.
Paula Barker (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Robertson. I congratulate my good and hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) on securing this hugely important and topical debate.
I will avoid wasting any time mincing my words and get straight to the point: the Minister’s Department, the Secretary of State and the Government are badly letting down the people of Liverpool city region. For all the talk of levelling up, excluding our city region from the Northern Powerhouse Rail network and introducing the integrated rail plan is an abject failure to support economic growth in one of the great cities of the north. Our metro Mayor Steve Rotheram called the new plan “cheap and nasty”, and those are words I echo without equivocation.
Alongside Members from the city region, the metro Mayor and the portfolio holder on the combined authority, I wrote to the Secretary of State in December to make our position clear. For the purpose of today’s debate, I will reiterate that the IRP will be remembered for what it does not deliver for Merseyside.
There will be no new line connection to Liverpool. That fails to integrate us into the High Speed 2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail networks. Upgrades to existing lines in and out of Liverpool will cause up to six years of disruption, which will be significant for the Liverpool city region, causing an economic hit of at least £280 million each year. The plan will fail to deliver transformational extra capacity, as it includes using the already congested west coast mainline into Liverpool. That means little ability to grow local services. In fact, some services will be lost.
There will be a detrimental impact to freight, as 88 freight trains will be unable to operate each week during the upgrade phase. That freight traffic may never return to Liverpool. The plan will constrain the port of Liverpool’s growth as the main deep-water port on the west of the British mainland. There will be no new station for Liverpool, which is vital to ensure the capacity for more long distance and local services. As the plan does not intend to commence work until the 2040s, there will be a slower delivery time. There are multiple caveats regarding the approvals and further progress. Do the Government have any intention of delivering anything beyond phase 2b to the west, and the west to east midlands link? Everything I just mentioned will prohibit the city region’s ability to achieve net-zero emissions.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
The original Transport for the North NPR plans proposed a real levelling up of the north of England, meaning that people in Liverpool city region and Merseyside could have economic opportunities in Manchester, Leeds and Bradford. It would have taken millions of cars off the M62, but these new plans bring us right back. The whole of the north will suffer, as will the whole of our economy, once again at the expense of London and the capital. Does my hon. Friend agree that these plans are letting down the whole of the north?
Paula Barker
My hon. Friend makes incredibly salient points, all of which I agree with. It is the whole of the north that will suffer under these detrimental plans.
As I was saying, support for HS2 in the north is largely predicated on delivering NPR in full, as promised, so that LCR and our regions can realise its full benefits. It is clear from the reply I received from the Department that cost is the driving factor in this deal, not the transformational change that Northern Powerhouse Rail would have brought. The IRP represents another broken promise from a Government who are intent on talking the good game of levelling up while delivering nothing of the sort. The consequences for the Liverpool city region and beyond in the north will be grave.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Robertson. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) for securing this important debate. Although my constituency is in Cheshire, we are very much in the hinterland of Merseyside. We are less than 10 miles away from Liverpool city centre, and our economic, educational, cultural and family connections mean that there are many people travelling across Merseyside on a daily basis. Sadly, it seems that we are an afterthought, suffering poorer services and higher costs.
I will not repeat the legitimate arguments made by my constituents about the two-tier charging system they face when they cross the River Mersey in their car through the tunnel or the over the bridge. What I will say is that we are now coming up to seven years since the then Chancellor George Osborne promised my constituents that they would not have to pay a fee to cross the bridge at Runcorn. Will the Minister tell us when that promise will be kept?
Constituents of mine travelling by train have a similar experience at the moment, as the Wrexham to Bidston line is operating a reduced service due to short staffing, which is understandable. For my constituents in Neston, that is the only route by public transport into Liverpool. We were expecting a half-hourly service by now, but the pandemic seems to have delayed that. The current service runs once every two hours, which hopefully will be put right shortly, but it seems extraordinary to me that the 7.10 am and the 9.10 am train have survived, but the 8.10 am train has been cancelled. Surely, as the peak morning service, this is the last journey that should be cut.
We are waiting for answers about this from the current operator, but when the Minister responds I hope he can say when we can get the half-hourly service that was specifically promised in the franchise agreement. Ultimately, passengers on this line need an end to the need to change at Bidston, and to get the direct line to Liverpool installed. That would deliver the true connectivity that we need in Neston.
My constituents in Ellesmere Port, on the other side of the constituency, already have a half-hourly service to Liverpool, although the price of tickets is an issue. We all know the cost of rail travel is going up, and indeed the cost of everything else is going up, but we seem to be paying more than others.
The cost of a ticket into Liverpool from Little Sutton is 30% more expensive than from a station just two stops further down the line, and three times as much as it would cost for a similar journey in London. I do not understand why those price differentials exist, and I would be grateful if the Minister could provide an answer as to why prices are so much more expensive for my constituents, or at least commit to looking into that.
There has been a 20-year campaign for a station at Ledsham, in Little Sutton, which was submitted to the railway renewal fund, but sadly rejected. The overall comment that the Department made was that it was
“a strong proposal with a well-articulated narrative on how the project could unlock growth opportunities in the area.”
It puzzles me somewhat that the application was rejected. Can the Minister enlighten me as to the reasons why it was turned down? The suspicion that we have seen in other areas is that decisions are being made on a party political basis, and not on the merits of the application. Will the Minister advise when there will be an opportunity to submit a further application? The problems that that station would solve are only going to increase.
Finally, I want to mention the crisis in school transport, which particularly affects my constituents travelling to schools on the Wirral. Driver shortages and increased fuel costs mean that some services are being pulled all together, or only offered on a termly basis, at a price that few can afford. As the schools are outside the catchment area, there is no financial support available.
I acknowledge that this will not be a priority for local authorities, with their stretched funds, but I know that this is not an isolated example and the pattern is being repeated across the country. Pupils have had enough disruption to their education during the last couple of years, so I would not want them to have to change schools because travel to the school of their choice has become unaffordable. Can the Minister comment on any assessment he has made on the cost and availability of home-to-school transport? That chimes with what my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead said earlier about the paucity of bus services in the area, and the need for places like Merseyside and Cheshire to be given the powers, rules and resources to take back control of their bus networks. That is something I think we would all want to see.
Ms Marie Rimmer (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to work under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) for securing this important debate.
For too long, the Government have been looking for transport companies to turn profit. The main purpose of transport is to get people around more easily. The knock-on effect of this is a boost to the local economy. That is how transport should be looked at and judged.
I will start by talking about buses. Buses provide over 80% of public transport journeys across the Liverpool city region. Across the region, a third of residents do not have access to a car. For many, a bus route is a lifeline to work, for food shopping, to see friends and family, and to the night-time economy.
Liverpool city region Mayor, Steve Rotheram, has submitted ambitious plans to the Government to improve our bus services, which are desperately needed. The plans would create a cheaper, more frequent and overall better bus service. The plans even look to introduce hydrogen buses, which aligns with the Government’s own promises to reduce emissions following COP26.
A reasonably-priced, reliable bus service across the Liverpool city region would make access to jobs and opportunities so much easier for many local residents. For too long, poor transport links have held people back from employment, social activities and culture. In St Helens, there are so many apprenticeship opportunities for young people. Often, the biggest difficulty is getting to them. This bus plan would improve the way that young people and people of all ages go about their lives. That is what a good transport network is all about.
I hope that my Merseyside colleagues will forgive me for using the other M-word—Manchester. St Helens is located between two great cities: Liverpool and Manchester. As many colleagues know, I am a rugby league fan, so I am not involved in any football arguments and drama. For St Helens, connections to both cities are crucial to us—for jobs, socialising, education, shopping and culture. For example, the Christmas markets have recently been enjoyed by so many of my constituencies, but the irregularity of off-peak trains is an issue. Lea Green station has a big free car park, which makes it very popular with my constituents. The trains to Manchester come at nine minutes to and six minutes past the hour. That is two trains within 15 minutes of each other, and nothing for the rest of the hour. They also arrive within three minutes of each other in Manchester. It makes many local residents think, “What is the point?”. Surely there is a better way to spread out the service, especially when there are only two trains an hour.
In Liverpool, the story is the same for trains. From Lea Green and St Helens Central to Liverpool Lime Street, there are two trains an hour within 15 minutes of each other. In fact, sometimes at St Helens Central, the two trains an hour are as close as eight minutes apart and nothing for the rest of the hour. Again, if this service is limited to a certain number of trains per hour, it is important that they are spread out as much as possible.
Public transport should not be about whether transport companies are making big profits for their shareholders. It should be about people getting around more easily and more cheaply to give a boost to local businesses, local high streets and local attractions.
The Government need to stop seeing transport in isolation, and see it as a way to support local economies and communities. We have all seen the impact that Transport for London has had on making London the economic hub that it has become. For decades, millions of pounds of Government support have helped London to become the powerhouse that it is, but here, unless people are in the golden triangle, there seems to be nothing going for them. Each announcement seems to give us a kick rather than a lift. To help other cities across the country, the Government need to start funding us in the way that they have funded the golden triangle.
Mr Laurence Robertson (in the Chair)
Please could we drop the length of speeches to three to four minutes?
Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Robertson. I join my comrades in thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) for securing today’s important debate.
This Government have attempted to make levelling up their watchword of the day, but instead of tackling regional inequalities, they are rolling back on their promises, abandoning northern towns and cities to cope with failing transport infrastructure.
The integrated rail plan was seen as a once- in-a-generation opportunity to tackle fragmentation, deregulation and underfunding in our railways. It recommended a new line between Liverpool and Manchester, which would have transformed Merseyside, promising to bring 100,000 jobs to urban areas across the north and contributing £3.4 billion to the economy by 2040. Instead, the north has once again been failed, with no significant improvements to journey times, compromised capacity for local and freight services, and the promise of severe disruption and delays.
The bleak reality is that, with spending per head in the north half of that spent in London, transport across Merseyside and in the broader region is woefully lacking. People needing to get to work on time or get to hospital appointments are left wanting, forced to travel for hours. In failing to integrate Liverpool into High Speed 2 and the Northern Powerhouse Rail network, this Government have undermined economic growth in the city region. It has condemned us to up to six years of disruption to existing lines coming in and out of Liverpool, costing at least £280 million in every year of that disruption. If this Government are truly serious about levelling up for so-called left behind areas such as my own city of Liverpool, they need to put their money where their mouth is. Instead, they have shown once again that their promises ring hollow.
Labour leaders in the north-west and elsewhere are leading the way in investing in integrated sustainable transport systems. Liverpool’s metro Mayor Steve Rotheram has done some incredible work to roll out state-of-the-art, fully accessible and publicly-owned trains for the Merseyrail network later this year. He has already begun to deliver on a 600 km network of cycling and walking routes for the city region. He has secured £710 million to invest in further infrastructure improvement, including new green bus routes, and he submitted a welcome bid of £667 million to re-regulate and increase bus services across the network, to begin the roll-out of zero-emission hydrogen vehicles and to slash bus fares.
The task before us is enormous. We need radical change to undo the decades of decline of our transport network. The piecemeal policies and additional funding allocated so far do not face up to the scale of the challenge ahead. Instead, we need additional powers for combined authorities to bring services such as Merseyrail into public hands. We need the Government to engage with, support and finance the radical and ambitious transport plans that the metro Mayor is implementing.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
It is an honour to serve under your chairship again today, Mr Robertson. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) for securing this important debate and for all the campaigning he has done on the issue. I also thank all the other MPs from Merseyside and beyond for their powerful contributions.
My hon. Friend outlined in detail the connectivity issues that we face across our transport networks in Merseyside. The environmental impact that this is having cannot be understated. The issues are intertwined. We need a change to the infrastructure if we are looking to reduce emissions, and have an impact on people’s health and wellbeing as well as to their ability to access work and services, and if we are looking to improve the digital economy experience that is vital in Liverpool.
We need long-term solutions—not pop-up cycle lanes or short-term schemes, but thought-out long-term investment infrastructure. We need real action, not soundbites about levelling up from the Government. If they are serious about the levelling-up agenda, the Government must listen, be led by what Merseyside Members, local leaders and our constituents are saying, and provide the resources and policy for the vital transport connectivity needed across our city region.
The integrated rail plan was a wonderful opportunity to revolutionise our country’s rail network, but the north has been offered a “cheap and nasty” deal, as has been much quoted today. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Paula Barker) made our collective thoughts clear in a letter to the Secretary of State, and there have been the comments made by Members today.
Since the reforms of the 1980s, areas such as Merseyside have been forced to contend with fragmentation, deregulation and underfunding. I thank metro Mayor Steve Rotheram and Liam Robinson for their work to reverse that awful legacy. I look forward to working with them to reintroduce the Bootle branch line. If the Bootle branch line—officially titled the Canada Dock branch—could be opened as a passenger route, it could save a host of Liverpool communities.
That line could run from Lime Street to Edge Lane, Prescot Road, West Derby Road, Townsend Lane, Walton Lane and County Road before going to Bootle. It would be a game changer for connectivity in West Derby and in the north of the city, and it is one that I know my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden) wholeheartedly supports.
In my constituency, the transport connectivity was arguably better a century ago than it is now. The former station buildings remind us of the Cheshire lines that served our community from 1884 to 1960, when passenger services ceased. My constituent Stephen Guy recalled:
“I was 12 when the passenger trains stopped and I recall the ticket office with its little window to pay fares. It was a picturesque line along the West Derby section and many people were saddened by the closure. People filmed and photographed the last trains. West Derby Station was the finest on the line. The station had popular staff who tended beautiful flower beds and hanging baskets—they won awards.”
That is a wonderful memory of civic pride in a publicly-owned railway network. I ask the Minister to look at what we had in the past and to see what can be reinstated; we could connect our city using existing train lines, by bringing stations back into public use and linking them to bus routes. That would offer real solutions, and result in cleaner air and better connectivity.
I am proud to have stood in 2019 on a manifesto that would have ensured that councils could improve bus services by regulating bus networks and taking them into public ownership and have given them the resources and full legal powers to achieve that cost-effectively, thereby ending the race to the bottom in working conditions for bus workers. It would also have delivered improvements for rail passengers by bringing our railways back into public ownership, allowing us to make fares simpler and more affordable and rebuild the fragmented railways as a nationally integrated public service, cut the wastage of private profit and improve accessibility for disabled people.
It is a false economy to waste funds, time and resources on quick wins that do not last. Will the Minister commit to investing in our infrastructure and look at long-term solutions?
Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Robertson. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) on securing this debate, which is much needed and very timely, as the number of speakers shows.
I agree with all that has been said about the IRP and the comments of Mayor Steve Rotheram. This issue gets to the heart of the problem with the Government’s transport policy, because we have been promised for more than a decade that the transport issues in the north will be dealt with. I am old enough to remember when the northern powerhouse was championed by the Conservative party; not any more, it seems. We were promised even by the current resident of No. 10 that we would see levelling up, but those promises ring absolutely hollow every time a constituent of mine tries to get a bus.
I will make just a few brief points. In Merseyside and right across the north of England, public transport is straightforwardly an equality issue, because it is people without cars, parents and older people who really struggle. If we are to improve productivity in this country and see a growing economy, dealing with the challenges of our public transport will be at the heart of the solution.
First, buses are massively important. We talk a lot about trains in this country, but the vast majority of people who are at the bottom end of things when it comes to wages get on buses; they have less access to cars, and in Merseyside they live further from train stations. I sound like an old woman today, but I remember when this Tory Government took away the bus support grant; it had a massive impact on the availability of buses in Merseyside and we are still feeling it today. Other hon. Members have talked about what a big deal it is when a bus gets taken away from a community. We have the possibility of some reform now in Merseyside, but what conversations has the Minister had with colleagues in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the Department for Work and Pensions and other Departments about the impact of poor bus services on the employment prospects for people in Merseyside and other parts of the north?
Secondly, our social housing areas in Merseyside are often very poorly served by public transport because of how the rail network was historically built to support a growing economy during the Victorian era. That means that, as many hon. Members have said, we need to go much further to address the imbalance. We need to look at the interconnections between areas of housing that need to grow, particularly for people who are struggling, and put the transport links in. My neighbour and hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) mentioned the Wrexham-Bidston line; I feel like when the world ends I will still be saying we need better services on the Wrexham-Bidston line, so I implore the Minister to look at it.
Thirdly, people without cars need better transport because they need to be able to get to work and have better chances. We all need people to get out of their cars, because we all need to do something about climate change and we know that it will most affect those who have least. It is a matter of our environmental future and a matter of equality. I ask the Minister what conversations he has had with the Liverpool city region about its plans, because we need to supercharge them.
Finally, when devolution came about for Merseyside, we wanted it because we wanted to demonstrate that we could run ourselves—that we could improve life prospects for people in Merseyside right where we are, instead of having to come begging all the time to people in Whitehall, asking them to help us. So far, it is working. I simply ask the Minister to get behind us and let us show what we can do.
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. My congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) on securing this important debate on transport connectivity in Merseyside. I express my gratitude, too, to my hon. Friends from Merseyside and nearby for the eloquence of their speeches, which amply illustrated their passion for their region. My Slough constituency is a long way from Merseyside—while they have the River Mersey, we have the Jubilee line, and while they have “Brookside”, we have “The Office”—but what I do share with the good people of Merseyside is their desire for better transport, and equality when it comes to transport funding.
For far too long the region has suffered, despite excellent local leaders pushing for better. Merseyside faces unique issues when it comes to transport connectivity. The majority of short trips—under 5 km—are made by car, and as a result the region has a significant air pollution issue. In the Liverpool city region alone, over 1,000 deaths a year are linked to this silent killer. On public transport, 80% of journeys are taken by bus, yet bus fares have risen by 40% and routes have been mercilessly cut nationally. Rates of active travel, such as walking and cycling, are relatively low, making up just 4.5% and 1% of journeys respectively. Given the population and the scale of the region, rail connectivity across the region and further afield is poor.
However, while the landscape of transport might be varied, the solution is simple: providing genuinely affordable, convenient, accessible and good-quality public transport. Indeed, despite this difficult landscape and northern funding facing a shortfall of £86 billion in comparison with London, it is a Labour-led locality that has driven through successes for the region, proving that when we listen to local people and commit to devolution, transport can be transformative.
Serving 1.6 million people, Mayor Steve Rotheram, with whom I had a good chat this week, has been fighting hard to bring about serious transformation of the Liverpool city region’s transport system. Under his leadership, Merseyside’s record on improving transport has been impressive. There is the roll-out of publicly owned trains for the Merseyrail network, and investment in new rolling stock, designed with local passengers’ needs in mind. That has used a direct public ownership and procurement model, which reduces costs and pioneers a new approach. There are the plans to completely overhaul and re-regulate the bus network as part of the bus service improvement plan. There is improved accessibility across the network, including level access from train to platform. Work is beginning on the first phase of a 600 km network of cycling and walking routes for the city region, and in the city region sustainable transport settlement, funding has been secured for new green bus routes and enhanced walking and cycling infrastructure.
Mayor Rotheram and hon. Members here are passionate about their region. A London-style integrated transport system is what they want. True devolution is required from Government, not mere soundbites. Significant funding is needed to meet the challenge ahead. How have Merseyside’s ambitions for transformational change been supported? I am afraid that it is the same old story from this Tory Government. Rather than levelling up, they neglect, betray and short-change the north from their Westminster bubble, ignoring local voices. and marginalising their well-informed views when it comes to decision making.
Nothing epitomises this more than the disintegrated rail plan; “cheap and nasty” is how Mayor Rotheram described the IRP’s weak offering for Liverpool, which will have all the disruption and none of the benefits. Instead of the full Northern Powerhouse Rail plans, as agreed by the cross-party, respected Transport for the North, Merseyside was offered a deal that provides no real or effective improvement to journey times, capacity or connectivity. Despite Liverpool Central station being declared at capacity by the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, there are no plans for a new station for Liverpool unless it is locally funded.
The port of Liverpool is one of the busiest; it transported 31 million metric tonnes of freight in 2020 alone. Anyone would think that the Government would want to ensure that the port was served properly by the IRP, so that we could move more freight off our roads and on to rail, and reduce inner-city traffic and emissions. I welcome the recent upgrades to the Bootle branch line, but concerns about the disruption that will be caused by up to 88 freight trains a week during construction relating to the IRP have yet to be addressed. I therefore ask the Minister, quite simply: why is Merseyside being short-changed once again as a result of the Government’s rail plan for the north? This matters because the potential of our northern regions is being wasted. I appreciate, acknowledge and understand the huge potential of Merseyside, and it is disappointing that the Government clearly do not feel the same. I urge the Minister to engage with local leaders, hon. Members and the people of Merseyside to ensure that the plans deliver for them, because they will have direct consequences for millions of people for decades to come.
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Andrew Stephenson)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson, and to respond to the numerous speeches made by right hon. and hon. Members.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) on securing the debate on this incredibly important topic. Transport connectivity in Merseyside is important for not just the city region, but the north of England and the whole United Kingdom. Responsibility for much of transport connectivity in Merseyside rests with the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and the city region’s metro Mayor, Steve Rotheram, who has been referred to by many speakers, and whom I meet regularly, given that my portfolio includes high-speed rail and Northern Powerhouse Rail, as well as the trans-Pennine route upgrade.
Mayoral combined authorities—Liverpool city region was at the forefront of the drive to create metro Mayors—were created in recognition of the strategic importance of joining transport connectivity with activity on economic development, housing and planning, so that we can ensure sustainable economic growth in our great cities and opportunities for the communities in them. Through a series of devolution deals, we have provided mayoral combined authorities with more transport powers and more funding. I assure all Members who have spoken that the Department for Transport and its Ministers, including me, work constructively with the Mayor and all our partners in the Liverpool city region to ensure that its transport connectivity maximises economic growth and supports thriving communities.
Sir George Howarth
I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. What does he think about Steve Rotheram’s suggestion, which I repeated today, that the Minister sits down with local government leaders to see if a compromise can be reached that does not have all the downsides we know about, and that would improve the service in the way that many of us would like?
Andrew Stephenson
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that point. I have spoken to Steve Rotheram since the integrated rail plan was published and I am aware of the call from northern leaders for more discussions. I am happy to have those discussions, both with the Mayor and with other northern leaders, to see how we can progress a variety of schemes. It is fair to say that I spoke to all the northern leaders regularly when considering the integrated rail plan and drawing it up. The Secretary of State met northern leaders through the Northern Transport Acceleration Council, which he founded. He also worked with Transport for the North to bring together a wealth of evidence and come up with the plan, but I am more than happy to continue to speak to the Mayor and others to ensure that we take local communities with us as we progress the plans. As we said in the plan, we take an adaptive approach towards investment. We are keen to continue to work with the Liverpool city region and others on delivery of the plans.
Improved transport connectivity within and between our great cities is fundamental to our levelling-up vision, in which we unlock the economic potential of the northern powerhouse, build back better from this awful pandemic, and ensure that the Liverpool city region and the north of England play a key role in a resurgent UK economy. That is why my Department, led by the Secretary of State for Transport, who is also the Cabinet Minister with responsibility for the northern powerhouse, is at the forefront of making that vision a reality.
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for giving way and I congratulate the hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley) on securing this important debate. For many, Liverpool is the capital of north Wales, yet direct rail services from the north Wales coast ceased in the 1970s. Thanks to the reopening of the Halton curve, hourly services are promised from Llandudno to Liverpool, although not, I think, until December 2023. Will the Minister join me in calling on Transport for Wales to bring that forward if it can?
Andrew Stephenson
I thank my hon. Friend for that point, which I will relay to the Minister with responsibility for rail, who I know speaks regularly to colleagues in Transport for Wales. He makes a very powerful point on behalf of his constituents.
Since 2010, over £29 billion has been invested in transport infrastructure in the north, but the Government want to go further, faster. Levelling up all parts of the UK is at the centre of the Government’s agenda as we build back better from the pandemic, and we will shortly publish a levelling-up White Paper that sets out bold new policy interventions giving local control to drive economic recovery. Transport connectivity is fundamental to that.
Maria Eagle
The Minister has said that he recognises the importance of transport connectivity and improving the economy of the Liverpool city region. Then why have his Government decided to deliver the worst option—a watered-down version of it described as “cheap and nasty” by the Mayor of the region? It is just not good enough.
Andrew Stephenson
It was described by Mayor Rotheram in those terms. However, our analysis has shown that the proposals from Transport for the North and others for brand new lines would have very significant additional costs and environmental impacts, and would deliver minimal additional benefits to passengers. They would also take longer to deliver than upgrades to existing lines.
Many right hon. and hon. Members referred to climate change. I speak as the Minister responsible for high-speed rail, and having spent a lot of time mitigating some of the environmental impacts of the construction of HS2. The embedded carbon in steel and concrete, and building brand new infrastructure through pristine countryside, has a huge environmental impact both on biodiversity and carbon emissions. We have to get the balance right. If in parts of the north of England we can deliver similar passenger benefits with less environmental impact, we have to consider those options realistically. These were the kind of issues we had to balance when we were drawing together the integrated rail plan.
The levelling-up White Paper is being finalised, but we are already making great strides towards strengthening the voice of the north. Mayor Rotheram represents a region that is part of the 60% of the north that is now covered by metro Mayors. We have announced the first allocations from the £4.8 billion levelling-up fund, which will regenerate towns and high streets and allow investment in the infrastructure that people need. This includes £37.5 million for Liverpool city region’s “levelling-up for recovery” proposals, which will deliver a range of transport interventions to support connectivity and economic growth in Liverpool city centre, the Maritime Gateway in Sefton and Birkenhead. Those include the transformation of Argyle Street with a new active travel corridor that will link regeneration at Woodside with a new Dock Branch Park and the enterprise zone at Wirral Waters; and reconfiguring the Kingsway tunnel toll plaza to address congestion and delay on the strategic bus and car route into Liverpool. In addition to this, we have committed £2.35 billion to 101 towns deals, which will invest in local economies; that will affect the constituency of the hon. Member for Birkenhead, but also Runcorn, St Helens and Southport—all in the Liverpool city region. All the towns fund proposals for those areas include measures to improve local transport connectivity.
England’s eight large metropolitan areas, including the Liverpool city region, are the mainstays of our work to level up the UK. We will invest £5.7 billion in the transport networks of those city regions through the city region sustainable transport settlements programme, including £710 million in the Liverpool city region. That funding will provide the Mayor with the flexibility to invest in local priorities, many of which have been applauded by hon. Members today. In Birkenhead, that funding will support further investment in the town centre, including, at Hind Street, the removal of the flyover that links the local highway network to the Queensway tunnel toll plaza and severs the town.
Mick Whitley
While I welcome any town or regeneration funds, the funding the Minister mentions is specifically for the regeneration of Birkenhead. What we are talking about is transformational change in transport. I have not heard in the Minister’s response about any changes that are coming any time soon. That is what we are talking about: transformational change to buses and transport on Merseyside and in the Liverpool city region.
Andrew Stephenson
In the 26 seconds left, I will say that the national bus strategy, which is part of a £3 billion spend on buses over this Parliament, should address many of the issues about buses raised by hon. Members. Obviously, during the pandemic, we provided £1.5 billion in emergency funding to keep the buses in the region going. We have supplied the region with £710 million in dedicated funding for active travel, and more has been announced by the Chancellor as part of a £2 billion package.
Written Statements
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Covid-19: PANORAMIC National Study
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Sajid Javid)
On 20 October 2021, the Government announced the procurement of two ground-breaking novel oral antivirals to treat UK covid-19 patients, supplemented by the announcement of additional volumes of these drugs on 22 December. I am writing to inform the House of the progress made on the platform adaptive trial of novel antivirals for early treatment of covid-19 in the community (PANORAMIC) national study and issue a call to action.
On 8 December, the PANORAMIC national study was launched by the University of Oxford. This study was set up so that comprehensive data can be collected on how well these antiviral treatments work in a highly vaccinated population before making these treatments more widely available in the NHS to patients in the most effective way possible.
This will ensure that both patients and clinicians have clear evidence and full confidence in taking and prescribing these treatments respectively across the UK. This has become even more important since the emergence of the omicron variant, as all research previously has been completed with non-omicron variants.
The first antiviral being studied is molnupiravir, which was granted conditional marketing authorisation by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency on 4 November 2021. The study has recruited 3,176 participants as of noon on 12 January 2022. This is excellent progress for a community-based trial in its first month, but it is crucial that recruitment ramps up significantly to generate results as quickly as possible.
We are encouraging people who receive a positive test for covid-19, are experiencing covid-19 symptoms beginning in the last five days, and are aged over 50, or are over 18 with certain underlying health conditions, to sign up to the study straight away.
The study is available to people in this cohort across the UK and it is possible to sign up from anywhere, with the treatment delivered to a participant’s house directly. To ensure eligibility for the study, those who wish to participate must sign up as soon as possible after getting a positive covid-19 test result as antivirals are expected to be most effective when taken at the earliest stages of disease.
Members of both Houses are requested to encourage constituents and others who may contact them to consider enrolling in the study online at www.panoramictrial.org or by calling the freephone number 0808 156 0017.
The Antivirals Taskforce is working across the health and care system in the UK, including NHS England and NHS Improvement, the UK Health Security Agency and our partners in the devolved Administrations to plan the wider deployment of antiviral treatments as data from the national study becomes available.
The Department of Health and Social Care will publish a further update in due course.
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Prime Minister's Trade Envoy Programme
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for International Trade (Mike Freer)
The Prime Minister has made two new appointments to his trade envoy programme.
The new appointments will extend the total number of trade envoys to 34 parliamentarians, covering 72 markets. The Prime Minister’s trade envoy programme is an unpaid and voluntary role with cross-party membership from both Houses. The role supports the UK’s ambitious trade and investment agenda by championing Global Britain and promoting the UK as a destination of choice for inward investment. Trade envoys will help to make the most of our new trade deals and support the UK’s economic recovery through the levelling-up agenda, by helping business take advantage of the opportunities arising in export markets.
The new appointments are:
The hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness, Graham Stuart MP, has been appointed as the Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.
Lord Sarfraz of Kensington has been appointed as the Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to Singapore.
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Smart Motorways
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Transport (Grant Shapps)
Since becoming Transport Secretary, I have worked consistently to raise the bar on motorway safety and I am determined to make sure people using our motorways continue to benefit from one of the safest and best performing road networks in the world.
To this end, one of my first actions as Transport Secretary was to order a stocktake of smart motorways. I also welcome the Transport Committee’s report published on 2 November 2021, following their inquiry into the roll-out and safety of smart motorways.
The stocktake and action plan, which I published in March 2020, focused efforts on further upgrading the safety of smart motorways. I am pleased that these efforts have been recognised by the Committee, which agreed that the Government were right to focus on upgrading the safety of all lane running (ALR) smart motorways, rather than reinstating the hard shoulder—which the Committee recognised could cause more deaths or serious injuries on our roads.
Having carefully considered the Committee’s report, I will be taking forward all of its recommendations. This includes the recommendation to pause the roll-out of future ALR smart motorway schemes until a full five years’ worth of safety data is available.
During the pause, we will continue to make sure all existing ALR smart motorways are equipped with best-in-class technology and resources and are as safe as they can possibly be.
I will also follow the recommendations to pause the conversion of dynamic hard shoulder smart motorways to ALR until the next road investment strategy; retrofit more emergency areas across existing ALR schemes; conduct an independent evaluation of the effectiveness of stopped vehicle detection technology; explore the introduction of the emergency corridor manoeuvre into the highway code; and investigate the benefits of health and safety assessments being undertaken by the Office of Rail and Road.
Taken together and building on my initial stocktake these measures will ensure that our roads continue to be among the safest in the world—helping drivers not just to be safe, but crucially, to feel safe and confident when driving.
I am grateful for the Transport Committee’s scrutiny and to all those that provided evidence for their work. I will be instructing National Highways to take immediate steps to implement the actions as set out in the response and will update the Committee on progress over the coming year.
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Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe: UK Delegation
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
The hon. Member for Broadland (Jerome Mayhew) has been appointed as a full member of the United Kingdom Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.
The hon. Member for Sedgefield (Paul Howell) has been appointed as a full member in place of the hon. Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers).
The right hon. Lord Keen of Elie QC has been appointed as a full member in place of Baroness Eccles of Moulton.
The hon. Member for Jarrow (Kate Osborne) has been appointed as a substitute member of the United Kingdom Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.
The hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East (Jane Stevenson) has been appointed as a substitute member in place of the hon. Member for Kensington (Felicity Buchan).
The hon. Member for North West Durham (Richard Holden) has been appointed as a substitute member in place of the hon. Member for St. Austell and Newquay (Steve Double).
Baroness Foster of Oxton has been appointed as a substitute member in place of Lord Balfe.
[HCWS530]
Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
My right hon. Friend the Member for Maldon (Mr Whittingdale) has been appointed as a full representative of the United Kingdom delegation to the parliamentary assembly of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe in place of my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson).
My right hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mark Pritchard) has been appointed as a full representative in place of my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley South (Mike Wood).
Lord Smith of Hindhead has been appointed as a full representative in place of Lord Bowness.
John Whittingdale has been appointed as leader of the delegation.
[HCWS531]
House of Lords
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Eswatini
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord Jordan
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) report Holding eSwatini to Account: Assessing the Country’s Compliance with the Commonwealth Charter, published on 5 March 2021, what plans they have to use their position as a member of the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group to initiate an investigation into potential breaches of the Commonwealth Charter by the government of Eswatini; and what steps they will take to support the implementation of the recommendations in the ITUC report.
The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)
My Lords, Her Majesty’s Government frequently raise concerns about human rights and governance within eSwatini. My colleague, the Minister for Africa, Vicky Ford, recently visited and spoke to the Prime Minister and, at his request, the King about the civil unrest and tackling its underlying causes, many of which were highlighted by the ITUC. The Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group is a confidential forum that subsequently enables discreet engagement by members. I cannot comment on the detail of the action the UK will take as a member of that group.
Lord Jordan (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply. All that has really been achieved are belated promises of dialogue made by the last absolute dictatorship on the African continent, after a year of government repression and killing with no progress on the reforms the protesters are demanding. The intervention by SADC and the Commonwealth Secretariat has been completely ineffective. Will the Minister tell them to toughen up their approach? Will he ensure that the UK’s representative in Eswatini engages with the local trade union movement? Will the Minister meet our TUC, which commissioned this damning report, to discuss its recommendations and what the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group can do to address them?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, I am always willing to meet. I will work with the noble Lord to arrange that meeting. On what is happening in country in Eswatini, the noble Lord is quite right to draw attention to the work of the African countries, particularly SADC. As he will know, the President of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, visited and met directly with the King of Eswatini. The three countries involved through SADC are also Commonwealth countries, so we are engaging in a very co-ordinated way. Our ambassador regularly makes representations directly to the Government. I spoke to him only two days ago.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, the strength of the ITUC report is that it includes African members of the Commonwealth too. Shortly before the lockdown, I led a CPA UK delegation to Namibia. The Namibian TUC is one of the organisations that has been raising consistent concerns. Can the Minister go a little further about the role of the UK chair-in-office? We currently have a cherished position before the next CHOGM regarding the protection of human rights, freedom of assembly and expression, and media freedom. I know that this is a priority for the Minister. What can we do as chair-in-office as practical action steps, rather than purely dialogue, to emphasise the benefits of the Commonwealth family?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, I pay tribute to the work of the noble Lord—he is aware that I very much appreciate his insights on the countries he visits. Specifically on what the Commonwealth can do, CMAG is different from our role as chair-in-office, so that we can provide support and funding for human rights, and have done so. On the specifics in Eswatini, we are also aware of like-minded partners. For example, on the education side, an initiative was taken recently by a trade union within Eswatini and a trade union in South Africa, supported by a trade union in Finland, to provide support and to stand up for justice and the rights of workers.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, the Minister just mentioned the position of chair-in-office since the London CHOGM. The London CHOGM achieved quite a lot on significant issues on LGBT rights. One of the sad things in the ITUC’s report is the terrible conditions for LGBT people and the fact that the sexual and gender minorities group has been banned. Can the Minister tell us what we are doing to try to ensure that this issue is covered in dialogue?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord is right to draw attention to our role as chair-in-office. We put LGBT rights at the heart of our work on human rights within the Commonwealth. I am pleased to share with him that a number of countries, particularly South Africa and Botswana, have made progressive steps on this agenda and they are engaging directly on this issue with the Eswatini Government.
Lord Flight (Con)
My Lords, this has clearly become a venal regime. How best might it be removed?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, democracy is one way, and all power to the people.
Lord Lea of Crondall (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I am very pleased to hear the Minister’s agreement to meeting the TUC and the international TUC because this is an excellent report. Does the Minister agree that, given our long history of close association with the people of what people of my generation used to call Swaziland—that is where we are talking about—this would be a good opportunity to encourage local participation in dialogue which could be the main road to a positive outcome?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, as it is the preference of the country, I will continue to refer to it as Eswatini. The engagement and the proposal that SADC has put forward are to ensure that all communities are represented. There is a tinkhundla system of government within Eswatini and we need to ensure that local representative voices are leveraged.
Lord Boateng (Lab)
My Lords, I served as high commissioner to Eswatini. I do not doubt for one moment the Minister’s commitment to the Commonwealth, but can he point to one single thing that this discreet and confidential engagement by the ministerial action group has produced by way of improvements in human rights in Eswatini, Cameroon or anywhere else in the Commonwealth where human rights are daily abused?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, there is a lot we have achieved in our role as chair-in-office. The noble Lord will know from his experience in Eswatini that it is right that there is a level of discretion and confidentiality when it comes to discussions within the CMAG group, which he will know well. In this regard, the Commonwealth Secretariat has engaged directly. When you profile issues, such as the abuse of human rights, on an international stage and have representatives of multilateral organisations, such as the Commonwealth, visiting and making the case, it makes a difference. We will continue to act in unison with our Commonwealth partners.
Lord Monks (Lab)
My Lords, are the Government considering getting in touch with the International Labour Organization to see what it can do to help in this unsatisfactory situation? Eswatini is a blot on southern Africa in the way that it treats workers’ rights.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, I can assure the noble Lord that the ILO itself, because of its interests, is already involved in discussions in this respect. I will certainly follow up to see whether it can play a further role when it comes to the issues currently in Eswatini.
Diplomatic Influence Post Brexit
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord Balfe
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the change in the United Kingdom’s diplomatic influence since it ceased to be a participant in the political cooperation meetings of the European Union.
The Minister of State, Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park) (Con)
My Lords, we continue to work closely with all our allies, including the EU and European states, to build a network of liberty and tackle shared foreign policy challenges and threats. We do not need to attend formal EU meetings in order to do so effectively. Our recent achievements, including our presidencies of the G7 and COP 26, have shown that we retain significant diplomatic influence, supported by the best diplomats in the world.
Lord Balfe (Con)
I thank the Minister for his reply, in which he did not actually deal with the Question: whether we have lost diplomatic influence since we ceased to be a participant in the political co-operation meetings of the European Union. At lunchtime today, the members are meeting in Paris to talk about migration. This evening, the EU Defence Ministers are meeting in Brest. We will be missing from both those meetings. Are we not losing influence?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
My Lords, I think the opposite is the case, as we have shown over the last couple of years. The UK has exerted extraordinary influence around the world through various fora. At the G7, which we hosted, the UK led the way in underlining members’ unwavering commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, for example. Last year, the Prime Minister and President Biden signed a new UK-US Atlantic Charter. We established the AUKUS defence partnership and agreed new free trade agreements with both Australia and New Zealand. There are many examples from last year alone where the UK performed globally in a way that I think is almost unprecedented.
Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate (Non-Afl)
My Lords, as a corollary to the Question from the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, can I ask the Minister whether there has been a diminution in co-operation or in the sharing of criminal intelligence following the exclusion of British police forces from the various policing institutions in the European Union?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
My Lords, we have shown that we do not need a separate institutional treaty to work effectively with the EU on foreign policy and security, whether that is co-ordinating on Belarus sanctions or responding jointly to Russian aggression, Iran or anything else. We maintain good diplomatic relations with the European states, which generally share our foreign policy goals on all the big issues of the day.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
In the policy areas the Minister has outlined, we were able to do that while we were a member of the European Union. When I watched the German election night coverage live, there was a home truth for me when I saw Anthony Gardner, former US ambassador to the EU, say that the election was of key importance to the US. He said that Germany is now the leader of the 27, since the UK has left. We have heard repeatedly that we have left the EU but not Europe, so can the Minister say what European policy areas we are currently leading?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
My Lords, Germany is an essential ally and one of our most important international partners. The new German coalition Government described the UK as one of Germany’s closest partners just a few days ago. Wherever it is in our common interests, the UK works extremely closely with the European Union, as noble Lords would expect, on security, counterterror and a whole range of different issues. The noble Lord asks where in particular we have led in recent months or years. The most obvious area relates to climate change, where we have galvanised the European Union into a position that greatly exceeds the position it held only 12 months ago.
Lord Robathan (Con)
Can my noble friend the Minister tell the House what our effective political influence actually was when we attended these political co-operation meetings as a member of the EU? For instance, what was said when we suggested that Nord Stream 2 was not a good idea?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
The noble Lord makes a really important point. We have always been concerned that Nord Stream 2—it is an obvious thing to say—risks entrenching European energy dependence on Russia and undermining Ukraine’s security. The noble Lord raises a broader point, and in the areas where I work in government, particularly in the department for the environment, it is not only the case that we have not lost a seat at the table by leaving the European Union; we have gained a seat at the table. In forums such as CITES, the UK is able to influence votes and actual outcomes in a way that we were never able to before, because we had to pool our voice with a whole bunch of other countries that did not always agree with us.
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
My Lords, there is a risk here of the Minister sounding complacent. This matters. The prosperity and security of the United Kingdom depend on us having significant diplomatic influence. Surely we must be seen to stick to our agreements. With that in mind, I encourage Ministers to resolve outstanding issues with the EU regarding the Northern Ireland protocol as a matter of urgency. Does the Minister agree that Russia’s hostile activity demonstrates our need to facilitate close security partnerships with the EU and our European partners as well as NATO?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
I certainly do not intend to sound complacent. I simply push back on the idea that the UK has lost influence. All the evidence over the last two years shows that we have extraordinary influence around the world, disproportionate to the size of our country and even to the size of our economy—notwithstanding that we are the fifth biggest economy in the world. However, the noble Baroness is right: post-Brexit relations with the EU remain heavily influenced by the resolution of outstanding exit priorities, principally the Northern Ireland protocol, where talks need to proceed with renewed urgency this month. I have every hope that we will see success at the end of those talks.
Lord Stirrup (CB)
My Lords, the Prime Minister has recently appointed a special envoy to the western Balkans. This is a welcome appointment, but what processes and mechanisms will be available to that envoy for co-ordinating with the EU, which has such an important presence on the ground in the western Balkans?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
As I said, my Lords, we retain good diplomatic relations with European states and share foreign policy goals with them, particularly on issues around Russia, Iran and China and indeed on the issue that the noble and gallant Lord raises. The trade and co-operation agreement provides for future co-operation on emerging security challenges—everything from counterterror to cyber- crime. It also provides for an agreement on security of information that will allow the UK and the EU to exchange classified information on a voluntary basis.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
I remind the Minister that Lord Carrington and Geoffrey Howe, two of the main architects of the institutions of European foreign policy co-operation, said on many occasions that this was one of the most valuable aspects of our membership of the European Union; that should not be forgotten. It was agreed in the Foreign Office 20 years ago that we could cut our staff in bilateral embassies across Europe because we did so much of the business in Brussels. Has the Foreign Office now accepted that we need to increase substantially our staff in bilateral embassies across Europe, even as the overall diminution in the size of the Diplomatic Service is still under way? We need to increase those bilateral staff if we are to maintain our contacts.
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
In the last decade our diplomatic network has expanded by over 10%, making it the fourth largest global network of embassies and high commissions after China, the US and France. We now oversee one of the world’s largest diplomatic networks, with 282 posts covering 179 countries and territories, including 161 embassies or high commissions. In the EU, the Foreign Office has carried out a comprehensive review of resources across Europe to ensure that we have the right staff focused on the right priorities. However, the noble Lord makes an important point that is fully accepted by the Foreign Office.
Lord Hamilton of Epsom (Con)
My noble friend Lord Balfe mentioned that we were absent from the EU defence committee that met the other day. How can EU defence come to anything if it does not have serious contributions from the French and the Germans? When we last looked at German defence capability it was ill equipped and ill trained, and this Government seem to be more pacifist than the one they replaced.
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
My Lords, I do not know whether my noble friend is referring to this Government or the French Government. Our defence capabilities have been consistently growing over the last few years, as noble Lords will know. As I have said, there is no shortage of dialogue between ourselves, Germany, France and other European powers when it comes to issues of security that are in our common interest.
Lord Watts (Lab)
My Lords, the Government seem to believe that the less engagement we have with our European friends, the more influence we have. Surely that is not the case. Now that we have left the European Union, do we not need to find new ways of engaging with our partners in order to look after Britain’s interests?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
My Lords, that is not the Government’s view at all. We engage on a very regular basis with our friends and allies across the European Union. It is also worth mentioning the obvious point of NATO. Continental European security is directly linked to UK security. We work closely through NATO, the Joint Expeditionary Force, and bilaterally on counterterror, serious organised crime and illegal migration—a particularly live issue today. As one of only two European nations with truly global military reach, Europe needs our defence and security capability.
Viscount Stansgate (Lab)
My Lords, if the United Kingdom’s diplomatic influence is as high as the Minister is claiming, why has the UK still not joined the Horizon Europe programme? Our absence from it is damaging to British science.
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
My Lords, I would love to have time to give lots of examples of where we have exerted disproportionate influence over the last year or two. On the specific issue that the noble Viscount raises, we are keen to formalise our association with programmes such as Horizon; we regard that as a win-win for all, so we are disappointed there have been delays from the European Union and I hope we will overcome them.
Nuclear Weapons
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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The Lord Bishop of Coventry
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to reconcile differences between nuclear possessor states and non-nuclear possessor states at the Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)
My Lords, the United Kingdom recognises its responsibilities as a bridge builder among nuclear weapon and non-nuclear weapon states at the 10th review conference on the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. To support discussions, we are submitting working papers on transparency, verification and peaceful uses. We will host side events including a joint P5 event on doctrines and policy.
The Lord Bishop of Coventry
I thank the Minister for his response and wholeheartedly welcome the recent P5 affirmation of the Gorbachev-Reagan principle. But in an unstable world where nuclear proliferation is a growing threat and widespread arsenal modernisation is a reality, these words must be backed up by actions—since the grand bargain of the NPT is that non-proliferation can be successful only if pursued in tandem with disarmament. Would the Government consider initiating a P5+ process to allow nuclear weapon states and non-possessor states to work collaboratively on key areas of concern? Mindful of the upcoming TPNW first meeting of states parties, will he explain the strategy for engaging constructively with the concerns underlying the TPNW in preparation for the forthcoming NPT conference in the common cause of disarmament?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, within the NPT, as the right reverend Prelate will know, there are three key strands: disarmament, non-proliferation, and the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. Like him, I recognise the importance earlier this month of the P5 declaration. The UK was instrumental in getting that over the line. We are looking forward to the review conference of the NPT, which was unfortunately delayed because of Covid, but I understand it will now take place in August. On the issue of nuclear against non-nuclear states, through the P5 format we are engaging directly with those countries. With the exception of four or five countries, everyone else has signed up to the NPT and we have a structured programme of engagement. On the TPNW specifically, the UK firmly believes that the only way to achieve a world without nuclear weapons is through gradual multilateral disarmament, and the best way to do that is through the NPT.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
Picking up that last point, can the Minister explain how the Government support multilateral disarmament initiatives while announcing in the integrated review an increase in the number of nuclear warheads the UK can hold?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, the announcements that we made in that respect are totally consistent with our obligations under the NPT. Specific elements and aspects within the NPT ensure that we meet those obligations. Requirements within the NPT ensure that all countries that have signed up to it fulfil their obligations, and the United Kingdom does just that.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)
My Lords, will the Minister accept how welcome it was that the Government —perhaps a little belatedly—agreed to the P5 statement that
“a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought”
which was issued last week? What do the Government intend with regard to the strategic dialogue among the P5 for achieving a reduction in the risk of nuclear war? What is the timetable for further meetings and what content are the Government putting into that dialogue?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, first, I do not agree with the noble Lord. The United Kingdom was actually central in its convening role in pushing for the P5 statement and we were delighted that all countries committed. Notwithstanding many of the issues that we debate in your Lordships’ House, there needs to be a recognition that all five countries signed up to this, and we take direct encouragement from that. We work in a structured way with other P5 members in relation to other countries. For example, we work closely on issues that are currently under way in Geneva, through the JCPOA discussions on Iran, and on issues around the DPRK to ensure that we focus particularly on the non-proliferation element.
Lord Trefgarne (Con)
My Lords, can my noble friend confirm that, every hour of every day and every night, somewhere in the world one of our Trident submarines is on patrol, ready to respond should our supreme national interest so require? And I mean “on patrol”, not on the way out or on the way back.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
I am sure that I share with my noble friend and everyone in your Lordships’ House a real admiration for all elements of our military, including our naval assets. Of course, I cannot discuss specific operational aspects, but I can say to my noble friend that we have one of the best militaries, and indeed navies, in the world.
Baroness Smith of Newnham (LD)
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Collins, asked the Minister how he could justify the increase in the number of warheads. He says that that is in line with our commitments under the NPT. If that is the case, what actions are Her Majesty’s Government actually taking to look for disarmament? The Minister said that we support multilateral disarmament, yet we seem to be increasing our armaments. So what, in practical terms, are we doing to meet our commitments?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, on the specific point about our own capacity, ultimately of course we retain our defensive capacity. Referring back to the P5 statement, it was encouraging that all countries have underlined the importance of the defensive nature of being nuclear states. On specific aspects of what we are doing, we have, for example, recently had discussions with other countries, including the likes of New Zealand, specifically looking at elements of the NPT. We also ensure that we look at issues of disarmament through regular reviews, ensuring that bodies are set up to review the capacity of countries to develop nuclear weapons and ensure that they do not do so. We work together with our P5 partners to ensure that that remains the case.
Lord Campbell of Pittenweem (LD)
My Lords, exactly how are the Government proposing to meet the cost of the 40 additional nuclear warheads referred to in the integrated review—or are they to be funded out of the already overstretched defence budget?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, on the specifics of that question, I will of course defer to my colleagues at the Ministry of Defence and will write to the noble Lord. But, as he will be aware, in the recent review that took place we increased our defence spending, and that was long overdue.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, Nikita Kruschev said that, in the event of a nuclear war, the living would envy the dead. The noble Lord has said that the P5 have rightly said that there should be no first use of nuclear weapons and that this would lead to mutually assured destruction. Having said that, the noble Lord has also referred to rogue states, such as North Korea—the DPRK. Can he tell the House more about its development of hypersonic missiles, its use of submarines and the threats that it is making to its neighbours?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, first, on the P5 element, all countries have sustained their position on nuclear weapons being a defensive mechanism —I stress that point again. The noble Lord rightly raised the current issues in the DPRK. It is clear that the missile test that recently took place was in direct contravention of the UN Security Council resolutions, and we are undertaking discussions on that element directly with our UN colleagues.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, would the Minister agree that the reason we have not had a world war since 1945 is nuclear weapons? Would he also agree that we should have some pride that our nation has only one system for nuclear weapons and have reduced them to an absolute minimum—to such a scale that I think we had to say that we would get some more weapons while we were doing a changeover? However, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, that we really must get methods of engaging with countries such as Russia because, otherwise, something will go wrong. The nuclear clock is moving towards midnight, and we must really strain ourselves to get links with these countries so that something does not go wrong. There is no doubt that, for example, if we did not have nuclear weapons at all and Russia had them, with Mr Putin there, it would go ahead and do what it wanted. We really have to make that effort.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, on the point raised by the noble Lords, Lord Hannay and Lord West, I agree that we must continue to engage. As the Minister for the United Nations, I recognise that where we have issues of disagreement with other nuclear states, including Russia, it is vital that we continue to engage, and we are doing just that. While they are specific not to the nuclear issue but to the wider security situation in Europe and Ukraine, we are today holding meetings through our NATO partners. My colleague, Minister Cleverly, is present. He will meet, among others, the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister to discuss security issues.
On the noble Lord’s first point, that nuclear weapons have ensured that we have kept peace in Europe, and on his second, that we have the best forces, my answer to him is yes and yes.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, the P5 statement that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought is of course hugely welcome, but it did not repeat a phrase used in earlier, similar statements that reaffirmed denuclearisation as an “unequivocal undertaking”. Does the Minister agree that that is the case?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, what I can say to the noble Baroness—and as the noble Lord, Lord West, has pointed out—is that the primary aim of nuclear weapons being in the armoury of any country, including our own, is to be a deterrent. We have achieved that objective, but we must work together as P5 members to ensure the key elements: that for those countries that have nuclear weapons we look towards disarmament and that for those countries that do not have nuclear weapons we look at non-proliferation.
Energy Prices
(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Lord Dodds of Duncairn
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of rising energy prices on the most vulnerable people in society, and the most effective means of helping them.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Callanan) (Con)
My Lords, the largest element of gas and electricity bills, which is wholesale costs, has increased significantly. The Government are committed to protecting customers, especially the most vulnerable. Households will continue to be protected through the winter by the price cap and through the warm home discount, winter fuel payment and cold weather payment schemes. A new £500 million household support fund has also been made available to councils to help the most in need over the winter.
Lord Dodds of Duncairn (DUP)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his Answer. We are looking at extraordinarily steep increases in energy prices over a relatively short period, coming on top of already big increases. This is causing real fear and anxiety among vulnerable people, especially the elderly, about the financial severity and hardship to come. So can the Minister go further today and announce new measures that will deal with the immediate crisis that people are facing, especially in the context of other cost-of-living pressures which are coming the way of hard-pressed families and individuals?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I totally understand the point that the noble Lord makes. Unfortunately, I am not in a position today to announce further measures, but I can tell him that we are actively engaging with stakeholders and energy companies. The Prime Minister and the Chancellor are in urgent discussions and we hope to announce some action shortly.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)
My Lords, was it not entirely predictable that there would be a surge in gas prices, and in such circumstances what further work will BEIS and the Government undertake? Why did they not have further plans at the ready to address the situation to help struggling households and to mitigate the impact of deepening fuel poverty as a result of those rising costs, as already referenced by the noble Lord, Lord Dodds?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I am not clear what further plans the noble Baroness is referring to, but, as I mentioned, we have a whole series of mitigations in place to protect precisely the people whom she mentioned. For example, the warm home discount scheme has helped millions of people at a cost of several billion pounds, and we will continue with policies such as that to help the most vulnerable.
Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)
My Lords, is it appreciated in this drama of exceptionally high prices that the whole process of moving to a decarbonised world and energy transition requires the most careful management of balance between supply and demand? If supply is discouraged or undermined while demand is still rising, we will get again and again the huge, volatile and extremely damaging rise in fuel and power prices that we have now. Is that not the main lesson to be learned from the mess that we are in now?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I know that my noble friend, as a former Energy Minister himself, is very experienced in these matters. Of course, the underlying point that he makes is right—but it is a transition that will take place over many years and, in the meantime, there will of course be considerable demand for fossil fuels.
Lord Newby (LD)
The Minister has just talked about mitigations that the Government have in place, but those mitigations were inadequate before the price rise that we have seen, and clearly will be completely inadequate in dealing with the huge increases with which vulnerable families will be faced in the next few months. On measures that the Government might take that will require expenditure, have they considered raising the money required by imposing a windfall tax on those oil and gas companies whose profits have soared as prices have soared?
Lord Callanan (Con)
There are a number of different policies under consideration but, of course, the situation is never as simple as the noble Lord would have us believe. Many of the North Sea producers over which we would have taxation control have long-term contracts in place at fixed prices to supply wholesalers in the United Kingdom. So it is not clear that there are excessive profits being made—but I am sure that this is something that the Chancellor will want to look at in his review, to see what else we can do in this area.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, if the Government want to focus any help with the cost of living crisis on those in greatest need, the simplest and fastest way in which to do so is to boost social security. Why are they not proposing such a boost?
Lord Callanan (Con)
Let me tell the noble Baroness what we are doing. The winter fuel payment provides all pensioners across Britain with between £100 and £300 to put toward their fuel bills, which costs £2 billion a year. The cold weather payment provides vulnerable households on qualifying benefits with payments of £25 during periods of cold weather, and the Government have spent £100 million on that. We will continue to spend considerable sums of money to help those most in need.
Lord Hannan of Kingsclere (Con)
My Lords, one thing that we have learned over the past 22 months is that government targets sometimes have to be adjusted in the light of circumstance. Would there be a situation in which the Government might reconsider their net-zero timetable; for example, if costs on consumers or taxpayers were disproportionate and if there were a realistic prospect that technological improvement would mean a significant fall in those costs with a deferral?
Lord Callanan (Con)
Of course, we want to keep all these things under review but, as my noble friend is well aware, net zero is a legally binding commitment, legislated for by Parliament—and, of course, it is the duty of government to carry out the wishes of Parliament. If a future Parliament or Government wish to reconsider that, I am sure that the Government at the time would want to take full cognisance of that.
Lord Grantchester (Lab)
My Lords, we all wish to protect vulnerable households, and there are many support schemes targeting approximately 3 million households. The expected increase in the price cap in April is around £600 per household to a total of £1,865 a year. While the Government continue to dither, Labour has announced costed, detailed plans to reduce the size of the exposure and extend help to more households to limit increases to just £5 a year for the most vulnerable. What target do the Government have in mind to reduce the size of the exposure in the forthcoming price cap rise, to be announced on 7 February?
Lord Callanan (Con)
Before I answer the noble Lord’s question, I understand that this is his last outing as a member of the Opposition Front Bench. From my point of view, it has been a pleasure sitting opposite him and dealing with his questions and points. I am sure that he will have a lot to contribute to the House from the Back Benches in future, and I certainly wish him well.
Of course, the price cap is a matter for the independent regulator—Ofgem—and we will find out in a couple of weeks’ time what it will be. The Government have already announced £500 million for local authorities to support vulnerable householders across the country with essentials, including utility bills. As I said in response to earlier questions, we are looking at what else we can do.
Lord Lilley (Con)
When my noble friend considers the impact of higher energy prices, will he bear in mind the fact that, wherever the cost of meeting net-zero targets has become an electoral issue, with the gilets jaunes in France, the elections in Australia and Canada and the municipal elections in the Netherlands, the party opposing higher taxes on energy has won?
Lord Callanan (Con)
We have taken careful note of the points that my noble friend has made. I know that we have discussed this in previous debates but, as I said to my noble friend Lord Hannan, net zero is a legally binding commitment that Parliament has placed upon the Government and, as long as that remains the case, that will be the policy of the Government.
Baroness Janke (LD)
My Lords, what is the Government’s response to the predictions of National Energy Action that children will be forced to do homework in cafés, libraries, the homes of friends and relatives and even A&E departments due to rising energy bills at home? What support will the Government provide to prevent further educational disadvantage to children and young people from poorer homes whose education has already suffered enormously as a result of the pandemic?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I outlined in earlier answers the support that we are providing for vulnerable families for their energy bills to do precisely that. As I also said, we are currently engaging with stakeholders and looking to see what else we can do in this area.
Baroness Altmann (Con)
My Lords, the winter fuel payment is currently less than it was in 2009, the cold weather payments are the same as they were in 2008, and the warm homes discount—which I agree is an excellent measure—has stayed the same since 2011. Given that the cost of fuel is rising so substantially and also that most of these benefits are available only to those who are claiming pension credit, will the Government now look at urgent measures to increase the take-up of pension credit, which has been stuck at 40% of people not claiming it since 2010? It would be a direct way of getting help to people immediately.
Lord Callanan (Con)
My noble friend is asking about social security policy, which, I am sorry to say, is not within my speciality, but I will certainly write to her with details on that. On the warm homes discount, she will of course be aware that we consulted last year on increasing the discount and extending the number of eligible households that would qualify for it. We will be responding to that consultation soon.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill
Wednesday 12th January 2022
(2 years, 3 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 View all Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 72-V Fifth marshalled list for Report - (10 Jan 2022)
18:37 - Division on Amendment 104E - Ayes: 206 / Noes: 176 - Amendment 104E agreed.
20:26 - Division on Amendment 104FE - Ayes: 157 / Noes: 145 - Amendment 104FE agreed.
22:15 - Division on Amendment 109A - Ayes: 32 / Noes: 20 - Amendment 109A agreed.
Baroness Meacher
“Restorative justice
The Secretary of State must, every five years— (a) prepare an action plan on restorative justice for the purpose of improving access, awareness and capacity of restorative justice within the criminal justice system,(b) publish a copy of the action plan, and(c) publish a report on progress in implementing the previous action plan.”
Baroness Meacher (CB)
My Lords, Amendment 103 seeks to ensure that the regular action plans on restorative justice provided by the Ministry of Justice until 2008 be restored and also that they should be published and a report produced on progress on the previous action plan as well. It is a more modest amendment than the one I moved in Committee. At that point, we wanted the Government to produce action plans every three years; we are now talking about every five years, which at least reduces the pressure on the department. The amendment would be an enormous improvement on the complete absence of national leadership on this issue since 2018.
But, first, what is restorative justice? It is an interpersonal approach that enables people who have been a victim of criminal or other harmful behaviour to meet the perpetrator, generally face to face, and others closely involved in the case to ask questions of that perpetrator and express how the incident affected them personally. It also enables perpetrators to express what was going on for them when they committed their crime or whatever they did and also to listen and understand the personal impact of that action, so that something that was a very impersonal action turns into something very personal. That is in fact a very important point.
Restorative justice is very much a voluntary process. No one is forced into it—both the victim and the perpetrator have to want to go through it. It can also go alongside other criminal justice activities or procedures. It is highly cost effective; for every pound spent on it, £8 are saved for the criminal justice system. That seems a very good reason for the Minister to take this amendment very seriously, as I hope he will, albeit I will not press it to a vote.
Why do we need the amendment included in this legislation? Every PCC area in England and Wales has a local restorative justice provider which takes referrals for restorative justice. Youth offending teams have a member of staff who leads on it. The victims’ code of practice from 2020 entitles every victim of crime to be informed about restorative justice and have access to it. However, this is simply not happening. The Office for National Statistics data showed, I think in 2020, that only 5% of victims are aware of being told anything about restorative justice at all. I hope the Minister will agree that that really is not satisfactory when these victims have a right to that information.
This problem seems to be driven by a lack of strategic direction from the centre. That is the whole point of this amendment. Also, the Ministry of Justice ceased to provide any funding to PCCs to support these important services. Before introducing the PCSC Bill, the Government published a White Paper highlighting the importance of restorative justice:
“We believe restorative justice is an important part of the justice system and has significant benefits both for the victim and for the rehabilitation of offenders.”
That is absolutely right. We know that reoffending drops by 14% if people have been involved in restorative justice. That is where the £8 saving for every £1 spent comes from. The White Paper went on to refer to opportunities to increase the use of restorative justice by using deferred sentencing and setting restorative conditions as part of out-of-court disposals.
Despite all this, restorative justice has been absent from the Bill. Can the Minister explain why it was promoted in the White Paper but does not feature in the Bill? I hope he will want to put this right. The amendment is relatively minor in its impact on the Ministry of Justice, yet it could have really far-reaching impacts, both for victims and for perpetrators. I hope the Minister will look favourably on Amendment 103.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, I made a very brief reference to restorative justice in one of our debates on Monday. I am glad to have an opportunity to comment briefly on the amendment just moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher. I agree with her wholeheartedly. We should always do everything we can to keep people out of prison; to repeat myself from Monday, although sending people to prison is the punishment and the aim is rehabilitation, it does not always work like that. I know that from experience in my former constituency, which had a very large prison—Featherstone—and a young offender institution at Brinsford just a mile or so away. I believe a lot of the young people in Brinsford would have benefited enormously by not going to prison and would have benefited from restorative justice.
I became totally convinced in this view when I had the privilege to be the chairman of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee for the last of my Parliaments in the other place, 2005 to 2010. I saw at first hand the effect of restorative justice in Northern Ireland, and a lot of young people who would perhaps have gone on to a long life of crime were rehabilitated and came to terms with their victims. As the noble Baroness said, there has to be agreement from both sides, as it were, but it was wholly beneficial in a vast number of cases.
Following the White Paper to which the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, referred, it seems very strange indeed that there is no provision or recognition in the fairly massive Bill before us. One of my criticisms of the Bill is that it is too long. It should be three Bills rather than one—but that is another story and we have touched on that in the past. But although the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, said that she will not press this to a Division—I do not dissent from her on that—I hope nevertheless that my noble friend the Minister will be able to make some favourable and encouraging comments about the importance of restorative justice and its place in the criminal justice system.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)
My Lords, I intervene to express my support for this modest but worthwhile amendment and, like my noble friend Lord Cormack, to urge my noble friend the Minister to give a sympathetic response when he winds up in a moment or two.
I have had an interest in RJ—restorative justice—for a number of years. In particular, I have followed the work of Why Me?, which has briefed us on the debate this afternoon. My noble friend the Minister will be aware of my concern, which I know is shared across the House, about the levels of reoffending, which seem a reproach to us all: a moral reproach, a societal reproach, a financial reproach—you name it. This high rate of reoffending is not a new problem; it has bedevilled our society and our prison system for many years.
It is said that the definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. That seems to be one of the positions we have got to with regard to trying new ideas which may—maybe at the margin—help cut the underlying reoffending rate. I am sure we need to try a new approach, or new approaches. To use the cricketing analogy, if I may, in light of the results of the test match in Australia, we need to change the bowling—
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)
Well, shall we change them both? I think changing the batting is a fair comment.
My noble friend and I have had one go round on reoffending over the bunching of Friday prisoners, and we now have a situation where three-sevenths of all prisoners released come out on a Friday, with all the problems of the weekend. We discussed this at some length. It was a cost-free option being put forward from across the House, but my noble friend could not accept it—though he has offered us, and has committed to, a consultation process as part of the prisons White Paper. But we are therefore in a holding pattern now for two or three years, doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, because it will be two or three years before we can find a place in a Bill for that measure.
With Amendment 103 on RJ, we have a chance to change the batting and try a different approach. I absolutely accept and I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, that it is not a silver bullet. It is not, by any manner of means, cost-free, because it requires very careful handling by trained staff and, as she said, it works only where both parties, particularly the perpetrator, have a moral commitment to making it work. Obviously, there are also touchy-feely aspects, which can be ridiculed in the media.
However, as the noble Baroness said, where it works, its results are remarkable, and remarkable in one unique sense. The victim can begin to understand how they found themselves in this difficult position when they see how the life chances of the perpetrator were so badly damaged. One of the problems in crime is that the victim finds that their life is ruined, but this can enable them to mend their life because they see that the perpetrator has had poor life chances and is now wishing to make amends.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lords, Lord Cormack and Lord Hodgson, and to agree with what they say. I support this amendment very strongly and I regret that we will not vote on it, because this is so important for justice. At the moment, justice just means taking something away from everyone instead of trying to add things back, both to all the people involved but also to society. Crime has to be seen partly as the result of a broken society; this is what it indicates. It cannot only be addressed—and it certainly cannot be fixed—by policing and punishment. There has to be something more that adds back and enriches us.
Effective restorative justice deals constructively with both the victim and the offender. The primary aim has to be to restore and improve the position of the victim and the community by the offender making amends. It recognises that a person convicted of a crime has the ability to improve the community. We do not at the moment employ restorative justice; we focus instead on punishing the offender, which means more prisons, more stress and more degradation in our society. Therefore, I regret that we will not vote on this, because it is a very important move.
Lord Ramsbotham (CB)
My Lords, I rise to strongly support this amendment, which was so ably introduced by my noble friend Lady Meacher, particularly if it is matched by a strong commitment to restorative justice among all sections of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, particularly prison governors. I have witnessed an unfortunate case in which a governor admitted to me that none of the recommendations of the very good police officer who was chairing the conference could be provided by the prison concerned, to the detriment of the whole process.
Lord Sentamu (CB)
My Lords, I too support this amendment. It asks the Secretary of State to prepare an action plan and to show how it is being implemented or otherwise, so it is not asking that which is beyond common sense.
I take your Lordships back to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa, chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. In front of him is a police officer who was responsible for setting alight a young man. The young man dies and the mother comes, and all that is left is just ash—the body is gone. Desmond Tutu asks, not the person who committed the crime but the mother: “What do you want to say to him?” The mother says, “I lost my son. In the light of what you have been saying to us about the need to address the maladies that have happened and to reconcile people, I say this. I have a broken heart; I lost my son. I want to take this police officer to the place where my son was burnt alive. When we have gone there and have actually touched the earth, I will adopt him as my son, because I no longer have a son.” Desmond Tutu broke down in tears. They go to the place where this had happened, and the mother takes in that police officer as her own son. That is the effect of restorative justice. It never asks the question: “Who has done this? What punishment do they deserve?” It asks the question: “Now that this rather unhappy fact has happened, what are we going to do about it?”
For nearly 20 years I have been lecturing all over the world on restorative justice. In this country, at an international conference gathered by the Bar Council, we had a great debate and discussion; but unfortunately, although we talk about restorative justice, in the light of our criminal justice system we really do not give a major role to what Desmond Tutu’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission did. Had it not been for restorative justice, a lot of people would have been revenging for what had happened. They were very angry and wanted to lock people away and throw away the key, but because of that mission and Desmond Tutu believing that, without forgiveness, there can be no peace—and that forgiveness is a consequence of restoration; it does not come out of nowhere—South Africa, where many people committed terrible, awful crimes, continued to live in peace.
I know that we will not be voting on this amendment, but somewhere, we must find words that express what the noble Baroness has put before us, because if there is no restoration of the relationships that have been fractured by a crime, you just think that that is it. After a big victory in a battle, George Washington started befriending the people fighting on the other side. Those on his side said to him, “Why do you want them to be your friends?” He said, “Well, if they don’t become my friends, they will still be protesting. The only way to overcome an enemy is to make them your friend; then, they stop protesting.”
There are so many people in our country for whom crimes have caused untold difficulty—take the Stephen Lawrence murder. It would have been good if some kind of restorative justice had happened. Neville Lawrence says, “Those five young men did a terrible thing to my son, but I have now realised that if I continue to be angry, it is me who is being destroyed.” Unfortunately, he is not being given the opportunity to go through the restorative justice process. I support the amendment.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, perhaps I may make three quick points in support of this important amendment. First, we all accept that short sentences are extremely expensive to manage and expensive to our society, and we ought to do our best to provide alternatives to them. They are also expensive in other ways because they introduce often naive offenders to much more serious crime. Secondly, short sentences are extremely disruptive to the individual concerned. They often lose whatever jobs they have and a whole range of things that are important in their life. Thirdly, restorative justice is a learning experience. Would that there were other parts of the criminal justice system that I could say with confidence were a learning experience.
Restorative justice is the opportunity for an offender to reflect carefully on what has happened as a result of their behaviour and on why it is important that they learn from that experience and change their way of life. This is an important amendment that I hope the Government will take seriously.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, I remind the House that at one stage in my police career I was the lead for the Metropolitan Police on restorative justice, working with Professor Larry Sherman. The evidence from that experience and other academic studies shows that the benefits to victims, in terms of allaying fear and victim satisfaction, and to perpetrators, in terms of engagement with the criminal justice process, and by being confronted, as the noble Lord, Lord Laming, has just said, by their offending behaviour, and in terms of reducing recidivism, are unequivocal.
The only objection to the amendment would be political, because restorative justice is wrongly perceived by those who do not understand the process as going soft on offenders; it is the opposite. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Laming, about short sentences. However, on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, it does not necessarily have to be an alternative to prison in very serious cases. The important outcomes are victim satisfaction and the offender having to confront their offending behaviour.
The Minister may argue that people get a long time in prison in which to reflect on their wrongdoing. However, a colleague of mine did some research on street robbery and went to a young offenders’ institution to interview those who had been convicted and incarcerated for that offence. Many of those he spoke to did not understand why they were in the young offenders’ institution. The process was so detached from them—they just sat at the back of the court while other people spoke and dealt with the case, without their involvement at all. They genuinely did not understand why they were in prison. That is why restorative justice is important.
The question is: are the Government going to be led by the evidence and support this amendment, or are they going to object to it, based on misconceptions?
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, I, too, support the amendment. It is modest and worth while, and is another step down the road.
I remember that the noble Lord, Lord McNally, introduced the phrase restorative justice into the statute book. I cannot remember which piece of legislation it was but at that point he spoke perceptively when he said that it was going to be a long road to get restorative justice embedded within the criminal justice system, whether in terms of probation, YOTs or prison. He was right and the necessity for the amendment proves that because the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, gave a number of examples, including where the funding or initiatives have stalled and the momentum with restorative justice has been lost. From memory, the initial introduction of restorative justice was through a separate funding stream for YOTs to use these programmes. So I very much support the amendment. It needs constant activity and oversight by a Minister to get the restorative justice programmes embedded in the system as a whole.
One reason why what I am saying is perhaps more relevant than what some noble Lords have said is that I have some scepticism on the issue. I am happy to have a cup of tea with the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, to express my scepticism. While I support the amendment, it requires a long-term programme, and it is for the Government to make sure that that programme is implemented.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Wolfson of Tredegar) (Con)
My Lords, I am pleased that the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, is able to be with us this afternoon—and in good health, I hope—having been unavoidably detained during the debate in Committee. It is good to have been able to hear from her directly on an issue that is of evident interest to a number of Members of your Lordships’ House. I have listened carefully to the points made by everyone, including the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, the noble Lords, Lord Ramsbotham and Lord Laming, the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Sentamu, my Front Bench colleagues and others to whom I will come.
I hear and feel the mood of the House and the noble Lords who spoke in support of the amendment. I also heard my noble friends Lord Cormack and Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts ask for some favourable and encouraging comments from me. The truth is that I do not really need any persuading on the importance and use of restorative justice. I agree that, in the right circumstances, it can certainly have far-reaching benefits.
Indeed, since we discussed this in Committee, I have spoken at the Council of Europe Justice Ministers meeting, which was specifically about restorative justice. On the upside, the meeting was held in Venice; on the downside, I had to appear virtually. Despite that, I was pleased to welcome the declaration on restorative justice made by that meeting. I talked about our history in the UK of exploring and embedding the appropriate use of restorative justice across the criminal justice system. The Venice declaration calls for the sharing of knowledge, best practice and scientific research on restorative justice. We are committed to playing our full part in this.
Turning to the amendment, it seems to be intended to address a concern that the Bill does not include provision for restorative justice by requiring the Secretary of State to publish an action plan every five years. As I explained in Committee, restorative justice is not just communication between victim and perpetrator. We consider that the concept of restorative justice extends to other parts of the Bill in the sense that we now have a new system for out-of-court disposals because the conditions attached to those disposals again provide an opportunity for intervention and support for offenders and appropriate input from the victim of the crime.
The new statutory two-tier framework replaces the current adult out-of-court disposal options. There must be conditions attached to both of the new proposed cautions, fulfilling one of three objectives: rehabilitation, reparation or punishment. These provide an opportunity for intervention and support for offenders. A restorative justice referral could also be an appropriate condition of a caution where the victim and offender agree to this.
I agree with my noble friend Lord Cormack that we should divert people from prison where we can; indeed, that is part of the Sentencing Code. I also agree with the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, that prison and restorative justice are not necessarily—I emphasise “necessarily”—alternatives. I remind the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, that, so far as the sentencing White Paper is concerned, the Bill provides for the greater use of deferred sentencing; this also provides opportunities for restorative justice in the deferred sentencing process.
Over and above that, we are concerned that victims know about restorative justice. Under the victims’ code, they now have the right to be provided with information about restorative justice and how to access restorative justice services in their local area. We continue to provide funding to PCCs to provide support services for victims of crime, which include restorative justice as well.
On 9 December, we launched a consultation, “Delivering Justice for Victims”, the first step towards what we hope will be a landmark victims’ law—a Bill which will build on the foundations of the victims’ code to substantially improve the victim’s experience of the criminal justice system. We propose to place the key principles of the code in primary legislation and are considering the roles and duties of PCCs in relation to victims. However, to repeat a point that I made in Committee—I think that it was also the point that the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, was reaching for—restorative justice is not always appropriate. For some more serious types of offending, it may not be appropriate. The welfare of the victim must always be paramount. I am thinking of some sexual violence and rape cases. We should not have an exhaustive list—even for those cases it is a case-by-case basis—but there will be cases where restorative justice would be unfair on the victim. The victim must always consent but should never feel forced into a process that they are not 100% comfortable with.
The probation service is also working on a new framework for restorative justice, to ensure a more consistent approach, focusing on the people for whom it will make the biggest difference. Having said that, the broad policy aim is that all victims can, if they wish, take part in restorative justice at a time that is right for them. Again, restorative justice does not have to be immediately at the sentencing date. It could be months or even years in the future. It is not a one-time-only option.
It remains the case that we are working very hard in this area. We share the aims and ambitions of the noble Baroness. The evidence base for restorative justice exists. Services are available. Victims should and will be made aware more clearly of their availability. However, requiring rolling action plans will simply create an unnecessary and overly bureaucratic burden. It will cost a lot more without any concrete benefit.
I support restorative justice in principle. I hope that is crystal clear. I cannot promise my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts that we will see restorative justice, or any other form of justice tempered with mercy, from the Australian cricket team, but that lies well outside my capabilities. So far as the amendment is concerned, with a strong endorsement of the principles of restorative justice, I invite the noble Baroness to withdraw it.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, the Minister seemed to suggest that, in any form of restorative justice, a victim might be compelled or forced to engage in the process. I think that is what he said. Can he reassure me that it was not?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
I was saying absolutely the opposite and, if it came out wrong, it came out wrong. The whole point of restorative justice is that the offender and the victim have to consent. That is the point which I was making about crimes of sexual violence. The victim there should not feel under any compulsion or pressure to engage in restorative justice if they do not want to. Victim choice and free-will participation is at the heart of restorative justice. I hope that I have made that very clear.
Baroness Meacher (CB)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for the warm and encouraging words that we were asking for. Unfortunately, they do not give us any reassurance that there will be a restoration of some sort of national leadership on this issue. As I explained in my brief comments, this is what is missing and why restorative justice is languishing. He said that victims should have access to restorative justice, which is very difficult when only 5% of them are aware of being told about it. There is a major issue of lack of information, lack of understanding and lack of national leadership. This was a small suggestion to put these things right and I very much regret that the Government will not take it on. Having said that, of course I will withdraw my amendment.
“Royal Commission on criminal sentencing
(1) Within six months of the passing of this Act, the Secretary of State must establish a Royal Commission to carry out a full review of criminal sentencing.(2) In particular the Commission must make recommendations on—(a) how to reduce the prison population;(b) how to reduce violence and overcrowding in prisons;(c) addressing the particular needs of young people in custody;(d) addressing the particular needs of women in custody;(e) how to ensure that sentencing for offences is focussed upon reform and rehabilitation of offenders and reducing reoffending;(f) how to reduce the over-representation of people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds in prison;(g) the imposition and management of non-custodial sentences; and(h) the abolition of some mandatory or minimum prison sentences.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would establish a Royal Commission to review criminal sentencing.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, this amendment seeks the establishment of a royal commission to carry out a full review of criminal sentencing. The urgent need for such a review arises in particular because this Bill continues and worsens an alarming trend towards sending offenders to prison for ever-longer periods. These Benches have consistently argued that we need to reduce the prison population, not increase it. This country imprisons more people than any other in western Europe, without any evidence that there is more criminality here than elsewhere or that prison works.
As has been said repeatedly in our debates, we have seen our prison estate fall into disgraceful disrepair. Gross overcrowding is standard and, although the Government are committed to providing more new prison places, the increase in prisoner numbers to be expected from longer prison sentences threatens to use up all that extra space. In any case, the new space will not become available for some time. Meanwhile, the overcrowding and squalor get worse.
Understaffing means that prisoners are stuck in their overcrowded cells for very long periods, bored, fractious and angry without relief. Even though recruitment levels aim to increase staffing, it is by nowhere near enough to do more than relieve a little of the pressure, without improving the overall standards of welfare in our prisons. All this breeds violence, of which we have seen appalling levels over recent years. Lack of opportunities for education, work and recreation, attributable at least in part to the lack of staff to deliver them, has made all this worse, so there has been little progress on rehabilitation.
Against this background, the Bill will introduce minimum sentences, longer sentences and later release dates. All this will fuel sentence inflation because, unsurprisingly, sentences will seek to ensure some kind of fairness in comparisons between them across the board, causing them to rise generally. The Bill will have a far more far-reaching effect on sentences than even its draconian provisions suggest. Yet, in our consideration of the Bill to date, we have been unable to deflect the Government from this unswerving and one-sided course. There is little in the Bill about community sentences, rehabilitation, the role of the probation services, or keeping people out of the criminal justice system or altogether out of custody. That is why we need an overall review of sentencing: to consider the topics mentioned in proposed new subsection (2) in the amendment.
So far, I have concentrated on reducing the prison population and reducing violence and overcrowding in prisons, but the other topics crying out for review include: addressing the needs of young people and women in custody; reducing the effect of what is undoubtedly an in-built discrimination against people of minority-ethnic backgrounds within the criminal justice system; keeping people generally out of custody where possible; and refocusing custodial sentences on rehabilitation and reform, not just keeping prisoners locked away from the public to address the perceived threat they present. This is not least because, in fact, the threat they present on release is exacerbated by the appalling conditions in which we incarcerate them. In short, we need to redress the manifest and politically driven imbalance inherent in this legislation.
The Government’s position and their answer to our criticisms were expressed in Committee. I am grateful to the Minister for meeting me last Friday and for his comprehensive email to me last weekend, setting out the Government’s perspective on this and other matters. The Government maintain that their intention in the Bill is to introduce a range of measures aimed at the most serious and dangerous offenders. However, they maintain that this is offset by an intention to focus, at the other end of the spectrum, on community sentencing measures aimed at diverting low-level offenders away from crime, addressing issues of mental health, drug and alcohol abuse, and making more use of electronic monitoring or problem-solving approaches.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
I will speak briefly in support of this amendment. There are five reasons for my support.
First, the debates on this Bill have shown the enormous disparity of views that can be expressed about sentencing. We have ranged from restorative justice, which I warmly support, to long prison sentences. We need to look at it in whole and strategically.
Secondly, the Sentencing Code shows how complicated the system we have devised is. It needs simplification so that people can understand the system better.
Thirdly—and this is a point on which I have found Her Majesty’s Treasury more enlightened than many—are we getting value for money? I doubt whether the present system is delivering value for money.
Fourthly, a royal commission in itself is value for money. It is certainly far better value for money than management consultants, who are often deployed to look at these issues.
Finally, the time is right. I see no reason why we cannot take a comprehensive and strategic view of where we are going. I have expressed no views on what the outcome should be; I am interested solely in the mechanism of getting a strategic approach that simplifies sentencing and delivers value for money.
Lord Beith (LD)
My Lords, I agree with all the arguments my noble friend brought forward for having an overall look at sentencing and how it operates, and how that needs to be done at arm’s length from government. I will simply add two questions to the list he created, which the noble and learned Lord just very helpfully added to.
The first question is: can we find a way in which society can assert its abhorrence at various kinds and levels of criminality that does not automatically increase the amount of time people spend in prison, or the amount of money we as a society spend on prison? Sentences are often used as ways of indicating, quite necessarily, that society will not stand for crimes of various kinds, but simply spending a lot of money keeping someone in prison, feeding them for the next decade or two, is not necessarily a cost-effective way to achieve that.
That leads me to my second point. Prison commands resources. It does so automatically. The impact statement for this Bill indicates that the Government anticipate that 300 more prison places will be required by the measures in the Bill, quite apart from all the other factors, leading us to spend more money on prisons. We have to ask: is that a good use of money for the purpose of preventing further crime?
Very interesting discussions took place in the US, particularly in Texas, in which the lead in changing the approach was taken by some of those on the Republican side, who said, “This is the taxpayer’s dollar, and it’s our responsibility to spend it efficiently and effectively.” In our country, it is our responsibility to spend the taxpayer’s pound efficiently and effectively to achieve the reductions in crime that taxpayers would like to see. Pouring money into more and more prison places is not demonstrably a way of achieving that objective, and we ought at least to look at how it might be done differently.
The Lord Bishop of Gloucester
My Lords, I fully support the amendment. Sometimes I feel a bit as if I am in “Groundhog Day” as we listen to things that are said again and again. When we first discussed the Bill in this House, many people far more learned than me commented on all the issues with the Bill and the fact that so much of it is piecemeal—that we are trying to put sticking plasters over things without looking at the issues holistically and without looking at evidence. So much of it seems to be a reaction—often to populist headlines, let us be honest. There is so much evidence that we are not looking at, and so much of what we are discussing is not backed up by the evidence.
For that reason, I warmly recommend taking a holistic look at what we are doing, why people end up in prison in the first place, what we are doing when we sentence people, what is going on in our prisons and what it means for when people come out through the gate. As has been said, even if people are utterly callous and care only about finance, what we are doing at the moment makes no financial sense whatsoever. I wholeheartedly applaud this amendment.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I also support the amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, has given us an opportunity to make things a lot better. During that quite irritable debate two days ago—I was irritable, anyway, and I think people got irritable with me—on this policing Bill, it struck me that we just should not have as many women in prison. Some of the things that women go to prison for are ridiculous. It costs a lot of money; it disrupts lives, especially for the women, their children and their support networks; and there is an opportunity cost when compared to the opportunities that we should be providing via rehabilitation and reintegration. Women go to prison for things like not paying their TV licence or their council tax, and that really should not happen. It is hugely disruptive, the cost of doing so exceeds the unpaid debt many times over, and lives are ruined.
For the vast majority of women in the criminal justice system, solutions within the community are much more appropriate. Community sentences could be designed to take account of women’s particular vulnerabilities and their domestic and childcare commitments. Existing women’s prisons should be replaced by suitable, geographically-dispersed, small multifunctional custodial centres. More supported accommodation should be provided for women on release in order to break the cycle of offending and custody. Prisoners should have improved access to meaningful activities, particularly real work, education and artistic and creative facilities. And, of course, all prisoners should be able to attain levels of literacy sufficient to allow them to function effectively in modern society.
That all seems so obvious, but it does not happen at the moment because this Government are obsessed with being “tough on crime”. What does that mean? If it means sending more and more people to prison then it is a very disruptive and damaging way of handling the problem of crime. A royal commission seems an incredibly sensible way forward just to rethink the way in which we handle prisons, prisoners, crime and, in particular, women in prison who really ought not to be there.
Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood (CB)
My Lords, I too support this proposal. The objectives set out in each of the paragraphs (a) to (h) of proposed subsection (2) of the amendment are plainly and urgently needed. It should not be necessary to establish a royal commission to focus on, pursue and achieve these objectives, but plainly it is necessary. These deficiencies have been identified, recognised and discussed for years but, as for getting anywhere in terms of achievement—on the contrary.
The main parties on both sides of the House, not least this Government, seem ever more intent on winning the law and order vote. Sentences are being increased; minimum and mandatory terms are being imposed. We now need the impetus, the force, of no less than a royal commission to start to recognise the intense problems of our whole penal system and to start to set the matter right.
Lord Macdonald of River Glaven (CB)
My Lords, I do not regard the United Kingdom’s place at the top of the incarceration league table for western European countries as a badge of honour. It seems to me that this fact in itself calls for a broad strategic view of how sentencing is working in this country and why it is that we send so many more people to prison than other countries do.
One of the issues seems to be that criminal justice, particularly sentencing, has become a political football. A sort of auction has been going on between the main political parties over the last 20 years or so to discover who can present themselves as the toughest on this issue. I do not mean to minimise the effect of crime on victims or on society as a whole, but short sentences in particular are surely counterproductive. The best way to school a young man in crime and anti-social behaviour is to send him to prison for three or six months.
It seems to me that one of the great possible achievements of a royal commission would be to take some of the political sting out of this issue and to inject some rationality and even some science into it. I strongly support the amendment.
Lord Bach (Lab)
My Lords, may I ask the Minister a question? A few years ago, when I was a police and crime commissioner, it came across our desk a lot that it was government policy to have a royal commission on the criminal justice system. What has happened to that proposal? Is it still there? Is it still the Government’s hope to do that? If it was, I would be very much in support of it. If it is not, I very much support the amendment that the noble Lord, Lord Marks, has moved.
Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I have thought long and hard about this amendment, and I am still torn about it. The other evening, in that rather fractious discussion about trans prisoners in women’s prisons, the Minister rather took me up on my quotes from Twitter, as though I was using Twitter as hardcore evidence, which I was not. He made a valuable point, because he said that putting management and protection first was what was done, rather than following public opinion or what was on Twitter or anywhere else. I have some regard for that. In fact, I had made the same point to the Minister in relation to Harper’s law at the beginning of this Report stage, when I said that sentencing should not be a consequence of an outraged public reaction to something, a campaign or what have you. I would rather feel that sentencing was decided in the cold light of day, much more rationally, and so on. I worry about knee-jerk legislation.
I suppose I want to ask a couple of questions, of both the Minister and the mover of the amendment. Sentencing often seems subject to caricature on both sides. People are caricatured as bleeding-heart liberals who want everybody to be let out of prison, and anyone who is concerned about increasing sentencing is caricatured as “lock them up and throw away the key”. It seems to me that there needs to be some relationship between sentencing and the public and their views about it, but we do not want it to be arbitrary and reactive.
So, in that sense, I was very positive about the notion of a royal commission that could look at this in the round, take it away from the political world in some ways and allow, if you want, a more rational and considered public debate, as well as a commission looking at it in detail. That seemed to me to be a way forward.
Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)
I know that some may be shocked. I actually worry a lot about prison reform, authoritarian tendencies and prison being used as an answer to all problems. There are a lot of draconian aspects of the Bill—the threat of jail for protesters, for example, which we are about to discuss—and all these things concern me.
However, I would not want a royal commission to be there to endorse what I or the movers of the amendment want. Therefore, a long list of things that are wrong with long sentences does not seem to be the basis of a royal commission—I would want it to look at sentencing without prejudice and bearing in mind public concerns about safety. It is absolutely the case that, despite my liberal qualms, there are times when people should probably be locked up for longer—but the prisons should then be reformed to make them more humane while you are in them for longer.
Lord Cormack (Con)
Well, my Lords, I had never really thought of the noble Baroness as a bleeding-heart liberal, but we all come in different guises, depending upon the subject. I find myself very taken by many of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, and by many others who have long been learned in the law.
I spoke to my noble friend the Minister after what the noble Baroness referred to as the slightly fractious debate on Monday. Funnily enough, I said to him that I thought that a royal commission would be a good way—better than an amendment to a Bill—to look at the issue that we were discussing: women in prison. Of course, this provision in the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, could be incorporated.
On balance, I would favour a royal commission on the criminal justice system. I do not suppose that the noble Lord would be particularly opposed to that, rather than the specific amendment that he is moving today. But we need to look at these things because—coming back to a point made on Monday and today—we are failing in our criminal justice system because there is far too much recidivism and far too many lives are not amended and rehabilitated but further broken and eroded by spending time in prison. We have not got the balance right.
I have always been opposed to the simplistic view sometimes expressed, not by bleeding-heart liberals like the noble Baroness but by some on my own side: “Lock them up and keep them in.” That is no way to tackle things. So, although I would understand if, in responding to this debate, my noble friend the Minister said that he could not accept this amendment, I nevertheless strongly appeal to him on the Floor of the House, as I have privately, to consider very carefully the merits of a royal commission on the criminal justice system.
It can do no harm. We all remember Harold Wilson on royal commissions—they sit for years and take minutes—but that is not necessarily what royal commissions do. They can be given a timeframe or asked to report back within a certain period. If, by chance, my noble friend is not able to give the positive response I hope he might, we have many in your Lordships’ House who are indeed learned in the law, and this might be an ideal subject for one of the special committees that we set up each year in your Lordships’ House. It would have perhaps the most distinguished membership of any such committee ever established and I am sure it could make a powerful report, but I would still favour the royal commission approach. I hope that when my noble friend comes to respond, he will be able to give us some encouragement.
Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)
Before we hear from the Minister and the noble Lord for the Opposition, I shall simply add that of course the aims identified in this amendment are probably shared by everybody in your Lordships’ House but, ultimately, is it not for the Government of the day to decide on these things? I think we can probably predict what most royal commissions would recommend following the terms of reference reflecting this amendment. Ultimately, a Government have to decide whether in certain circumstances, as was the case in the Bill, there need to be mandatory sentences or the prison estate needs more money spent on it. These are matters for government. I will be interested to hear what the noble Lord for the Opposition says about this; during the course of the Bill, I do not think the Labour Party has opposed the increased mandatory sentences in various areas. That is a position it is entitled to take. A royal commission can recommend; a Government have to decide.
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, we support this amendment and every element of what the noble Lord, Lord Marks, said when he was introducing it. It is about criminal sentencing. My noble friend Lord Bach raised the question of a royal commission on the criminal justice system as a whole, and I will be interested to hear the Minister’s response on that.
The noble Lord, Lord Faulks, correctly identified that in this Bill the Opposition have supported some measures that have led to increased sentences. In a sense, the heart of the problem is that the constant inflation of sentences is leading to the overarching problem we have now with overcrowding and squalor in our prisons and a lack of effectiveness in our out-of-court sentences. I understood that to be the main purpose of the royal commission.
I want to give a very simple example of my role as a magistrate sentencing, as I was yesterday, in a magistrates’ court in London. As a magistrate, I have powers to sentence up to six months’ custody for a single offence. When, on occasion, I do that, I simply do not know how long that person will spend in custody. When I first became a magistrate about 14 years ago, I used to say to the offender, “You will spend half your time in custody and then, at the discretion of the prison governor, you will get out”. I do not say that any more because I do not know whether it is true. Sometimes the offender will get out after one-quarter of their sentence, if there are particular reasons and it is a non-violent offence, and sometimes, if they commit relatively less serious offences while they are in prison, they may serve their whole term, so I simply do not say that any more when I am sentencing.
That is a very particular example; there are many examples within sentencing as a whole where any sentencer, including a magistrate, is asked to use fairly obscure phrases which are not simple to understand for the person being sentenced. There is a role for an overall look at this to try to have consistency in sentencing and the words used while sentencing. The noble Lord’s amendment goes further than that as it is looking at community sentences as well. There really is a strong need for an overarching view of criminal sentencing.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, this amendment, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, would require the Secretary of State to establish a royal commission to review and report on criminal sentencing. The amendment was tabled in Committee and I am glad to have the opportunity to further clarify the Government’s position on this matter.
First, let me pick up the direct question put to me by the noble Lord, Lord Bach, which I think was echoed by my noble friend Lord Cormack and mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede. The 2019 Conservative manifesto did commit, as noted in Committee, to set up a royal commission on the criminal justice system. Work to set up that royal commission was slowed at the onset of the pandemic to focus on the very practical matter of ensuring that the criminal justice system could continue to operate—as it did, thanks to a lot of hard work by staff up and down the country—in a Covid-safe environment. As work on the commission was paused, officials were redeployed to other work and other roles in government.
Significant new programmes of work have now been stood up to support recovery and build back a better criminal justice system. That means that many of the areas the royal commission was due to look at are now being progressed more quickly, for example on efficiency and effectiveness of the system. That includes ensuring that all component parts of the extremely complex system—which we call the criminal justice system but is an amalgam of all sorts of systems—work together to deliver swifter justice for victims. As I said on the last group, on 9 December we announced our consultation on a new victims’ Bill to improve the level of service victims can expect from the criminal justice system. We remain committed to delivering our manifesto commitments. However, we think it is right to continue to pause the work on the royal commission on the criminal justice system while we focus on delivering these priorities over the coming months. We will then revisit what further role there is for the royal commission.
At the same time, let me clarify a point of confusion, which may have been behind the noble Lord’s question— I do not know. To be very clear, the amendment, as drafted, calls for a royal commission on criminal sentencing, not a royal commission on the criminal justice system. For the record and to make it very clear, when my noble and learned friend Lord Stewart of Dirleton previously responded and assured the Committee that a royal commission of this nature was unnecessary, it was the royal commission on criminal sentencing in the amendment that he was referring to. I see the noble Lord nodding and I am grateful; I did not want there to be any confusion on the point.
The sentencing White Paper published last year set out the Government’s proposals for reform to the sentencing and release framework. Work is under way on the non-legislative commitments made there; the legislative measures are being delivered by the Bill. I can assure the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, that we want to adopt a strategic approach here. We believe that the White Paper delivers that, but I am sure that the conversations on these points will continue. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Beith, that the taxpayer’s pound is an important factor here. We want value for money in this and other areas of government. The rationale of the White Paper is to deliver a smarter, more targeted approach to sentencing. The most serious violent and sexual offenders should serve sentences that reflect the severity of their offending behaviour.
I say to the House in general, responding in particular to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, that it is crucial that the Government listen when there are issues on which the public feels strongly, and there are some offences that society finds particularly concerning and, indeed, offensive. At the same time, for lower-level crimes, we are making community sentences more effective, so they can offer an appropriate level of punishment and address the underlying drivers of offending. As part of that—to pick up the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb—we do of course look at the particular issues facing women in prison. We have discussed that on a number of occasions, and I intend no discourtesy by not repeating now what I have said before. We have spoken, and we have focused as a Government, on the needs of women in prison and sentencing women to prison, particularly the primary carers issue, which we have discussed and debated.
Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)
My Lords, I have listened to the debate this afternoon with great pleasure, and I must say with growing agreement with what was said—until I heard the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, who said that sentencing should be a matter for the Government of the day. That is a very dangerous approach, because it means that sentencing becomes a reflection of the political pressures on the Government of the day. Somebody used the term “auction”. You would get competition between people who were seeking votes from the public in projecting themselves as being tough on crime, and the resulting sentencing guidelines—
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I am sorry, but the Minister had already sat down. We can only take a question if it is very short.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, in those circumstances I think that it is for me to respond. I do not know whether the Minister wishes to respond to any question—although there has not really been a question.
Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I believe this is in order, because I did not suggest for a moment that it was for the Government to send people to prison or to make up their mind. Ultimately, the policy that is reflected in this amendment is something that a Government would have to decide upon.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, at the end of this interesting debate, I say first that I am very grateful to all who have spoken and to the noble Lord the Minister for his careful response. Two things strike me: first, this amendment enjoys overwhelming support and, secondly, there has been a distinct theme to the contributions to the debate from noble Lords from all around the House, expressed perhaps by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, when he talked about a comprehensive and strategic approach. Others have talked about a holistic approach.
The aim has been to address the failures of the criminal sentencing system, as part of the criminal justice system, identified by, among others, the noble Lords, Lord Cormack and Lord Ponsonby. It is a rethink that is required—to use the expression of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones. Another important matter was identified by two dissimilar figures in general approach. The noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of River Glaven, talked about taking the political sting out of issues arising on sentencing. This was put in a similar way by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley. I share the slight surprise of the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, at being told that she was a bleeding-heart liberal, but I take the point.
I do not intend the royal commission that we have described in this amendment to prejudge the issues. What we are calling for overwhelmingly is an evidence-based approach to sentencing, rather than a politically based approach or one that simply responds to public opinion or the perception of public opinion. I completely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, that the question is not one where the Government are excluded from making decisions. The point about the royal commission is, as he put it, that the royal commission recommends and the Government then act on those recommendations. What distinguishes a royal commission, I suggest, is that its recommendations are widely seen by the public, the Government and the Opposition as authoritative. It is that quality of being authoritative that I believe gives the royal commission its weight.
It is a question not of outsourcing the decision-making process but of setting up a process to advise and direct the future. This Bill does none of that. It contains sentencing in its Short Title, yet it is piecemeal and bitty and lacks a philosophy. The Minister set out a philosophy that is two-sided, but only one of those sides is reflected in the Bill. We believe that a royal commission would address that, which is why I would like to see this amendment agreed. That said, however, what the noble Lord has said about the Royal Commission on Criminal Justice as a whole is of some encouragement, because I take criminal justice to include criminal sentencing. I hope I see him nod in agreement with that. I am waiting—he is not going to commit to the terms of reference, but it seems to me that that offers some hope for the future.
I am concerned about the use of the word “paused”. It should not be paused; it is urgent. If the Government take anything from this debate, I hope they will take the feeling around the House that this is an urgent matter requiring urgent attention and will revisit it. That said, and in the confidence that they will approach it in that way and that the royal commission will proceed, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Rosser
“Child criminal exploitation
In section 3 of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 (meaning of exploitation), at the end insert—“Child criminal exploitation(7) Another person manipulates, deceives, coerces or controls the person to undertake activity which constitutes a criminal offence and the person is under the age of 18.””Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause would introduce a statutory definition of child criminal exploitation.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
My Lords, a similar amendment was debated in Committee as part of a series of amendments relating to ensuring that safeguarding and tackling the criminal exploitation of children are a central part of the duty to reduce serious violence as set out in Part 2, with its duties on specified authorities to collaborate and plan to prevent and reduce serious violence. Children who are groomed and exploited by criminal gangs are the victims and not the criminals. A statutory duty to reduce violence cannot be effective on its own without a statutory duty to safeguard children. This amendment would provide a statutory definition of child criminal exploitation, putting a recognised definition in law for the first time.
The present lack of a single clear statutory definition has contributed to local authorities responding differently to this form of exploitation across the country. The Children’s Society says that just one-third of local authorities have a policy in place for responding to it, yet child criminal exploitation does not stop at local authority boundaries and requires a shared understanding and approach nationally. Barnardo’s has said that it has found that agencies, including police forces, do not routinely collect or record information on this type of exploitation. It reports that a number of reviews have found that children at risk are passed between agencies without meaningful engagement. Indeed, many children are not seen as victims of exploitation and abuse but instead receive punitive criminal justice responses.
A statutory definition, as we now have for domestic abuse, would improve awareness and understanding of child exploitation and its signs, and encourage joined-up working not only across the justice system but across all partners included in the serious violence reduction duty. It would give a common definition of what we are seeking to tackle in response to the abhorrent coercion and manipulation of children and vulnerable young people. This is not a minor issue. More than 25,000 children in the United Kingdom are presently at risk of gang exploitation, according to the Children’s Commissioner.
The response of the Government in Committee to establishing a statutory definition of child criminal exploitation was that they had considered it with a range of operational partners and had concluded that the definitions of exploitation within the Modern Slavery Act were sufficient to respond to a range of child criminal exploitation scenarios. However, the operational partners with whom presumably the Government considered a statutory definition will include the local authorities which according to the Children’s Society do not have a policy in place for responding to child criminal exploitation, the police forces and other agencies which Barnardo’s found are not routinely collecting or recording information on this type of exploitation, and the agencies which pass children at risk between each other without meaningful engagement. The evidence indicates that there is no consistency of approach across the agencies on child criminal exploitation, so it is clear that the existing definitions on which the Government relied when rejecting this amendment in Committee are not assisting in the way they should in responding to abhorrent child criminal exploitation scenarios.
I hope that the Government will be prepared to reflect further on this issue of a much-needed definition of child criminal exploitation as provided for in this amendment, which I move.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
I would be remiss if I did not point out to the Benches opposite that this is an issue that I have talked about quite a lot, in the context not of county lines and gangs but of the Met Police. I did not even realise that there was not a statutory definition, so I welcome this amendment. The definition talks about another person who manipulates and so on, and, of course, the Met Police manipulates children. We are assured constantly that it is a very small number, but it happens and does so apparently lawfully because the Government have not stopped it, so the Government are complicit in a crime.
The Lord Bishop of Gloucester
My Lords, I speak in place of my right reverend friend the Bishop of Derby, who sadly cannot be here today. She and I support this amendment, to which she has added her name. I declare her interest as vice-chair of the Children’s Society. These are her words.
In Committee, my right reverend friend the Bishop of Durham spoke in the place of my right reverend friend the Bishop of Manchester. I will not repeat all that was said, but I will reiterate a few fundamental points as we consider this amendment. As a Church living and working in every corner of this nation, we support families and children, often in the most vulnerable of contexts. We have seen the devastating consequences when children are coerced and exploited, including through serious violence. Those consequences have ripple effects through not only the life of that child but the wider community. Visiting young offender institutions, I am struck by how many of these children and young people are victims first. Their stories could have been very different if intervention had occurred earlier. They have been groomed and coerced in the same way as children groomed for sexual exploitation; as such, they should be treated as victims. They need support rather than the further trauma of being charged and prosecuted.
I share with noble Lords the story of a young person supported by the Children’s Society which illustrates how many victims of child criminal exploitation are not recognised as such. Bobby—not his real name—aged 15, was picked up with class A drugs in a trap-house raid by the police. Bobby had been groomed, exploited and trafficked across the country to sell drugs. After his arrest, he was driven back to his home by police officers, who had questioned him alone in the car and used that information to submit a referral through the national referral mechanism, which did not highlight Bobby’s vulnerability—instead, it read like a crime report. Bobby had subsequently been to court in Wales and, because his referral to the NRM failed and his barrister did not understand the process, he was advised to plead guilty, which he did.
At this time, he was referred to the Children’s Society’s “Disrupting Exploitation” programme. With its help, Bobby challenged the NRM decision and worked to ensure that he was recognised as a victim instead of an offender, enabling him to retract his plea of guilty. The Children’s Society was able to work with Bobby, his family and the professionals around him to ensure that they recognised the signs of exploitation and how it can manifest.
But for many young people who are criminally exploited, that is not the case. Many will be prosecuted and convicted as offenders, while those who groomed and exploited them walk free. Agencies that come into contact with these children are not working to the same statutory definition of what constitutes child criminal exploitation.
What this amendment hopes to achieve is for statutory services to recognise that these children have not made a choice to get involved in criminal activity. I whole- heartedly agree that local multiagency safeguarding arrangements are key to responding to child exploitation. However, we need a clear, national definition and understanding of the types of child exploitation that they must safeguard against. Front-line agencies all agree: there is no evidence that the system as it stands is working consistently to protect these children from exploitation.
We are committed to the flourishing of all people. That includes children and young people from the most marginalised and disadvantaged circumstances—those for whom real choice is out of their grasp. We must do all within our power to give hope to victims and dare to dream of a different future for these children.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, in Committee I recalled my own experience of visiting the only young offender institution in Scotland, where the governor told us that every young person in her institution had suffered multiple adverse childhood experiences, or ACEs. These are potentially traumatic events that occur in childhood and include experiencing violence, abuse or neglect, particularly head trauma; witnessing violence in the home or community, something that is becoming all too common; and having a family member attempt or die by suicide. Also included are aspects of the child’s environment that can undermine their sense of safety, stability and bonding, such as growing up in a household with substance use problems, mental health problems or instability due to parental separation or household members being in prison.
ACEs also make children particularly vulnerable to criminal exploitation and it is important that this is recognised in statute to ensure that a trauma-informed approach is taken to child victims of criminal exploitation, rather than a criminalising, punitive approach. This amendment provides that statutory definition and we strongly support it.
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, for setting out the case for the amendment and to all noble Lords who took part in this short debate. I wholly agree that the targeting, grooming and exploitation of children who are often the most vulnerable in our society for criminal purposes is deplorable. This Government are committed to tackling it.
Before I start, I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, that the Government are not complicit in crime. I remember CHIS being debated quite extensively in your Lordships’ House. They are subject to significant and stringent safeguards, so I think that we can leave that there.
This amendment seeks to establish a statutory definition of child criminal exploitation. As I indicated in Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Field of Birkenhead, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and Maria Miller MP undertook an independent review into the Modern Slavery Act 2015, the findings of which were published in May 2019. The definition of exploitation in Section 3 of the Act was explored as part of this review in response to calls that it should be amended to explicitly reflect new and emerging forms of exploitation, such as county lines.
The review heard evidence from the CPS, which warned against expanding the scope of the meaning of exploitation or defining exploitation so precisely that it would lack flexibility when applying the legislation to a changing profile of criminal conduct. The authors of the review agreed and recommended that the definition should not be amended, as it is sufficiently flexible to cover a range of circumstances, including new and emerging forms of modern slavery.
We agree that front-line practitioners need to have a clear understanding of child exploitation; the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, made these points very well. That is why child exploitation is already defined in statutory guidance, including the Keeping Children Safe in Education and Working Together to Safeguard Children statutory guidance. It is also set out in non-statutory practice documents for those working with young people, such as the Home Office Child Exploitation Disruption Toolkit and the county lines guidance.
We recognise that the vast majority of child criminal exploitation cases occur in the context of county lines. That is why the Home Office is providing up to £1 million this financial year to the St Giles Trust to provide specialist support for under-25s and their families who are affected by county lines exploitation. The project is operating in London, the West Midlands and Merseyside, which are the three largest exporting county lines areas. We also continue to fund the Missing People’s SafeCall service. This is a national confidential helpline service for young people, families and carers who are experiencing county lines exploitation.
I listened carefully to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Gloucester, who made some powerful points. She mentioned the Children’s Society. I should point out that the Home Office is funding the Children’s Society’s prevention programme, which works to tackle and prevent child criminal exploitation, child sexual abuse and exploitation, modern-day slavery and human trafficking on a regional and national basis. This has included a public awareness campaign called “Look Closer”, which started in September. It focuses on increasing awareness of the signs and indicators of child exploitation and encourages the public and service, retail and transport sector workers to report concerns to the police quickly.
Back to county lines and drugs. They devastate lives, ruin families and damage communities. That is why this Government have recently introduced a 10-year strategy to combat illicit drugs using a whole-system approach to cut off the supply of drugs by criminal gangs and give people with a drug addiction a route to a productive and drug-free life. Through the strategy, we will bolster our flagship county lines programme, investing up to £145 million to tackle the most violent and exploitative distribution model yet seen.
Clearly, we are all in agreement that tackling child criminal exploitation must be a priority. I have set out some of the steps that the Government are taking to do just that. However, the Government remain unpersuaded that defining child criminal exploitation in statute would aid understanding of the issue or help such exploitation. As I have indicated, we should pay heed to the conclusions of the independent review of the Modern Slavery Act, which commended the flexibility afforded by the current definition of exploitation. For these reasons, I ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
First, I thank the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Derby and the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, for adding their names to this amendment. Indeed, I thank all noble Lords who spoke in this debate.
Basically, the Government have repeated what they said in Committee. There is nothing new and no response to the point that a statutory duty to reduce violence cannot be effective without a statutory duty to safeguard children, which is what this amendment would provide by putting a recognised definition in law for the first time. There has not really been a response to that.
I made the point that the evidence indicates that there is no consistency of approach across the agencies on child criminal exploitation. Clearly, the definitions on which the Government relied in Committee, which they have now repeated on Report, are not assisting in the way that they should in responding to child criminal exploitation scenarios. It is a bit depressing to find no movement at all on the Government’s stance and, if I may say so, no attempt to respond to my point that, bearing in mind the inconsistencies, the existing definitions are clearly not doing the job that the Government claim they should be doing and, indeed, claim they are doing. That clearly is not the case.
I do not intend to test the opinion of the House on this. I say only that the issue is not going to going away. If we continue, as I suspect we will, with the inconsistencies of approach that have been identified by Barnardo’s and the Children’s Society and referred to during this debate—that is, if the Government do not address them, which is what this amendment in effect invites them to do—this matter will not go away. I am quite sure that it will be the subject of further discussion and debate if the present highly unsatisfactory situation continues in respect of child criminal exploitation. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“Video recorded cross-examination or re-examination of complainants in respect of sexual offences and modern slavery offences
(1) Section 28 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 comes into force in relation to proceedings to which subsection (2) applies on the day on which this Act is passed.(2) This subsection applies where a witness is eligible for assistance by virtue of section 17(4) of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 (complainants in respect of a sexual offence or modern slavery offence who are witnesses in proceedings relating to that offence, or that offence and any other offences).(3) This section has effect notwithstanding section 68(3) of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999.”
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, the proposed new clause in Amendment 104B would bring Section 28 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999, which provides for the cross-examination of vulnerable witnesses to be recorded rather than undertaken in court, fully into force for victims of sexual offences and modern slavery offences. When we debated this in Committee, the point was made that there have been a number of pilots of this approach in, I believe, three Crown Courts in England and Wales. A further point was made in the response by the noble and learned Lord, the Advocate-General for Scotland, that it would be judge-intensive to have judges present when recording the evidence. For those reasons, we were invited to reject the amendment.
In response to those points, I ask the Minister when the results of the pilot will come forward, so we can have an informed decision about whether to roll out this approach. I also question the assertion that this is a very judge-intensive process because judges have to be present when the recordings are made. I made this point to the Minister when we met in private a few days ago. I have done this procedure several times within youth court and, as far as I am aware, there was never a judge or magistrate present then. I have also done this process in Crown Court and for an appeal. On that instance, I was sitting as a winger and there was a Crown Court judge in the middle. We heard the evidence by videolink and, again, as far as I was aware, there was no judge present. So I question the assertion that it would be very judge-intensive to use this approach in the adult court for victims of sexual offences and modern slavery offences.
The proposed new clause in Amendment 104C would give the complainant a right of representation with legal aid, if they are financially eligible, to oppose any application to admit Section 41 material about them. It would also give complainants the right to appeal to the Court of Appeal if the application is allowed, in whole or in part. The proposed new clause also provides that the complainant is not compellable as a witness at the application. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, for putting her name to this amendment.
This issue was again explored at some length in Committee. My noble and learned friend Lord Falconer made the point that it is very sensitive. If there is the possibility of somebody’s sexual history becoming known in a wider context within court, it acts as a cooling method for people making allegations. This is a way around that problem to try to give people the confidence to come forward and make complaints of sexual assaults.
Amendment 107C is in the name of my noble friend Lord Coaker. It would require police forces to have a specialist rape and serious sexual offences, or RASSO, unit. As background, I have three facts to share with the House. First, two-fifths of police forces currently do not have one of these units, which specialise in the prosecution of rape and serious sexual offences and supporting victims of these offences. Secondly, the current prosecution rate for reported rapes is about 1.4%. No matter how many times we hear this statistic, it remains deeply shocking. Finally, Home Office figures show that the number of victims dropping out of prosecutions has increased to a record 41%. In each of these cases, we are failing to deliver justice for a victim and to tackle a dangerous predator.
MPs and noble Lords from across this House have worked, with limited success, to make tackling violence against women and girls a part of this Bill, including explicitly recognising violence against women and girls as serious violence under the serious violence reduction duty. We are in a situation where this Government may pass a flagship piece of criminal justice legislation without including any specific plans to improve the investigation and prosecution of rape and serious assaults. This issue needs to be taken forward in partnership with the police and finally recognised as a priority. I look forward to what I hope will be a positive response from the Minister and beg to move.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
I reassure noble Lords that I will not be speaking on every amendment today, but I regret that all those that we have discussed so far, including this one, will not go to a vote. That is a real shame, because they are so sensible.
I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, on tabling the amendment to which I have put my name. I support all the amendments in this group, not just Amendment 104C. The criminal justice system is hugely distrusted by survivors of sexual violence, based on the way they are treated when they come forward to make a complaint. There have been some important steps forward over the years, but trust is still far lower than it needs to be for survivors to come forward, go through the whole criminal justice system and have their lives pored over. Granting the right to complainants to be represented by a lawyer in an appeal to adduce evidence on questions of sexual conduct would be an important leap forward. The complainant is seen as a neutral third party with no particular legal rights, rather than someone deserving legal protection and representation, and this really has to change.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, my noble friend Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames is leading for us on this group, but I want to speak on Amendment 107C. I was commissioned by the then Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, now the noble Lord, Lord Blair of Boughton, to conduct a review of rape investigation in the Metropolitan Police, working together with Professor Betsy Stanko OBE.
At that time, the Metropolitan Police had specialist rape investigation units. Their performance was mixed, but they were considerably better than the experiment in community policing that was being conducted in one part of London. Small teams of detectives were allocated to each part of the borough to investigate all crime there, including rape and serious sexual offences. In addition to being overwhelmed by large numbers of more minor criminal investigations, they lacked the experience and expertise of officers who specialise in rape and other sexual offences.
I know from practical experience on the ground within the police service that specialist rape and serious sexual offences units provide much better outcomes for the victims and survivors of these types of crime. I doubt that legislation such as this amendment can override the operational independence of chief constables, but the principle is right and the Home Secretary, the College of Policing Limited—we will come to that in an upcoming group—HMICFRS and police and crime commissioners should all exert pressure on chief constables to ensure that they are established.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, we support all the amendments in this group. First, I will consider Amendment 104B. As explained by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, this amendment would authorise a special measures direction to enable videorecording of cross-examination of complainants in criminal proceedings for sexual offences or modern slavery offences, in order to enable their evidence to be given remotely.
This is a sensible measure for the protection of witnesses not only from alleged perpetrators but from the trauma of giving evidence in these difficult and painful cases. We have heard many times in debates on this Bill and on the Domestic Abuse Act how painful an ordeal giving evidence is likely to be. In the absence of a special measures direction, complainants who are witnesses have to give evidence before strangers, often in the presence of their assailants or exploiters and often under hostile questioning, to relive some of the most painful experiences of their lives. Nor should we forget how, in these cases, recording the evidence of complainants might well be the very best way of securing truthful and accurate evidence so that courts might be better placed to do justice than if they had to rely on the live oral evidence of very frightened and intimidated witnesses.
We also support Amendment 104C in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, because we have heard that Section 41 applications, if granted, permit the most intrusive and personal questioning of complainants about their previous sexual history. Such questioning might sometimes legitimately be regarded by a court as necessary in the interests of justice, but even when that is the case it nevertheless involves a gross invasion of the privacy, the sense of decency and the perceived rights of the complainant. The noble Lord and the noble Baroness are entirely right to seek the protections for the complainant that the amendment involves: the right to take part in the application or not at her choice, because it is generally a woman’s choice; to be legally represented; and to have a right of appeal against a direction admitting questioning or evidence of previous sexual conduct.
These Section 41 applications and the fear of the questioning they involve have been a reason for the large numbers of sexual offences going unreported or unprosecuted, as complainants are not prepared to go through the hell of facing such cross-examination and they pull out of cases for fear of it. They should be entitled to significant legal protection, just as if they were parties, when such an important issue for their personal integrity is considered by the courts. The protections proposed in the amendment are fully justified.
Finally, we support Amendment 107C on rape and serious sexual offences units—the so-called RASSO units—for the reasons given by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and by my noble friend Lord Paddick. I will try not to repeat the points he made.
Historically, there has been a problem, which we should not seek to deny, in ensuring that police forces treat rape and serious sexual assault with the importance these offences merit. It might be that the situation has improved, and I have no doubt it has. In most forces, victims are treated sympathetically, with tact and care, and derive support from the officers handling their case. However, the public, and women in particular, still lack confidence in the treatment they are likely to and do receive from the police if they are victims of sexual assault. This is one of the factors again driving the low rate of reporting and prosecutions, and the high rate of the withdrawal of complaints. The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, gave us the figures, with which we have become familiar.
Specialist units are likely to concentrate expertise and experience of dealing with rape and serious sexual offences in the hands of those who really know about them. This amendment concentrates on the specialist training of the staff in such units. That is critical. Such units have the potential to improve the evidence-gathering process and ultimately, one would hope, the reporting and the prosecutions of offences and the conviction rates, which, as we know, are appallingly low.
All the amendments in this group identify serious issues and propose practical, worthwhile and achievable solutions. In respect of each of them, I suggest it would be helpful for the Government simply to accept them or to come back with alternatives to similar effect at Third Reading.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I recognise that behind all these amendments is a dedication to improving the way in which the criminal justice system handles sexual offences cases and supports victims. On both those points, that dedication is shared by the Government. It is absolutely right that we do as much as we can to support all victims, including those of sexual offences, and help bring to justice those guilty of those very serious crimes. I know that there is no disagreement between us on the need to continue to improve the victims’ experience of the criminal justice system, and of the important role that special measures, such as Section 28, can play in supporting victims and witnesses to provide their best evidence.
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his assurances, and I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
“Offence of destroying or damaging life-saving equipment
(1) The Criminal Damage Act 1971 is amended as follows. (2) In section 1(2), at the end of paragraph (b), insert “or(c) intending to destroy or damage any property which is considered life-saving equipment, including life-belts, life jackets and defibrillators.””
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
My Lords, I rise to move the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Ponsonby on life-saving equipment. It deals with a specific issue in relation to criminal damage: the effect of vandalism on safety equipment.
Noble Lords who were present in Committee will have heard my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton speak about the death a young man from Rotherham, Sam Haycock. His parents, Simon and Gaynor Haycock, went to see their MP, Sarah Champion, who moved an amendment in the other place. Sam went swimming in Ulley reservoir in Rotherham in May 2021. He was leaving school that day and was just 16 years old. He was helping a friend who was in trouble in the water. At this reservoir in Rotherham—I believe that this is not unique to it—there was a throw line with a lifebelt attached to it that you can throw into the water to help someone in trouble. The problem was that it was kept in a locked cupboard and, to access it, you need to phone 999 and get a PIN from the police. Obviously, this takes time, and when someone is in distress in the water, you do not have time. The delay in getting the throw line might well, and in this case did, have tragic consequences. It is behind a locked door with a PIN to prevent vandalism of the safety equipment.
In regional media, I have found several similar instances where life-saving equipment has been vandalised. One was at Salford Quays. Manchester Council felt it lacked the ability to prevent and deal with this, so it has taken to using public space protection orders to try to deal with the issue. There was also a case in Uckfield in Sussex where a defibrillator was rendered unusable by vandals. These acts clearly cause costly damage but, most importantly, they also pose a very clear risk to life and can be shown to have cost lives in some instances.
The amendment is very straightforward: it proposes that it is made a specific offence to intend
“to destroy or damage any property which is considered life-saving equipment, including life-belts, life jackets and defibrillators.”
In terms of criminal damage, the value of what is damaged may be relatively minimal in the case of a lifebelt and a throw line, compared to other criminal damage offences. As my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer said in Committee, it would already be an offence to vandalise such equipment, but it matters a great deal that the law should indicate that this is something regarded with particular hostility because of the cost to life, including that of Simon and Gaynor’s precious son, Sam.
Earl Attlee (Con)
My Lords, I rise briefly to support the noble Baroness in moving her amendment. This might not be something that we want to send back to the Commons today, but I hope that my noble friend the Minister will tell us what he will do about this problem, because of the effects so ably described by the noble Baroness.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
I promise that this is the last time that I will speak—this evening; there will be other times. I rise to support this amendment, obviously, and also to troll the Government. Amendment 104D, which they obviously do not support, shows the huge inconsistency that the new statues statute will create. If the Government do not accept this amendment, it is hard to justify the whole plan to bring in a severe criminal penalty for toppling the statue of a slaver. To penalise that but not the destroying of life-saving equipment seems to me very strange, so I would like the Minister to explain that discrepancy to me.
It just shows me that the Government are still in the coloniser mindset. Between 2 million and 4 million enslaved African people died being shipped to America, with no criminal punishment to the slavers. It was just money—they had lots of money—and that is why the Colston statue was standing where it was standing. Somehow, toppling the statue of a slaver is what gets the harsher penalty. The Minister has got to make that make sense.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, the effect of Amendment 104D would be to increase the maximum sentence for criminal damage with intent to destroy life-saving equipment from 10 years’ imprisonment to life imprisonment. I listened very carefully to the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman of Darlington, and her harrowing accounts of the vandalising of life-saving equipment and the damage and consequences of that. I also listened to the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and it is very clearly necessary that the Government make it clear how they will respond to the issue of vandalising life-saving equipment.
The behaviour comprising the offence is extremely serious because it carries the risk that life will be endangered by the damage caused. However, if I may adopt a slightly lawyerly approach to the amendment, I question whether it is necessary. The scheme of the Criminal Damage Act, as amended, is that under Section 4 an offence of criminal damage generally carries a maximum sentence of 10 years. However, Section 1(2)(b) of that legislation states that where the offence is arson or, as stated, is committed by a person
“intending by the destruction or damage to endanger the life of another or being reckless as to whether the life of another would be thereby endangered”,
the maximum sentence is increased to life imprisonment. That is the combined effect of that subsection and subsection (4).
I understand that the intention of the noble Baroness in moving the amendment on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, would be to cover criminal damage to life-saving equipment with the intention of endangering life. However, given that by Section 1(2)(b) the offence is committed where a person commits criminal damage recklessly as well as intentionally in relation to endangering life—which means where the offender deliberately takes a risk that the damage he causes may endanger the life of another—I cannot at the moment see that such behaviour does not cover intentionally destroying or damaging life-saving equipment without lawful excuse. Nor can I at the moment see how, in the absence of such an intention or recklessness as to life being endangered, a maximum sentence in excess of 10 years would be justified on normal principles.
Consequently, I await hearing from the Minister with interest. He may or may not accept the slightly lawyerly approach that I put, but I hope that he will give some reassurance about how the Government propose to respond to the problem of vandalising life-saving equipment.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, this amendment was debated just a few weeks ago when the Government set out why we believed it was unnecessary, given the scope of the Criminal Damage Act 1971. I will come back in a moment to what the noble Lord, Lord Marks, called a lawyerly point.
However, it is right first to remind ourselves, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman, did, of the very real consequences of this sort of behaviour. On the death of Sam Haycock in Ulley reservoir, can one begin to imagine what his parents Simon and Gaynor went through and are, no doubt, continuing to go through? One only has to say it to try to grasp to enormity of that. The noble Lord, Lord Marks, used the word “harrowing”. That is spot on. This relates to the appalling behaviour of the people vandalise equipment, which results in the requirement of having to make a telephone call to get hold of a life ring, defibrillator or whatever life-saving equipment it happens to be.
I turn to the legal position, as I am afraid we have to, given that we are considering an amendment to a Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Marks, is correct. I explained that it is already an offence intentionally or recklessly to damage or destroy property, including life-saving equipment. Section 1(2) of the Criminal Damage Act 1971 makes a specific provision for an aggravated offence of criminal damage where the defendant intends to endanger life or is reckless about such endangerment. To that extent, it goes beyond the scope of the amendment, which relates only to intention and does not include recklessness. As the noble Lord said, that offence already attracts the possibility of life imprisonment.
Of course, I understand that part of the reason why it is proposed to add a specific offence is to put beyond doubt that the law will punish those who damage and destroy vital life-saving equipment, whether they intend to do so or are reckless as to the risk. The concern was raised in Committee that it is not well known that causing damage to life-saving equipment means that Section 1(2) of the Criminal Damage Act 1971 could be in play and therefore carry a potential life sentence. However, if the concern is that that is not well known, I would question whether it would make a real difference if this Bill were amended essentially to repeat that point of law. The ordinary citizen, particularly the people who carry out this appalling behaviour, is still as unlikely to understand or perhaps care about the consequences and penalties associated with the crime. Therefore, I suggest that the ultimate problem here is not a question of a gap in legislation or a lacuna in the criminal law but people knowing what the law is and bringing home to people the likely criminal consequences of their actions.
In response to my noble friend Lord Attlee, as I suggested in Committee, if the law is not enough of a deterrent, we must focus on those responsible for water safety, health and safety, and law enforcement to come together to find out what is not working and identify workable solutions that might include sign- posting more clearly on the equipment the consequences of damaging that equipment. That might be a way forward. However, I share with the noble Baroness, Lady Chapmen, that these are abhorrent acts of criminal damage that should be prosecuted. The sentence must fit the crime. There is a potential maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, put the question: why are the Government making destroying statues a criminal offence if destroying life-saving equipment is not a criminal offence? The problem with that question is that destroying life-saving equipment is a criminal offence. So far as statues are concerned, the next instalment is due on Monday, so I will leave the matter for then.
However, so far as today is concerned, while sharing very much the sympathies behind the amendment, I invite the noble Baroness to withdraw it.
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
I am grateful to the Minister for what he had to say and I do understand that creating a new offence or separate provision may not have the desired effect of reducing these horrendous instances. It is right that we want to stop that happening and I welcome his comments about working together, perhaps with local authorities and police forces, to do more creative things to try to prevent this. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“Offence of requiring or accepting sexual relations as a condition of accommodation
(1) It is an offence for a person (A) to require or accept from a person (B) sexual relations as a condition of access to or retention of accommodation or related services or transactions.(2) For the purposes of this section, A is—(a) a provider of accommodation,(b) an employee of a provider of accommodation,(c) an agent of a provider of accommodation, or(d) a contractor of a provider of accommodation.(3) A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable on conviction on indictment to imprisonment for a maximum of 7 years.”
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, this group of amendments seeks to introduce new offences to make it illegal to have sex-for-rental accommodation. Currently, sex for rent was affirmed as a sexual offence in 2017 by the Ministry of Justice. Under the current legislation, an individual can be prosecuted for such a crime only under Section 52 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003—causing or inciting prostitution for gain. Only one person has been charged in a sex-for-rent case, and only as recently as a year ago.
The law itself has made it extremely difficult for sex-for-rent victims to seek justice. According to the law, victims must be legally defined as prostitutes, which is a huge deterrent in their access to justice. Another reason why this scandal continues virtually unchecked is that landlords are able to advertise sex for rent in their properties very easily. Landlords still post on sites such as Craigslist, where they talk about free house shares, room shares or even bed shares, and even some of the postings are extremely explicit about the requirement of sex for rent.
Amendment 104E would create a new offence of requiring or accepting sexual relations as a condition of rental accommodation, with a maximum sentence if convicted of seven years. Amendment 104F would create a new offence of arranging or facilitating the requirement or acceptance of sexual relations as a condition of rental accommodation, with a maximum fine of £50,000. That would of course be for those who allow the advertisements on their websites or allow any other form of this type of advertising.
Amendment 114A would put a requirement on the Secretary of State to establish a review into the prevalence of, and the response of the criminal justice system to, the offence of administering a substance with intent under Section 61 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. This is a separate point, and it is something that has had a lot of publicity recently. What is not known is how much of that has been drummed up by the press, if I can put it like that, and how much is real. Nevertheless, the concern that has been raised is certainly real, and this amendment would put an obligation on the Government to get to the bottom of the matter and see whether it is a real problem that nightclubs and other people need to take action to stamp out.
Amendment 114B would put a requirement on the Secretary of State to establish a review of the offence of exposure under Section 66 of the Sexual Offences Act. Again, this is a separate and wider issue, which has ramifications regarding violence against women and girls and the question of whether it is a step along that road. It is right that it should be viewed in its wider context. As a sitting magistrate I see these cases fairly often; they are highly variable and the perpetrators range completely across the social spectrum. Nevertheless, the impact on the women and girls who are subject to these exposures is real, and I am sure there is sufficient data to see whether people who expose themselves progress to much more serious offences.
However, it is fair to say that the main purpose of this group of amendments is to put in new offences of illegalising sex for rent. I beg to move.
Earl Attlee (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, for tabling Amendments 104E and 104F, because this gives me an opportunity to speak to them as I was not available at an earlier stage.
My first point is that sex for rent is invariably immoral and abhorrent and frequently evil, so I agree with the sentiments expressed by the noble Lord today and by noble Lords the last time we debated it. Unfortunately, I share the concerns expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Marks, in Committee on 22 November last year. Like the noble Lord, I am worried about the unintended consequences. He asked:
“What about the landlady of the bed and breakfast who seduces the potential paying guest and offers him or her a free room in return?”—[Official Report, 22/11/21; col. 684.]
The problem is not so much in the drafting but in the way that the amendment works. For instance, I worry about the use of the word “provider”. Does the proposed offence catch a young, affluent male student who has a spare bed or room to offer a female student, partially or wholly in exchange for sex or an intimate relationship?
Lord Pannick (CB)
My Lords, I do not share the concerns that have just been expressed. It seems to me that Amendment 104E makes it very clear what the mischief is; it is making it a condition of access to accommodation that sexual services are provided. We all know what that means, and juries will know what it means. It is a real mischief and it needs to be addressed. If the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, divides the House on Amendments 104E and 104F, he will certainly have my support.
However, I have concerns about the drafting of Amendment 104F. My concern is that in several places it uses the concept of “arranging” an offence—not simply facilitating the offence but arranging or facilitating it. I do not really understand what the difference is and what is added by “arranging an offence”. I am not myself aware of other contexts where that concept has been used. It is a very vague concept and, I think, a rather undesirable one.
I am also troubled by proposed new subsection (3)(c) of Amendment 104F, which makes it an offence if a publisher is informed that its actions
“had enabled the arrangement of or facilitated an offence”
and it then
“failed to take remedial action within a reasonable time.”
All that is extremely unclear and uncertain as to the ingredients of the offence. No doubt that can be dealt with at Third Reading if others share my view. I emphasise that I support the amendments, but I draw attention to those matters that cause me concern.
Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)
My Lords, I have one point to add to what has been said by my noble friend Lord Pannick. The word “publisher” troubles me a bit. It is not defined in the amendment, and I am not quite sure what that word is directed to. Is it somebody in business as a publisher or somebody who simply publishes something, describing the activity rather than the trade? The amendment would be improved if something was said in it as to what exactly is meant by the word “publisher”.
Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I speak briefly in support of Amendments 104E and 104F, in the name of my noble friend Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede. In doing so, I declare my interest as director of Generation Rent.
Predators online attempt to coerce men and women to exchange sex for a home by exploiting their financial vulnerabilities. They have used the economic effects of the pandemic as a marketing technique. This is already a crime, and it is not a new crime, but there has only ever been one charge for this offence, and that was in January last year. However, back in 2016, Shelter found that 8% of women had been offered a sexual arrangement. Two years later, its polling estimated that 250,000 women had been asked for sexual favours in exchange for free or discounted rent, and its more recent research showed that 30,000 women in the UK were propositioned with such an arrangement between the start of the pandemic in March 2020 and January 2021.
This is a crime that goes on, openly and explicitly, through adverts on online platforms. Despite the adverts being clear in their intention, they go unchecked, are placed without consequence and are largely ignored by law enforcement and the online platform providers. The fact that there has only ever been one charge for this crime shows how inadequate the law and CPS guidance are in this area.
The victims of this exploitation have been failed. As my noble friend said, for a victim to get justice, they need to be defined as a prostitute for a criminal case to progress, which is a huge deterrent that has to be changed. The online platforms—that is what I believe is meant by “publisher”—allow this crime to be facilitated, and they must have action taken against them. That is why I very much support the amendments tabled by my noble friend.
In closing, I pay tribute to the honourable Member for Hove in the other place for his campaigning on this issue, and the many journalists who have kept this issue on the agenda, including the team at ITV, whose research I understand helped to lead to the one charge for this crime that there has ever been. No one should ever be forced by coercion or circumstance to exchange sex for her home. There is a housing emergency in this country. It continues to hit new lows—so low that sexual predators can deliberately take advantage of people’s desperation to find a home. For me, Amendments 104E and 104F are an opportunity to protect some of the country’s most vulnerable renters.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, I shall be brief because we have a lot to get through. I should have preferred Amendments 140E and 104F, the sex-for-rent amendments and the facilitating amendments, to be rather more tightly drawn. I note that the points I made in Committee were taken by the noble Earl, Lord Attlee. However, I have been persuaded by re-reading the speech made in Committee by the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of Cradley, and what she said today, with her extensive experience as director of Generation Rent—that there is a serious need for criminal legislation to stop what is a particularly nasty form of predatory behaviour. I also took the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, on the interpretation of Amendment 140E, implicitly supported by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, so we will support those amendments. We will also of course support the amendment calling for a review of the criminal law relating to exposure offences and spiking offences, for the reasons given by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, and which we supported in Committee.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)
My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, explained, these amendments relate to three matters we debated in Committee: namely, whether there should be a bespoke offence to tackle so-called sex for rent and whether the police, prosecutors and courts are doing enough to tackle offences relating to spiking and exposure. If I may, I shall take each issue in turn.
Amendments 104E and 104F are intended to address the so-called sex-for-rent issue, whereby exploitative landlords, and others, require sexual relations in return for housing or accommodation. This is an abhorrent phenomenon, which takes advantage of very vulnerable people, as noble Lords have said, and it has no place in our society.
Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, there are existing offences which may be used to prosecute this practice, including the Section 52 offence of causing or inciting prostitution for gain and the Section 53 offence of controlling prostitution for gain. Both offences carry a maximum penalty of seven years’ imprisonment. They can capture instances of sex for rent, depending on the circumstances of the individual case.
In 2019, the Crown Prosecution Service amended its guidance on prostitution and exploitation of prostitution to include specific reference to the availability of charges for offences under Sections 52 and 53, where there is evidence to support the existence of sex-for-rent arrangements. In January of last year, the CPS authorised the first charge for sex-for-rent allegations under Section 52. The individual against whom these allegations were made has pleaded guilty to two counts of inciting prostitution for gain. To better protect tenants from rogue landlords convicted of certain criminal offences, banning orders were introduced through the Housing and Planning Act 2016. A banning order prohibits named individuals engaging in letting and property management work. The Government have been clear that housing associations and local authorities should use these orders if needed. Action will be taken against landlords who exploit vulnerable people. This behaviour simply is not tolerated.
I thought I might say something about a victim having to identify as a prostitute for the Section 52 and 53 offences to be used. I must stress that anyone making a report to the police would benefit from the anonymity provisions in the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1992. The Section 52 offence applies when an identified victim has been caused to engage in prostitution or incited to do so, whether the prostitution takes place or not. The Section 53 offence applies whether the victim has, on one or more occasions, provided sexual services to another person in return for financial gain.
Moving on to Amendment 104F, I definitely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, about the woolly terminology of “arranging an offence”, and the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, about “publisher”, but on the amendment itself, the forthcoming online safety Bill will require companies to put in place systems and processes to remove certain types of illegal content as soon as they become aware of it.
I move on now to spiking, the subject of Amendment 114A. This would require the Secretary of State to review
“the prevalence of, and the response of the criminal justice system to, the offence of administering a substance with intent under section 61 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003”.
I share the concerns expressed by the noble Lord about this offence, particularly the recently reported phenomenon of spiking by needles. This is understandably causing considerable anxiety among young people, especially in our university towns and cities, but there is no need to create a statutory obligation on the Government to review the operation of Section 61 as this issue is already very much on the Government’s radar. Indeed, a statutory requirement setting out a specific agenda risks hindering the Government’s ability to respond flexibly to the problem.
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate. It has been quite quick but focused on the issues raised in this group of amendments.
The noble Earl, Lord Attlee, raised some reservations and talked about the nature of the victims. I advise the noble Earl to read very carefully what my noble friend Lady Kennedy said when she itemised the victims of this offence. It is overwhelmingly women who are victims of this offence. The numbers are very large and it has been going on for years. My noble friend is an expert on this matter and I think his remarks were misplaced, if I can put it like that.
Earl Attlee (Con)
My Lords, I have no issue with what the noble Lord said, nor with what the noble Baroness said. This problem has been going on for a very long time and large numbers are involved; I do not disagree with that.
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, I move on to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope. I am grateful for their support. They raised drafting issues, if I can put it like that, around the word “arranging” in Amendment 104F, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, questioned the use of the word “publisher”—although my noble friend Lady Kennedy said that she regards “publisher” as including online platforms. Nevertheless, I am not stuck with the specific wording in front of us. I think the purpose of the amendments is perfectly clear, and I am glad that both the noble Lord and the noble and learned Lord are nodding their heads.
I was disappointed with the answer given by the Minister. She made it clear that the Government take these issues seriously and said that they are constantly reviewing the law on these matters, but here is an opportunity to change it right now. There has been a very effective campaign on this issue, and it would have been an opportunity for the Government to change their approach. So I think that we on this side of the House should force the issue and test the opinion of the House, just to see the strength of opinion on this long-standing problem.
“Offence of arranging or facilitating the requirement or acceptance of sexual relations as a condition of accommodation
(1) It is an offence for a person, who may in particular be a publisher, to arrange or facilitate an offence under section (Offence of requiring or accepting sexual relations as a condition of accommodation).(2) A person commits an offence if they intend to arrange or know that their actions would facilitate an offence under section (Offence of requiring or accepting sexual relations as a condition of accommodation).(3) A publisher commits an offence if they—(a) know they are arranging or facilitating an offence under section (Offence of requiring or accepting sexual relations as a condition of accommodation),(b) reasonably should know their actions would enable the arrangement of or facilitate an offence under section (Offence of requiring or accepting sexual relations as a condition of accommodation), or(c) were informed that their actions had enabled the arrangement of or facilitated an offence under section (Offence of requiring or accepting sexual relations as a condition of accommodation) and failed to take remedial action within a reasonable time.(4) A person found guilty of an offence under this section is liable on conviction on indictment to a fine of £50,000.”
“Police and crime commissioners: limit on age of disqualification for conviction
In section 66(3)(c) of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011, after the first “offence” insert “committed after the age of 21”.”
Lord Bach (Lab)
My Lords, Amendment 104FA stands in my name of those of the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath. It is hard to think of two more respected, valued and experienced Members of the House, and I know that other noble Lords would be happy to have supported this amendment. I am very grateful to them. I thank the Minister for suggesting a meeting, which we had online yesterday; I am very grateful to him for it. I enjoyed our discussion, and it was particularly good that part of that discussion was with a senior civil servant who is advising him and who, many, many moons ago, advised me when I sat in his place.
In Committee, my amendment was slightly differently drafted, but the point remains a simple matter of principle. It is not of world-shattering interest, but it is still a matter of principle that all people of good will, including the Government, should support. The Bill in the House tonight is a legitimate and timely moment to put right a minor wrong. We should not waste that opportunity. Section 66 of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011 makes it clear that if a person has at any stage in their life a conviction for any offence which, if they were over 18 at the time, could carry a sentence of imprisonment —whether or not it did carry one is irrelevant—that person will remain ineligible for the rest of their lives to stand as a police and crime commissioner: not just until the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act applies, or for five, 10, 15 or 20 years, but for their whole life.
In Committee, three case histories were given which I hope helped the Committee to feel that the present position is a nonsense. Two of those cases were given by me and one by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, to whom I was grateful. They showed how ridiculous, absurd and unique Section 66 is. There will be other cases that the House will not have heard of. Let me briefly repeat one of those examples. It concerns a boy aged 16 in 1972, and an old scooter. He and his friends visited a hospital. His mate handed him an old scooter helmet, which was apparently completely useless. He foolishly placed it in his family garage. He was charged with handling and fined £5. Since then, it goes without saying that he has never been in trouble. He has had a highly successful career in journalism. He has been head of a regional media outfit and worked for the NSPCC as a communications officer. In addition, he has been a TA soldier for many years and, indeed, was the company sergeant-major. He is a county councillor in his local area and is in his fourth term. He is also an ex-member of the local police authority that existed until the creation of police and crime commissioners. Now that there are PCCs, he is on the police and crime panel, which has authority to hold to account the local police and crime commissioner. One can imagine his surprise when, 40 years on, in 2012, the year of the first police and crime commissioner elections, he was told that he could not stand because of an offence he committed and a conviction he got when he was 16, in 1972. I suggest to the House that that is absurd.
I suppose it could be understood if anyone who had been convicted of such an offence at any stage in their life was considered ineligible to apply for the following jobs: Member of Parliament, councillor, lawyer, judge, Home Secretary, Prime Minister, archbishop—if the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Sentamu, whom I warned that might mention in passing, will forgive me—or, even more extraordinarily, police officer. If people were prevented from doing those jobs throughout their lives merely because they had a conviction when they were 15 or 16, it would have at least some logic and sense to it, but that is not the position. Each of those important and responsible jobs is open to someone like the example I have given, who may have offended when they were a youngster but have since lived sensible, law-abiding lives. The position is quite rightly much more flexible for those others, so why on earth is it so strict for those who want to be a police and crime commissioner? There is no automatic bar for anybody else, so why should there be for this post? Is there something in the position of police and crime commissioner that is so remarkable —so close to heaven, perhaps I could say—that people must pass this incredible test and, if they fail it when they are 16, they fail it for life? The rigidity is absurd.
Lord Pannick (CB)
My Lords, I respectfully agree with everything the noble Lord, Lord Bach, said. I will add just one point. The problem is not simply the unfairness to the individuals concerned, although that is bad enough, but the damage to the public interest that otherwise eligible and fine candidates are prevented from serving. It is a basic principle of our constitutional law that Parliament can do anything it likes, but there are limits, and we ought to get rid of this manifest absurdity.
Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood (CB)
My Lords, I too support this amendment; I did at Second Reading. Indeed, I have added my name to the amendment but too late for it to appear on the fifth Marshalled List. The case for it could hardly be simpler or more compelling. Frankly, the illustration of the scooter helmet from the noble Lord, Lord Bach, ought of itself to be enough to carry this. I am against absolutism and total purity and inflexibility routinely, but flexibility and discretion are almost invariably required to be welcomed and valued, and they are here. It is nothing short of bizarre, absurd and conspicuously unfair to single out this one public office as one from which people are uniquely disqualified in the circumstances already sufficiently indicated. I need not waste another word. My only regret is that the amendment is not being put to the vote.
Earl Attlee (Con)
My Lords, I have worked with the noble Lord, Lord Bach, for many years in this House —sadly, on opposite sides of it—but I have never heard him make a stronger argument for anything. The only reason why I cannot say that I will support him is because I have not written a little note to my noble friend the Chief Whip.
Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I cannot say that I know many teenagers who, growing up, aspire to be police crime and commissioners. However, I was convinced by the arguments made in Committee and I wanted to just make a couple of additional small points. For me it is not just about unfairness; there is a principle here. If you work with teenagers and one of them has made a mistake and has been fined or has broken the law in some way, you say to them, “Now we want you to rehabilitate and become a fine upstanding citizen”, and, “The world is your oyster and you can do anything.” I cannot imagine anything that is more proof of being fine and upstanding than growing up and then saying, “I want to be a police and crime commissioner.” I do not even know whether I agree with the idea of police and crime commissioners, but that is not my point.
The other thing, on a kind of principle, is that increasingly I would like public servants and people taking on roles such as police and crime commissioners to have some real-life experience—and that might involve youthful indiscretions.
I completely support the amendment. There are principles here that could easily be upheld by the Government simply accepting it; it makes perfect sense. I think even the public would cheer.
Lord Sentamu (CB)
My Lords, since I have been gratuitously referred to, I ought to say some words. Archbishop Robert Runcie said, “A saint is a person whose life has never been fully examined.” All our lives have never been fully examined, but I confirm that I never committed any crime at the age of 15 or 16, and have not done even now. Even if I committed one, I am already excluded from becoming an archbishop again because I am now 72. Age would discriminate against me and push me out.
What I do not get is why being a police commissioner is the only calling where there is discrimination if something was done at the age of 16. I would have thought that, 40 years on, the person has done their time. Yes, there is a record but it does not have to be the only thing over which you exclude them, because they have come on in age. In wanting to remove this for police commissioners, we are not sending out a message that it does not matter whether you commit a crime at the age of 16. We are saying: why is there this hindrance to this profession? Because one day I may become a saint and my life will never be fully examined, I want to vote for this amendment. I hope that the Minister will just accept it and it will be put into statute without more debates, because this just does not make sense. But I speak like a fool.
Baroness Jolly (LD)
My Lords, as we said in Committee, we are in principle supportive of this amendment. However, we would want in an ideal world a balancing amendment to ensure the possibility of recall and by-election should a police and crime commissioner be found guilty of misconduct, along the lines of the Recall of MPs Act 2015. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Bach, about the discrimination of early offences. Currently, because police and crime commissioners are democratically elected, they can be replaced only by means of another election, and as things stand there is no mechanism to force such a by-election. It is hoped that a disgraced PCC would resign but this should not be at the sole discussion of the PCC concerned. Therefore, we are reluctant to support the amendment without another along the lines of the one described earlier. My noble friend Lord Paddick says that he thinks it is unfortunate that the noble Lord, Lord Bach, did not take the hint that he gave him in Committee.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
My Lords, I will be brief. I recall that the Minister said in Committee on this amendment
“I fear that my ice thins a little here”.
One can only say that I think it has got even warmer since then. The Government said in Committee:
“Having said all that, I have heard everything that has been said around the Chamber this evening, across party, and I will make sure that those arguments are reflected back to the Home Office.”
What happened when those arguments were then reflected back to the Home Office, to whom in the Home Office were they reflected back to, and what was the response?
The rules on previous convictions, which the Government said in Committee were necessary to ensure
“the highest levels of integrity on the part of the person holding office and to protect the public’s trust in policing”
do not seem to have been very effective or relevant in North Yorkshire on two occasions already where two different PCCs have already departed the scene in interesting circumstances.
I conclude, in indicating our support for this amendment and thanking noble Lords for all the arguments and points made, that in Committee the Government referred to part 2 of the review of police and crime commissioners. They said that it is “currently under way” and that
“this review will also assess the benefits and demerits of a trigger mechanism for the recall of PCCs; it is being debated.”—[Official Report, 22/11/21; cols. 649-50.]
Will this part of the review of PCCs also now look at the issue of the current bar, in its present form, on a potential candidate being able to stand for the position of police and crime commissioner, which is the issue we are debating tonight? If the Government cannot even say that this will now be included in part 2 of the review, what is the reason for that stance?
I very much hope, like my noble friend Lord Bach, that the Government will accept this amendment, or at the very least agree to reflect on it further prior to Third Reading so that it can be brought back again if the Government’s reflections are not very satisfactory.
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
My Lords, first, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bach, for giving us a further opportunity to discuss the disqualification criteria for those wishing to be elected as police and crime commissioners and for joining the meeting yesterday when we discussed this issue online. I thank all noble Lords who have participated in this debate and, to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, I do fear my ice is rather thinner.
However, this latest amendment would allow anyone convicted of an imprisonable offence before the age of 21 to stand as a police and crime commissioner. I commend the noble Lord for seeking some middle ground to address this issue, but the amendment would still dilute the current high standard of integrity we expect of PCCs—namely, preventing anyone convicted of an imprisonable offence to stand for or hold the office of PCC.
As I said on this matter in Committee, the rules governing who can stand as a PCC are the strictest of all elected roles in England and Wales. We believe that this is necessary to ensure the highest levels of integrity of the person holding office and thus protect the public’s trust in policing. Any dilution of that high standard, as proposed by the noble Lord, could still undermine public confidence in a PCC.
Under the noble Lord’s amendment, it would be open to a person convicted of and imprisoned for a very serious violent offence at the age of 20, for example, to stand for election as a police and crime commissioner. That is inappropriate, given the nature of the role the PCC plays in holding the chief constable and the force to account. I suggest that were a PCC to hold office with a previous conviction for an imprisonable offence, both the PCC and the chief constable may find it untenable to maintain a professional and respectful relationship.
The current standard was set with cross-party agreement and the support of senior police officers. If the current standard is lowered, the Government maintain that it would be a very serious risk to public confidence and the integrity of the PCC model at a time when we should be doing all we can to protect and increase public confidence in the police.
Lord Pannick (CB)
Before the noble Lord sits down, may I ask him this question? Why is it that public confidence requires, in his view, this absolute rule, when I can serve as a Supreme Court Justice even if I was convicted of an imprisonable offence at the age of 17 or 18?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
With regard to public confidence, I go back to what I said earlier: this was originally designed with cross-party support and with the assistance and advice of police chiefs.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down, may I have a response to my question? Bearing in mind that in Committee the Government were prepared to tell us that part 2 of the review will
“also assess the benefits and demerits of a trigger mechanism for the recall of PCCs; it is being debated,”—[Official Report, 22/11/21; col. 649.]
may I ask for an assurance that part 2 of the review will also look at the issue raised by my noble friend Lord Bach in this amendment about the bar on being able to seek office as a PCC? May I have that assurance?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
I am sorry I forgot to answer the noble Lord’s specific question. The problem is that I do not have the terms of reference to hand so I cannot give him the assurance he seeks, but I will write to him.
Earl Attlee (Con)
The noble Lord told the House that we agreed on a cross-party basis that these arrangements were appropriate. Was that by means of a vote or did we just acquiesce to it?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
I am afraid I do not know. It predates me, sorry.
Lord Lexden (Con)
Is it the Government’s view that, by retaining the ban—as it is at the moment—for PCCs, there would be a case for extending it so that, if it should emerge that the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, committed an imprisonable offence before the age of 21, he should be barred from becoming a Supreme Court judge? Does one thing not follow the other?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
The noble Lord will forgive me for not venturing an opinion on that.
Lord Bach (Lab)
I forgive the Minister anything. I was in his position many years ago when I had to defend the completely indefensible. All Governments do it; it is not an attack on this Government. Somehow there is a collective—I am going to use the word “idiocy”, which is perhaps too high, but collective mistakes are made. Individual Ministers know very well that something such as this should be got through easily and the matter of principle—the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, is right—can be put right and we can move on. But somehow, “The Government say no”.
I do not think any of the reasons so articulately put by the Minister really hold water at all to be honest, particularly the argument on the public being really offended by something such as this and losing what confidence they have—which I hope is high but may not always be—in police and crime commissioners. I do not honestly think the public would care a jot and, if they did, they would be surprised by how the law stood. I have to say that I do not find placing reliance on part 2 of the inquiry, and particularly on when legislation might come to this House again on this matter, very convincing.
We have a lot of important business to do tonight—I understand that. I am reluctant to withdraw, given the strength of feeling—and I want to thank everybody who has spoken in this debate; very distinguished Members of this House have spoken, and I am really very grateful to them. However, in the circumstances, while inviting the Minister to take this issue back to the Home Office again and to show other Ministers and officials what was said tonight in Hansard, I hope that it may move the Government to do the right thing on this before very long. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
“Section 6 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956: removal of time limitation
(1) Proceedings for the offence under section 6 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956 (intercourse with a girl between thirteen and sixteen) are not barred only by virtue of the passage of time since the date of the alleged offence.(2) Nothing in this section permits the trial of a person who has already been convicted of an offence relating to the sexual intercourse in question.”
Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, men who seduced girls between the ages of 13 and 16 before 1 May 2004 are effectively immune from prosecution because of a procedural time limit. The law therefore stops historic child abusers from being held accountable for their actions; the law denies justice to women in England and Wales who were groomed for sex as teenage girls before 1 May 2004 as they cannot bring charges against the people who took advantage of them. Let me take a minute to explain why.
Abusers are immune from prosecution because sexual offences committed before 1 May 2004 must be prosecuted under the Sexual Offences Act 1956. Under that Act, the applicable offence is unlawful sexual intercourse, as outlined in Section 6. In the 1956 Act, and there is a time limit of one year from the alleged commission of the offence under Section 6. Proceedings must therefore be instituted within a year from then. This time limit is clear and unambiguous and can be found in paragraph 10 of Schedule 2 to the Act.
Amendment 104FC would remove the time limit and therefore remove the legal barrier which protects abusers of underage girls from prosecution. Some may read this speech and question why I am using the phraseology “girl” and not “child”. This is because, remarkably, the time limit applies only to girls; if the victim were a boy, it would be different, as historical cases of sexual intercourse between men and boys under 16 can still be prosecuted. How can the law deny justice and discriminate in this way, and this House not seek to put it right?
The time limit has to be removed, especially as no such time limit applies to offences of this nature committed after 1 May 2004. If a man had sexual intercourse with a girl aged between 13 and 16 after 1 May 2004, he can be prosecuted for the new offence of sexual activity with a child. That was created by the Sexual Offences Act 2003, where no equivalent time limit is applied. This time limit is therefore a procedural anomaly that clearly stands in the way of justice.
This problem had been going on for some time, since before May 2004, but prosecutors were for a long time able to evade the time limit. Instead of charging for underage sexual intercourse, which could not be done if the offence was discovered or prosecuted too late, they would charge for indecent assault in relation to the same underage sexual intercourse. But in 2004, when this House also acted in its judicial capacity, it considered an appeal by a Mr J, who argued that his charge of indecent assault was a device to circumvent the time limit and was an abuse of the court—and the House accepted his argument. Since that time, therefore, men who procured sexual intercourse from vulnerable and impressionable girls before 1 May 2004 have been immune from prosecution.
Some may say that this may be an unnecessary change and ask how many people it would actually affect—but, as the CPS does not keep a record of how many cases are discounted at an early stage because of issues like time limits, there is no data for us to know whether this is affecting one woman, 1,000 women or more. What we do know is that, sadly, historic sexual abuse comes to light all too frequently. We know that girls can be threatened into silence for long periods of time. It is well known that very many girls, victimised in these ways, only recognise themselves as victims, or only have the confidence to go to the police much later than one year afterwards, or something else comes to light that encourages them to bravely break their silence. There must be hundreds of thousands of cases where men seduced a girl aged between 13 and 16 before 1 May 2004, but those victims for various reasons never told the police during the year.
I do not believe that we should need much evidence of the extent of the problem to justify the removal of this arbitrary time limit and allow justice to be done. Some may argue that you cannot retrospectively make law in this way, but applying that argument to this amendment I believe is incorrect. It is true that you cannot retrospectively create new offences and punish people for them—but here, the relevant offence always existed. This amendment would just change the rules relating to trial for those offences. It has always been understood that rules of evidence and procedure can be amended and have immediate effect in subsequent trials, regardless of when the acts complained of actually happened. Article 7 of the European Convention on Human Rights, as I understand it, applies to the definition of offences and defences; it does not apply to matters of procedure, including time limits.
Finally, some may argue that this amendment risks exposing those who were prosecuted and successfully used the time limit to avoid prosecution to further conviction. That is not my intention with this amendment, which is why subsection (2) of my proposed new clause states:
“Nothing in this section permits the trial of a person who has already been convicted of an offence relating to the sexual intercourse in question.”
I am aware that that this is a complex matter, and I thank Dr Jonathan Rogers, assistant professor in criminal justice at Cambridge University, who has been arguing for a change in the law to address this issue for many years. I thank him for all his advice and support on this issue. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson of Tredegar, for meeting Dr Rogers and me last week to discuss this matter. We are conscious that our meeting lasted twice as long as expected, so I thank him for the time that he gave and for the further discussions that were facilitated between Dr Rogers and the Civil Service team. However, my view remains that this issue needs resolving; there are still women who are denied justice for what happened to them in their early teenage years and men who can be fairly tried. This time limit is wrong —the amendment would remove it and, in doing so, close a loophole which protects sex offenders. I beg to move.
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, I support my noble friend, who is quite right in everything she has said. Sexual abuse and rape can quite often take decades to come to light. The anomaly, which she has outlined very clearly, is within the power of the Government to put right, and I urge the Minister to do so.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, before I turn to this amendment, I begin with an apology. I made an incorrect statement in an earlier group. On Amendment 104B, I said that in September 2019, we rolled Section 28 out to a further four courts” and then I identified them. I should have said “September 2021”, not “September 2019”. I have already sent a written note to the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, correcting the point, but I take this opportunity to correct the record and apologise to the House for that error.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of Cradley, for tabling the amendment, which is aimed at a narrow but important category of cases that remain subject to a highly unusual time limit—we do not usually have time limits in our criminal law—and I thank her for the very useful discussions that we have been able to have on this topic. The amendment affects offences under Section 6 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956 of unlawful but consensual sexual intercourse with a girl aged 13 to 15 that were committed before 1 May 2004, when the Sexual Offences Act 2003 came into force and replaced the 1956 Act. It was a requirement under the earlier statute that a prosecution for this under Section 6 had to be commenced within 12 months of the offence. There is no time limit for the offences under the 2003 Act that have been chargeable since 1 May 2004, but when the offence was committed before that date, the 12-month limit for commencing a prosecution continued to apply. That, of course, has long since expired.
As my noble and learned friend Lord Stewart of Dirleton explained in Committee, Parliament usually acts on the principle of non-retroactivity. Although removing the time limit in circumstances where a prosecution was already time-barred would not have amounted to substantive retroactivity in the sense of criminalising conduct that was not previously unlawful, it still would have exposed a person to criminal liability where there had not been any before.
Baroness Kennedy of Cradley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for his response and for the large amount of time last week that he and his advisers gave me and Dr Rogers from Cambridge University, whose writing, as the Minister said, has rightly put this issue into the public arena.
I note the Government’s concerns about Article 7, but I also note that Governments have taken greater risks with Article 7 before when the political will has been there. I believe that there is cross-party consensus that men who continually seduced underage girls, in many cases ruining their young lives for their own amusement, in the 1980s and 1990s still deserve to be punished.
There is also Strasbourg case law, which condemns states for relying on arbitrary procedural rules that act as barriers to effective justice in cases of sexual offences against the young. My noble friend Lady Chakrabarti referred to one such case in Committee. However, as the Minister suggests, we should pause to consider whether Article 7 might protect a man who would be prosecuted after the original time limit expired. The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has expressly said that the propriety of this is yet to be decided; on that basis, I accept that there is a risk that merits further consideration. I appreciate that this needs more time to resolve than the timing of the Bill allows. I therefore very much welcome the Minister’s offer to keep the discussions on this issue going with the Minister who is directly responsible for this area of policy. Today is only the start of the discussion on this issue.
I remain hopeful that, through discussion with the Government, more can be done to quantify the exact risk of losing a case under Article 7. If it is low, I hope that we will have the courage of our convictions and change the law for the better, as we did with the double jeopardy rules in 2003. I am grateful to the Minister for his offer to facilitate further deliberations on this issue; I look forward to future discussions with him and other Ministers.
I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Baroness Coussins
“Spoken word interpreters: minimum standards
Within six months of commencement of this section, spoken word interpreters appointed to a court or tribunal must—(a) be registered on the National Register of Public Service Interpreters (“NRPSI”),(b) possess a Level 6 Diploma in Public Service Interpreting, or comply with NRPSI Rare Language Status protocols, and(c) have completed the requisite number of hours’ experience of court interpreting commensurate with the category of case complexity, as agreed by the Secretary of State in conjunction with relevant professional bodies.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would establish minimum standards for qualifications and experience for interpreters in courts and tribunals, along the lines of the Police Approved Interpreters Scheme.
Baroness Coussins (CB)
My Lords, I remind the House of my interests as vice-president of the Chartered Institute of Linguists and co-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Modern Languages.
I am very grateful indeed to the Minister for the interest he has taken in the issue of court interpreters and my concerns about the weaknesses of the present system, as well as for his willingness to meet several times and discuss candidly the detail of my amendment. This dialogue has been very constructive and leads me to be hopeful that we can reach a positive outcome.
My amendment seeks to establish minimum standards for court interpreters based on their qualifications, experience and registration with the National Register of Public Service Interpreters—NRPSI. Obviously, I am not going to repeat the detail of the case I set out in Committee, but perhaps I could just comment on the response I had at that stage from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart of Dirleton.
There seemed to be three main reasons for rejecting my amendment. The first was that the MoJ system is already fit for purpose. For example, the noble and learned Lord said:
“All interpreters are required to complete a justice system-specific training course before they are permitted to join the register.”—[Official Report, 22/11/21; col. 659.]
This refers to the MoJ’s register. My understanding, however, is that that course takes four hours to complete, which does not strike me as remotely adequate for such potentially demanding and specialist work. It remains the case that the current MoJ register will admit people who would not be considered sufficiently qualified or experienced to be on the NRPSI—nor, indeed, on the Police Approved Interpreters and Translators scheme. The DPSI at level 6 is considered by all the specialist professional bodies in the field to be the correct minimum qualification for any court interpreting work.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart, also claimed that the MoJ system is fit for purpose because the complaint rate is less than 1%. I had claimed that the failure rate following spot checks was 50% but, in our subsequent meetings and correspondence, the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, has clarified that the 50% figure I quoted in Committee applied only to referrals of quality-based complaints, and that the overall failure rate is actually 5% of all assessments. I still think that a failure rate of 50% after a referral from a court or mystery shop is unacceptably high. I would also contend that even an overall rate of 5% out of hundreds of thousands of assignments each year could potentially lead to a significant drain on the public purse through the costs of rescheduling adjourned hearings or keeping defendants in custody for longer—not to mention the avoidable stress and confusion for victims, defendants and witnesses.
Secondly, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart, thought that my amendment fell short because it would not be right to take a one-size-fits-all approach, given that there are various levels of case complexity. But I agree with that: the point is explicitly acknowledged in my amendment, which specifies that the number of hours’ experience required should reflect case complexity and, crucially, should be agreed between the department and “relevant professional bodies”. In discussions with the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, over the past few weeks, it has been repeatedly pointed out to those of us supporting this amendment that there are no fewer than 1,000 different types of assignment. The mind boggles—well, mine does anyway. I would certainly love to see a list spelling out exactly what those 1,000 different categories are.
Thirdly, the obstacle of the rules on public procurement was raised as a reason why my amendment’s provision for the NRPSI registration was unacceptable. I still find this a bit odd and confusing as an argument, as the NRPSI is not a membership organisation, nor a supplier. It is worth remembering that it was established at the request of the judiciary in the first place after the interpreting calamity of the Begum case. It is surely just akin to the professional registers in many other fields, such as teaching, medicine or law, from which we would always expect and require practitioners to be drawn. There appears to be at least one significant precedent in that the Metropolitan Police Service mandates that all its listed interpreters must have continuous NRPSI registration. Of its annual 25,000 face-to-face assigned interpreters, only 2.5% are not NRPSI registered, and then for a very good reason—for example, to do with the need for a rare language speaker or the need for a super-speedy appointment in highly urgent or dangerous situations.
I accept, of course, that this whole system is complex and that there are inherent challenges to any solution that I have not touched on today, such as the supply chain of interpreters. I also acknowledge that the wording of my amendment may not be perfect, although I have tweaked it since Committee to try to build in a transition period, as suggested in Committee by the noble Lord, Lord Marks. But I have been encouraged by the approach of the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, in our discussions in that he acknowledges that if there are improvements that could or should be made, it would be sensible for them to be made before the current contract is due to be retendered in 2023. The challenge, of course, is to get to the bottom of precisely what those improvements are, and I am extremely concerned that there should be no more delay in establishing and achieving them than absolutely necessary. The current contract expires in October 2023, so presumably a revised tender will need to be issued some months before that in order to achieve a seamless transition.
With this in mind, we raised with the Minister the possible option of conducting a detailed and independent inquiry into exactly what the standards of qualifications and experience and other matters should be. I am hopeful that the Minister might be able to say something about that proposal when he comes to reply today. Such an inquiry would need to be conducted on a genuinely independent basis and cover all aspects of the MoJ’s responsibility for interpreting services, with a commitment to apply its findings to the next contract. I believe that such an independent inquiry would also have the credibility to help attract back into public service the many hundreds of professional interpreters who have left because of low pay, bad conditions or a lack of acknowledgement of their professional status. This exercise would have the potential to make a long-term strategic impact on the service, as well as knocking into shape the terms of the next contract. I look forward to the Minister’s response and beg to move.
Lord Pannick (CB)
My Lords, I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, for pursuing this important matter, and to the Minister for his engagement on a number of occasions with those of us who support the noble Baroness and are concerned about this. During those discussions, I expressed the view that it is striking that there is such a radical difference of view between the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, with her enormous expertise in this area, and civil servants as to how the system is working in practice. I therefore suggested to the Minister that one way forward in this important area would be for him to agree that there should be an independent assessment—an independent inquiry—of an outfacing nature that can rely on the expertise of the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, and others in order to inform the department as to the way forward. That seems to be a constructive way forward, and I very much hope that the Minister will be able to say that the department is prepared to do that.
Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)
My Lords, I too pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Coussins for the determination with which she has pursued this argument. As a user of the court, it is crucial to have complete confidence in the interpreter. Most of us do not have the complete gift of language—which perhaps my noble friend has—over a wide range of languages. You have to rely on the interpreter; confidence in what the interpreter is doing is crucial to the way the proceedings are conducted, so the highest standards should be aimed for. I must say, I am surprised that it is taking so long for the advice my noble friend has offered to be accepted and put into practice.
Lord Hogan-Howe (CB)
My Lords, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, as I have from the beginning, as a layman who does not understand an awful lot about interpreting standards but does understand the importance of evidential matters going through tribunals needing to be of a high standard.
What has confused me from the beginning—as I think the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, suggested —is that the Government’s response is that they do not prefer the standard that the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, offers and that they therefore want to rely on the standards that are in the contract. However, it is not at all clear what that standard is, because the easiest response would be that the standard in the contract is far better than the standard she offers, but no one is saying that. There is clearly a differential standard for different acts; the Minister mentioned something of the order of a thousand different scenarios leading to different qualities of interpretation, but I am not sure that that would lead to a thousand different standards.
It is clear from the Metropolitan Police’s experience that, broadly, there is a split between face-to-face contact and other types, but the real split is whether the material interpreted is going to be evidential. Often, a person who is arrested needs to have a conversation with the charging sergeant about who they are and whether they need medical attention—all the common tactical things that people need to talk about—or the police may need to talk with a victim at the scene of a crime. That can be achieved by telephone. That immediate conversation has some value, of course, but not in the context of an evidential test. When it comes to an interview, a prosecution decision and, obviously, attendance in court, it is vital that that standard is of the highest level.
Therefore, I support the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, but if it cannot be achieved in this Bill, I think the proposal for an independent inquiry is a reasonable next step.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, I spoke at length on this amendment in Committee and attended the meeting with the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leeds, who also signed the amendment. It has led to a full and thorough response from the Minister, and we expect him to announce a full and independent review. If that is right, that is extremely welcome news. I join the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, in saying that it would be extremely helpful to have an indication of the timescale of such a review—if that is to be announced—because of the imminence of the renewal of the contracts. It would also be extremely helpful for us to have an indication of how the independence of the review will be assured, because independence is a relatively flexible word, and it is an extremely important part of this.
For all the reasons given by the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, the standard of interpretation is incredibly important to the maintenance of justice where there are litigants, parties or witnesses for whom English is not their first language. We talked about the importance of having the undisguised and unchanged evidence of the witness before the court in an evidential case without the interpreter’s view of matters intervening. That calls for the very highest standards of quality and for any review to be completely independent.
Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)
My Lords, I too spoke in Committee, and I have been copied in on the very helpful response from the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson. I felt he was trying to embrace this important subject. To extend the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, a little, one has to understand that when people are in court, it is not just a question of interpretation; quite often, it is case of compassion and being able to communicate with a witness or a defendant. If there is a language barrier, those are the first things that tend to go out of the window.
Just to lower the conversation slightly, I mentioned in Committee an occasion on which the word “cow” was confused with the word “car”—a cow was observed travelling at 90 miles an hour.
I think it would be good to finish my brief contribution to this debate by repeating the explanatory statement of the noble Baroness:
“This amendment would establish minimum standards for qualifications and experience for interpreters in courts and tribunals, along the lines of the Police Approved Interpreters Scheme.”
I find it very hard to see why the Government would not want to embrace that.
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
Clearly, we agree with everything that has been said. Rather than repeat it all, I will just compliment the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, on her amendment. We will listen carefully to what the Minister has to say.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, having begun my response to the previous group with an apology for getting a date wrong, I then went on to get another date wrong. The case of Antia is, for those noble Lords keen to read it, 2020 and not 2000. The rest of the legal analysis, I hope, remains unchanged. I will seek to avoid any reference to dates in what I am about to say.
This amendment would restrict the Ministry of Justice to appointing in our courts and tribunals only interpreters who are registered on the National Register of Public Service Interpreters and who possess a level 6 diploma in public service interpreting or comply with the national register’s rare language status protocols. I place on record at the outset my thanks to the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, the noble Lords, Lord Pannick and Lord Hogan-Howe, and others for their time engaging with me.
This is a very important issue. The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, noted that it goes to compassion, which is correct. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, said, it also goes to the heart of the justice process. Anyone who has done a case with interpreters knows how important their role is. Indeed, I remember one case where, when the witness answered a question of mine, it was interpreted through a language I knew, and I knew that it had been interpreted wrongly. The judge also picked up that the interpretation was wrong and the witness himself criticised the interpretation, thus illustrating that the presence of the interpreter was unnecessary, and they were dispensed with.
We currently commission the service of interpreters for our courts and tribunals through our contracted service providers, thebigword and Clarion interpreting. The contract has a clearly defined list of qualifications, skills, experience and vetting requirements interpreters must meet, which have been designed to meet the particular needs of the justice system. The highest complexity level has qualification criteria comparable to those set by the NRPSI. They are sourced from the MoJ register, which is audited by an independent language service provider, The Language Shop. All interpreters must have 100 hours of experience and complete a justice system-specific training course before they can join the register.
As the noble Baroness said, the overall failure rate of all quality assurance assessments remains low, at 5%. We believe that illustrates the effectiveness of the auditing measures. Complaints about quality are also carefully monitored and independently assessed by The Language Shop. The complaint rate remains low, at less than 1%.
I am confident that there are no systemic quality issues with the current arrangements. None the less, I discussed this in some detail with the noble Baroness and others and we want to improve the quality of the service we provide, if that is possible, right across the justice system. That is why I am commissioning a full independent review of our existing qualifications and standards and the requirements for each type of assignment our contract covers. There are over 1,000 of these—I do not have a list to hand. This will also consider experience levels and rare language requirements. The review will be completed in time to inform the retendering of our contracts in 2023. It will establish a detailed framework of the standards and qualifications required for all assignments covered by the contracts, with clear explanations and justifications for each. The aim is to ensure that our contracts continue to meet the demands of all our court users.
We will continue to consult external stakeholders, including the NRPSI—its input is highly valued. We will learn from other schemes, including the police-approved interpreter and translation scheme, which adopts a level 6 diploma in public service interpreting as a minimum qualification standard, but with safeguards to allow for exceptions as needed to ensure timeliness in progressing a case.
We understand that there are issues about the availability of NRPSI-registered interpreters in some parts of the country—40% of them are based in London. Under our current arrangements, we can control and direct recruitment for our register based on geographical and language needs. This is tied in to the supplier’s obligation to fulfil bookings and ensures that we can dictate recruitment trends to meet our requirements.
I cannot say at this stage whether the police-approved interpreter and translation scheme would be suitable for the Ministry of Justice. We are concerned not to have a one-size-fits-all approach; even within a court setting, interpreting in a criminal court is quite different from interpreting, for example, in the family jurisdiction. It is not only court settings; there is telephone interpreting for court custody officers, and service centres require interpreting assistance to support court users paying fines or responding to general inquiries. However, we will look at the outcome of the review. All the options we consider will need to be fully costed in accordance with government policy for large government procurements to ensure value for money for the taxpayer.
The review will be undertaken. We have already started some work; we want to establish the most appropriate and cost-effective solution, one which meets the current and future needs of the justice system and promotes the continued development and progression of new entrants into the interpreting profession. With renewed thanks to the noble Baroness for her time and the discussions we have had, including on the option of a full independent review, which I hope I have set out clearly, I respectfully urge her to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Coussins (CB)
I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to this debate. I especially offer my thanks to the Minister and warmly welcome his decision to commission a full independent inquiry into the qualifications, experience and overall standards of all the different types of interpreters for court work. I look forward to seeing the terms of reference, the timetable and other details of this inquiry. I feel optimistic that professional bodies in the field will also feel encouraged by this development and welcome the decision. With that in mind, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Lord Coaker
“Fast-track public space protection orders
In the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, after section 61 (variation and discharge of orders) insert—“61A Fast-track public spaces protection orders(1) A local authority may make a fast-track public spaces protection order where the conditions under subsections (2) or (3) are met.(2) The conditions under this subsection are—(a) the public space to which the order will apply is a school within the local authority area;(b) activities carried on, or likely to be carried on, in the vicinity of the school have had, or are likely to have, a detrimental effect on the quality of life for pupils and staff; and(c) consent for the order to be applied has been granted by—(i) the leadership of the school to which the order will apply,(ii) a chief officer of police of the police area in which the school to which the order will apply is located, and(iii) the leader of the local authority which will make the order.(3) The conditions under this subsection are—(a) the public space to which the order will be applied is a venue providing NHS vaccination services to the public;(b) activities have been carried on, or are likely to be carried on, in the vicinity of the venue with the intent of—(i) harassing or intimidating members of the public using the service, or staff or volunteers providing the service, or(ii) impeding members of the public from accessing the service, or staff or volunteers from providing the service; and(c) consent for the order to be applied has been granted by—(i) the NHS body with responsibility for provision of the service to which the order will apply, (ii) a chief officer of police of the police area in which the venue to which the order will apply is located, and(iii) the leader of the local authority which will make the order.(4) A public spaces protection order granted under this section may come into effect immediately on the fulfilment of the requirements in subsection (2) or (3).(5) Restrictions in section 72(3), that consultation must take place before an order is made, do not apply to public spaces protection orders made under this section.(6) The local authority must carry out the necessary consultation, as defined in section 72, following the making of an order under this section.(7) A fast-track public spaces protection order may not have effect for a period of more than 6 months unless extended under this section.(8) Before the time when a fast-track public spaces protection order is due to expire, the local authority that made the order may extend the period for which it has effect if satisfied on reasonable grounds that doing so is necessary to prevent—(a) occurrence or recurrence after that time of the activities identified in the order, or(b) an increase in the frequency or seriousness of those activities after that time.(9) A fast-track public spaces protection order under this section may not be extended for a period of more than 6 months.””Member’s explanatory statement
This would allow fast-track public spaces protection orders, which can come into effect immediately, to be made for schools and vaccination centres. Usual statutory consultation on the order would still be held, but would not delay the start date of the order.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
My Lords, I start this debate by deploring—I hope the Minister will pass this on—the anti-vaxxers who targeted the home of Sajid Javid MP, the Health Secretary, in early January when his children were there. We all deplore that.
Amendment 104FE fast-tracks public spaces protection orders. It would provide for fast-track public spaces protection orders—what we know as buffer zones—around schools and vaccination centres. It builds on existing powers in the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. It does not create new powers. The Government have already accepted the need for and use of these buffer zones. The amendment simply provides that, in specified circumstances, a buffer zone around a school or vaccination centre can be put in place immediately, without being delayed by a lengthy consultation process. The required consultation process would still take place, but it would do so alongside the operation of the order—community views would still be taken account of and changes would be made to the order as necessary.
Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, as has already been noted, I raised concerns about an earlier version of this amendment in Committee, when I argued that, ultimately, it felt like it was legitimising a climate of demonising protests based on a subjective assessment of whether those protests were politically approved of or not.
Specifically, this new amendment relates to attitudes to Covid vaccines, which I want to look at. To put it beyond any doubt, I support the use of vaccines, although not vaccine passports or mandated vaccines—I say that too—but I do not believe that those who are opposed to vaccines, whether they are tennis players, NHS anaesthetists, fearful pregnant women or even conspiratorial cranks, should be criminalised or discriminated against because of their views, and I am concerned that aspects of that would happen from this amendment.
This new amendment would expand the use of the proposed fast-track public space protection orders beyond activities outside schools to venues providing NHS vaccination services to the public. We all have in mind those scenes—they have already been described—of vaccination centres being invaded, with equipment trashed and abuse shouted and so on. As it happens, like everyone else, I condemn that activity. However, if, as the amendment notes, such activities involve harassment, intimidation or impeding members of the public accessing a service that they want to access or impeding the staff or volunteers providing that service, surely we have laws on the statute book to deal with this, and those laws should be applied.
My question really is: why do we need to use PSPOs, and why are they proposed for non-specified activities outside schools, which could obviously be used, for example, to prohibit anything from leafleting to collecting names on a petition for any cause? In relation to the schools part of the amendment, anti-vaccine issues are not mentioned. I confess that I have long been an opponent of PSPOs. Sadly, I feel, they are used as arbitrary powers, issued by councils acting as though they run fiefdoms. I have written about the issue regularly in council publications such as the Municipal Journal since 2014 when they were brought in.
PSPOs do not ban any particular activities, which is why they are so broadly interpreted, often depending on the pet hates of local councils. Their name is something of a misnomer because, rather than protecting the public, they are used mainly to eject the public from public space, effectively privatising public space. Indeed, they are regularly used as dispersal orders for, for example, groups of individuals “hanging around”, often young people, or for political vigils or leafleters. Often, they are dispersed by authorised private security guards with the power to issue on-the-spot fines—one has to consider who would police the PSPOs in this amendment.
No wonder the civil liberties group the Manifesto Club has warned that PSPOs fundamentally undermine rights of free association and free expression in the public square. Indeed, in 2017, the Home Office recognised the overuse and overreach of PSPO powers and produced amended statutory guidance—but to no discernible effect as they are now being issued at an increased, and rising, rate.
The fast-track PSPOs proposed in this amendment have conditions, but those conditions simply use the phraseology usually associated with the orders in terms of activities that various individuals consider have
“a detrimental effect on the quality of life for pupils and staff”,
or whoever is being discussed. The phrase “detrimental effect on the quality of life” has been critiqued by many opponents of PSPOs as very vague and elastic. It has led councils in recent years to use PSPOs to restrict everything from cycling, charity collecting, rough sleeping, walking dogs without leads, begging and busking. A couple of dozen councils have used that phrase and PSPOs to ban—two of my favourites—swearing and loitering. I do not know whether any noble Lords have ever dropped their kids off at the school gates, but loitering in groups—often involving a little swearing, I confess—is almost a compulsory activity for parents.
More seriously, as the Manifesto Club has regularly noted, the test of “detrimental effect” is an unprecedentedly low legal test for criminal intervention, but there is also no requirement to show any substantial evidence of such detrimental effect. There is no proper democratic oversight locally, with no requirement for PSPOs to be passed through internal scrutiny procedures within a council.
Normally there is a requirement for consultation, but, as has been explained, this amendment would dispense with that. The consultations are usually fairly procedural, and many PSPOs have been passed with as few as 10 respondents. Anyway, in this instance we would remove even the formal need for consultation. Therefore, the PSPO would be issued. It would be signed off, as we have been told, by three people—the police chief officer, the school leadership and the local authority leader—and the public would be consulted only after the order is issued, which is laughable and contemptuous.
Also, there is no workable system for appealing PSPOs locally beyond an appeal to the High Court. Finally, to note the wording of the amendment, these fast-track PSPOs can be issued for activities not just carried on but
“likely to be carried on”,
and that not just have had a detrimental effect but are “likely to have” a detrimental effect. These are weasel words, wholly open to speculation and a pre-crime-like interpretation.
I hope those noble Lords who, on Monday, will oppose the swathe of legislative proposals that threaten to close down protests and chill the rights of free assembly will also oppose this amendment. I find the views of hardcore anti-vax protesters distasteful, nihilistic and absolutely things I would argue against. I actually feel the same about Extinction Rebellion, but that misses the point. We need to be very careful about picking and choosing which protesters we support. If there is a problem of obstruction or any kind of unlawful activity outside schools or vaccine centres it should be dealt with, but I fear this amendment would give succour to the Government ahead of Monday’s battles. I will therefore oppose it.
Lord Walney (CB)
My Lords, surprisingly, my remarks will overlap substantially with the noble Baroness’s speech, although they come from a somewhat different perspective.
I thought that the opening speech from the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, was convincing and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s reply before I make my mind up on how to vote. But it left me wondering whether this approach ought not to be actively considered for extension around not simply schools and vaccination centres but seats of democracy such as Parliament and potentially local councils, where we have seen pretty disgraceful activities that are clearly designed to intimidate elected members—anti-vaccine activists have pursued a highly aggressive strategy. It is notable that that is off the table in the amendment.
There is no reason why this issue should necessarily be covered, but—this is my point of overlap with the noble Baroness—I raise it because I will be listening with interest to what Members of the Opposition and from all sides of the House say about the very controversial measures that are due to come on Monday. I share the concern that we have a real tendency as a House and a legislature to find ourselves in instinctive agreement with measures designed to avoid intimidation from groups whose causes we do not agree with; yet we find ourselves, often subconsciously, contemplating what can be equally intimidatory methods of protest deployed in the name of a cause whose broader case we do agree with. It is really important that we guard against doing that.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, talked about demonising protest—I bet she is looking forward to Monday. The noble Lord, Lord Walney, talked about exclusion zones around Parliament; there are significant powers to protect Parliament from this sort of thing.
As the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, has explained, this amendment is a significantly improved version of the one considered in Committee, with numerous safeguards. Unlike the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, I am “glass half full” man: I think that the safeguards here are actually quite significant, in that it requires the consent of the leadership of any school affected or of the NHS body responsible for any vaccination centre affected and, in addition, of the local police chief. Generally speaking, the police are very averse to making political decisions and siding with one particular protest group against another, so that is a significant safeguard. It also requires the consent of the local authority leader, which is another significant safeguard. The potential for selective protection orders based on the issue being protested about—the one the noble Baroness raised in Committee—is therefore significantly reduced.
In addition, contrary to what the noble Baroness said, the statutory duty to consult the public on the order is not waived at all but can take place concurrently with the order taking effect, if the matter is urgent. It also cannot last more than 12 months; the initial grant is for six months, and it can be extended only once. If only the Government were to take such a reasonable approach to the renewal of orders in other aspect of the Bill.
In the light of recent events such as the invasion of the test and trace centre in Milton Keynes last month, we have seen the importance of such orders and the need for the police to secure intelligence and take action to prevent such interference with the vaccination effort, which does not seem to be going away any time soon. There is ample recent evidence of the need for this amendment, and we support it.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, I start by joining the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, in deploring the anti-vaxxers who stood outside my right honourable friend Sajid Javid’s house. I deplore it every time they disrupt our public services such as schools and hospitals. More recently, they have taken part in some very disruptive and abusive activity. On the point about Parliament made by the noble Lord, Lord Walney, we will of course debate that on Monday.
I actually share the aims of this amendment, and I am grateful for the further opportunity to debate the policing of anti-vax protests and consider the merits of fast-track public space protection orders, or PSPOs. The amendment is very similar to one debated in Committee that sought to provide the fast-track PSPOs to protect schools from harmful protests, but it goes further, also allowing for fast-track PSPOs outside premises providing NHS vaccination services. It also removes the need for a consultation in advance of a PSPO outside these premises being implemented.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, pointed out, I set out in Committee the powers of the police to protect pupils, teachers and staff from disruptive protest activity outside schools, as well as the benefits that some of the new measures in the Bill will bring. Many of these existing or new powers apply also to disruptive protests at vaccination sites. I sympathise with the noble Lord’s intention to protect schools and vaccination sites from harmful protests, but this amendment will not help to achieve that aim. It removes the need for a consultation prior to a PSPO being put in place, instead requiring consent from the relevant school or NHS body, the chief of police, and the leader of the local authority. This is unlikely to materially speed up the process in which a PSPO can be implemented as there is currently no minimum consultation period required before a PSPO can be put in place. I struggle to understand how we can implement the PSPO and run a consultation concurrently.
It is also important to note that in making a PSPO under this amendment a local authority would still be accountable, potentially in legal proceedings, for demonstrating that the order is compliant with Articles 10 and 11 of the ECHR. Consultations can provide supporting evidence to demonstrate this compliance, meaning that a local authority could find itself subject to increased legal risks if it does not perform a consultation prior to implementing a PSPO, even if legislation states that it is not necessary. I share the unease of the noble Lord, Lord Walney, and the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, that it would, at the hands of a very few people, allow local areas to pick and choose which protests were politically acceptable.
Although I support the underlying aims of the amendment, in the sense that no one working at a school, hospital or other vaccination site should be subject to abusive or highly disruptive protests, powers are in place, which we are strengthening through the Bill, to assist the police and others to tackle such protests. We will be discussing many of them on Monday. The powers already include the ability for local authorities to make, at speed, a PSPO. Given this, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, is happy to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her reply and for the courteous way in which she always tries to engage with the issues. I also thank all noble Lords who joined the debate. The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, can call me naive, but I was, though the amendment and the changed amendment, trying to address some of the concerns that she raised, particularly in trying to make it clear that it was not a blanket ban but was dealing with a very specific problem that has resulted in and around some schools—
Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I was reading my speech, but I acknowledge that the noble Lord said that in his opening. It is perhaps an unintended consequence, but can he see from the Minister’s response that it fuels arguments that they will be using on Monday? That was always my concern.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
That is a different point. I accept some of that. It was not what the Minister was saying, but I take the point. The noble Baroness raises legitimate points. I do not agree with her on many of them, which is fine. It is not a problem. It is the whole point of debate and discussion. The fundamental point is that the amendment seeks to do what the public space protection orders do not do. They are not a blanket ban on protests. They do not allow people to pick and choose in the way that some people, including the Minister, have highlighted.
I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and do not believe that school leaders, local authority leaders, NHS vaccine providers and the chiefs of police for an area would pick and choose protests. I do not believe it. The school leaders in our country know and understand what causes alarm and distress to parents and pupils in their area and they would not abuse that power—nor, in 99.9% of cases, would local chiefs of police, NHS vaccine providers or local authority leaders of whatever political party. They are upstanding public servants who understand the responsibility that comes with their post and would not seek to use one of these orders inappropriately, just because there happened to be a protest outside a school.
I was a deputy head teacher. There were numerous protests at different times, about different things. We did not seek to ban or stop them. One occasion was when I reintroduced school uniform. There were people saying how ridiculous it was that Coaker was reintroducing school uniform, but I did not stop them doing that; nor do I believe that school leaders, police chiefs or others in an area would do that.
The amendment seeks, for particular circumstances that we have all seen on our televisions and read about in our newspapers, to give an immediate power for people to act reasonably, not to prevent any protests but to deal with a specific situation where alarm or distress is being caused. Whatever the current law says, it is not dealing with people in that situation. All we seek, in a reasonable way, is to give those people the power, in situations where there is consensus and agreement, to take immediate action to protect those going for a vaccine, or children, staff or parents going to school. It is perfectly reasonable to ask the law to provide that and, because of that, I ask to test the opinion of the House on my amendment.
Lord Blencathra
“(4) Part 6 of Schedule 4 does not have effect unless the College of Policing is re-established under an Act of Parliament.”
Lord Blencathra (Con)
My Lords, this amendment is in my name and those of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, and my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts. I say to my noble friend Lord Sharpe that I am sorry that Ministers in this House once again have to take the brunt of my ire over Home Office matters for which they are not responsible and entirely blameless. I also say to the Government that I am not a natural rebel. I made the mistake of sitting in on the last debate and was utterly convinced by the arguments of the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, but nevertheless as a former Chief Whip felt that I had better support the Government, only because I had not told them in advance that I would rebel.
The College of Policing employs more than 700 people, and last year spent more than £47 million. The Bill, like others before it over the last seven years, gives the college the right to prepare guidelines to be implemented by the police, which will affect the public. In this case, it is pre-trial bail. Your Lordships may have assumed that a body called the College of Policing to which the Home Office has been granting regulatory authority is a statutory body set up by Parliament, and that perhaps you had missed the Bill setting it up when it went through this House. That is what I thought until recently, when I discovered that it has no statutory authority whatever but is a private limited company, limited by guarantee. Not many people know that, as the great Sir Michael Caine denies he ever said. It was announced by the then Home Secretary, Theresa May, on 24 October 2012, and this is what she said—sorry, this is not what she said; it was merely a Written Statement, with no questions asked:
“My Department has now legally incorporated a company limited by guarantee under the name ‘College of Policing Limited’. The college will become operational in December 2012. The college will be established on a statutory basis as soon as parliamentary time allows.”—[Official Report, Commons, 24/10/12; col. 62WS.]
Nine years and 20 Home Office Bills later, there has apparently been no time to put this powerful arm’s-length body on a statutory footing. Do your Lordships believe that this is simply an oversight? I am afraid that I am a cynical person, and I do not. I suggest that it is a deliberate attempt by the Home Office to avoid parliamentary scrutiny for this organisation.
I serve on two arm’s-length bodies and they, like dozens of others, were created by statute. It is not rocket science for the Home Office to simply copy the usual format of 10 to 15 clauses setting out the general powers of the organisation and a schedule with the technical stuff about salaries, appointments and all that sort of thing. Our statute book is full of such creations of statutory arm’s-length bodies. Indeed, the Home Office has done all the homework already; this private company, of course, has a memorandum and articles of association, which Companies House requires. It is not rocket science for the Home Office simply to lift all that from the memorandum and articles of association and add it to a Home Office Bill such as this Christmas tree one, or introduce a new one. I can conclude only that the Home Office has deliberately not done it, and it cannot say that it has had no time to do that after nine years of this limited company operating.
Let me make it clear that I do not challenge the honesty, integrity or desire of the police officers and civilians running this organisation to try to do good and reduce crime. Indeed, in my time as a Police Minister I never met a policeman who did not believe that if he or she had that little bit of extra power—to be able to take the fingerprints and DNA of everyone and keep them on file in case they are needed—they would make a huge difference in cracking down on crime. They are right, of course, but if one were to grant those powers it should be done by Parliament. I do not challenge its honesty and integrity, but I challenge its right to exist as a powerful arm’s-length body without a single minute of parliamentary time, either in the other place or in this House, devoted to considering its establishment, powers, rights and duties.
If I may say so, it gets worse. In a recent Parliamentary Answer, the Home Office confirmed that the college has put in a bid for a royal charter. Can your Lordships imagine that—a private limited company, already exempt from parliamentary creation, getting a royal charter? Who do they think they are? Of course, if it got it and if MPs or Peers—someone like me—then began to question its activity, it would say that it had a royal charter and was above repute, and how dare I question them and to mind my own business. My instinct tells me that this is simply not right.
Lord Judge (CB)
My Lords, I put my name to this amendment because it raises some important and delicate issues. I follow the noble Lord in asking: can we please have a date? Can we at least be told that somebody is considering the position of the College of Policing? As he said, it is a company under the control of the Secretary of State with no statutory basis.
There is no problem with the College of Policing issuing guidance to police officers about how police officers should go about their responsibilities, as that is what it is there for. However, the college, a non-statutory body, is being required or invited by the schedule to this Bill—we are not going to look at that now, because it is too late and we all want to go home and there is a lot more business to come—to issue guidance which will impact on bail decisions. Bail is a question of liberty; it will impact on that. We are told not to worry because there is no liability one way or the other for not following the guidance, but we are also told that a court considering an issue such as this may take into account whether the guidance issued by the College of Policing on this issue has been followed. My point is very simple and very small compared to the major issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra. It is: should instructions or guidance issued by the College of Policing have any impact whatever on a decision made by a court that a citizen should or should not be granted bail?
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)
My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Blencathra. He and I have been chasing down issues with secondary and, tonight, tertiary legislation for some months and have produced reports to that effect that I think have found favour in your Lordships’ House, bearing mind the number of noble Lords who wished to speak in the debate tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Cavendish, last Thursday.
Government by Diktat, the title of a report by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which I chair, is alive and well and living with the situation that my noble friend wishes to remedy. The issues of regulation and guidance, of who provides the guidance and of how enforceable it is are questions with which the SLSC has been struggling. However, if we have been struggling with that, when it comes to this latest idea the guidance will not even touch the sides of the regulatory process of your Lordships’ House. We as a House will be presented with a series of faits accomplish, and unless somebody is able to persuade the usual channels to find time to debate something, we will just be told, “There it is and off we go”.
That is not a satisfactory situation. It is part of a much wider issue of how we deal with secondary and, in this case, tertiary legislation, but my noble friend Lord Blencathra has done a valuable service by bringing this case to the surface. We will make progress in this area only if every time we see this sort of thing emerging we raise it, talk about it and try to deal with it. That is why I support the amendment and put my name to it.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, said, in December 2011 the then Home Secretary announced the establishment of the College of Policing and the Government said that as soon as parliamentary time allowed, the College of Policing would be established as a statutory body, independent of government.
Now it is 10 years later. In addition to supporting what other noble Lords have said, I say that the College of Policing being a limited company undermines its credibility, which is not strong among operational police officers in any event. There is an anti-intellectual culture in the police service and the very name gets operational cops’ backs up. To then see documentation that the college produces marked as copyright of the College of Policing Ltd, an organisation headed by someone called a chief executive rather than a chief constable, further undermines its status and credibility in the eyes of operational police officers.
For these reasons, we support bringing forward legislation this calendar year that would go further than re-establishing the professional body for policing under an Act of Parliament. The college should be renamed and the head of the organisation should have the title “Chief Constable”.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
My Lords, I have listened carefully to this short debate and the points made by the noble Lords, Lord Blencathra and Lord Paddick, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge. It will be interesting to hear what the Minister has to say about placing the College of Policing on a statutory basis. I also listened to the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, and it would be interesting if there were a long debate about pre-charge bail.
However, it is important to say something about the schedule that is mentioned in the amendment. We strongly support the provisions in the Bill on pre-charge bail. The House is aware that the changes that have been brought forward are known as Kay’s law, after Kay Richardson, who was murdered by an abusive ex-partner after he was released when he was under investigation, rather than placed on pre-charge bail. Our concern, picking up the point rightly made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, is that the guidance under Part 6 of Schedule 4 should be clear and effective and should accurately reflect the necessary changes made to the use of pre-charge bail under the Bill.
We understand that this was brought forward as Kay’s law, and all of us will have abhorred the horror of what happened. Notwithstanding that, it will be interesting to hear the Minister’s response to all of that.
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Blencathra for explaining the amendment, which in substance relates to the power conferred on the College of Policing to issue guidance about pre-charge bail. I recognise that my noble friend has made a wider point about the appropriateness of the College of Policing in its current guise issuing any operational guidance to the police.
The set of reforms in Schedule 4 to the Bill, known collectively—as the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, mentioned —as Kay’s law, aims to establish a pre-charge bail system which is fairer and more efficient, with the removal of the presumption against bail and changes to pre-charge bail timescales. My noble friend’s amendment would require the College of Policing to be placed on a statutory footing before it can issue guidance on pre-charge bail. In practical terms, this would mean that the guidance, and therefore the whole pre-charge bail reform package, would need to be delayed while an appropriate legislative vehicle was found for this fundamental change to the college’s status.
Guidance to underpin these changes is essential to secure the effective implementation of the reforms, and I think I should stress again that the guidance is about pre-charge bail, not court-ordered post-charge bail. Policing partners have made it clear throughout the drafting of the provisions that clear statutory guidance aimed at operational experts is required to build a system which is consistently applied across all forces.
I understand that my noble friend’s amendment probes the issue of the College of Policing’s status, but it is important to note that a number of the college’s functions have statutory underpinning. Among other things, Sections 123 to 130 of the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 enable the college to issue codes of practice for chief officers and guidance about the experience, qualification and training of police staff. The provisions in Schedule 4 to the Bill enabling the college to issue guidance about pre-charge bail would thus be an extension of these existing powers.
As the college is the professional body for policing, the Government consider it entirely appropriate that it should be able to issue guidance which police officers are required to have regard to when exercising functions to which the guidance relates. The Government do not believe that the fact that the college is not a body established by statute alters that fact. It is relevant, however, that the guidance to be issued under Part 6 of Schedule 4 is subject to the approval of the Home Secretary, who is, as my noble friend Lord Blencathra said, accountable to Parliament, and must be laid before Parliament. It is therefore open to either House to scrutinise the guidance at any time.
The college does hold the long-term aim of achieving royal charter status, as my noble friend noted, but the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, asked whether its status was being considered in any other ways. It is. The college chair, my noble friend Lord Herbert of South Downs, is currently undertaking a fundamental review of the college, which may include recommendations about its status. Obviously, the Government will consider the recommendations flowing from the review when it is published, but I am afraid I do not know when that will be, to pre-empt any questions.
As I indicated, regardless of the college’s legal status, we believe it is entirely proper that it should be able to issue guidance of this kind to which police officers must have regard. I should reiterate that the practical effect of this amendment would be unacceptably to delay the implementation of these necessary reforms, which, as the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, noted, have wide support and would better help protect the victims of crime. It is crucial that Kay’s law is delivered in a timely way, supported by robust guidance issued by the professional body for policing, and the current provisions do exactly that.
I am afraid that I cannot answer my noble friend Lord Blencathra’s specific question about when space may be found to alter that. I would be surprised if that answer surprised him, but I hope that, having had this opportunity to debate the role and status of the College of Policing, he will be content to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Blencathra (Con)
My Lords, I think that my noble friend has inadvertently answered the question of when it will be done. It is quite clear, reading between the lines, that the Home Office does not intend to do it ever. So do the Home Office, he and the Home Secretary still stand by the promise of the then Home Secretary in 2012 that this would be put on a statutory footing?
If I may say so, the Home Office, in drafting my noble friend’s speech, has been a bit disingenuous. It knows fine I am not opposed to the schedule. The schedule was the mechanism by which we could debate the principle of the college not being on a statutory footing. I discussed this with the Public Bill Office. I looked at various ALBs, including the two of which I am a member, and asked the staff whether I could lift 12 clauses from one of them, change the name to the College of Policing and lift the schedule. They said, “That would be 12 clauses to debate. It would be easier, Lord Blencathra, just to find a mechanism to say that the college must be put on a statutory footing before this schedule is approved.”
I am not opposed to the schedule—no one is. It was a mechanism in order that we could debate the principle. I must say that I am rather concerned by my noble friend’s reply—but also how delighted I am that, on this occasion, the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and I are on the same side, despite some strenuous disagreements in the past few weeks. I must say to my noble friend that, if I had realised, and had had the nous and wit beforehand to discuss with the Lib Dems and possibly the Labour Party what this amendment was about, we could have had agreement tonight and I could have forced it to the vote and won it. Of course, I am not going to do that tonight, but I can tell the Home Office that this issue will not go away. I detect the mood among other parties here, and I hope among my noble friends as well, that we must honour the Home Secretary’s promise to have this body put on a statutory footing.
Lord Beith
Member’s explanatory statement
This is intended to address a potential gap in the law related to other teaching or supervisory positions/ of trust.
Lord Beith (LD)
My Lords, in moving this amendment, I seek to bring music, drama and dance within provisions that the Government have included in the Bill in respect of sport and religion. The Bill takes the Sexual Offences Act 2003 and imports the position of trust of someone who is training in sport or religion into the mechanism of the Sexual Offences Act. That makes the concept of positions of trust apply not simply in institutions such as schools but to individuals carrying out training on a private basis or as part of a community organisation and in any number of other ways.
It has puzzled me from the beginning how the Government have identified sport and religion alone as fields in which abuse can take place—when people who have close personal charge in a training role of a young individual can have undue influence that could be put to the wrong use, as a means of sexual abuse or a route into sexual abuse. I do not know anybody who believes that this problem exists only in the areas of religion and sport and not in other areas where very close contact is involved in training, instruction and development. The Government concede one small part of my amendment by taking the view that dance is already included, which must be true, in the wording of the legislation, if the dance is preparation for “competition or display”. I can imagine that an Irish or Scottish dancing group for which individual training was taking place might well be covered. I am less convinced that professional ballet might be covered; that is an area in which we have seen very serious abuse of people undergoing training by a professional ballet instructor.
It is very difficult to understand why the Government have alighted on those two areas alone and not others, because the characteristics of the situation are very similar in all these different areas of activity. There are some distinctive features but so many similar characteristics: being alone with someone quite a lot; a competitive situation in which the person being trained is desperate to be included in the display or team; a desire to please; and the developing of a close personal relationship. They are all elements that we find in a number of other areas, so I wonder what the Government’s argument is.
I have had very helpful discussions with the Minister, who has been generous with his time and his staff’s attention to this matter. However, despite all his efforts, he has not succeeded in convincing me that the Government have a logical case at all. The argument that the Government resort to is that extending these provisions to music and drama would have the effect of raising the age of consent, so relationships that would not be unlawful at present would become unlawful if we extended them into music and drama. That is a very odd argument because that is precisely what the Government are doing for sport and religion: they say that the danger of predatory sexual activity is so serious that we must protect people aged 16 to 18 from this being done in a training situation, but only if their training is in sport or religion.
I simply do not understand that argument or why, if the Government think it is such a serious objection, they are prepared to do exactly that for sport and religion but not in other areas. If it is because of abuse by sexual predators that such provisions are being considered and provided for those two areas, it makes no sense that these other areas are excluded. However, they can be included subsequently because the Government have given themselves the power by affirmative order in this legislation to add other activities, or indeed to remove either of the two activities currently included.
As I thought about this, I wondered what the circumstances were in which the Government would decide to add one of the areas that I have identified—music teaching or drama teaching—to the condition where people are regarded as having a position of trust when they are engaging in training. What would lead the Government to make that change? It would probably be cases coming to light. Such cases will come to light, because in all these areas we know that, despite many thousands of people conscientiously providing this kind of training, there are those who get into these roles with predatory intent, and others who might be regarded as having done so where perhaps it has arisen more innocently between two relatively young people but in a situation that we cannot simply ignore.
When those cases arise, the question will be asked: why is the perpetrator not being charged as someone in a position of trust would be? The answer will be that the Government decided that we did not need this provision in respect of music or drama, even though we need it for sport and religion. I think future Ministers will find that a very uncomfortable question to deal with from the Dispatch Box when we then point out that cases have arisen that could have been pursued under the kind of provisions that they see as necessary for sport and religion.
The Government are in an illogical position, and their only way out of it is at some point to decide to add other areas to the list. That may come at a time when more bad cases have arisen, and then they will have a difficult case to answer. I invite the Minister to think further about this matter, but for the time being I beg to move.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, as my noble friend Lord Beith explained, the amendment would extend the position of trust to include people who coach, teach, train or instruct on a regular basis in dance, drama and music.
I am sure the Minister will correct me if I am wrong, but I seem to remember him saying in Committee that the Government wanted evidence that these amendments were necessary before they were able to accept them. On 20 October 2021, the Guardian reported that a former ballet teacher and principal dancer at the English National Ballet had been sentenced to nine years in prison for more than a dozen counts of sexual assault against his students—I think that is dance. On 30 September last year the Sun reported that a drama teacher had been convicted of sexually abusing girls as young as 15 over five years, abusing his position of power and targeting teens who wanted to become actresses by sexually assaulting them at the theatre group he had set up in Northamptonshire—I think that is drama. The Edinburgh Evening News reported on 22 December, just last month, that a retired music teacher in Scotland had been sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment for raping and sexually abusing former pupils—I think that is music.
There is the evidence. What is stopping the Government now? We strongly support my noble friend’s amendments.
Lord Pannick (CB)
My Lords, the noble Lords, Lord Beith and Lord Paddick, make a very strong case. Clause 46 addresses a serious mischief: abuse of trust to gain sexual advantage. Like them, I cannot understand why this is to be addressed only in the context of sport and religion and not in the context of dance, drama and music.
I have one other question for the Minister. I also cannot understand why sport is only to be covered in relation to games in which physical skill is the predominant factor. What if there is an abuse of trust by someone who is training young people in chess or bridge? Why is it not equally objectionable if they take sexual advantage of those young people? Why should that not be included within the scope of the offence?
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, for giving those very good and relevant examples of abuses of trust in dance, music and drama. I remember the points that the Minister made when we had this debate in Committee: he did indeed ask for examples, and I thank the noble Lord for providing them.
Surely, the similarity in everything that we are talking about is the nature of the relationship. It is a trusting relationship where a lot of time may well be spent alone with the young person, and it is open to abuse. The Minister had other arguments about why dance, music and drama should not be included, and I would be interested to hear how he rehearses them, given that there is unanimity in the views expressed in today’s debate. I do not know whether the noble Lord will press his amendment to a vote—I think probably not—nevertheless, I will listen to the Minister’s answer.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Beith, for again raising this matter for debate. I am also grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, who is not in her place but who gave up a lot of time last week to discuss this with me and the noble Lord.
I start by clarifying what we mean by a “position of trust” in this context—there may have been some confusion in Committee. The position of trust offences that we are discussing are set out in Sections 16 to 19 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. They are necessarily narrow in scope and were never intended to apply in all scenarios in which a person might have contact with, authority over or a supervisory role over another person, even those aged under 18. Rather, these offences were created to tackle potentially abusive relationships between those under 18 and adults who were in specific positions of trust.
The existing positions of trust, as set out in Section 21 of the 2003 Act, were so drafted in an attempt to capture situations where the young person had a high level of dependency on the adult involved, often combined with some vulnerability. These included those caring for a young person in a residential care home, hospital, school or educational institution. In these contexts, the power dynamic is such that Parliament considered that any sexual activity should be criminalised.
The law was created, therefore, in recognition of the risk inherent in these types of position and the power the individual could have over the young person, which could impact on and affect the young person’s ability to consent. As such, the offences are committed as soon as the adult in one of these specified positions engages in sexual activity with the young person they are caring for; there is no need to prove any abuse or actual manipulation.
Lord Beith (LD)
To clarify, is the noble Lord saying that when the department looked into this matter it discovered more evidence in respect of sport and religion than in other fields, or some specific evidence that made it clear that this was much more likely to occur in sport or religion?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
As I say, we discussed this with a wide range of people, and it seemed to us from looking at all the material that sport and religion are the particular areas where law at the moment should intervene. I was coming to this point. The noble Lord presented the amendment saying, “Abuse can take place in other relationships too”, and of course he is absolutely right. However, abuse can take place where there is no relationship at all, and I am afraid it can take place in lots of different relationships. The question here is when the law should intervene to prohibit automatically, regardless of the particular 17 or 19 year-old and whether any abuse is taking place, to prevent any sexual contact. For those reasons, we consider that at the moment, we should intervene—I will come to the delegated power—in sport and religion only. Those settings involve high levels of trust, influence, community recognition, power and authority, and these figures are often well-established, trusted and respected in the community.
The report of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse found that religious organisations
“may have a significant or even dominant influence on the lives of millions of children”
and that
“what marks religious organisations out from other institutions is the explicit purpose they have in teaching right from wrong.”
Also, both sport and religion can provide a young person with a strong sense of belonging, whether in a team, a squad, a community or a faith. Such deep feelings held by the young can provide unique opportunities for predators to exploit or manipulate and can make it more difficult for the young person or concerned relatives to report abuse.
With respect to sport specifically, the physical nature of the activities means that coaches often ostensibly have legitimate reason physically to touch the children and young persons they are coaching. A sports coach will often have opportunities for closer and more prolonged physical contact compared with other roles, and this can be manipulated by abusers. That is why, to respond to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, the 18 and a half year-old tennis coach would be prohibited from having a relationship with a 17 and a half year-old tennis student, but the 18 and a half year-old chess coach could have such a relationship —assuming for these purposes that chess is not a sport; I do not need to decide that because it is a physical definition that is in the Act—because there is not that scope, ostensibly, for a physical relationship.
The noble Lord’s amendment addresses dance specifically. Again, let me reassure him that the definition of “sport” in Clause 46 includes types of physical recreation engaged in
“for purposes of competition or display”.
We consider that this includes dance.
On the delegated power for the Secretary of State to amend new Section 22A, we accept that new evidence may emerge that may justify legislating further. Let me reassure the House and put it on record that this power will not be used lightly, but nor will we wait until instances of abuse are brought to our attention. We will proactively monitor data on child sexual abuse to ensure that we have the evidence needed to inform policy and act decisively where required, including evidence relating to the nature of roles and the institutional or organisational context, the level of power and control, other factors which we have seen contribute to abuse including opportunities for extensive unsupervised contact, and any inherent risks posed to young people as well as any data on incidents of concern. We are establishing channels through which partners such as the police, the CPS and local authorities can share emerging evidence and highlight patterns of behaviour.
Some of the behaviour that has been mentioned this evening and in Committee is already covered under other offences within the Sexual Offences Act 2003. Let us be clear: sexual activity with someone under the age of 16 is a crime. Non-consensual sexual activity such as rape is obviously a crime. I certainly heard the word “rape” in at least one example mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. We are not talking about that—that is the point—because rape is already a crime. We are talking about sexual activity which would otherwise be lawful and consensual. I did not quite catch all the examples, but one cited was from a newspaper in Scotland where somebody had done something. How old was the person? If they were under 16, it is already caught. Was there consent? If there was not, it is already caught. One has to be careful when one is talking about evidence. We will be proactive in looking for that evidence and, for the avoidance of any doubt, we will of course re-read the examples that he gave us.
I accept that Clause 46 does not represent everybody’s preferred approach, but we believe that, on the material that we have at the moment, our approach strikes the appropriate balance between the protection of young people and the sexual freedoms and rights otherwise granted to 16 and 17 year-olds, while still allowing for rapid responses to emerging patterns of abuse in the future. For those reasons, I respectfully invite the noble Lord to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Paddick (LD)
Before the Minister sits down, can he clarify two points? First, is he saying that those people who teach drama, music and dance should be allowed to exploit their positions up until the point that they rape or indecently assault somebody, or does he agree with my noble friend that action should be taken to prevent that in the first place? Secondly, what is to stop a teacher of a young person who wants to engage in sexual activity with them distancing themselves from their teaching role to enable that to take place? How on earth does this amendment change the age of consent?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
I am struggling with that second point, but let me try to answer the first. On whether I am saying that anybody should be allowed to exploit a young person, the answer is no. Frankly, I do not understand how the noble Lord has reached that conclusion. There is nothing in the provisions about justifying exploitation or abuse up to the point of rape and assault. Maybe this is the confusion that he is under in relation to the second question. At the moment, if someone is caught in a position of trust—let us say, for example, a minister of religion who is 18 and a half—that person is prevented from having any sexual contact with, say, a 17 and a half year-old congregant. Before that person was ordained or appointed to the position as a minister of religion, that person could have had a sexual relationship with a 17 and a half year-old. That is why I am talking about changing the age of consent, because that 17 and a half year-old is able to sleep with an 18 and a half year-old but not if that 18 and a half year-old is, for example, her minister of religion. I hope that answers the noble Lord’s second question, although I confess I did not quite understand it because, if I may say so, it seemed to proceed from a fundamental misapprehension of what we are talking about.
Lord Beith (LD)
My Lords, one thing I want to say in response to the Minister is that, as I said earlier, there are many thousands of people engaged in the training of young people in many contexts, but particularly in some of these fields very close contact and continuous interchange is involved, including activities in which the contact is physical. That applies not just to sport but to teaching someone how to hold their violin and their violin bow; it applies to all sorts of activities. There are spheres too in which the relationship is affected by the authority of the training person, the desire to please that person and to be successful in the activity. The more the Minister described those activities, the more it seemed that what he described happens not just in sport and religion but in many other areas as well.
It is important that we remind society that vast numbers of people are engaged in this kind of training work entirely selflessly and giving great service to young people. They are people we recognise and support. A very small number of people do everybody else so much damage by the kind of abuse referred to in the course of the debate. Unfortunately, we still have to deal with it, which means we have to talk about it, debate it and devise laws that work for that purpose.
I would much have preferred to see a wider clause that used the concept of a position of trust in a series of places in which it is clearly relevant. The Government have preferred to retain power by statutory instrument to make extensions to the list, and the Minister, in response to my request, tried to give a bit more indication of the sort of circumstances involved. He has said that they are not just waiting for cases; they will look to the views and experience of organisations in the field. That could usefully be done. If organisations in any of the fields I have talked about respond to the Government by saying, “Yes, it would help us in our disciplinary and regulatory arrangements if this power was extended”, then I hope that is the kind of information that might lead Ministers to come before the House to make use of those powers. I certainly do not want them to be waiting for cases. I am serious in my concern that some cases will arise where abuse has taken place that otherwise falls within the definitions in this clause but where the position of trust appellation has not been applied because it is in one of the other groups—it is not sport or religion.
This is a serious problem that undermines the wonderful work that so many people do with young people, and the wonderful achievements of those young people in sport, drama, music and the arts. We have to keep it under continuous review but, at this stage, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
“Voyeurism: breast-feeding
(1) Section 67A of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (voyeurism: additional offences) is amended as follows.(2) After subsection (2) insert—“(2A) A person (A) commits an offence if—(a) A operates equipment,(b) A does so with the intention of enabling A or another person (C), for a purpose mentioned in subsection (3), to observe another (B) while B is breast-feeding a child, and(c) A does so—(i) without B’s consent, and(ii) without reasonably believing that B consents.(2B) A person (A) commits an offence if—(a) A records an image of another (B) while B is breast-feeding a child,(b) A does so with the intention that A or another person (C) will look at the image for a purpose mentioned in subsection (3), and(c) A does so—(i) without B’s consent, and(ii) without reasonably believing that B consents.”(3) In subsection (3), for “and (2)” substitute “to (2B)”. (4) After subsection (3) insert—“(3A) In this section a reference to B breast-feeding a child includes B re-arranging B’s clothing—(a) in the course of preparing to breast-feed the child, or(b) having just finished breast-feeding the child.(3B) It is irrelevant for the purposes of subsections (2A) and (2B)—(a) whether or not B is in a public place while B is breast-feeding the child,(b) whether or not B’s breasts are exposed while B is breast-feeding the child, and(c) what part of B’s body—(i) is, or is intended by A to be, visible in the recorded image, or(ii) is intended by A to be observed.””Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause creates new offences of recording images of, or otherwise observing, breast-feeding without consent or a reasonable belief as to consent. To be guilty of the offence the perpetrator must be acting for the purpose of obtaining sexual gratification or of humiliating, alarming or distressing the victim.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, in moving government Amendment 107A, I first thank sincerely all those in both Houses who have campaigned on this important issue, particularly the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and all those who spoke in the debate in Committee in this House. I know that she wanted to be here this evening, but I am afraid the hour has prevented her doing so. It is right to put on record my thanks for the tireless work she has done in this area, and for the time she gave on a number of occasions to discuss this issue with me. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, has also been extremely helpful on this point, and I thank them for joining me in putting their names to the amendment.
I made it clear in Committee that the Government supported the aims of the original amendment put down by the noble Baroness but considered that it was too broadly drawn and would capture conduct that ought not to be criminalised. In particular, I explained in a series of to-and-fro discussions with the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, that the issue of intention needed to be more carefully addressed.
Lord Pannick (CB)
As the Minister said, the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, is unable to be in her place tonight. She has asked me to say that she joins me in thanking the Minister, who has engaged with us sympathetically on this topic and secured this welcome change in the law. That is a tribute to his persuasive powers not just in this House but in government.
I hope that the Minister’s remarks tonight will receive as much publicity as his speech in Committee, which, as he said, featured not just in Hansard but elsewhere. He mentioned his appearance—or his remarks’ appearance—on “Have I Got News for You”; well, the news tonight is that this amendment has achieved a welcome change in the law that will be appreciated not just by breastfeeding women but by their partners and relatives.
Lord Blencathra (Con)
My Lords, I intervene to ask my noble friend a question. I listened carefully to what he said and I completely support the amendment, but does it go far enough? I cannot find any excuse or justification for anyone who is not a family member to take any photographs of a woman breastfeeding. It would seem from what my noble friend said on the amendment that mens rea has to be proved—there has to be a proven intent to get sexual gratification from it—but why should that be the case? In my view, there can be no justification for anyone outside the family—a stranger—to want to photograph a woman doing this. This is a simple question from my simple little mind.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, we welcome the Government’s decision to accept the force of the amendment pursued by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, and supported by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, to outlaw this unpleasant practice and introduce this amendment.
Over recent years, we have achieved considerable progress in the area of taking, procuring or disclosing what I would generically call voyeuristic images. Revenge porn was outlawed under the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015, and this was finally extended to threats to disclose intimate images in the Domestic Abuse Act last year. The unpleasant practice of upskirting was outlawed by the Voyeurism (Offences) Act in 2019.
Recording images of breastfeeding mothers is another example of voyeurism. It is easy to forget, certainly when the practice is made light of, that this is demeaning, embarrassing and humiliating for a breastfeeding mother. It is also frightening, because the mother is in a uniquely vulnerable position. A mother who is breastfeeding, if she is being photographed, is left in the entirely invidious position that she can either stop, in which case she has to close or adjust her clothing, giving more subjects to the photographer and depriving her infant of food, or go on and continue the agony of being photographed. That is a horrible position for a mother to be in.
We agree that this is a serious issue. These amendments are directed at an arrogant and frankly misogynistic practice. It is right to criminalise it for the protection of the women affected and we fully support the two amendments.
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
We wholeheartedly welcome this, and we welcome how the Minister can laugh at himself and bring good humour to this. I think it is okay to have a sense of humour about this issue; what matters is that we are finally dealing with it. This really is important. Encouragingly, breastfeeding rates are improving in this country; over 80% of women start to breastfeed their baby when they are born, but the rates fall quite dramatically, with around 25% continuing at six weeks. There are lots of reasons for that, but one of them is about feeling uncomfortable breastfeeding in public. We should be doing everything we can to normalise breastfeeding and make breastfeeding mothers feel welcome and supported, wherever and however they choose to feed their babies.
There are two amendments in this grouping: one is the government amendment, which we completely support, and there is also the issue about needing to show intent for sexual gratification or humiliation. It was thoughtful of the Government to include that word, and I just want assurance that the perception of humiliation that ought to matter is that of the woman breastfeeding and being photographed. That ought to be sufficient to prove that there was an intent to humiliate. I would welcome some clarification from the Minister on that point.
We warmly welcome this measure. Breastfeeding women will be very pleased that the Government have come to a place where they see things in the way that they do.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I am very grateful for the warm words from across the House and for the support this amendment has received. I will pick up a couple of the points made. First, I respectfully agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman, that we want to normalise and support—to use her verbs—women who are breastfeeding; that is very important. It is a matter for my department in this legislation and for other government departments in other areas. That is certainly our aim.
I will try to answer the question put by my noble friend Lord Blencathra. This amendment is modelled on the upskirting offence in the Voyeurism (Offences) Act 2019. We want—without getting myself on “Have I Got News for You” for a second time—to avoid capturing people within the offence who ought not to be captured. Let me try to give a different example. The point made by my noble friend was about forgetting intention and purpose. The problem there, for example, could be that if you were running CCTV in a children’s play area and a mother was breastfeeding, you would be taking images of her; you would not have her consent, nor any reasonable basis to think that she was consenting to being filmed. Therefore, you could be committing a criminal offence. That is why here, just like the upskirting offence, there has to be a purpose of sexual gratification or humiliating, alarming or distressing the person photographed.
The noble Baroness asked me about “humiliating”. I again thank her for spotting that word, which comes from the other Act. It is a really important word. I will put it this way: the fact that the person subjectively feels humiliated does not necessarily mean that it is done for the purpose of humiliation. There is not a one-for-one correlation. However, any court will have to ask the question: was this for the purpose of humiliation? That is a question for the court to decide. You look at the circumstances objectively. The fact that the person feels very humiliated is a very important part of answering that question. But I cannot go so far as to say that the subjective feeling of humiliation necessarily answers the legal question. I hope that has answered the noble Baroness’s question. This is an issue that arises in other areas of criminal law as well. Without delaying the House, I hope that that is a sufficient answer for this evening. I am very happy to engage with the noble Baroness further on this.
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
I appreciate that and understand what the Minister is saying. Is he saying that, if it could be reasonably expected that a breastfeeding woman would feel humiliated in the particular circumstances, that would be interpreted as humiliation? On the point about the CCTV, I think most breastfeeding women would not feel humiliated in that circumstance.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
The question which has to be asked is: was this done for the purpose of humiliating the woman breastfeeding? To answer that you would look at all the relevant circumstances. I would suspect that, rather like the upskirting offence, in the vast majority of cases the question almost answers itself, given our experience from upskirting.
In this area, as in all areas, if, once the offence has gone into the law, it turns out that there is a problem in prosecuting—for this reason or any other—we will keep it under review, because our intention is to stop the conduct, to make it criminal and thereby punish people who engage in it—but, I hope, to stop it. If there are problems, we will keep it under review, and I am very happy to continue the conversation on that. I will draw my remarks to a close and invite the House to support the amendment.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
“Time limit for prosecution of common assault or battery in domestic abuse cases
After section 39 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 insert—
“39A Time limit for prosecution of common assault or battery in domestic abuse cases(1) This section applies to proceedings for an offence of common assault or battery where—(a) the alleged behaviour of the accused amounts to domestic abuse, and(b) the condition in subsection (2) or (3) is met.(2) The condition in this subsection is that—(a) the complainant has made a witness statement with a view to its possible admission as evidence in the proceedings, and(b) the complainant has provided the statement to—(i) a constable of a police force, or(ii) a person authorised by a constable of a police force to receive the statement.(3) The condition in this subsection is that—(a) the complainant has been interviewed by—(i) a constable of a police force, or(ii) a person authorised by a constable of a police force to interview the complainant, and(b) a video recording of the interview has been made with a view to its possible admission as the complainant’s evidence in chief in the proceedings.(4) Proceedings to which this section applies may be commenced at any time which is both—(a) within two years from the date of the offence to which the proceedings relate, and(b) within six months from the first date on which either of the conditions in subsection (2) or (3) was met.(5) This section has effect despite section 127(1) of the Magistrates’ Court Act 1980 (limitation of time).(6) In this section—“domestic abuse” has the meaning given by section 1 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021;“police force” has the meaning given by section 3(3) of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985;“video recording” has the meaning given by section 63(1) of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999;“witness statement” means a written statement that satisfies the conditions in section 9(2)(a) and (b) of the Criminal Justice Act 1967.(7) This section does not apply in relation to an offence committed before the coming into force of section (Time limit for prosecution of common assault or battery in domestic abuse cases) of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment extends the time limit for commencing proceedings for an offence of common assault or battery in certain cases where the alleged behaviour of the accused amounts to domestic abuse.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, this government amendment meets a commitment to bring forward proposals on Report to address concerns that the time limit for bringing prosecutions for common assault or battery involving domestic abuse is unfairly short. I am very grateful that, joining my name on this amendment are the names of the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, and the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross.
In response to the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lady Newlove in Committee, we acknowledged that such cases are disproportionately likely to time out. I am pleased now to present our solution to this problem—in the form of government Amendment 107B —to the House.
Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for what he has just said and for the actions he has taken. I thank his colleague in the other place, Victoria Atkins, for having given the original commitment, and I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Stewart, who responded in a very positive way to the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, in Committee.
I also particularly thank Yvette Cooper in another place because the beginning of this was when one of her constituents came to her who had suffered an assault and had been timed out. That was really the first time that Yvette Cooper had come across this; it was one of those problems that was hidden in plain sight. It took a series of freedom of information requests to try to get the necessary information to understand the nature of the problem and, indeed, the scale of it. If this was not a government amendment and we were still trying to persuade the Government, I would have stood up to say, “I do not rise to speak briefly, because I am going to make 12,982 different points”, as that is the number of cases of alleged common assault that were timed out within a five-year period. That was revealed by the freedom of information requests, albeit only 70% of the police forces that received the FoI requests actually bothered to respond, so that number is probably an underestimate.
I am extremely grateful for this. The noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, would have been here, but she was sitting at the back earlier, doing her impression of the young noble Lord, Lord Young of Graffham, in his usual place, with a large cushion behind her, because her back has been giving her a lot of problems, so she has gone back to her hotel to rest it. On her behalf, I pay tribute to the work that she has done and thank her for having put it forward in Committee.
In a very helpful online call with the Minister, in which he explained what the Government were intending to do, we discussed how it is one thing to have laws, and laws which are well intended, but laws which are well intended, even forensic, are of little use if they are not applied properly and understood effectively. The issue we must focus on is when the police start responding in a different way to some of these allegations of assault. The ability to understand the exact nature of what is required and the ability to move very quickly to get it into a form where it is prosecutable within the six-month time limit is extremely important. I thank the Minister and the Government for this amendment, but can the Minister ensure that the combination of the Ministry of Justice, the Home Office, the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council will keep a really close eye on the enactment of this new legislation, to ensure that what we hope and intend should happen is happening, and that if it is not proceeding as we hoped and intended, to keep that under review and, if necessary, adjust it? Again, I thank the Government very much for bringing this amendment forward.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, we add our thanks to the Minister to those of the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, for his approach to changing the time limit for common assault prosecutions in the context of domestic abuse, and for engaging with us on this and other issues over the last few weeks.
It is clearly a sensible compromise for the six-month time limit to start from the first formal step in criminal proceedings of taking a witness statement or a formal recorded interview. We understand the reason for retaining the overall time limit of two years. It is a compromise in these cases between the need for finality and recognition that it frequently takes some time for victims—generally women in these cases—to report assaults formally, even though, as the noble Lord said, they may have some sort of informal interaction with the police at an earlier stage. We warmly support this amendment and thank the Government for coming to this view.
Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)
My Lords, I was sitting in the City of Westminster magistrates’ court yesterday with our Bench chairman, Jane Smith, who was aware of this government concession. We had a very constructive discussion about how welcome it was. In Westminster magistrates’ court we have a specialist DA court, which is not that common among magistrates’ courts. While the noble Lord, Lord Russell, described the problem cleverly—in the best sense; I mean that as I say it—as being hidden in plain sight, it is a problem that we see regularly in that court. It shows that when the Government listen and move quickly, that does get wider recognition. This was certainly recognised and appreciated by my Bench chairman.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I am very grateful for the support that the amendment has received across the House. This ought to be a cross-party issue and I am very pleased that it has been. I repeat my thanks to all those who worked with me and my ministerial colleagues to get this amendment before the House this evening. As it is a cross-party matter, it is quite right for me also to thank Yvette Cooper in the other place, who did a lot of work on this issue. Sometimes parties do not matter; it is about the work that we do. I thank her for getting the ball rolling on this very important issue.
We will keep the matter under review, as we do with all legislation, and certainly for something such as this. Again, I do not want to take the House’s time, although this is an important topic. I instead invite the House to join me in supporting the amendment.
Lord Rooker
“Application of Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 to National Food Crime Unit of Food Standards Agency
In the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, after section 114B, insert—“114C Application to National Food Crime Unit of Food Standards AgencyThe Secretary of State may by regulations apply any provisions of this Act to investigation of offences conducted by officers of the National Food Crime Unit in respect of search and seizure.”” Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment is intended to avoid the police having to obtain these powers from a court on behalf of NFCU. The officers dealing with offences could present the case.
Lord Rooker (Lab)
My Lords, I beg to move Amendment 109A, which proposes a new clause. I freely admit that the content of what I am about to say is really nothing to do with the Bill; the Bill is a vehicle for a change quite unconnected with its main thrust. Oh! You can forget to take your mask off.
During Oral Questions on 22 February, I raised the issue of food-related crime and the resources devoted to it. The then Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, pointed out that the Food Standards Agency constituted the National Food Crime Unit in 2014 and that Ministers were in dialogue about increasing its powers. Indeed, in his supplementary answer later he went further and said that
“its investigatory powers could be enhanced and its impact improved. That is the view of the Government, industry and the police, and that is why we are committed to the dialogue, first suggested by the Kenworthy review”.—[Official Report, 22/2/21; col. 614.]
The food crime unit’s work is about tackling serious organised or complex cases of food crime. The unit, and indeed the Food Standards Agency—which, of course, is a non-ministerial department—can use the powers of RIPA and CHIS, and the unit can access the police national computer and the automatic number plate recognition system. But in key aspects, the unit cannot get into the serious complex cases without the support of hard-pressed partners in policing and local government.
The police have never taken food crime seriously and admit that it is not a high priority. I first came across food crime when I went into MAFF in 1997. I had the same issue when I arrived at Defra a dozen years later. I am not criticising; this is the reality. It is not counted as proper crime, yet billions of pounds are involved—and what is more, there is the risk to public health. There is an issue there.
Delays owing to competing higher-risk police priorities have proven detrimental to a number of food crime unit investigations. The unit needs the powers to be able to go to the courts rather than have the police doing it once removed. In fact, all the unit needs is access to the powers in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act. There have been some cases in the recent past where the police have been unable, unavailable or reluctant to apply for warrants on behalf of the unit. There have been delays when the food crime unit has had to wait for police officers to become available or when police withdrew support because of other priorities.
The gangmasters authority, among others, has secured these powers. In fact, my amendment is a straight copy of the amendment put into the Police and Criminal Evidence Act on its behalf, so I did not have any trouble drafting anything. Of course, the Public Bill Office was incredibly helpful, but I am just following a process that has happened before.
The lack of these powers is affecting staff in the unit due to it being a real constraint. The officers of the unit, none of whom I have spoken to, are well qualified to present cases directly. They consist of ex-police officers of very senior rank, ex-National Crime Agency officers and ex-police intelligence officers, so they are fully qualified in other circumstances to go to court to get the warrants. We are talking about seizure and search; that is the limit of what is in the amendment. The former chair of the Food Standards Agency, Heather Hancock, has said that the National Food Crime Unit cannot do its job relying on the kindness of the police to lend their powers in important cases.
Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)
My Lords, I am delighted to be able to support this amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, whose knowledge on this subject is extensive. He has set out his case, and I agree with his arguments.
As has been demonstrated throughout the passage of the Bill, the police are overworked and stretched to their limit. Food crime is not at the top of their list of priorities. A couple of years ago, I went out with the district council’s environmental health officer. Although most of the premises that we visited were providing good-quality catering facilities to both residents in homes and the general public, we visited one that had been closed due to the intervention of the police and the council, in a successful prosecution, for providing food that was unfit for human consumption. This was a very minor case, but it took several attempts before the police were eventually brought on board.
Given the increase in serious crime that the police are now facing, it is not surprising that they are unable to support the National Food Crime Unit in the way that the FSA would like. As the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, indicated, the available information shows that, in 2020, more than 30 operations were opened, while 40 were already running. This is clearly more than the police can deal with, given their current resources.
Organised crime has long tentacles, and that includes food crime. Surely it is better for the FCU to be able to apply directly to the courts than for the public to be put at risk by food crime. The FCU has to wait for the police to support it. Delays will occur, and some crimes will go unpunished. The Food Standards Agency supports this amendment. I hope that the Minister will be able to offer his support to it and allow the National Food Crime Unit to get on with its job unhindered.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, as other noble Lords have just said, serious and organised food crime can have very serious consequences. To free up scarce police resources by giving the National Food Crime Unit the powers that it needs seems sensible. According to the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, the National Police Chiefs’ Council supports this change, so I am looking forward to hearing from the Minister what I am missing, because I cannot immediately see any reason why this amendment should not be accepted.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
As has been said, this amendment raises the issue of food-related crime and the powers and resources available to tackle it. I will make just one or two comments that may seem almost irrelevant, in view of the very strong case that my noble friend Lord Rooker has already made, as we anticipated he would.
As my noble friend said, the National Food Crime Unit, which is part of the Food Standards Agency, works to tackle serious organised cases of food-related crime. My noble friend Lord Rooker powerfully and persuasively made the case that there are blocks on the powers that the unit can access and that it is often reliant on the police, who are overstretched across competing priorities, to be able to use certain powers or apply for warrants, for example. The amendment that my noble friend has moved would allow the unit to access powers directly, under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, rather than waiting for police support to become available.
I will spell out exactly the Oral Question that my noble friend asked in February last year:
“My Lords, does the Minister accept that the National Food Crime Unit is operating against organised crime with its hands tied? Investigations are being hampered. Does the Minister agree that investigation powers should be strengthened to include powers to collect the necessary evidence to a higher standard? In other words, will the Government agree that the Police and Criminal Evidence Act powers should be granted to the National Food Crime Unit? The National Police Chiefs’ Council agrees to this to remove the burden from local police forces, which actually agree that food crime is not a high priority.”
As my noble friend said, the Minister replied:
“The noble Lord entirely has a point. I completely agree with him that the National Food Crime Unit has a formidable task ahead of it and that its investigatory powers could be enhanced and its impact improved. That is the view of the Government, industry and the police, and that is why we are committed to the dialogue”.—[Official Report, 22/2/21; col. 614.]
That is what the Government said in reply.
We welcome this commitment and would have given appropriate support to a resulting legislative process, which is why we are supportive of what my noble friend Lord Rooker seeks to achieve with this amendment. The Government have thus previously recognised that this is a problem, but what action has been taken so far since that clear recognition, which was repeated last February? Will the Government now accept the amendment my noble friend has moved? If not, why not?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, for raising this important matter. I acknowledge that there is considerable experience of the Food Standards Agency in your Lordships’ House. We support, in principle, the proposal to increase the investigative powers available to the National Food Crime Unit. The fraud cases of which we have been made aware by the chair of the Food Standards Agency, Professor Susan Jebb—as referred to by the noble Lord—are truly shocking.
Food crime is a very serious issue, with fraud in our food supply chains costing billions of pounds each year. The National Food Crime Unit, which was established to investigate these crimes, should be empowered to tackle them, to improve the response to these cases and to reduce the burden on its colleagues in law enforcement. As such, we are still committed to working with the Food Standards Agency and DHSC, its sponsoring department, on extending certain Police and Criminal Evidence Act powers to the National Food Crime Unit. However, in doing so, we need to work through the implications of this. It may assist the noble Lord if I briefly set out some of the issues we think we would need to explore further.
First, the exercise of any PACE powers by the National Food Crime Unit must be necessary, proportionate and legitimate. As such, it is important that there are suitable governance, accountability, oversight, investigations and complaints arrangements in place, as there are for the police. The National Food Crime Unit is not a statutory body, nor does it have a separate legal identity. Oversight, governance and the complaints processes sit with the Food Standards Agency board, which commissions independent reviews and facilitates a complaints process which ultimately reports to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman. There is therefore no formal independent oversight.
There is also a lack of clarity on the necessary protocols when PACE powers would be exercised, including in relation to post-incident procedures on seizure, retention and evaluation of evidence, and the treatment of arrested persons without police presence. These are all issues which, I have no doubt, can be resolved but I am sure noble Lords would agree on the necessity of ensuring that the appropriate accountability and governance arrangements are in place, given that we are dealing with intrusive powers of the state. As such, we do not believe that it would be appropriate to extend the search and seizure powers in PACE to the National Food Crime Unit without further consultation on the issues I have described. I do not think the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, misses very much, but that is the answer to his question.
I reassure the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, that we are committed to taking this work forward with the Food Standards Agency. I do not have a specific answer to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, on where the dialogue is at the moment. On that basis, I hope that the noble Lord will be content to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Rooker (Lab)
I remind the House that I said that the Food Standards Agency, and therefore the unit, can use the powers of RIPA and the CHIS Act that we passed last year. We are not dealing with some little quango here; this is a government department. If the Government were serious, between February last year and today they would have sorted this out.
I have not campaigned on this. I left it in February and thought, “All I have to do is wait until a vehicle comes along and check if it has been dealt with or not.” The fact is that I am not going to let the Minister get away with it. Someone is going to have to go to the members of the FSA board, and therefore the unit, and say to them, “The Government stopped this change.” When the next big scandal comes along—there are scandals of different scales, and it is nine years since horsemeat so we are due another any time now—no one over there will be able to say, “We were going to do this but Lord Rooker withdrew the amendment.” As such, I am going to test the opinion of the House.