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Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Wendy Morton)
Along with Department officials, I am in regular dialogue with South Western Railway about its service levels. I have also recently met all managing directors of the train operating companies, including the managing director of South Western Railway, to discuss service provision, among other key industry topics.
Fleur Anderson
I am glad the Minister is holding meetings with South Western Railway, as Putney residents have faced dreadful service from SWR for years, with overcrowding, delays and the cancellation of trains. Currently, they are on a temporary timetable—a chaos omicron timetable. The Prime Minister announced in Prime Minister’s Question Time that that timetable would end on 19 February, but that seems to be news to SWR. Did he inadvertently mislead the House?
Wendy Morton
As I explained to the hon. Lady, my officials and I are in regular dialogue with SWR, working hard on the issue of services, because we absolutely understand that it is what matters to passengers right across the country. Services will be restored as soon as possible.
Chris Loder (West Dorset) (Con)
I very much welcome the news from the Prime Minister yesterday that services in Dorset and across the west country will be returned on 19 February. Will the Minister share with the House how we got to the place where an entire region of the United Kingdom—Somerset, Dorset, Wiltshire and Devon—had its direct service to London completely severed and slashed in half, without MPs even being told about it?
Wendy Morton
I assure my hon. Friend that the Department continues to work closely with rail operators, as we work through mitigating the impact of staff absences on rail services. I assure him that the current temporary rail timetable is exactly that—temporary—but it is providing passengers, especially the country’s key workers, with certainty, so that they can plan as much as possible, with the confidence that we want. I really hope that as staffing pressures start to ease, alongside passenger demand increasing, we will see those rail services, which are key, starting to increase accordingly.
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
I am sure that the whole House will join me in wishing my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) a speedy recovery from covid.
Rail commuters in towns and suburbs across the land did their patriotic duty: they stayed home when asked by the Government at the start of the pandemic. They were told after that that if they did not go back to work, they were shirkers. Then, before Christmas, the Government asked them to stay home again. Now, on their return, they find that fares, including on South Western Railway, have risen by nearly 4%, on a reduced service. Do this Government take rail commuters for fools?
Wendy Morton
We absolutely do take passengers—[Laughter.] We absolutely do take passengers very, very seriously. I assure the hon. Gentleman of that, and I am not taking any nonsense such as the language he is using, not given the amount of support that this Government have shown to the rail industry throughout the omicron situation and the covid-19 pandemic more broadly.
Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)
Clearly taking its lead from South Western Railway, Southern has suspended all direct trains on the Brighton line into Victoria, meaning that my constituents along the south way have to change twice, which they calculate is adding about a third to their commuting times. That is completely unacceptable. Given the special funding arrangements between the Department for Transport and Govia Thameslink Railway, what compensation can be given to my constituents or, better still, what pressure can the Minister bring to bear on that company to provide a decent service again, at last?
Wendy Morton
I share my hon. Friend’s frustration and, as I said in response to earlier questions, we have been supporting the industry heavily throughout covid-19. During the omicron part of the pandemic, the industry has been handling staff absences, but this is absolutely about getting those services back up and running as soon as possible. I assure him that that is what we continue to focus on.
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Trudy Harrison)
Online services continue to operate normally. The DVLA has introduced new online services, recruited extra staff and secured extra premises.
Mike Amesbury
In the past three months alone, I have received 26 complaints about delays at the DVLA—
Mike Amesbury
I know that this is reflected right across the House. One of those complaints came from Greta. Greta has ill health, she is disabled and she is reliant on her vehicle. Will the Minister intervene? Let us turbocharge this process, not only for my constituents, but for those of Members right across the House.
Trudy Harrison
I assure the House that online applications are not subject to delays and customers usually receive the documents within two to three days. We strongly encourage customers to use online services where possible. I pay tribute to the DVLA staff who have worked overtime and provided extra resources and extra sites. I am pleased to say that of the 36 cases the hon. Gentleman submitted, 32 have been closed, and I am following up the remaining four.
Ian Levy (Blyth Valley) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government’s investment of £96 billion in the railways is the biggest investment in the rail network ever? By reinstating the Northumberland line running through Blyth Valley to Newcastle—
Mr Speaker
Order. That is not related to the question about the DVLA. [Interruption.] One of us will have to sit down and I am not sitting down. I am sorry, but that is not even linked to the question. Supplementary questions must be linked to the original question tabled.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
In my constituency there is huge dependency on the private car. Given the huge backlogs arising in the DVLA, and the similar backlogs at the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency, many young people are being deprived of their independence and find themselves isolated both socially and from work and education opportunities. In the light of this situation, the recent DVSA decision to close Whitchurch driving test centre is a hammer blow to people who want only to improve their quality of life. Will the Secretary of State commit to keeping this important facility open and thereby removing the necessity of people paying for double lessons and driving for an additional hour just to practise or attend a test?
Trudy Harrison
I am more than happy to meet the hon. Member to discuss the matter in detail. The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency is working hard to increase driving test availability by recruiting more driving examiners, offering out-of-hours tests and asking all those who are qualified to conduct tests to do so. I reiterate my willingness to meet the hon. Lady.
Andrew Rosindell (Romford) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)
On 24 January, the Secretary of State announced to the House that all testing requirements will be removed for eligible fully vaccinated arrivals.
Andrew Rosindell
Given the success of the roll-out and the welcome news that the plan B restrictions are ending and will end, with travel restrictions set to end on 11 February, will the Minister please assure the country that we will never again go back to travel restrictions of that kind? The latest travel restrictions seem to have had very little effect and the damage done to our economy was vast.
Robert Courts
My hon. Friend is absolutely correct: thanks to the success of our roll-out and booster programme—the fastest in Europe—we are now in a position where we can live with covid and start to travel again. The Government are developing a more flexible model, including a contingency playbook to deal with future variants that will provide certainty to consumers and industry alike.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Minister for his response—he has definitely been on his Weetabix this morning, so he has.
My question is on a specific issue. As filling out a passenger locator form per traveller takes a long time, has consideration been given to providing group application facilities, whereby families can fill in their details as one and save themselves the stress of having to fill out multiple applications in a foreign country so that they can return home safely?
Robert Courts
The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent suggestion. We have committed to looking into and radically simplifying the way that the PLF works. It remains necessary for now but I shall take that suggestion on board and consider it in any upcoming review.
Gareth Bacon (Orpington) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Trudy Harrison)
The Department is investing more than £5 billion over this Parliament in local highways maintenance—enough to fill in millions of potholes a year and resurface roads throughout England.
Gareth Bacon
The Mayor of London is considering a daily charge of £2 to drive on Greater London’s roads that would slap more than 2.5 million people with a substantial new driving bill. My constituents, like those in many places in outer London, rely on their cars to get around because the public transport alternatives are inadequate. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Mayor should look at more creative ways to fix Transport for London’s finances instead of planning highway robbery?
Trudy Harrison
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend: hammering motorists is not the way to do it. Transport in London is devolved to the Greater London Authority and therefore decisions on road-user charging are for the Mayor of London, not the Government. We will continue to work with the Mayor to help him put TfL on a sustainable long-term footing, but it is exactly as my hon. Friend said: creative solutions need to be put forward.
Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)
Last year, the Chancellor told people to enjoy National Pothole Day before the potholes were all gone. He then slashed the road maintenance budget by £400 million—enough to fix millions of potholes. Thanks to those broken promises, the roads Minister’s own community has become the pothole capital of England. The Government talk about levelling up, but in reality they cannot even level up the surfaces of our roads. When will the Minister get a grip, reverse these broken promises and deliver the funding that communities need to sort out the mess on our roads?
Trudy Harrison
Actually, at the spending review, the Government announced £2.7 billion over the next three years for local road maintenance in places not receiving those city region settlements, which is enough to fill in millions of potholes a year, repair dozens of bridges and resurface thousands of miles of road. The three-year settlement will help local authorities plan effectively for managing their highway assets, tackling those potholes and other road defects across local road networks.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Andrew Stephenson)
The Government are committed to improving rail services across the north of England, and rail passengers in Yorkshire will already be benefiting from our recent £161 million investment in Leeds station. The recently published integrated rail plan outlines our ambitious £96 billion investment plan for the next 30 years.
Jason McCartney
I welcome the integrated rail plan, which is investing in the trans-Pennine route coming through my patch in Slaithwaite and Marsden, which the Minister has visited. As he knows, though, I have another line—a single track line—going through Huddersfield and Penistone to Sheffield. I have been supporting the levelling-up bid of my hon. Friends the Members for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Miriam Cates) and for Dewsbury (Mark Eastwood). Will the Minister continue to work with us so that we can get investment in this single-track line that will lead to real positivity for local connectivity in our part of the world?
Andrew Stephenson
My hon. Friend remains a real champion for his constituency. I can reassure him that the integrated rail plan confirms that the Government will continue to invest in smaller rail enhancements across the north and the midlands in addition to the trans-Pennine route upgrade, HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail. I would be happy to meet my hon. Friend and his colleagues to discuss this, perhaps on a future visit to his constituency—probably later this month.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
According to the original plans, trains should now be arriving in Sheffield on the electrified Midland Main Line. When will the first electric trains actually arrive?
Andrew Stephenson
I am delighted to confirm that we have shovels in the ground on the Midland Main Line electrification. The Secretary of State was pleased to visit those works just before Christmas. As part of the £96 billion integrated rail plan, we will be delivering benefits to passengers sooner than ever anticipated.
Cherilyn Mackrory (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Trudy Harrison)
The Government continue to support the uptake of electric vehicles. About as many electric vehicles were sold in 2021 as the last five years combined, with one in six cars now having a plug.
Cherilyn Mackrory
I thank the Minister for her answer. In Cornwall, there is clearly an appetite to move towards cleaner and greener transport, and Cornwall Council is currently rolling out a £3.6 million project to install and operate EV charging points across the county. Despite that huge step in the right direction, given Cornwall’s rurality, it is limited in scope. Can the Minister help me to encourage towns, businesses and constituents in my Truro and Falmouth constituency to make use of the Government’s electric vehicle home-charge scheme, which provides grant funding of up to 75% towards the cost of installing electric vehicle charging points?
Trudy Harrison
I commend Cornwall Council, and I also commend my hon. Friend for the work that she is doing to ensure that we have this transport revolution as we transition from a fossil fuel transport system to one that is decarbonised. Electric vehicle charge points are absolutely the way forward at home, at work, en route, and at destination. This Government are rolling out the charging points with local authorities, and I would be delighted to visit her constituency and work with her council to do so.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Wendy Morton)
Railways are a product of Britain’s rich history of engineering innovation and the 200-year anniversary is a nationally important moment to mark and celebrate. The Department for Transport will work with the whole industry to make this a special event for workers and passengers alike.
Rachael Maskell
Clearly, in York the 200th anniversary will be incredibly significant, with both the reopening of the National Railway Museum, which will be an incredible moment, and the opportunity it gives us to look not just back but forward at the future of rail. Will the Minister therefore work with us to promote the future of digital and civil engineering, and focus on those from minoritised groups and women, to ensure that they have their place in the future of the railway too?
Wendy Morton
The 200-year anniversary is an important one. I recall many visits to the National Railway Museum when I was a kid; we used to go on school visits there. On the hon. Lady’s point about skills, engineering and more diversity, yes, absolutely—I am really keen, as I am sure are all my colleagues on the Front Bench, to see more diversity in the railways.
Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)
What a wonderful way to celebrate that anniversary: setting up a scheme to help small stations in economically important towns such as Milford Haven in my constituency to access funding in a timely way to see an upgrade. The current process, whereby Network Rail works up a project and then it takes years and years of multiple rounds of appraisals—big money-spinners for the consultants—just does not work. Will my hon. Friend please look at that?
Wendy Morton
I am more than happy to pick up on that point. If my right hon. Friend wants to tell me more about his local station, which he is clearly passionate about supporting, I would be happy to meet him.
Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Wendy Morton)
Department officials are working closely with operators in south-east London, including SE Trains —Southeastern—and Govia Thameslink Railway, to ensure that a reliable and punctual service is delivered as passengers return to work. Performance on both SET and GTR has been at a good level throughout the pandemic, with some recent challenges on GTR, owing to a high level of driver absence, leading to a temporarily revised timetable.
Matthew Pennycook
The Minister will be aware that both Southeastern and Thameslink services in south-east London are running on a reduced timetable. With the restrictions having eased and growing numbers of my constituents once again needing to commute, that cut in services is beginning to cause overcrowding on not only trains, but local bus and tube services, as well as incentivising more people to jump into their cars. Can I get a commitment from the Minister today that those withdrawn services will be fully reinstated as soon as possible?
Wendy Morton
I understand the concerns of colleagues across the House when it comes to trains and passengers. I assure the hon. Gentleman, as I have assured other colleagues this morning, that we continue to work closely with rail operators as they mitigate the impact of staff absences on rail services. It is important that we work together to get people back to work.
Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Andrew Stephenson)
Ministers have been in frequent contact with transport operators and industry regarding supply chain disruptions.
Martyn Day
The Road Haulage Association estimates a shortfall of some 85,000 drivers, affecting supply chains, retailers and the wider economy, while the Government’s short-length temporary visa scheme has been unfit for purpose, with only 200 visas having been issued. Given the scale of the problem, the industry is asking for a 12-month visa for heavy goods vehicle drivers. Will the Minister confirm whether that is being considered?
Andrew Stephenson
The Government have taken decisive action on the HGV driver shortage, with 32 short, medium and long-term interventions. We have more than doubled the number of tests available for HGV drivers in a normal week from 1,500 weekly appointments pre-covid to 3,200 in a normal week now. I am pleased to hear from industry bodies that their current assessment is that the shortfall in drivers is lessening.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
That may well be the case, but one haulier has likened Brexit to
“death by a thousand cuts”,
as EU companies withdraw business due to each new round of post-Brexit bureaucracy, administration and delays. That is causing significant hardship for many UK and Scottish businesses; smaller ones, especially, are struggling to cope. After the UK implements import controls in July, the crisis will deepen further, with the current miles-long queues of HGVs on the A20 simply getting longer and longer. What are the Government doing to mitigate the damage they have inflicted with Brexit on the UK’s economy?
Andrew Stephenson
I know that the hon. Gentleman likes to blame Brexit for everything, but of course there are HGV driver shortages around the globe. On freight coming in and out of the UK, we are seeing similar numbers at the moment as we would normally. The checks that are due at the ports are on track in England. Of course, in Scotland, they are a matter for the devolved Administration. We are aware of some risks there, but the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and other Departments are working closely with the Scottish Government to find a resolution.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
Sara Britcliffe (Hyndburn) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Transport (Grant Shapps)
We are committed to reversing the Beeching cuts and reopening railways through our £500 million restoring your railway fund. I was pleased to reopen the first such line—the Dartmoor line—in November 2021.
Damien Moore
Does my right hon. Friend agree that restoring the Burscough Curves link, which would connect Southport with Preston and up to Glasgow via the west coast main line, should be a priority for the Government, both to demonstrate the levelling-up agenda and connect all regions of our great United Kingdom?
Grant Shapps
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend—and, it seems, yourself, Mr Speaker—that it would be a great idea. My hon. Friend is a fantastic champion for the people of Southport. I know he applied unsuccessfully for the first round of restoring your railway fund money, but I am very committed to working with him on that to link up his community. I will arrange to meet him. I spoke to him about it this week and I am arranging to meet the Rail Minister on the subject.
Sara Britcliffe
We are moving forward with the Rawtenstall to Manchester line, which would significantly benefit my constituents in Haslingden, but will the Secretary of State provide the House with an update on the Skipton to Colne railway line?
Grant Shapps
I certainly can. Regarding the Skipton-East Lancashire Rail Action Partnership—or SELRAP—and the rail link between Skipton and Colne, I appreciate my hon. Friend’s unstinting support for the scheme and will set out our position on the projects in the rail enhancement portfolio very soon.
Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)
Good morning, Mr Speaker. Will the Secretary of State join me in congratulating the residents of Levenmouth and East Neuk of Fife, who will see their rail link restored more than 50 years after it was abolished by his predecessor? Yet another Westminster cut reversed by Scottish Parliament as part of the transition to net zero. Does he agree that the glacial progress on reconnecting communities in England to the national rail network is hindering growth, compared with the Scottish Government’s record of delivering real benefits for the people of Scotland?
Grant Shapps
No, I do not agree. It has taken 50 years for a UK Government to come along and reopen the lines that were closed under Beeching and successive Governments. We are the ones reversing that and paying to reverse it, and Britain is proud of that.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
If we are really going to celebrate the 200th anniversary, it would be good to open even more lines. You will know, Mr Speaker, that not far from your constituency, the first person to be killed on the railway was a Member of Parliament and Minister when the Rocket was being trialled. We should remember that.
If we are serious about marking the anniversary and bringing the old lines back into use, will the Secretary of State look again at Yorkshire? We feel absolutely bereft. Here is this opportunity, with a Government commitment to raise standards and level up, at a time when the Government have smashed the integrated plan for Yorkshire rail.
Grant Shapps
Huddersfield massively benefits from the £96 billion plan—the biggest plan that any Government have ever announced on railway funding. By the way, it is bigger than the plan that President Biden just announced for railways in his package, even though the United States has a population that is five times bigger than ours. I would have thought that people in Huddersfield would be celebrating in the streets.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Transport (Grant Shapps)
I regularly speak to the Chancellor about the impact of the fuel duty freeze, which has now run for 12 consecutive years, in no small way thanks to my right hon. Friend.
Robert Halfon
My Harlow constituents strongly welcome the fuel duty freeze, and long may it continue. When wholesale oil prices rise, the cost at the pump rockets. The RAC and FairFuelUK have shown that average profit margins for diesel have increased by 150% in the past two years, with petrol margins at the pumps more than doubling. But when the global oil price comes down there is a feather approach; the savings are not transferred to the motorist. Will my right hon. Friend introduce a pump watch monitor to ensure fair prices at the pumps for motorists?
Grant Shapps
It is genuinely true to say that there is not a more expensive Member of Parliament. The cuts—or the freezes—that my right hon. Friend has persuaded successive Chancellors to make are now accumulating a £1,900 saving for a UK driver every year. He is right that when oil prices go up fuel prices seem to track very fast, and when they come down they are much slower. I will pay close attention to his idea.
David Duguid (Banff and Buchan) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)
We have delivered approximately £8 billion of support for the aviation sector through the pandemic, and we are currently developing a strategic framework to help support the sector’s recovery.
David Duguid
I thank my hon. Friend for his answer. Has he given any thought to how public service obligations could help support regional airports right across the UK, including in Scotland—such as Aberdeen airport, which serves my constituency—to recover from the covid-19 pandemic?
Robert Courts
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. May I congratulate him on his campaign and his support for his constituents’ campaign, particularly that led by Val Fry, to reintroduce flights to Aberdeen such as the easyJet flight from Aberdeen to Gatwick. I have flown from Aberdeen. I can see its importance, and I know that it is exceptionally important particularly for the offshore energy industry. We recognise the significant impact that covid-19 has had on regional airports. We will consider whether there are further opportunities to utilise public service obligations.
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
Having failed to secure a sector-specific deal from the Treasury, the industry is recovering much more slowly than our international competitors, and now we have the spectacle of an unholy row between airlines and airports on landing charges. With the new rules on slots, we have the prospect of planes flying empty or with half loads. Industry leaders tell me that the Secretary of State has been missing in action, but he has been busy shoring up the beleaguered Prime Minister’s whipping operation—we would like to thank him for that. Is it not time for the Secretary of State to step up to the plate when it comes to aviation?
Robert Courts
The Secretary of State and all members of the Government have been in constant contact with the aviation sector, and it is through that that we have been able to tailor our response. We have given £8 billion of support to the sector. The airport and ground operations support scheme is on top of that, and there is the aviation skills retention platform. The Government wholeheartedly support the aviation sector, particularly in getting it flying again.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Wendy Morton)
The Government have consulted on changes to penalty fares to ensure that deterrents against fare evasion are effective and fair. Fare evasion costs other rail passengers and taxpayers, who ultimately subsidise the journeys of those who deliberately travel by train without paying the correct fare.
Martin Vickers
I thank the Minister for her reply, but my experience is that ticket inspection falls very far short of 100%. As she says, the cost ultimately falls on other passengers and the taxpayer. What further steps can she take to ensure that the companies bear the burden of their inadequacies rather than the taxpayer?
Wendy Morton
My hon. Friend makes an important point, and he is right to take this seriously. I can assure him that the Department continues to encourage train operators to prioritise revenue protection and ensure that revenue is maximised and fraud is prevented. He is right to say that it is the responsibility of train operators to follow Government guidance in relation to this.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Trudy Harrison)
The Government recognise the vital role that safe public transport plays in getting people to and from where they need to be at night. The Department works closely with transport partners on a range of initiatives to ensure safety on the transport network.
Ian Byrne
Many of my constituents feel vulnerable taking public transport at night, especially women and those returning home from late shifts at work. Will the Minister support Unite the union’s “Get Me Home Safely” campaign and the early-day motion of my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry South (Zarah Sultana), which calls for the extension of the employer’s duty of care to include safe transport home and policies such as making free night transport for staff a pre-condition for new liquor licences?
Trudy Harrison
I thank the hon. Member for his interest in this important issue. We are already doing much on the transport network to improve safety, particularly for women and girls—for example, the rail to refuge scheme helps four people a day. We have also recently undertaken a review with our transport champions to look specifically at the safety of women and girls. I would be happy to meet him to understand how those proposals align with the recommendations from our champions.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Transport (Grant Shapps)
It is for the Mayor to take decisions about how to balance the TfL budget. We are committed to supporting the system and have done so with hard cash—£4.5 billion and counting.
Bob Blackman
As my right hon. Friend knows, the current deal expires very soon. The Mayor was due to provide ways that he would balance the budget; I understand that he has not done so yet. Could my right hon. Friend confirm that in any arrangements that he makes with the Mayor of London, we will exclude the outer London charge for people driving into the London area and stop the Mayor introducing road pricing in London unless the whole country goes ahead with it?
Grant Shapps
My hon. Friend is a terrific champion of a fair settlement. It is the easiest thing in the world for someone to propose a tax that people other than their own residents pay, which is exactly what the Mayor has been pursuing with the boundary tax. It is not fair; we will oppose it—no taxation without representation.
Sam Tarry (Ilford South) (Lab)
The Government’s piecemeal funding for Transport for London is short-sighted and, yet again, will have an impact on thousands of jobs across the entire country. For every £1 spent on London’s transport infrastructure, 50p is spent outside the capital. We know that they have the money after yesterday’s news about the latest Government wastage—£9 billion blown on dodgy PPE about as effective as the Prime Minister’s Save Big Dog strategy.
Some 30 TfL projects currently support thousands of jobs around the country from Wrightbus in Ballymena in Northern Ireland to Bombardier in my constituency. That includes a £1 billion contract for building tube trains in Goole in East Yorkshire. Is it not time for the Government to save jobs across the country, stop rolling out the rhetoric and start investing in London’s transport infrastructure?
Grant Shapps
The trouble is, when someone writes that kind of passage in advance and practises it in front of the mirror, they potentially miss the announcement that was made in the original answer. We have now spent £4.5 billion propping up TfL to help out, rightly, because of the pandemic and, in addition, because of the decisions that failed to be made earlier, such as the four-year fare freeze and the concessions that go way above anything available elsewhere in the country.
Jerome Mayhew (Broadland) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)
My Department has passed legislation paving the way for space flight and satellite launches from UK soil, and we have already awarded £40 million of grants to kick-start capability.
Jerome Mayhew
I recently discussed the current rocket launch environment with Gravitilab, a dynamic Broadland company that provides microgravity testing and space access via reusable launch platforms. Its ambition is to provide that service in Norfolk. Space is no longer just for Governments and multinationals, so will my hon. Friend ensure that our regulatory regime recognises and encourages start-up companies and is made responsive to that fast-rising sector?
Robert Courts
I gladly join my hon. Friend in celebrating the growing success of Gravitilab. I congratulate him on being an excellent advocate for it, Broadland and the space industry as a whole. The Government have put in place the most modern space flight legislation in the world. We will continue to review it to ensure that it meets the needs of the UK’s entire space industry.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Trudy Harrison)
The Government plan to publish the second cycling and walking investment strategy in the spring.
Ruth Cadbury
I thank the Minister for the answer. I am concerned that the Treasury has clearly decided that £2 billion is all the ringfenced funding that will be allocated for cycling and walking, but the Department for Transport commissioned research several years ago that apparently says this £2 billion is only a quarter to a third of what is needed to meet the stated aims of the Government to increase cycling and walking by 2025. Can I ask if she will now publish this research, as a former Transport Minister, the hon. Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), repeatedly promised two years ago?
Trudy Harrison
I am delighted to confirm that we have now appointed Chris Boardman as the acting CEO of Active Travel England, which I will be meeting after this session. Actually, the £2 billion is an unprecedented amount to be investing in walking and cycling over this Parliament. Our investment is already seeing results: levels of cycling increased by 46% in 2020 compared with 2019. However, I would like to put on record my thanks to the hon. Member for the work she does on the all-party parliamentary group on cycling and walking, which I look forward to joining.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
I cycle for 10 hours a week, and on a narrow forest road I always cycle close to the kerb, because I am a driver too and I want to accommodate drivers. The advice in the new code that I should cycle in the centre of the carriageway is bonkers, isn’t it?
Trudy Harrison
I would like to stress that that advice is only on narrow roads, but I am delighted that my right hon. Friend has embraced cycling, because we want to see half of the journeys made in towns and cities walked or cycled by 2030.
Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)
At the Budget, we announced £1.2 billion of new dedicated funding for bus transformation deals. We will provide details of indicative allocations in due course.
Mohammad Yasin
Bus companies have suffered financially during the pandemic, and this cost is being felt by customers in downgraded services. Stagecoach has had to replace its coaches from Bedford to Cambridge with double-decker buses with no toilet facilities. This leaves older people, sometimes travelling to access medical treatment, without access to a toilet for 90 minutes. When will the Government give bus companies the investment they need to improve services?
Robert Courts
Well, we are doing that at the moment. There is £1.2 billion of new funding, delivering improvements in bus services, fares and infrastructure in England outside London, and that is just part of over £3 billion of new spend on buses in the course of this Parliament.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
I was delighted to see in the levelling-up White Paper yesterday that, thanks to this Conservative Government working with Conservative-led Stoke-on-Trent City Council and three Conservative Stoke-on-Trent Members of Parliament, we are going to receive a multimillion-pound settlement for bussing back better in our great city to make sure that we are better connected. Part of the bid does contain some funding for roads, particularly for widening the Waterloo Road, which does suffer from congestion, so will the Minister meet me and Stoke-on-Trent MPs to discuss why it is vital that this is funded?
Robert Courts
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the leadership he has provided on improving the roads and the buses in Stoke in conjunction with his Conservative colleagues, and I know that the Buses Minister will be delighted to meet him to discuss that further.
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
In the north-east, we have an ambitious bus service improvement plan, but before we get there we have a crisis in our bus services as a result of covid-19. Can the Minister say what action he will take to prevent our bus services from being reduced as a result of the cliff edge in funding in March?
Robert Courts
As I have outlined, over £3 billion of new spend on buses is coming along during the course of this Parliament. The hon. Member is quite right to draw attention to the bus service improvement plans, and we will be able to provide some information on indicative allocations for that by the end of February.
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
Buses are vital for many of my North West Durham constituents, but to put it simply, at the moment there are not enough of them and they are prohibitively expensive, especially for single-fare journeys. Will the Minister look closely at our bus back better strategy for the north-east to give us the funding and the buses we need for our communities?
Robert Courts
I know that the Buses Minister will be delighted to look at that particular strategy in the context of the overall funding the Government are providing.
Abena Oppong-Asare (Erith and Thamesmead) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Wendy Morton)
The Government and Homes England are exploring potential opportunities and options at Thamesmead and Beckton Riverside with the Greater London Authority and Transport for London.
Abena Oppong-Asare
Thamesmead in my constituency needs levelling up. It has some of the worst public transport links in the capital. There are ambitious plans to extend the docklands light railway to Thamesmead, which are supported by Greenwich and Newham councils and Transport for London. Will the Minister look favourably at these proposals when they are submitted to the Government, and provide the necessary funding to finally put Thamesmead on the transport map?
Wendy Morton
With regard to extending the DLR, the scale of the opportunity from the potential options at Thamesmead and Beckton Riverside is being explored and the Government and Homes England are working together with the Greater London Authority and Transport for London to do this.
Topical Questions
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Transport (Grant Shapps)
I would like to update the House on action we have taken against the behaviour of Insulate Britain activists. Last year I asked National Highways to seek injunctions against the so-called eco-warriors who have inflicted such misery on motorists across the country, and following the latest High Court hearing yesterday a further five immediate prison sentences were imposed as well as 11 suspended sentences against Insulate Britain activists for breaching these injunctions. That brings the total number of sentences and suspended sentences handed down to 31. Gluing oneself to the tarmac and throwing paint on public highways, causing miles of misery, just is not on; it affects hard-working people and causes misery to them, costing the taxpayer money.
Ruth Jones
The Secretary of State will know that vehicle standards, including for e-scooters, are reserved to Westminster. I am hugely concerned about the impact of e-scooters on people living with sight loss in Wales as they cannot be heard and are very quick. What plans does he have to assess the impact of the already widespread and illegal use of e-scooters in Wales?
Grant Shapps
We currently have a trial programme for e-scooters, with 31 trials in operation, which is collecting the data that the hon. Lady seeks. I share her concerns, particularly about e-scooters sold through the private market where they are not legal to be ridden on the roads or pavement, or indeed in the public arena. We are looking at measures that will crack down on those while ensuring that those that have been properly insured and used through the trials continue until we have all the data.
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Wendy Morton)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this matter today, and I appreciate the incident on Sunday near Haddiscoe will undoubtedly have caused disruption to passengers, but I understand that work is going well and I am sure he will be pleased to know that services are expected to resume on Saturday morning. Network Rail recently outlined its long-term adaptation ambitions, which are now being considered at local level. Importantly, this will help build greater understanding of the key areas of vulnerability that are critical in the development of plans to mitigate and minimise impacts on passengers.
Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)
I welcome the new rail Minister, the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton), to her post. Last year the Prime Minister promised
“great bus services…to everyone, everywhere”,
with £3 billion of new funding to support that. Yesterday we learned the truth about the transformation funding—slashed by £1.8 billion. Why have the Government broken their promise and downgraded the ambition of communities?
Grant Shapps
I am really pleased that the hon. Lady has raised this, because I have seen her tweet and talk about it elsewhere and I want to inform her that she is inadvertently misleading. The figure is still £3 billion; the £1.2 billion is a part of that £3 billion and there are other elements of funding that have already been announced, including £0.5 billion on decarbonisation, and more money is on the way. So that is simply an incorrect figure that I ask her not to continue to repeat.
Louise Haigh
I can assure the House that I am not the one misleading anybody. We have it in black and white, in a leaked letter from his own official, who wrote to local transport authorities confirming the cut and saying
“the scale of the ambition across the county greatly exceeds the amount”
of transformation funding. Doesn’t that say it all: the ambition of this country far exceeds that of the Government? So will the Secretary of State come clean by admitting that vast swathes of the country will not get a penny in transformation funding and that he sold bus transformation but is delivering managed decline?
Grant Shapps
No, that is absolutely incorrect. We have just heard about this Government’s investment in Stoke. That is investment we are going to spread across the country. It is false to claim that that £1.2 billion is the total funding. It is not, as I have already pointed out. There will be £5.7 billion over five years for the city region sustainable transport settlement, for example, bringing more money in. I will write to the hon. Lady with a detailed breakdown, but I ask her to take into account the full amount of money being spent on buses—a record never achieved before by any Government, as far as I can see.
Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)
Wendy Morton
I know that my hon. Friend takes a close interest in this issue on behalf of his constituents, as I would expect. I would be very happy to have a meeting with him, at which he can share with me some of the concerns he has on behalf of his constituents.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
It is two years since the Prime Minister pledged 4,000 zero-emission buses, but that pledge is in tatters. Not a single bus has been ordered through the fast-track zero-emission bus regional areas scheme. In contrast, the Scottish Government have already produced the equivalent of 2,700 bus orders. No one in the industry—not a single person—thinks that the Prime Minister’s pledge will be met, and let us remember that 4,000 is only one tenth of the English bus fleet, while Scotland decarbonises half of its bus fleet. When are the UK Government going to get real on this?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Trudy Harrison)
The Government remain absolutely committed to supporting the introduction of 4,000 zero-emission buses and achieving a zero-emission bus fleet. I had the joy of visiting a place in Glasgow, when I was there for COP26, that is rolling out those buses, and this will support our climate ambitions, improve local transport for communities and support high-quality green jobs. Overall, we are providing £525 million of funding for ZEBs this Parliament, and the Government have provided funding for 900 zero-emission buses through existing funding schemes.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
Trudy Harrison
We will of course look into my right hon. Friend’s suggestion, but over the past two years we have provided over £1.7 billion in covid-related support to the bus sector. The recovery grant is worth more than £250 million to operators and local authorities, and has been supporting the sector as passenger numbers remain suppressed.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
Grant Shapps
If the hon. Lady is exempt from levelling up, we need to have a word with the Mayor of London about it, because transport in her constituency is run by him, of course. On a serious note, I am very interested in that scheme, and I will speak to her about it offline.
Dame Andrea Leadsom (South Northampton- shire) (Con)
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Andrew Stephenson)
HS2 Ltd takes its responsibilities to secure and maintain land along the line of route extremely seriously. I thank my right hon. Friend for taking the time to show me some of the specific problem sites when I visited her constituency. Where fly-tipping or littering occurs, HS2 Ltd must act to address it as soon as possible.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
Trudy Harrison
I thank the hon. Member for his question, but I refer him to the 31 trials currently ongoing throughout the country to identify how we can legislate in the safest possible way. We regard micro-mobility as an essential part of the transition towards a much cleaner community, but I will endeavour to meet colleagues in the Home Office to discuss matters of policing with regard to illegal electric scooters.
David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)
Grant Shapps
We would be very pleased to organise that meeting with my hon. Friend. I will set up a meeting for him with the Minister with responsibility for roads. As the House knows, we are spending £24 billion on roads and at least half of that is for their upkeep and maintenance.
Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)
Trudy Harrison
That decision is yet to be taken, but in terms of the hon. Gentleman’s council and the money it is missing out on, it is disappointing to learn that in Chester the green bus technology fund, the low emission fund, the ultra-low emission fund, the all-electric bus city fund and all the zero-emission bus regional area funds have not been taken advantage of by his council. I really would encourage him to work with his council to make the most of the generous offers provided by the Department.
Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)
Airlines have had a tough couple of years, of course, but so too have passengers and travel agents in obtaining refunds from those airlines. This has been going for years. Reform is badly needed, with a regulator that has upfront powers to effect change. I am delighted to see the Government’s consultation. Can I ask the relevant Minister when we expect to see change implemented?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Robert Courts)
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I commend him for his work on this and a number of issues. The consultation on consumer rights has just been launched. We will be running that and carefully considering the options that come out of it. We will be looking to make the necessary changes as soon as possible.
Mhairi Black (Paisley and Renfrewshire South) (SNP)
The Scottish Government are currently rolling out free bus travel across Scotland for anyone under the age of 22. Will the UK Government take a moment to congratulate the Scottish Government and tell us when they might deliver the same for young people in England?
Grant Shapps
The difficult decisions that need to be made have to be made by every Government, but I think what the hon. Lady was pointing out was just how generous the grant funding is, through the Barnett formula, for the Scottish Government.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
Will the Secretary of State agree to an urgent meeting with me and representatives of the business community in North West Leicestershire impacted by the Birmingham to East Midlands Parkway route of HS2, to discuss the necessary changes to the route to enter Parkway station and any possible mitigations?
Andrew Stephenson
My hon. Friend remains a doughty champion of businesses in his constituency that will be affected by the proposals in the integrated rail plan. I would be more than happy to meet him again to discuss those proposals and the specific impacts on residents and businesses.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
Further to the issues raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook), south-east London is not served by the London underground, which means our constituents rely heavily on rail services. A station in my constituency where there has been a major redevelopment has seen a nearly 50% increase in footfall: there are 1.5 million entrances and exits a year. It is essential that capacity is maintained and increased on our rail services because of the lack of alternatives. May I impress that on Ministers who will make decisions on the franchise?
Wendy Morton
As I explained earlier, we are working closely with the rail operators as they mitigate the impact of staff absences on rail services. Obviously, as restrictions are lifted and staffing pressures ease, operators will reinstate services to meet expected increases in passenger demand. I think it is fair to say that no timetable is ever static. As demand patterns continue to evolve while we recover from the pandemic, timetables must be flexible.
Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)
I welcome the massive investment this Government are making in the east midlands. They are electrifying the midlands main line as we bring HS2 from Birmingham to Nottingham. However, to benefit fully, my constituents need better trains to Nottingham. Will the Minister support my campaign for more trains on the Poacher line so that my constituents in villages such as Radcliffe-on-Trent can have the regular train service they need?
Andrew Stephenson
My hon. Friend rightly points out the massive investment going into the east midlands. I am sure the Rail Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton), will be more than happy to meet her to discuss the specific configuration of local services.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
My constituents already face long waits for overpriced bus services without the real-time data that Londoners take for granted, and now we hear that there will be further cuts to bus services. We urgently need a bus service improvement plan. Why will the Secretary of State not urgently support one?
Grant Shapps
As I have mentioned a couple of times, we have the biggest ever programme of bus service improvements. We have gone out to local authorities to ask them for their plans, and we have funded them to bring forward those plans. They are now coming back with the first stages in the levelling-up White Paper. We will continue to deliver more on the bus agenda over time.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
There has been clear interest on both sides of the House in investment in the future of buses, and we have a very positive bid from North Yorkshire County Council, working with local bus companies, to improve the services in Harrogate and Knaresborough. Will the Minister give me an indicative date for when we might hear of that bid’s success?
Trudy Harrison
I am afraid that I cannot give a precise date at this time—there will of course be a date in due course—but I will make the necessary inquiries and relay back to my hon. Friend.
Business of the House
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Thangam Debbonaire (Bristol West) (Lab)
Will the Leader of the House give us the forthcoming business?
The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg)
The business for the week commencing 7 February will include:
Monday 7 February—Motion to approve the Social Security Benefits Up-Rating Order 2022 and motion to approve the Guaranteed Minimum Pensions Increase Order 2022, followed by consideration of Lords amendments to the Northern Ireland (Ministers, Elections and Petitions of Concern) Bill.
Tuesday 8 February—Opposition day (12th allotted day). Debate on a motion in the name of the official Opposition. Subject to be announced.
Wednesday 9 February—Motions relating to the police grant and local government finance reports.
Thursday 10 February—Motion on UK-Taiwan friendship and co-operation, followed by general debate on the dementia research in the UK. The subjects for these debates were determined by the Backbench Business Committee.
At the conclusion of business on Thursday 10 February, the House will rise for the February recess and return on Monday 21 February.
The provisional business for the week commencing 21 February will include:
Monday 21 February—Remaining stages of the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill [Lords].
Tuesday 22 February—Remaining stages of the Charities Bill [Lords] followed by remaining stages of the Public Service Pensions and Judicial Offices Bill [Lords].
Wednesday 23 February—Opposition day (13th allotted day). Debate on a motion in the name of the Official Opposition. Subject to be announced.
Thursday 24 February—Business to be determined by the Backbench Business Committee.
Friday 25 February—Private Members’ Bills.
Thangam Debbonaire
I thank the Leader of the House for giving us the forthcoming business.
Tomorrow is World Cancer Day, and this year’s focus is on closing the care gap and recognising global inequities in cancer care. Here in the UK, figures show that one in three people with symptoms are not receiving the life-saving care within two months of an urgent referral from their GP that they need. This is a record, and not the sort to be proud of. Given the vacancies and staff shortages across the NHS, may I ask the right hon. Gentleman what the Government are doing to bring cancer waiting times down? Will he ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to make a statement on, in particular, increasing early diagnosis for children with cancer?
While the Prime Minister is peddling far-right conspiracy theories in a desperate bid to deflect from his own rule breaking, working families are being hit with steep hikes in energy prices, low wages falling even further and a triple whammy of Tory tax rises. The right hon. Gentleman has previously demonstrated his socialist tendencies and expressed his support for our calls for the scrapping of the national insurance rise that will unfairly hit working families, but the Chancellor and the Prime Minister have not listened. In fact, this Government’s tax hikes for working people and businesses mean that we will have the biggest tax burden in 70 years. I wonder whether the Chancellor will be addressing that shortly.
As if that were not bad enough—this affects Conservative Members’ constituents as well—10 years of the failed Tory energy policy has left us uniquely exposed. Dither, delay and incompetence have created an energy price crisis faced by everyone, and the Government are choosing to leak their policies in the papers rather than coming to this House first; but perhaps it is wise to try and roll the pitch when all their announcements will do is push more costs on to working people further down the line. Labour’s fully funded measures to cut VAT on energy bills would save households £200 a year, and an extra £400 for the families and pensioners who need it most, without stacking up debt lower down the line. The Government have so far chosen not to support that plan, but it is not too late, given that our motion on Tuesday to introduce a windfall tax on oil and gas companies to pay for it was passed unanimously. Can the Leader of the House confirm that the Chancellor will be announcing this as part of the forthcoming business?
It has taken the Government two and half years to come up with a 10-year plan to do 12 things. It will now take them until 2030 to deliver things that they first promised back in 2010: that is a gap of 20 years. Can the Leader of the House explain what the Government have been doing for the last 12 years? Whatever it is, it certainly is not levelling up.
While the Government are reaching into people’s pockets for their hard-earned cash with one hand, they are giving it away to fraudsters with the other: £4.3 billion-worth of fraudulent loans have been written off by the Chancellor, £3.5 billion has been spent on crony contracts, £300,000 went from the levelling-up fund to save a Tory peer’s driveway, and half a million pounds went on the Foreign Secretary’s flight to Australia. Does the right hon. Gentleman think that this is an acceptable use of taxpayers’ money? Can he explain when it became Government policy to waste taxpayers’ money on fraudsters, private jets and driveways?
While I am on the subject of the levelling-up fund, let me add that on 24 January the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the hon. Member for Harborough (Neil O’Brien), said that my constituency of Bristol West and the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson), the shadow Education Secretary, were among those that had received levelling-up funding. I have checked, and as far as I can see Bristol has received no funding and nor has my hon. Friend’s constituency. Will the Leader of the House please ask the Minister to correct the record?
We have all been horrified and appalled by the report from the police watchdog, published earlier this week, which uncovered the disgraceful conduct of some serving officers at Charing Cross police station: abusive, racist, misogynist and disrespectful messages routinely shared between officers. This is not just an issue in London, so what is the Home Secretary doing to overhaul police training and restore public confidence in our police forces?
This is a Government who have completely lost their grip. Working people are paying the price for a decade or more of dither, delay and incompetence. The Government are out of control, out of touch, out of ideas and soon to be out of office.
Mr Rees-Mogg
What a delight it is to hear from the hon. Lady every week, running through her socialist mantra. She is, of course, right to highlight the importance of cancer and cancer care, particularly the treatment of children. I am glad to say that treatment rates for cancer are now back to their usual levels. Since the pandemic began, over 510,000 people have started treatment for cancer. We have provided record taxpayer spending to tackle the backlog, with £2 billion this year and £8 billion over the next three years, to deliver an extra 9 million checks, scans and operations for patients across the country. I am very pleased that we can be in agreement that the right things are being done after the period in which we have been suffering from covid, which did lead to an increase in the numbers awaiting care.
The hon. Lady then mentioned far-right conspiracy theories, which seemed to be in relation to the Leader of the Opposition, so let me quote his own words. The right hon. and learned Gentleman said:
“I accept the conclusions reached by Ms Levitt QC and, in the interests of transparency and accountability I have decided to publish her report in full. In doing so, I would like to take the opportunity to apologise for the shortcomings in the part played by the CPS in these cases.
But I also want to go further. If this report and my apology are to serve their full purpose, then this must be seen as a watershed moment. In my view, these cases do not simply reflect errors of judgment by individual officers or prosecutors on the facts before them. If that were the case, they would, in many respects, be easier to deal with.
These were errors of judgment by experienced and committed police officers and a prosecuting lawyer acting in good faith and attempting to apply the correct principles. That makes the findings of Ms Levitt's report more profound and calls for a more robust response."
This is about the traditional understanding of ministerial responsibility. Somebody who is in charge of a Department—and the right hon. and learned Gentleman was in charge of the Crown Prosecution Service—must follow the Crichel Down principle of taking responsibility for what went on in his organisation and then apologise for failings. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has apologised similarly for mistakes that may have been made in Downing Street. I think that what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, and that the geese and the ganders should not complain, one or the other. They are perfectly fair and reasonable points of political debate.
The hon. Lady then came on to issues concerning the police, which are deeply concerning and there was an urgent question on this yesterday. We expect the Metropolitan police and the Mayor of London to implement the recommendations of the Independent Office for Police Conduct report as soon as is practically possible. What came out over the past couple of days is deeply shocking and is not what we expect of the police. In this Palace we are so lucky, because we see the police who protect us and we talk to them. They do amazing work for us, but then we discover that there are people in the police force, including ones who have been at this Palace, who let the side down desperately, shockingly and unforgivably. This must be rooted out, and the leadership of the Metropolitan police will have to ask themselves how they can put this right and have culture change, as we in politics have had to adopt culture change. That is fundamentally important, and I encourage the police to do everything they can to deal with that.
The hon. Lady also referred to questions relating to fraud and the bail-outs provided. It has to be said that £400 billion of taxpayers’ money was provided and 12 million jobs supported during the pandemic. The economy has got back to pre-pandemic levels, which is an enormous achievement and success. The policies that were followed were right. But fraud must always be cracked down upon, so the Government have stopped or recovered £743 million in over-claimed furlough grants and prevented £2.2 billion in fraud from our bounce back loan scheme, and the taxpayer protection taskforce is set to recover an additional £1 billion through investigations that are under way. It is really important that fraud is tackled and that, of course, is what Her Majesty’s Government are doing.
The hon. Lady then wanted to talk about matters pertaining to the Chancellor, but may I say that patience is a virtue, virtue is a grace, and Grace is a little girl who would not wash her face? If the hon. Lady reads the magic words on the Annunciator, she will see that all will shortly be revealed by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)
May we have a debate on the levelling-up fund? We need to have great scrutiny of how these decisions are taken by civil servants and Ministers. My right hon. Friend has stood for Parliament in Shropshire and will know some of the problems we have in that rural shire county. Yet again, Shropshire Council has, unfortunately, failed in its levelling-up bid. May we have a debate on this so that our constituents are more cognisant of how these decisions are taken and so that there is more transparency?
Mr Rees-Mogg
My hon. Friend is a great champion for his distinguished constituency and has been for many years. Levelling up needs to be looked at in the round and regionally. Wolverhampton, which is near Shropshire, is receiving considerable support, which will benefit the whole of the regional economy. What is happening is the transformation of the country’s infrastructure, which will be fundamental to levelling up, with £600 billion. It is also about attracting further investment—private sector investment—into areas, and that will depend on how regions do better together and succeed, looking at it as a rounded picture.
On having a debate, a statement was made earlier this week by the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and Minister for Intergovernmental Relations, my right hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), but levelling up will be a major topic of discussion for this House in the weeks and months to come.
Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)
We have missed the Leader of the House’s weekly “Newsnight” performance; after he shattered the relationship with the Scottish Tories and declared the Mogg republic, the Tory press office must have decided he had run out of his usefulness, but we look forward to seeing him back again at some point. Although we are grateful for the statement this week on the Sue Gray report, what the House really requires is a full day’s debate about all the issues contained in it, which should be led by the Prime Minister. We cannot simply leave aside a report that points to
“failures of leadership and judgment”,
excessive drinking and a cultural failure at the heart of government, set against the backdrop of a deadly pandemic. Sixteen events fell within Sue Gray’s remit, 12 of which are being investigated by the Met police. We cannot just leave that behind, perhaps for weeks. Members of the House must have the opportunity to properly consider all these issues, and our constituents would not expect anything else.
We also need an urgent debate about parliamentary discourse and how we hold Members accountable for the veracity and truthfulness of things said in this House. The thing that probably irks and frustrates our constituents most is when a Member says or claims something that is manifestly untrue and there is no way to have it challenged and addressed in this House. If a Member does raise an untruth in this House, he is likely to face your wrath, Mr Speaker. You are right that, according to precedent and to “Erskine May”, you must take action and ask that Member to leave the House, but “Erskine May” was written before the days of the internet, fact checkers and the current Prime Minister. You said that the matter may be reviewed and you suggested the Procedure Committee be involved. Does the Leader of the House not agree that a general debate, like the one we are having on standards this afternoon, could also be useful in addressing this? When untruths go unchallenged and MPs can say anything, regardless of its relationship with the truth, it can only have a corrosive effect on our democracy and on trust in this House. Surely the Leader of the House agrees that that cannot go on.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I think the hon. Gentleman takes the view that anything that is said that he disagrees with is not true. That is not right, which is why we have the forms of debate that we have. When people hold views strongly and somebody else stands up and thinks the other thing, they say, “That is not true”, but it is not a matter of truth; it is a matter of opinion, which is what we discuss in this House. It is not a matter of fact-checking; it is a matter of, “I think X, the hon. Gentleman thinks Y,” and both of them are views that people are entitled to hold. What we get from the Scottish National party constantly is the doubting of the good faith of the people they oppose, and that is quite wrong. That is the corrosive element of public life: the doubting of the faith and honesty of one’s opponents. I disagree with a great deal of what is said by those on the side opposite, but I do not question the honesty and integrity of what they say. I question the effectiveness of what they do, and that is the important difference between the Government and the Opposition sides.
As regards the Sue Gray report, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister was here on his feet for two hours, I think, answering questions earlier this week and has said that the full report will be published when it is allowed to be published, after the Metropolitan Police have completed their work. That commitment has already been made—[Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman heckles—I hope Hansard heard it—that that is weeks away. If the police were not doing it properly, he would be the first to say, “The police aren’t doing it properly!”. He cannot have it both ways. It is being done properly and rigorously and, when it is done, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister will ensure the full report is published. He comes to the House regularly.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
Can we have a statement on value for money provided by local councils? Harlow’s Conservative council, elected as a majority for only the second time in the town’s history, is cutting council tax for residents by £55 and freezing it until 2025. That is possibly the highest council tax cut in the country. Can the Government send a taskforce to Harlow to learn how to cut the cost of living, as we provide an example that the rest of the nation should follow?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for highlighting the success of Harlow Council. It is amazing what good Conservative councils can do: we look at Westminster and Wandsworth, which for decades have been able to keep the council tax down when other socialist councils have kept on putting it up. Harlow should be held in light, not least for having my right hon. Friend to represent it, which he does with such distinction and panache. It is important to recognise that local council spending is the responsibility of local councils, and good, well-run councils—Conservative councils—are able to save taxpayers money.
Ian Mearns (Gateshead) (Lab)
I thank the Leader of the House for the business statement and for announcing the Backbench Business debates for next week. I understand there will be some time for the House to spend considering remaining departmental estimates—I believe it will be in early March—so hon. Members will need to be preparing to make applications to the Backbench Business Committee for time in those debating slots on the return from the February recess. I also remind the Leader of the House that we have date-specific applications on the stocks already, for Welsh affairs and St David’s Day for the first week in March, and for International Women’s Day for the second week in March.
Could we have a statement on the increasing use of off-road motorcycles for criminal purposes? We have a scourge of that in my own constituency; unfortunately the local constabulary, Northumbria Police, having been hit by severe cost cutting, does not have any equivalent motorcycles with which to apprehend those individuals. Can we have a statement from the Home Secretary about what can be done by constabularies around the country to cut down on that menace?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful, as always, to the hon. Gentleman. I have done quite well so far this Session in providing him with the debates he has asked for when he has given me long notice; I cannot promise to be able to do the same, but I always try, if possible, to make time available for the time-sensitive debates. Off-road motorcycling, which has been raised by others in this House, is clearly a problem, but the police must set their own policing priorities. The Government have provided the funding for, I think, an extra 11,000 police officers so far, with a target of 20,000 over the course of the Parliament. I encourage him to put further pressure on his local police force to enforce the law as it is. I do not think it is really for the Government to set policing priorities from the Dispatch Box.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
Given that one of the principal benefits of Brexit is that we now have the ability to set our own laws, rules and regulations, may I have a statement from the Leader of the House on the reasoning behind the ending of the Regulatory Reform Committee on 20 May 2021, at the very time when it had the best opportunity to help to shape our regulations to make the UK economy a better place?
Mr Rees-Mogg
It is very straightforward: legislative reform orders, which went to the Regulatory Reform Committee, are going to the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee instead, and it seemed more sensible to bring that together with the Select Committee that is in charge of the interests of business, is fighting for business and is economically involved, rather than having a separate and expensive Select Committee. It is a question of efficiency—a legislative reform of our own within this House to save the taxpayer money.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
Yesterday afternoon, I chaired a meeting here in Parliament with the Russian ambassador, which was interesting, to put it mildly, and obviously we talked about the crisis in Ukraine. Lots of us in the House want to help the Government to put in place proper sanctions, if necessary, in a timely fashion. Before the Foreign Secretary fell ill with covid—we wish her well—she announced to the House that a statutory instrument will soon come before us that is to be legal by next Thursday. It would be much better were the whole House able to show support for that SI in consideration on the Floor of the House, so that we could make clear our support for the Ukrainian people and our desire to make sure that jaw-jaw is more important than war-war.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his support for Government policy in relation to Ukraine. Her Majesty’s Government have made it absolutely clear that should a further Russian incursion into Ukraine happen, allies must enact swift retributive responses, including unprecedented sanctions. It is obviously right that any statutory instruments that come to the House are considered fully and I note the hon. Gentleman’s request for a debate.
Dame Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)
We have a debate this afternoon on the Standards Committee review and report, which my right hon. Friend will know makes copious reference to the independent complaints and grievance scheme that was established in the House across party lines only a couple of years ago. Does my right hon. Friend agree that we need to look at the ICGS and non-ICGS complaints systems together, to make sure that our constituents and those who want us to serve them can see what is going on and that there is full transparency?
In particular, my right hon. Friend might be aware that the introduction of the ICGS was really focused on changing the culture of this place, which meant training and proper induction for new Members and staff who come into this place, and it also meant exit interviews to find out why people do not stay. Those things are not happening; what can my right hon. Friend do to make sure that the system is properly in place and that the two different processes are aligned once and for all?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for her work to foster culture change in the House of Commons and in the setting up of the ICGS, which would not have happened in the form in which it has without her energy and drive. It has been enormously to the advantage of the House of Commons. I am glad that the Chairman of the Standards Committee, the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), is present in the Chamber, because I am sure he will have heard what my right hon. Friend had to say. There will be a debate later and it is important that all views about how things can be done better and differently are sent into the Standards Committee so that it can produce its report. My right hon. Friend’s comments are extremely helpful and her experience makes them particularly valid—[Interruption.] I think the Chairman of the Standards Committee is indicating that he has taken them as a formal representation.
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for agreeing to the statement later this afternoon on affairs in Northern Ireland. The Leader of the House will know—I have already spoken to him—that events in Northern Ireland are teetering on the brink: we are not months, weeks or days but moments away from the collapse of the Northern Ireland Executive. That is of course very sad, but it is entirely predictable and has been predicted from those on the Democratic Unionist party Benches for the past 13 months.
Will the Leader of the House assure us that good governance and good practices will be put in place to ensure that Northern Ireland does not fall behind in any of its governmental matters; that more time will be set aside in this House to debate issues to do with and pertinent to Northern Ireland; that the daily affairs of Northern Ireland will not be set to the side in any way; that the British Government will take full and proper charge of affairs when and where they have to; that people from the Republic of Ireland and their Government will not be allowed to interfere in the internal mechanisms and affairs of Northern Ireland; and that the frictions that exist between GB trade and Northern Ireland—
Mr Speaker
Order. You will be coming in later! I call the Leader of the House.
Mr Rees-Mogg
It would be wrong of me to predict what is happening in Northern Ireland at the moment. We have to wait upon events, but I can assure the hon. Gentleman that the British Government take responsibility for the whole of the United Kingdom. It is one single and undivided United Kingdom, and Her Majesty’s Government have a responsibility for the best interests of the whole of our country. We recognise the serious difficulties that are being caused by the Northern Ireland protocol and its implementation, and the effect that it has had on Northern Ireland. Her Majesty’s Government are aware of the issues, but we are a Unionist Government who attach great importance to being part of the United Kingdom.
Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)
Last Sunday I marched with thousands of Derby County fans to Pride Park stadium to show support for Derby County football club, one of the football league’s founding members. Derby County football club’s administrators have agreed another month’s extension with the English Football League, temporarily staving off the threat of expulsion and liquidation. Every day is crucial, and I do not want to see us approach that deadline without a sale of the club having been agreed. Could we have a statement next week to update MPs on the issue, and in particular on how fans’ interests are being represented in these important negotiations?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I congratulate my hon. Friend on bringing this to the attention of the House again. She has already had an urgent question, and this is a reminder of how effective the procedures of the House can be in highlighting important local issues and what a fantastic champion she is for Derby County. I am not a football expert, as she knows. However, I can tell her that the Minister for Sport, the Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Worcestershire (Nigel Huddleston), and officials in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport are in regular contact with the English Football League and the administrators about the club’s future. Ultimately it is for the EFL, the administrators and the club to resolve the issues, to ensure the survival of Derby County football club, but the Government have urged pragmatism from all parties to find a solution for the benefit of the fans and the community that the club serves. It is positive that the EFL has granted Derby County a four-week extension. That is a vital lifeline for the survival of the club, and the opportunity must be utilised to ensure that a suitable outcome is reached with the interests of Derby County’s fans in mind. Offering a debate may be difficult, however, because I have a feeling that my right hon. Friend the Chief Whip might not necessarily be a fan of Derby County, as it is a competitor football club to the one he follows. However, there are DCMS questions next week.
Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)
I want to thank the Leader of the House—surprisingly—for writing to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to try to secure a debate on the Government’s unlawful disability strategy. Will he commit to keeping us updated at business questions on the progress he is making on securing this important debate in Government time?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her kind words. I take very seriously the points raised in business questions and I pass on all points to the relevant Secretaries of State every week after business questions to ensure that other members of the Government are kept informed of the issues of concern to the House. On the disability strategy, the Government are committed to a strategy that supports all areas of life and to taking action to create a society that works for everyone, so that we can build back better and fairer. It is important to note that the recent judgment did not quash the national disability strategy; it was made on technical grounds. The Government are very much committed to the strategy, which is one of the broadest packages of real practical action so far put together. I will, of course, mention further that the hon. Lady has asked for a debate, and it may be that the Chairman of the Backbench Business Committee has some capacity.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
I was shocked last week when the Leader of the House told us that he felt the Government were drifting towards a presidential style of government, rather than a parliamentary one. I draw his attention to the fact that yesterday I published my private Member’s Bill, the Prime Minister (Accountability to House of Commons) Bill. I understand that tomorrow might be oversubscribed, so I have decided not to move it tomorrow, but perhaps the Leader of the House could deal with this particular point. I am requesting that we have Prime Minister’s questions on a Tuesday and Thursday again, so that the Prime Minister is here twice. It will make Thursday a more important day and it will stop his officials sending him on silly photoshoots on days when he should be in this House. Would the Leader of the House like to support my Bill?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am so sorry to hear that my hon. Friend is not proceeding with his Bill tomorrow, because I was going to be here to respond to it had we reached that stage of the debate. Sadly, the pearls of wisdom that I was looking forward to spewing forth will not be available. None the less, he makes an interesting point about whether PMQs was better on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I think, by and large, that the House likes having the longer time that is available on a Wednesday, but, obviously, the decision on when questions are taken is for the Government, and we listen to hon. and right hon. Members’ views.
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)
There can be few things more valuable to us than the air that we breathe and how clean it is. In my constituency of Edinburgh West, we have a particular problem with two of the worst polluted roads in Scotland. It is why I currently have a private Member’s Bill, which will be heard shortly. Will the Leader of the House consider having a debate on how we, across the United Kingdom, reach the World Health Organisation guidelines on clean air and on setting up some mechanism whereby the Government here in Westminster can work with the devolved authorities to ensure that we have a national strategy—or perhaps he would like to support my Bill?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Clean air is very important for the whole of the United Kingdom and it is something that the Government are very committed to improving. As I have said in the House previously, it does seem to me that one of the great scandals of modern politics was the promotion of diesel engines and the nitrous oxides that they spew out, which was done by the last Labour Government in cahoots with the European Union and German car manufacturers, which has had a terrible effect on air quality in our major cities. None the less, the Government are very committed to promoting air quality. As for an immediate debate, I once again point the hon. Lady to the Backbench Business Committee.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
My right hon. Friend is a great champion for us Back Benchers in getting information from Government Departments. Can he arrange for the Home Secretary, or a Minister from the Home Office, to come forward and give us a statement about what is happening to immigration correspondence? I received a plethora of emails this week. I shall quote from one of them, but they are all the same.
“Thank you for your emails of 30 November 2020, 8 January 2021, 5 February 2021, 5 March 2021, 7 April 2021,10 May 2021, 7 June 2021, 6 July 2021, 5 August 2021, 3 September 2021, 30 September 2021, 3 November 2021 and 1 December 2021…We apologise for the delay in replying to your correspondence.”
I will not quote all the letter because of time, but it goes on to say that it hopes to resolve this claim, which by the way was submitted in 2019, by September 2022. That is three years and three months for an individual awaiting on an asylum claim. Can we have a statement on what is happening about this, because it is unacceptable behaviour by the Home Office?
Mr Rees-Mogg
It will not surprise my hon. Friend that I will make no attempt to defend that type of delay. Members have a constitutional right to hold the Government to account and to get proper, full and swift answers. To get a recent reply to a letter dated 30 November 2020 is not a proper constitutional service. I assure my hon. Friend that I will take this up with the Home Office immediately after Business questions. None the less, I do think that getting people back to work in their offices will be tremendously important in clearing up this backlog, because working from home has had all sorts of unintended consequences.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
The Leader of the House is right: we have our own opinions, but we cannot have our own facts. Facts are facts. One fact is that the victims of Jimmy Savile, through their solicitor, have made it quite clear that the smear against the Leader of the Opposition is groundless and should be withdrawn. This is a new low for the Conservative party. What makes Conservative Members think that they know better than the victims of Jimmy Savile?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The hon. Gentleman must ask the Leader of the Opposition why he gave an apology.
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
With respect to the restoration and renewal of Parliament, I welcome yesterday’s announcement by the Commission, chaired by the Leader of the House, that it will take back control from the sponsor body and that all the figures that come out of the delivery authority and the sponsor body, on which I sit, should be published. Can he confirm that the figures for the delay, length and cost of decant are truly horrendous; that no work would be scheduled to start before 2027, although the building works need to be got on with now; and that we are talking of a decant in excess of 15 years and costs in excess of £14 billion? Will he therefore confirm that some of us have been proved right when we said that we should have got on with it years ago? Can we have an early resolution of the House so that we can resolve the matter, take back control and start the work now?
Mr Rees-Mogg
My right hon. Friend raises some very important points. The Commission has asked that the figures be made available to all Members as soon as possible. The figures now range from £7 billion to £13 billion for the cost and from 12 years to 20 years for the decant. It seems to me that if we were to have a decant of 20 years, we would never come back to this Palace and that £13 billion or possibly even £14 billion of taxpayers’ money is not justifiable.
My right hon. Friend is also right that it has gone on for too long. We have been waiting for years for the perfect scheme instead of getting on with what we ought to do. He says it would be 2027 at the earliest, which is correct in part, but realistically it would probably be 2031, because the northern estate would have to be ready for people to move into it. I am glad to say that, with much thanks to your leadership of the Commission, Mr Speaker, we have been getting on with things before restoration and renewal that have been taken out of the scheme.
The Elizabeth tower is emerging butterfly-like from its chrysalis day by day to reveal an exceptionally beautiful part of the Palace. The fire safety programme has been proceeded with, so there are 4,126 sprinkler heads and 8 miles of pipe that are an important part of protecting life in the event of fire and are some protection for fire suppression that would be beneficial to the building.
By and large, the cast iron roofs have been restored in a very big programme as it is thought to be the largest expanse of cast iron roof in Europe. We are also getting on with the northern estate. It is really important that we get on with things and do them at a proportionate cost. We cannot possibly be out of here for 20 years; I do not think any Member thinks that is reasonable.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
I put on record my role as chair of the Threehills Community Supermarket, which will be Scotland’s first community supermarket. It opened its larder last week and the feedback has been positive. People using the service are on low wages or benefits. Will the Leader of the House undertake to place in the Commons Library a copy of the Government’s evidenced review of the systematic drivers of the need for food aid, which was due to be published by the Department for Work and Pensions 18 months ago, so we can facilitate an open and transparent debate on the serious matter of food aid provision?
Mr Rees-Mogg
May I congratulate the Threehills Community Supermarket in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and him on the work that he has clearly done to support it? The issue relates to the cost of living and what we have been doing to help people with their livelihoods, for which the rise in the national living wage to £9.50 in April, which will leave a full-time worker £5,000 a year better off, and the cut to the universal credit taper and the increased work allowance, which will give 2 million families an extra £1,000 a year in their earnings, are of fundamental importance. On the report that he is asking for, I will take that up with the Department.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
I am sure that you appreciate, Mr Speaker, that the British Lawnmower Museum in Southport is a real jewel in the nation’s heritage crown—indeed, a cut above the rest. It is under threat, however, from Labour-controlled Sefton Council and Sustrans, which are trying to impose a liveable neighbourhood near the museum that would seriously inhibit access, particularly for elderly people and disabled people. Could we have a debate on accessing our great British heritage sites? If my right hon. Friend or you, Mr Speaker, want to donate a lawnmower to the museum, it would be gratefully received.
Mr Rees-Mogg
It must be a very great place if it has been honoured by a visit from Mr Speaker himself. It is one of the glories of our country that we have museums for almost everything. A lawnmower museum is a reminder of the pride that we take in having finely cut lawns. It is worth bearing in mind that until, I think, the 1860s, the cricket ground at Lord’s—Thomas Lord’s ground—was cut by sheep. It is therefore relatively recently that lawnmowers have been used to assist the tending of Lord’s cricket ground.
Socialist councils are an absolute menace. We know that Sefton Council is a particular menace to all good ideas locally. It is absolutely typical that it is trying to stop something that gives pleasure to people. I am glad to say that £850 million of taxpayer spending was announced in last year’s spending review to support world-class cultural and heritage buildings. We should take pride in and support our local museums, and—dare I say it—we should cut socialist councils down to size.
Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
I am sure that the Leader of the House will be delighted to know that, following a campaign by the women’s parliamentary Labour party, the journalist Rose Stokes and the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, Boots has announced that it is slashing the price of its morning-after pill from £15.99 to £10.99, removing the sexist surcharge that is attached to that medication. It is interesting to note that Superdrug is still charging £13.49, whereas people can get generic emergency contraception for £3.99 on the Chemist4U website. I am raising this because cuts to public health budgets and the fragmentation of the NHS have meant that it is more difficult for women to access contraception advice. May we have a debate about the report of the all-party parliamentary group on sexual and reproductive health in the UK, which made clear recommendations on proper funding and accessibility for women’s contraceptive health services?
Mr Speaker
Before the Leader of the House answers, may I just say that we are finishing at 11.30? If we want to get people in, we are really going to have to speed up both questions and answers.
Mr Rees-Mogg
The right hon. Lady cannot expect me to speak in favour of abortifacients.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
The levelling-up White Paper that was launched yesterday will see Stoke-on-Trent become an educational investment area and get multi-million pound funding to bus back better, adding to the £56 million from the levelling-up fund, the £17.6 million Kidsgrove town deal, the £29 million transforming cities fund and the 550 new jobs from the Home Office. There are also the powers to compel rogue and absent landlords of high street shops to fill them and to increase fines when heritage and history is allowed to rot. Does my right hon. Friend agree that Burslem and Tunstall, which he has visited, deserve a future high streets task force?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I did indeed visit. I got to try some of Margaret’s famous vanilla custards at the Tunstall indoor market and she gave me supplies to eat on the train back to London. Stoke-on-Trent already receives support from the Government’s high streets task force, which announced its first tranche of bespoke expert support last year. It is staggering the delivery of its expert support to a total of 152 selected local authorities over the period 2021-24, but my hon. Friend is a brilliant campaigner for any cakes that are available.
Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)
Can we have a debate on banning rapists from football? This week, Scottish club Raith Rovers signed David Goodwillie, who was found to be a rapist by one of the most senior judges in Scotland in a civil court. The club has just reversed its decision, but it has caused huge trauma, upset and a devastating impact on the football community that supports Raith Rovers, including the women’s team, now renamed the McDermid Ladies, who will play on Sunday at 2 o’clock. Does the Leader of the House agree that rapists have no place in professional football, or any football, or any role in public life?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Of course I agree with the hon. Lady. She is right to raise a matter of this importance in the House.
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
I would like to associate myself with the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh). When it comes to restoration and renewal, we should prioritise taxpayer value for money. Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the works could be done more cost-effectively and to a perfectly decent specification, without the bells and whistles currently planned? Does he agree with me and my constituents that we should pursue this path?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Yes. The Commission was told that we could define how to meet lesser requirements at a fraction of the cost of the essential scheme. It has got far too expensive, it is taking far too long and we need to get on with doing what really needs to be done and to prioritise taxpayer value.
Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)
Public houses are an essential part of the fabric of the community up and down the country. However, I hear not just from my city of Cambridge but elsewhere that not only did they have a tough pandemic but they face a difficult challenge with food inspections that have become more complicated, with less experienced inspectors and extra costs. Could a Minister please address this issue? Perhaps the Leader of the House will note that it is the socialists who know the problems of business.
Mr Rees-Mogg
Yes; I am delighted. As I have said before, there is more joy in heaven over the one sinner who repenteth than the 99 who are not repenting. The hon. Gentleman is always right to seek redress from over-zealous regulators who do not do their job properly. I will pass on what he has said to the relevant Department.
David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)
My constituent David Bosley contacted me last month about his son Alex, who is one of a number of my constituents to have had their Instagram account hacked and used by fraudsters to trick their contacts into giving them money. The fraudsters often walk away with tens of thousands of pounds. May we have a debate on clamping down both on the perpetrators of the frauds and on the lax processes of the social media platforms that inadvertently facilitate fraud?
Mr Rees-Mogg
My hon. Friend is so right to raise this important and concerning issue, which will be of importance to Members across the House. The Online Safety Bill will ensure that big platforms, including Instagram, will have to do a great deal more to take scams seriously and keep people safe. If firms fail to keep people safe, Ofcom will be able to give huge fines of up to multi-billions of pounds for the largest companies, or even block sites. We are carefully considering the recommendations of the Joint Committee on the draft Online Safety Bill at the moment and will incorporate them where we feel that the Bill can be strengthened further. I can assure my hon. Friend that work is under way.
Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)
I thank the Leader of the House for the work that he does on following up answers to parliamentary questions that are of low quality. May I—surprisingly perhaps—praise one that I have received from the Department of Health and Social Care? I asked different Departments what their policy was on references for recruitment. Not only did the DHSC answer my question but it helpfully included the Cabinet Office round-robin guidance to all the Departments on lines to take in answering my question, including a section explaining my motivation in asking the question, which I thought was very useful as I was wondering what it was myself. Could this novel, but perhaps—to use the word of the week—inadvertent, innovation be adopted in all such cases?
Mr Rees-Mogg
As it happens, I have often thought that the greater the openness the more understanding there is from other sides. This inadvertent mistake sounds to have been rather beneficial.
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)
The independent inquiry into child sexual abuse reported its conclusions this week and made a number of findings about failings of police and local councils to protect vulnerable children. The report describes a horrific culture that forced survivors of child sexual exploitation to fight to be believed. Those who were heard were made to feel as if they had brought the exploitation on themselves. Investigations were hampered by poor data collection on a range of issues, including the ethnicity of perpetrators. Please can we find Government time for a debate on this issue, which affects so many communities across the country, including in Rother Valley?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the work that he has been doing on this particularly important issue. The Government are committed to considering carefully the inquiry’s recommendations and will respond fully within the inquiry’s deadline of six months. Obviously, I cannot comment on the recommendations at this stage, but the Government are delivering the action set out in our groundbreaking tackling child sexual abuse strategy, which sets out our whole-system response to tackling sexual abuse, including exploitation. The Government will shortly publish an updated child exploitation disruption toolkit to help the police and local authorities to prevent and disrupt organised exploitation. It is likely that there will be an opportunity for Members to discuss the work of the IICSA when it publishes its final report later this year.
Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)
During COP26 the Women’s Institute distributed crocheted bangles like the one I am wearing—a bracelet made by Jean Boyle of Flockton WI—to remind decision makers that there should be no more loopholes in carbon emission reduction targets. May we have a debate on how decisions made at COP26 will be monitored and held to account later this year at COP27?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I congratulate the WI on its terrific work. It makes not only marmalade but items for the hon. Gentleman to wear. Of course there will be regular discussions on COP26, and we will be held to account in this House through Adjournment debates, Backbench Business debates and, indeed, questions to the COP26 President.
Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)
Yesterday I met Fran Hall and Lobby Akinnola, representatives of Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice. They are very angry that the covid inquiry is being delayed, and they want to know when it will be launched so that the evidence is contained and made secure, and so the hearings can go ahead in the spring, as has been promised. If there are more delays, the covid inquiry will be kicked into the summer or later. The inquiry needs to start in the spring. Can we have a statement from the Government on the covid-19 inquiry and when it will start?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I think preliminary work is beginning and, as I understand it, the website was opened yesterday. I will confirm this to the hon. Lady, but it is happening. The inquiry will go ahead, and it is very important that it goes ahead when all the facts are known.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
We had the very positive levelling-up statement and White Paper yesterday, but please can we have a debate on one element of levelling up that is urgent and specific enough to merit direct consideration, and that is the role of education, skills and colleges? The lack of skills or access to a skilled workforce is the issue most raised with me by local businesses.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I agree with my hon. Friend that education and skills have a vital role to play in levelling up the country. Like him, I welcome yesterday’s announcement of the White Paper by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.
Through our multibillion pound plan for jobs, we have seen 120,000 young people starting their kickstart job and more than 160,000 apprentices being supported through the apprenticeship incentive scheme. There is a £3.8 billion increase in skills spending, and we are funding a lifetime guarantee and quadrupling places on skills bootcamps. As announced by the Secretary of State yesterday, the Government’s mission is to target new high-quality skills training at the lowest-skilled areas, with 200,000 more people completing high-quality skills training annually. What my hon. Friend is calling for is in the pipeline.
Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)
Will the Leader of the House make time for the Minister for Defence People and Veterans to make even a written statement on the progress he is making on ensuring that the veterans card is issued to former service personnel who served before 2018? I have been asking for an update from the Minister, his predecessor and his predecessor’s predecessor since the card was announced. It would be good to understand what the delays are and why the Government are not willing to issue this much-needed card for veterans.
Mr Rees-Mogg
I commit to the hon. Gentleman that, in my regular correspondence with Ministers after business questions, I will take this up with the Minister for Defence People and Veterans and get an answer.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Unlike the Leader of the House, I will never have enough money to own an Aston Martin, but I have a constituent who is lucky enough to own one. It was repaired after being flood damaged. He drove it safely in Cyprus for four years, he has insurance and he has an MOT showing it is road-worthy, but the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency will not allow him to register the car to be driven on the road because, according to its database, it was written off and due to be scrapped by a previous insurance company. I have tried to assist my constituent, but the DVLA has more or less told me to go away with a capital F. Will the Leader of the House ask the Secretary of State for Transport to have a look at this and see how the DVLA makes decisions and to whom it is accountable?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Sadly, I do not have an Aston Martin, although I think they are particularly beautiful and elegant cars. His constituent therefore has my greatest sympathy as he finds this bureaucratic morass is stopping him registering his car and being able to use it when it is now in working condition and with an MOT.
The DVLA has been a mainstay of problems for Members of Parliament in recent weeks. I was told that the backlog had been sorted, but I am afraid that is not the experience of my constituents. I will definitely take this up for the hon. Gentleman’s constituent with the Secretary of State for Transport.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
I am always pleased to listen to the Leader of the House, but I like it better when he seems to be speaking for the House of Commons rather than as a sort of public relations man for the Prime Minister. He said some very thoughtful things when he talked about the Metropolitan police and police behaviour, about how a few rotten apples can make such a difference in an institution’s culture. I hope he will reflect on what he said and apply it to what has been going on in this House of Commons and in this Government. While he is thinking about that, can we have an early debate on the campaign that my great old friend, my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), has been raising in this House with no response: why is it that so much Russian money is swilling around in London? It is in the Conservative party; it is everywhere, to such a level that we are now told we cannot have sanctions against the Russians because there is so much Russian money laundering in this city.
Mr Rees-Mogg
First of all, this Government is made up of a collection of the finest, best apples that has ever been seen anywhere in the world. They are the Beauty of Bath, the Cox’s Orange Pippins—the best and finest that a costermonger could ever have on his stall.
To come to the point about Russian money, as I said earlier, should a further Russian incursion into Ukraine happen, allies must enact swift, retributive responses, including unprecedented sanctions. We have very tough laws against dirty money, and they are enforced.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
I know that the Leader of the House places great importance on the honesty and integrity of Members. More than two years ago, during the election campaign, the Prime Minister gave a categoric assurance that members of the mine-workers’ pension scheme would receive the moneys back from that pension scheme, so could we now have a statement to tell us when that is going to happen, given the length of time they have had to wait and the importance of this issue for ex-miners in my constituency?
Mr Rees-Mogg
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising this point on behalf of his constituents. It has been raised before by other Members, and I have been following it up with the relevant Department.
Economic Update
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Rishi Sunak)
The UK’s economic recovery has been quicker and stronger than forecast. In the depths of the pandemic, our economy was expected to return to its pre-crisis level at the end of 2022; instead, it got there in November 2021, a full year earlier. Unemployment was expected to peak at nearly 12%; instead, it peaked at 5.2% and has now fallen to just over 4%, saving more than 2 million jobs. With the fastest-growing economy in the G7 this year, with over 400,000 more people on payrolls than before the pandemic, and with business investment rising, it is no wonder that borrowing is set to fall from £320 billion last year—the highest ever peacetime level—to just £46 billion by the end of this Parliament. As we emerge from the depths of the worst recession in 300 years, we should be proud of our economic record. The economy is stronger because of the plan we put in place, because of the actions we took to protect families and businesses, and that plan is working.
However, for all the progress we are making, the job is not yet done. I know that right now, the No. 1 issue on people’s minds is the rising cost of living. It is the independent Bank of England’s role to deliver low and stable inflation, and the Governor will set out its judgments at midday today. Just as the Government stood behind the British people through the pandemic, so we will help people deal with one of the biggest costs they now face: energy. The energy regulator Ofgem announced this morning that the energy price cap will rise in April to £1,971, an increase of £693 for the average household. Without Government action, this would be incredibly tough for millions of hard-working families, so the Government are going to step in to directly help people manage those extra costs.
Before I set out the steps we are taking, let me explain what is happening to energy prices and why. People’s energy bills are rising because it is more expensive for the companies that supply our energy to buy oil, coal and gas. Of the £693 increase in the April price cap, around 80% comes from wholesale energy prices. Over the past year, the price of gas alone has quadrupled, and because over 85% of homes in Britain are heated with a gas boiler and around 40% of our electricity comes from gas, this is hitting households hard. The reasons gas prices are soaring are global: across Europe and Asia, a long, cold winter last year depleted gas stores. Disruption to other energy sources, such as nuclear and wind, left us relying more than usual on gas during the summer months. Surging demand in the world’s manufacturing centres in Asia, at the same time that countries such as China are moving away from coal, is further increasing demand for gas, and concerns about a possible Russian incursion into Ukraine are putting further pressure on wholesale gas markets. So prices are rising.
The price cap has meant that the impact of soaring gas prices has so far fallen predominantly on energy companies—so much so that some suppliers that could not afford to meet those extra costs have gone out of business as a result. It is not sustainable to keep holding the price of energy artificially low. For me to stand here and pretend we do not have to adjust to paying higher prices would be wrong and dishonest, but what we can do is take the sting out of a significant price shock for millions of families by making sure that the increase in prices is smaller initially and is spread over a longer period.
Without Government intervention, the increase in the price cap would leave the average household having to find an extra £693. The actions I am announcing today will provide, to the vast majority of households, just over half of that amount—£350. In total, the Government are going to help about 28 million households this year. Taken together, this is a plan to help with the cost of living worth about £9 billion.
We are delivering that support in three different ways. First, we will spread the worst of the extra costs of this year’s energy price shock over time. This year, all domestic electricity customers will receive an up-front discount on their bills worth £200. Energy suppliers will apply the discount on people’s bills from October, with the Government meeting the cost in full. That discount will automatically be repaid from people’s bills in equal £40 instalments over the next five years. This is the right way to support people while staying on track with our plans to repair the public finances.
Because we are taking a fiscally responsible approach, we can also provide more help faster to those who need it most—the second part of our plan. We are going to give people a £150 council tax rebate to help with the cost of energy in April, and this discount will not need to be repaid. I do want to be clear with the House that we are deliberately not just giving support to people on benefits. Lots of people on middle incomes are struggling right now too, so we have decided to provide the council tax rebate to households in bands A to D. This means that about 80% of all homes in England will benefit.
The third part of our plan will provide local authorities with a discretionary fund of nearly £150 million to help those lower-income households who happen to live in higher council tax properties, and households in bands A to D who are exempt from council at all.
We are also confirming today that we will go ahead with existing plans to expand eligibility for the warm home discount by almost a third, so that 3 million vulnerable households will now benefit from that scheme. That is not all we are doing to help vulnerable households. We are providing £3 billion over this Parliament to help more than half a million lower-income homes become more energy efficient, saving them on average £290 a year; increasing the national living wage to £9.50 an hour in April—a rise of over £1,000 for 2 million low-paid workers; and providing an effective tax cut for those on universal credit, allowing almost 2 million households to keep an average of £1,000 per year.
The payment through energy suppliers will apply across England, Wales and Scotland. Energy policy is devolved in Northern Ireland, with a different regulator, and the Government do not have the legal powers to intervene, but we will make sure that the Executive are funded to do something similar, with about £150 million for Northern Ireland through the Barnett formula next year. Because the council tax system is England-only, total Barnett consequentials of about £565 million will be provided to the devolved Administrations in the usual way.
I know that some in this House have argued for a cut in VAT on energy. However, that policy would disproportionately benefit wealthier households. There would be no guarantee that suppliers would pass on the discounts to all customers, and we should be honest with ourselves: this would become a permanent Government subsidy on everyone’s bills, a permanent subsidy worth £2.5 billion every year, at a time when we are trying to rebuild the public finances. Instead, our plan allows us to provide more generous support, faster, for those who need it most, providing 28 million households with at least £200, and the vast majority receiving £350. It is fair, it is targeted, it is proportionate: it is the right way to help people with a spike in energy costs.
Today’s announcements are just one part of the Government’s plan to tackle the country’s most pressing economic challenges. It is a plan for growth, with record investment in infrastructure, innovation and skills; a plan to restore the public finances, with debt falling by the end of this Parliament; a plan to cut waiting lists and back the NHS with £29 billion over three years, and with a permanent new source of funding; and, with the measures that I have announced today, a plan to help with the rising cost of energy, with £350 more in the pockets of tens of millions of hard-working families. That is our plan to build a stronger economy, not just today but for the long term, and I commend it to the House.
Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)
I thank the Chancellor for his statement.
We have known that this price rise was coming for months, and today we learn that the energy price cap will increase to £1,971 in April. In October, I called on the Government to provide immediate support for support for households, cutting VAT on their energy bills and saving £200, with £400 in extra targeted support for those who need it most, which would mean, for some of the poorest families in our country, almost no increase in energy bills from April. The Government have not done that today.
We all remember when the Prime Minister said that cutting VAT on energy bills was one of the benefits of Brexit. He said:
“When we Vote Leave, we will be able to scrap this unfair and damaging tax.”
Could there ever be a time when that policy is needed more than it is today? I should have thought that the Prime Minister, with his unblemished record of integrity, would defend the commitments he had made, but instead, that is another pledge thrown on to the bonfire of broken Tory promises.
The uncomfortable truth for the Chancellor is that even after what he has announced today, families in Britain—including some of the poorest—will still be paying hundreds of pounds more for their energy from April as a result of the breathtaking rise in energy prices just announced by Ofgem. Millions of people will be cutting back to pay the bills. Citizens Advice says that it saw a record number of people in January struggling with fuel debts, before the energy price increase. But what do the Government offer? A buy now, pay later scheme that loads up costs for tomorrow; high prices as far as the eye can see, this year, next year, and the year after that. It is a case of give with one hand now, and take it all back later with the other.
The Conservative party used to talk about the nation’s credit card. Today, we have seen the Chancellor force British households to load up their credit cards. By lending billions of pounds to energy companies, he is gambling that prices are going to fall, but they could go up further in October. What then? Billions more loaded on to people’s bills? The best way of targeting support to those who need it most would be an increase to £400 and an extension to 9 million households of the warm home discount, as Labour has proposed. The Government’s scheme is a pale imitation of Labour’s, especially for the households and pensioners on the most modest incomes, but the Chancellor is using council tax to target extra help. That will mean that many of the poorest households receive no extra support, while some of the richest do, and it is people living in the north and the midlands who will lose out most. The hypocrisy, the day after the publication of the Government’s levelling-up White Paper, is obvious. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. Mr Holden, I think we need to be a little calmer. I am sure you will want to catch my eye, and that is not the way to do so.
Rachel Reeves
Can the Chancellor confirm how many people who are fuel-poor will miss out on council tax support compared with the warm home discount support that Labour has announced?
The Government had a choice. Only today, Shell announced that its profits have quadrupled to $20 billion. It described its results as “momentous”—dividends up, profits up, and people’s energy bills up too. Labour’s plan would impose a one-off windfall tax on those excess profits, but this Chancellor would rather shield the oil and gas producers while at the same time loading the cost on to working people and pensioners. Cabinet Ministers have described the oil and gas producers as “struggling”. Tell that to the one in five people who are already skipping meals so they can pay their energy bills.
This energy crisis has not happened overnight. A decade of dither and delay from the Conservative party has brought us to this point: a decade of failure to regulate our energy markets; a decade in which they have slashed our gas storage capacity, leaving us more reliant than ever on Russia for our gas imports; a decade of failure to make the most of solar, tidal and wind energy; and a decade of stalled progress on insulating our homes to keep bills low, not just for one year but into the future. It has been the Tory decade that has led to this announcement of the biggest increase in the price of domestic energy since records began. That is what the Chancellor should acknowledge and apologise for today. The Conservatives are not solving the cost of living crisis, because the Conservatives are the cost of living crisis.
Rishi Sunak
The Opposition may have some soundbites but they certainly do not have a policy. [Interruption.] In contrast, this Government have announced measures—[Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
Order. Mr Seely, is there something wrong with that wood you keep knocking, because I think it is in good order? You do not need to test for woodworm.
Rishi Sunak
In contrast, this Government have announced measures to share the burden with consumers and help manage the global price rise. Despite the faux outrage from the Opposition Benches, I am sure that even they would admit privately that the support just announced is both generous and comprehensive.
Let me take some of the hon. Lady’s points in turn. First, on VAT, may I say how very welcome it is that the Opposition are recognising the benefits of Brexit? I hope they will join me in celebrating the fact that we have been able to change mass migration to this country after decades, that we can create new freeports in places such as Teesside, that we can sign new free trade deals, and that we can deregulate our economy to drive faster growth. She talked about VAT. VAT will, on average, be worth £90 to every household. We are providing £150 to those households that really need it and delivering that support quicker.
Secondly, the hon. Lady tried to claim that it was the Government’s responsibility to manage global gas prices. I outlined in my statement that it is very clear, as any person looking at this sensibly will acknowledge, that global factors are causing the increase in gas prices. No British Government or Chancellor can change what is happening in Asia or, indeed, stop a nuclear power plant going offline in Germany, and the hon. Lady should acknowledge that. Even in places such as Norway, electricity bills are rising because global factors are in play. She would do well to acknowledge that—and the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), sitting next to her, will know that, having spent a lot of time on this.
Thirdly, I want to address the point about our support for the most vulnerable, because I am proud of this Government’s record in supporting those who need our help. The policies we have announced today are progressive in their nature. A flat rate will, of course, mean far more to those on lower incomes or with lower energy bills. It is worth five times as much as a percentage of income for those in the lowest incomes as for those on the highest incomes. The hon. Lady talked about insulation. Over this Parliament, we are spending £3 billion to improve energy efficiency and insulation for over half a million households in fuel poverty. That is the right thing to do and it will save those vulnerable families, on average, £300 a year, not just this year but every year going forward. We have already announced those plans.
Lastly, to address the hon. Lady’s point on a windfall tax, of course that sounds superficially appealing, but we on the Government Benches deal with complex problems in a responsible way. The obvious impact of a windfall tax would be to deter investment—it is as simple as that. At this moment I want to see more investment in the North sea, not less. Last year we saw the lowest amount of investment on record in the North sea, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy pointed out just the other day. There are £11 billion of projects lined up to go. I want to unlock that investment because that is good for this country, good for British jobs and good for our energy security.
We will pursue policies that are good for the interests of this country not just today but in the future. My right hon. Friend the Energy Secretary is working very hard to make sure we have an energy market that is fit for the future. We have made investments in nuclear, which, as he rightly pointed out, were ignored by the Labour party when it was in power, but which we are now fixing.
In conclusion, I am not blind to the challenges we face. I have to say to the hon. Lady and her colleagues, however, that we on this side of the House did not have the luxury of sitting on the sidelines and throwing stones. Faced with the gravest of crises, this Government chose to protect millions of jobs. We chose to support millions of businesses, we chose to invest in a world-leading vaccination programme, and we chose a balanced approach to covid so we could open up faster than anywhere else in Europe. We did those things at record speed and at a time of great uncertainty, and we will always strive to learn from mistakes. Nothing is ever perfect when responding to a crisis, but I say to the Labour party that there is a fine line between reasonable criticism and political opportunism, and in my experience the British people can always tell the difference.
Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend’s announcement today. Does he agree that a cut in VAT to solve this crisis is a completely flawed policy, as evidenced by the three economists who spoke to the Treasury Committee this week, including Torsten Bell from the Resolution Foundation, who wanted something far more targeted, such as what my right hon. Friend has announced today? It is clear that one factor in this crisis is Russia’s willingness to weaponise its gas supplies. Will he confirm that if there is any incursion into Ukraine, this country, with our international allies, will look at weaponising our banking system, which would be economically catastrophic for Russia?
Rishi Sunak
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. On VAT, I have nothing further to add. He is right; what we are doing is more targeted, faster and more generous to those who need our help. With regard to sanctions on Russia, I can assure him that absolutely nothing is off the table. We are working closely with our international partners, as the Foreign Secretary has outlined, to prepare a very robust package of sanctions.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
The Chancellor brags about having the fastest recovery, but that is actually wrong because Italy, for a start, has a higher growth rate. If the economy is doing so well, why is he still introducing a £12 billion tax on workers this financial year? Why has it taken to the last minute to try to do something about the cost of living crisis? Why is so much of this measure actually a loan that bill payers will have to pay back? He talks about not doing a VAT cut because he wants a more targeted approach. How is giving everybody a rebate a targeted approach? It is illogical.
The reality is that the Treasury is currently raking it in compared to where it thought it would be in the March 2021 Budget: an extra £3 billion this financial year and next year from oil and gas revenues; and VAT receipt predictions in October last year were nearly £40 billion higher than what they were in March 2021. That is a lot of money that the Treasury could be freeing up. Meanwhile, average energy bills increased this year to nearly £1,200, up from £700 the year before, bringing in an extra £0.6 billion in VAT. The VAT increase due to the cap rise will bring the Treasury another £0.8 billion a year, so there is much more money it could free up.
The Scottish Government are bringing in a £20-a-week child payment and uprating the child winter assistance payment. Could the Chancellor not look at doing something similar? Will he confirm that the council tax rebate proposal he is bringing in will have Barnett consequentials, how much they will be and that they will go to the Scottish Government? Will he look at devolving further budgets and powers so that Scotland can take a more targeted approach?
National Energy Action estimated that increasing the cap would put 6 million people into fuel poverty. With the Chancellor’s measures, what impact assessment have the Government done of how many households will be in fuel poverty? How many more premature deaths will there be because people are in fuel poverty? Lastly, the highlands of Scotland generate electricity and send it to the rest of the UK, yet electricity users in the highlands on the restricted meters pay 4p a unit more for electricity, or £400 more on their bills. When will the Treasury and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy work with Ofgem to remove that ridiculous surcharge for ageing people in the highlands?
Rishi Sunak
I am happy to confirm to the hon. Gentleman that the Barnett consequentials for Scotland will be around £290 million, which I hope he will welcome. My right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury will be speaking to Kate Forbes later today to go over the details, and I very much hope that the Scottish Government will choose to do something very similar to what we are doing, to the benefit of Scottish citizens. Of course, Scottish citizens will benefit from the rebate scheme on bills, because that is a Great Britain-wide policy, as I outlined.
With regard to the hon. Gentleman’s broader points on the North sea, there is a clear point of difference between us on the Government side of the House and the SNP. We believe in the future of the North sea, in the oil and gas industry, and in the 200,000 jobs it supports, and we want to ensure it plays an important part in our transition to net zero. I hope he can see that that is the right thing for Scotland and will join us in supporting that very important industry.
Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for his excellent statement, and particularly for the thoughtful and progressive nature of the actions he plans to take. Does he agree that it is right to help not only the poorest, but those on middle incomes who are struggling with their household budgets?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right; I know that is something she is perhaps bringing up on behalf of her constituents. A price increase of this magnitude impacts almost everybody, and it is right that our response therefore helps almost everybody. That is what we are doing: ensuring that those families who are working hard on household incomes of £40,000 or so will still get £150-worth of support. Four out of every five households will benefit. We are on the side of hardworking families like those, and I make no apology for it.
Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
I see we now have the Klarna Chancellor—“Get it now, pay later.” There is an important issue with council tax: in areas such as mine and other parts of London, there are not many people in those bands, and certainly not in bands A to C. Who will fund the council tax rebate? Will it be fully funded by the Exchequer, and will there be a weighting of the £150 million fund to areas such as mine, where there are poor households in high-value properties?
Rishi Sunak
Just to confirm for the hon. Lady, it is council tax bands A to D, so it is four out of every five households across England. Obviously, that will vary by region. I can confirm that it will be fully Exchequer-funded and, on top of that, there will be a discretionary fund of around £150 million, for which the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities will decide the best allocation formula. Local authorities will be able to use that to help those low-income households that happen to live in higher council tax band properties and those people, such as students, who are exempt from paying council tax at all, but whom we would want to get that support to.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
Conservatives believe in holding taxes down and putting more money in people’s pockets so that they can decide how to spend it. Socialists believe in raising taxes and then choosing to give it back, in the form of discounts and rebates, to selected people who the Government think need them. Could the Chancellor explain his approach in increasing national insurance contributions and then handing money back to different people through rebates and discounts? Is that a Conservative approach, or is it a socialist approach?
Rishi Sunak
With the greatest respect to my hon. Friend, I also believe that it is a Conservative approach to be responsible with this nation’s public finances. I believe that, after recovering from the worst economic shock in 300 years, where borrowing spiralled to levels that we have not seen since world war two, it is right and responsible to tackle that and get our borrowing and debt down to sustainable levels. That is why I have had to make difficult decisions, but also fund the country’s No. 1 priority: the NHS and the unacceptably high and growing number of people waiting for operations. That is what that funding will do. It is right that we provide a secure, long-term, sustainable funding stream for the country’s No. 1 priority, and people should be reassured that every penny of that levy is going to go to the thing that they care most about.
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
There is an obvious unfairness in the massive profits being made by the oil and gas companies at a time when families are facing such great hardship. Surely the Chancellor must make an intervention to address that. He has announced a discretionary fund for local councils. Worried families will have no idea how much that will benefit them, if at all. Will he instead introduce an uplift in universal credit, having cut it so unfairly just four months ago?
Rishi Sunak
It is worth pointing out that the energy companies that the right hon. Gentleman talks about are already subject to a far higher rate of corporation tax. In fact, at 40% versus 19%, it is double the rate of corporation tax that other companies pay. I will not repeat my earlier arguments about the windfall tax.
We believe that the right way is to make sure that people can keep more of what they earn, which is why we cut the universal credit taper rate by 8 percentage points. That is a £2.2 billion tax cut that will benefit 2 million of the lowest paid people in our society. It is making working pay, it is strengthening incentives to work, it is the right policy and it is a Conservative policy.
Esther McVey (Tatton) (Con)
Many families across the country will struggle with their energy bills this year, so I am grateful that we have a Chancellor who is in touch with that. Will he commit to continuing to ensure that those in middle Britain, as well as those on the very lowest incomes, are supported by this Government?
Rishi Sunak
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right and I can give her that reassurance. I hope that today’s announcements will provide her with the confidence she needs that both I and this Government are committed to being on the side of those hard-working families, whom she does an enormous amount to represent and champion in this House.
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)
The Chancellor said that energy suppliers will apply the discount on people’s bills from October. Vauxhall constituents contact me almost daily, including residents who live in properties that are too cold to heat and residents pleading for help to get repairs done. Current data suggests that more than 8,000 households in Vauxhall already live in fuel poverty. What does the Chancellor have to say to my constituents who are already unable to make ends meet and who face a hike of over £700 in their energy bills?
Rishi Sunak
What I can tell them is that they will not have to wait until October, as the Labour party’s proposals would have had them do. They will receive £150 in April, and then in October they will receive the rebate on their bills at a time when the energy price cap will be looked at again. So it is appropriate that there is further action to provide support then. That is why this policy is the right policy. By using the council tax system, we can get money to people faster—£150 in April for the hon. Lady’s constituents.
Matt Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)
I welcome this smart set of measures. We must retain fiscal discipline; otherwise the problem will get worse rather than better. On monetary policy, the Chancellor mentioned the independence of the Bank of England decision, which has just been announced, but there is some chatter about working in tandem with the Bank. Will he confirm that, on monetary policy—not just interest-rate setting but the withdrawal of quantitative easing—Bank independence will be respected?
Rishi Sunak
I can give my right hon. Friend that assurance. It is absolutely right and proper that the Bank is independent of Government on matters of monetary policy. That is exactly what has always been the case over the past two years and it will continue to be the case. I can wholeheartedly give him that assurance.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
The Chancellor will be pleased that his campaign team are behind him today. Does he really think that the super-profits of $20 billion made by Shell are untouchable? His hands-off approach will not persuade many people across our country.
Rishi Sunak
What millions of people across this country will see today is a Government who are on their side and a Government taking action to help them with the anxiety they feel about rising energy bills. We are doing it in a proportionate, fair, targeted and responsible way to protect people not just today, but for years.
Sir Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
Thousands of families in Swindon and millions of households across the country will welcome the immediate help on council tax that the Chancellor has announced today in his welcome statement. Does he agree that the cod analysis we heard from the hon. Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves) about the energy market in Europe is demonstrable evidence of the paucity of the Labour party’s approach to energy? Is not our approach to a zero-carbon economy—one based upon energy security—going to be the way we deliver our country out of these short-term problems?
Rishi Sunak
As ever, my right hon. and learned Friend makes an excellent point; he is absolutely right and I agree wholeheartedly with him. He will know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is working very hard to undo some of the mistakes that the Labour party made in the past.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I know that the Chancellor is all pumped up, but this is pretty puny stuff, to be honest; £350 is not going to touch the sides of the problem for my constituents. Gas and electricity are up for the average family in my constituency by £686; fuel is up by £314; the average weekly shop is up by £385; universal credit has been cut by £1,040; national insurance is up by £150; and frozen tax allowances—frozen by him—will cost another £300. That makes £2,875, in a constituency where the average wage is £27,000. That is really going to cause hardship and £350 does not even touch it.
Rishi Sunak
The Labour party has proposals that would give considerably less to many people, so it is a bit rich to hear that. The hon. Member had a long list of numbers. I also have one: 400,000 more people on the payroll than there were before the crisis; 2 million jobs saved because of the actions of this Government; the national living wage going up by £1,000 a year in April; and a £1,000 tax cut for millions of people on universal credit. Those things are what we are doing to put more money into people’s pockets when they need it, and they can rely on us to continue supporting them not just now, but for days and years into the future.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
First, I thank the Chancellor for coming to the House to make his statement before he does a press conference. That is the right order of priorities. I also thank him for engaging with Conservative colleagues, listening to their concerns and responding to them in his statement. Finally, may I highlight the realism and honesty with which he has grappled with global gas prices? We cannot pretend that they have not gone up and what he has done is set out a package to smooth the impact for everybody and to help those on the lowest incomes. That is the right approach and it demonstrates why we have got it right and the Labour party is not fit for office.
Rishi Sunak
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. Those of us in government make responsible decisions and we are honest with people. I think people respect that honesty and it is the right thing for us to do. He is right that there is a global surge in gas prices and it would be wrong to pretend that we do not have to adjust to that, but what we can do is take the sting out of that adjustment, spread its impact over time and limit its immediate impact. That is the right and responsible approach and I am grateful for his support on that plan.
Naz Shah (Bradford West) (Lab)
The Chancellor comes here and says he is proud of his record. Let me tell him what my constituents think of his record. The Conservative party cut £20 a week from universal credit and was dragged here kicking and screaming for U-turn after U-turn just to feed poor and hungry children. This £350 does not cut it when the Chancellor has wasted billions. More than £6 billion went on wasted personal protective equipment and more than £4.7 billion has been lost to fraud in respect of covid funds. The Chancellor brings £9 billion here when he has lost £12 billion. It does not quite cut it for my constituents, who do not trust this Government because they are not helping my constituents. Those at the bottom end are the ones being hit the most. This does not even come near the £700, let alone the cost of living.
Rishi Sunak
The hon. Lady talks about universal credit; this Government provided the extra support for people when they needed it during the crisis. All the data and evidence show that throughout the worst of the depths of this pandemic the Government’s actions helped those on the lowest incomes the most. That is a record of which I am enormously proud.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
I realise that to the champagne socialists on the Opposition Benches £350 is not a lot of money, but my right hon. Friend knows that I care deeply about this issue. My constituents are just about managing but this is a cost of living package for white van men and women throughout the country, including in my Harlow constituency. Will he continue to do everything he can to focus on the just-about-managing group of people who make up my constituents, and make sure that the Government continue to cut the cost of living for hard-working families?
Rishi Sunak
I am grateful for my right hon. Friend’s support. He rightly champions those people who are just about managing and who work incredibly hard to build a better life for themselves and their families. They should know that this Government are on their side. I thank him very much for his support and we will continue to champion those people.
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)
The Chancellor’s plans play Russian roulette with taxpayers’ money, gambling that prices will go down, rather than providing a real solution to help families to avoid skyrocketing bills. It is just delaying the pain while he increases taxes by £600 a year for the average household. Why will he not listen to the Liberal Democrats’ suggestion of a package that would help families to reduce their bills by £1,000 a year? Surely it is time to admit that he has got it wrong. It is time to scrap the Conservative tax hikes.
Rishi Sunak
We have not heard from the hon. Lady’s party any plan to provide the funding that the NHS needs. We all know that the NHS is grappling with the recovery from covid. There is an unprecedented scale of backlogs to work through and the social care system needs urgent reform. The only way to grapple with those challenges is to provide the NHS and social care with a sustainable source of funding. That is what we are doing, it is the responsible and right approach, it is the progressive approach, it will benefit people in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as well as England, and in the long run it will be the right thing for this country.
Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the comprehensive package of support that he has provided, which is fiscally responsible in the face of global energy-price volatility. My constituents will have the benefit and reassurance of the rebate on energy bills that the Chancellor has announced, but they will not have the reassurance of the council tax support he is making available in England. Will he at least encourage the Welsh Government to follow suit, so that my constituents have the same benefit as those in England, or even go a step further and insist that the benefit is passed on?
Rishi Sunak
I can confirm that the Welsh Administration will receive £175 million or so in Barnett consequentials, which will enable them to provide a similar discount. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury will speak to the Welsh Government later and will very much make the point that we would like to see that happen, to the benefit of all my right hon. Friend’s constituents and people throughout Wales.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
On the council tax rebate, some of the poorest families do not pay significant amounts of council tax because they are on council tax support schemes. Even if their council tax bills are less than £150 a year, will they still get the full £150? Will their local authority pay that to them in cash in April? On the £150 million discretionary fund, will it truly be at the discretion of councils to decide how they spend it, or will the Government direct how it is spent?
Rishi Sunak
The hon. Gentleman is, of course, well informed on these issues. Our intention is that those people will benefit from the £150, which is why we are providing the discretionary fund. It has been sized with a sense of who those people are and how many they are. We will of course provide some guidance to local authorities on whom we would expect the support to go to, but ultimately they will be able to make those decisions for themselves.
John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)
I thank the Chancellor for an extremely welcome package, which is the latest step in a series of strong reactions to different crises throughout the pandemic and today. He also mentioned improving investment in North sea gas fields, which is very welcome. It is only a temporary set of solutions, however, that will dull the initial economic pain without solving the long-term problem of sky-high energy prices. What conversations has he had with the Energy Secretary, who is sitting next to him, about solutions to deal with those longer-term problems? When we can we expect to hear answers on such things as reforming the price cap and the wholesale energy market?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is very thoughtful on such matters and has, rightly, long made the point that we must also ensure that the long-term energy market is working in all our benefit. The Energy Secretary, the Prime Minister and I have been involved in such conversations for some time. The Energy Secretary is working on a set of measures that will address many of my hon. Friend’s concerns and he should expect to hear from the Government soon.
Alex Davies-Jones (Pontypridd) (Lab)
May I say how nice it is to finally see the Chancellor in his place? Some of us had been considering filing a missing persons report given his absence in recent weeks. Although I appreciate his update, for families across Pontypridd and Taff Ely, it is another case of too little, too late. The Welsh Labour Government have doubled the warm home discount scheme and Labour’s proposal would have taken £600 off the bills for the poorest in our country, but his plan gives them £350 off. Why does it fall so far short of what is needed and what is proposed?
Rishi Sunak
I am sorry that the hon. Lady did not welcome the £175 million in Barnett consequentials for the Welsh Administration. The Government are providing significant support for those on middle incomes, because they are also struggling, and we believe that is the right approach.
Bob Seely (Isle of Wight) (Con)
I welcome the Chancellor’s recognition, as my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose) said, of the importance of a long-term energy policy. I thank him very much for the help for council tax payers. Bands A to D cover most folks on the Island. Can he confirm that he is talking about people with primary residences on the Island and nationally?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. I confirm that the £150 is not for those with second homes or empty homes. We will make that crystal clear in how the policy is executed.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Chancellor for his contribution. I do not want to be churlish—a fair bit of money has been set aside and we appreciate that—but with the further rise in energy prices and the uplifted cost of living in general, working families will have to choose what to cut out of their lives to make ends meet. I put on record that I welcome the £150 million for Northern Ireland and the other Barnett consequentials, but will he consider and commit to reviewing the child benefit threshold for families whose wages are the same but are simply not worth the same in real money terms as when the threshold was introduced in 2013?
Rishi Sunak
I am glad that the hon. Gentleman recognises that there are two sets of Barnett consequentials for Northern Ireland stemming from each of the policies, which sum total £250 million. He will appreciate that I cannot comment on future tax and welfare policy but, as always, I will take what his says and reflect on it.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
I warmly welcome the Chancellor’s statement because 94% of properties in Stoke-on-Trent are in council tax bands A to C, so the £150 rebate will do wonders across Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke. From his recent visit to the city, he knows that the ceramics sector is an energy-intensive industry and will be looking for more creative solutions in the short term to help with rising energy costs. Can he confirm that he will meet me and other Stoke-on-Trent MPs to discuss those ideas further?
Rishi Sunak
I am always happy to meet my hon. Friends from Stoke, which benefited from not just one, not just two, but three successful levelling-up fund bids, and which I was pleased to visit recently. My hon. Friend is right and he is, rightly, a proper champion for the ceramics sector in this House. I enjoyed meeting representatives from that sector on my recent visit and I would be happy to meet him and them to discuss the situation further.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
We all know that the Chancellor is a fast-talking, slick operator who knows how to keep his head down when it is useful, but as someone who has been in the House since 1979, he is the most incompetent Chancellor that I have ever seen. When children go to bed—[Interruption.] He does not like it, but when children in my constituency go to bed with no food in their tummies and no heat in their homes, what does he think is the honourable position of a Chancellor who has just allowed £4.3 billion to be taken in fraud from one of his direct policies under his watch? Any other Chancellor that I have known would have come to the House today to resign.
Rishi Sunak
I will let this Government’s record on economic policy speak for itself. It is a record of which I am proud. I can provide the hon. Gentleman with the reassurance that I and the Government remain committed to tackling fraud wherever we see it. He mentioned the figure of £4.9 billion. As I said to the House in oral questions on Tuesday, that estimate has already been reduced by a third—by £1.6 billion—because of the actions that we are taking. I will not go into them all now, but he should know that we will go after everyone wherever we can to recover that money for the taxpayer, and I am confident that we will do a very good job.
Jacob Young (Redcar) (Con)
This is a targeted package that helps those just about managing, which is entirely right. The last Labour Government closed six nuclear power stations and had a policy of no new nuclear. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, alongside these measures to help people in the short term, it is imperative that we invest in our long-term energy security—in domestic gas production, in renewables, and, crucially, in new nuclear?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right about some of the failures of policy that the Labour party propagated in power. That is being fixed by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. We are investing not just in new nuclear, as he said, with billions of pounds at the spending review, but in offshore wind, and—as he knows in his part of the world—carbon capture and storage and hydrogen, where Teesside is playing a starring role in that green energy revolution.
Ben Lake (Ceredigion) (PC)
The Chancellor will be aware that nearly 20% of households in Wales are not connected to the mains gas grid. In rural areas such as Ceredigion, that figure actually rises to more than 80%. Research by the Office for National Statistics notes that Ceredigion suffered the highest increase in fuel bills over any area in mainland UK in the past year, increasing by £863 on average. Will the Chancellor confirm whether the rebate announced today will also apply to households that are not connected to the main power grids?
Rishi Sunak
The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point and one that colleagues not just in Wales, but in England and Scotland will also be asking, not least my own constituents. I can tell him that the rebate will be delivered through electricity bills to solve the exact problem that he mentions, which is much more universal. Separately, obviously, the council tax discount in England is through the council tax system, so it is agnostic to the heating source, and I would expect the Welsh Government, should they choose to do the same thing, to be able to solve that problem in that way.
Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)
Quite simply, this is a superb plan—very well done. My right hon. Friend is right to question the Opposition’s idea of a windfall tax, given that Gordon Brown completely stifled the telecoms market in the late ‘90s by doing exactly the same. Speaking as the chair of the all-party group for district councils, I wonder whether my right hon. Friend will join me in thanking councils for once again being able to offer swift and agile responses to local communities and families in helping us to deliver this today.
Rishi Sunak
As a former local government Minister, it gives me great pleasure to pay tribute to district councils and to the work of the District Councils’ Network. I do not know whether John Fuller is still running it, but it does an excellent job. Once again, when we need it to help us to deliver policies, it steps up. I can confirm also that it will have received new burdens funding for doing that, but I thank it for all its work, and my hon. Friend is right to champion it.
Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
Even before covid, a third of children in Hull North, many in working families, were living in poverty. With the cost of living crisis and energy prices soaring, will the measures that the Chancellor is introducing today see an increase, or a decrease, in the number of children living in poverty by Christmas?
Rishi Sunak
Thanks to the actions of this and previous Governments, since 2010, there are 200,000 fewer children living in poverty. We also know that children growing up in workless households are five times more likely to be in poverty than those who have working parents, which is why it is very good news that the number of children in workless households has fallen by 700,000 over the past decade. That is the best way to get children out of poverty: find jobs for their parents, and that is what this Government are committed to doing.
Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend the Chancellor for his honesty in stating that we cannot completely remove inflationary global pressures, and for his focus on supporting hard-working middle-income and low-income families. I want to ask about the discretionary £150 million fund. In particular, will he ensure that that funding is directed so that all those living in military family accommodation who are not eligible to pay council tax are eligible for the £150 discount?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is right to highlight one of the categories of those who are exempt that we want to get support to and ensure that they are included in the discretionary fund. I know from our conversations that she has also highlighted those living in rural constituencies such as hers who are off the gas grid, and I hope she is reassured by the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Ben Lake).
Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)
The Chancellor’s proposal to “buy now, pay back later” while ignoring the eye-watering profits from oil and gas companies, as he did with the fraudsters, tells us all we need to know about whose side he is on. Prepayment meter customers face a much higher rate—£708 on average—so can he tell us how these plans will help the people who pop down to the corner shop to top up their prepayment cards?
Rishi Sunak
Around 4 million households have prepayment meters, and about 40% of those will be able to receive the rebate on bills automatically because of the nature of their prepayment meter. For the remaining 60%, we will have to do something more manual and there are various ways we can do that, whether by sending barcodes or QR codes through the post or by email—[Interruption.] Before the Opposition say anything, that is exactly how we already deliver the warm home discount to those people, and we did exactly the same thing in a similar measure in 2012 under the coalition. This affects less than 9% of all households, but we have a plan for them. We will work with the energy companies to ensure that all those on prepayment meters benefit in exactly the same way.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
Residents in the Kettering constituency will warmly welcome the assistance that the Chancellor has announced to help them with their rising energy bills. As well as the measures he has announced today, there is an additional £1.8 billion of support out there in unclaimed pension credit. One million pensioners are eligible and not claiming, including 4,500 in north Northamptonshire. Just as we reached out to pensioners to come forward to get their vaccination, please can we reach out to those people who are not claiming, because some of them have the highest energy bills?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point, which he also made the other day in Treasury questions, when we committed to looking at how best we could take up his suggestions. I think I am right in saying—the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, my right hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne (Kwasi Kwarteng) will correct me if I am wrong—that the warm home discount is already moving to a more automatic system for that rebate for those on pension credit, but we will of course take his suggestions on board and figure out how best to improve what we do.
Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)
Each week, the Prime Minister tells us that there are 420,000 more people in work than there were before the pandemic, yet the Office for National Statistics tells us that there are 506,000 fewer people in work than before the pandemic. The reason for that, as the Chancellor knows, is that the Prime Minister excludes the self-employed. Will the Chancellor correct the record to show that there are in fact half a million fewer people in work, and explain why, in the circumstances, he is imposing a massive national insurance tax on jobs?
Rishi Sunak
If the hon. Gentleman looks at the remarks I made earlier, he will see that I was clear that there are 400,000 more people on payroll, and that is the right use of that statistic. It is obviously harder to track those in self-employment because we have real-time information numbers from HMRC for those on payroll. We are proud of our track record on jobs. Unemployment in this country was forecast to reach 12%, with millions of people unemployed, but unemployment has now fallen for almost 10 straight months. It is almost back to the record lows we saw pre-pandemic, and we have record job vacancies and record low redundancies. That is all evidence that our plan for jobs is working.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
As somebody who supported a VAT cut, may I invite my right hon. Friend to confirm that people in Wycombe will receive more help faster under his plan?
Rishi Sunak
I can give my hon. Friend the reassurance that the vast majority of people in his constituency will receive £350. Those in council tax bands A to D will get £150 in April. That is more than a VAT cut would have given them, and it will come faster. I am grateful to have his continued support.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Older people, sick people at home and many disabled people will need to put on their heating for longer, and therefore will be paying more. What additional steps will the Chancellor take to ensure that they are not pushed further into poverty, and not least as he has tangled with the pensions triple lock this year, what has he got against older people?
Rishi Sunak
This Government and previous Conservative Governments have a proud track record of supporting those who are retired and are pensioners. Because of the triple lock, which has been in place because of a Conservative Government, pensions are now at their highest level relative to earnings in 30-odd years, and we are protecting pensioners with a double lock this forthcoming year. Of course, the winter fuel payment, with up to £300 of support for those over the state pension age, will address exactly the hon. Member’s concerns.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I call Matt Vickers—[Interruption.] Sorry, Martin Vickers.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. It must have been the mask.
As the Chancellor did at the time of the pandemic, he has put together a very comprehensive protective shield around people in my constituency, and that is very welcome. Many well-paid jobs are being created, particularly in the energy sector, thanks to Government policies, but there are many, particularly in food processing or the security sector, who are on very modest incomes and fixed incomes. Can my right hon. Friend give them an assurance that he will keep this policy under review so that if the energy price rise continues, as is likely, they can be reassured that support will be available?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is always a champion for those who are working hard and doing the right thing, and that is why he has rightly championed the freeport in his constituency to provide jobs and opportunity for those families. I can give him that reassurance. It is because it is likely that energy prices will remain high and may even increase when the October price cap is set that the rebate of £200 will come in in October—in that month. I hope that will help at that time if energy bills continue to rise then, and of course the £150 will come much sooner, which gives him the reassurance he needs. As I said earlier, we do have to be honest and recognise that we are all going to have to adjust to higher energy prices, but what we can do is slow the pace and scale of that adjustment for families across the country.
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
Is the Chancellor comfortable about the fact that he has given more support to fraudsters, writing off billions of pounds of debts, than he is giving to hard-pressed families for whom this just prolongs the pain? This 54% price rise will be paid over four years, won’t it, Chancellor?
Rishi Sunak
As I outlined earlier this week, nothing has been written off. We are committed to going after everybody who has defrauded the taxpayer. It is important to remember the context. These schemes were delivered at enormous scale: 9 million people benefited from the furlough scheme and 1.5 million small businesses benefited from bounce back loans. At the time—we can remember the context—I was here almost every other day being rightly held to account by Members on both sides about the speed of support that we were getting to businesses in all of our constituencies that needed cash as quickly as possible. In those circumstances, I had to make balanced trade-offs and judgments about the best way to support those people. I am confident in the judgments we made, but it is also right, now that we are through the pandemic, that we go after anyone who has defrauded the Government and the taxpayer with the full force of the law.
Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
I join my colleagues on these Government Benches, and I am sure many secretly on the Opposition Benches, in thanking my right hon. Friend for his measures today. As he is aware, we have some real deprivation in my beautiful constituency of Hastings and Rye. Can he confirm that the measures announced by him today target support to the most vulnerable and disadvantaged in my constituency, are more generous as well as more financially sensible than Labour’s uncosted plans, and will reach the families who most need help now?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Getting cash to people who need it quickly is paramount in this circumstance. That is why the £150 will go to those in her constituency in council tax bands A to D in April, which will provide immediate relief. As she said, this is a financially responsible approach to this problem, because we do have to continue getting our borrowing and debt down so that the plan we have put in place maintains us on our path. It is actually important to recognise—I have made this point before—that one of the reasons why I care about getting our borrowing and debt to better levels is so that we have the resilience to respond to shocks exactly like this, and that is why it is important that we do rebuild such resilience.
Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab)
The Chancellor’s package offers £350 off to the poorest households. Labour’s proposals offer £600 off to the poorest households. The cap has gone up by £693. Why is the Chancellor offering the poorest households so much less than they would get under Labour?
Rishi Sunak
Those of us on the Government Benches believe that it is also right that we support those on middle incomes; those families are also working hard and they deserve our support. It is important that they know that the Government are on their side at times like this, and that is why we have taken the approach that we have. But of course we are cognisant of those on lower incomes. As I said, this is a progressive package. Flat-rate payments are a greater percentage of income for people on lower incomes, and indeed with smaller energy bills. As I have outlined, we have a range of other interventions specifically targeted at those people.
Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)
I welcome this generous plan, especially the inclusion of families on middle incomes, which will do a lot to help many of my constituents in Rushcliffe. Does my right hon. Friend the Chancellor agree that now is the time for us to be investing in our domestic energy industry and energy security—in turbo charging our move to clean energy, as we are doing in the east midlands freeport, rather than risk driving investment from the UK with a counterproductive windfall tax as the Labour party would?
Rishi Sunak
I agree with my hon. Friend. She puts the point excellently. Government Members are in favour of more investment in domestic energy, more jobs for the British economy and greater energy security for our nation.
Ronnie Cowan (Inverclyde) (SNP)
With families facing an extra £2,800 of expenses, this package does not really touch the sides at all, does it? With regard to electricity, the Chancellor said:
“with the Government meeting the cost in full.”
But he is not is he? He is spreading it over five years, which means that next year, when electricity prices continue to rise, the poorest families will face increased bills and have to find £40 to pay back to the Chancellor. You have not put a lid on it, Chancellor, you have just kicked the can further down the road.
Rishi Sunak
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) said earlier, £350 is a significant amount of money for families up and down the country, and I think it will make a real difference and lessen their anxiety. What I was talking about was the council tax rebate, which will be fully Exchequer funded with no cash due back.
Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend the Chancellor for meeting me and colleagues and responding so positively on this issue. He may remember that I asked him to ensure that any support extended to cover those just above benefit thresholds because they are often most in need of help. How does the support that he has announced today for those constituents compare with the suggestions made by Labour?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend, as ever, makes a thoughtful contribution, and I enjoyed our conversations. He was right to champion those who are on middle incomes. As a result of those conversations with him and others, we have designed a package that does exactly as I think he would like to have seen. By targeting support at those in council tax bands A to D, four out of five households—those up to middle income, those just about managing—will receive £150 extra support, and they will get that support in April.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
A poll by Survation today reveals that 63% of the public support a windfall tax on oil and gas producers’ profits. It is not like this Government to ignore the polls so may I suggest that, rather than misnaming, as he did in his statement, a renewable loan as a discount, why not go for the windfall tax and give that money to our hard-pressed constituents?
Rishi Sunak
We have had this debate. Conservatives believe in more investment in our domestic energy sector. We want to support British jobs and British energy security and we believe in doing the right, responsible thing. That is what a responsible Conservative Government do.
Saqib Bhatti (Meriden) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for these packages, which will help my constituents across my constituency. On the issue of a windfall tax, will my right hon. Friend confirm that the Labour party’s call for a windfall tax would undermine competition in the market, reduce investment and kill off jobs? Ultimately it would mean that energy prices were likely to be higher for longer and hit the poorest the hardest.
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is exactly right. Some 200,000 jobs are supported in that industry, and as I pointed out earlier, there are £11 billion-worth of projects waiting to get going. I would like to see those projects go ahead, which will be good for the country’s energy security, good for our economy and good for jobs. I know that the Energy Minister and I share that ambition.
Brendan Clarke-Smith (Bassetlaw) (Con)
I thank the Chancellor for his statement. My constituents in Bassetlaw will be breathing a sigh of relief at his announcements today, which blow the Opposition’s VAT cut out of the water. The Chancellor mentioned wholesale prices; as we become more self-sufficient and move to renewables and new nuclear, is he able to outline what the Government and the Treasury are doing to tackle this problem at source? May I suggest the excellent step fusion project in Bassetlaw that we are bidding for?
Rishi Sunak
I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s support, and I am glad that this announcement will provide some reassurance to his constituents, who I know would be worried about the cost of living. I have heard warm noises about his fusion project from my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. We announced, I think, £120 million for advanced nuclear technologies in the spending review, and there is no doubt that there is a productive conversation to be had about how we allocate that money to projects such as his.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for today’s statement, and for confirming that this significant £9 billion package is going to be targeted at those who need help most. He also highlighted that 80% of cost increases are coming from the global wholesale price increase, so is he going to continue his focus on trying to insulate the UK as much as possible from those global price fluctuations, increasing our energy security, boosting domestic production and ensuring that our energy supply is diverse in nature, sustainable for the future and significant in scale?
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is important that we have diversity of supply: that is what we are doing, whether through offshore wind, nuclear, carbon capture and storage, or exploiting domestic gas. We are doing all those things to build diversity of supply for our security. My hon. Friend is right to highlight that, in the long term, that is the right policy for British customers.
Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
I welcome these targeted and fair measures that will help those who need help most. While Labour’s VAT plans would help by just £89, I welcome the fact that this council tax rebate will help 89% of households in Yorkshire and Humber—I have just had the figures through—with a £150 rebate. Will the Chancellor also confirm that those who fall outside the A to D bandings and who still need help will be able to get that help through the extra discretionary funding for local councils?
Rishi Sunak
I am grateful to my hon. Friend, because I know that this is an issue that was on his mind, and he wanted to make sure his constituents got the support they needed at a time of anxiety for them. I can confirm that the £144 million discretionary fund is there to take care of those people—we estimate around 300,000 people—who are on means-tested benefits and happen to live in council tax bands above A to D. That is why that discretionary fund is there, to get support to the people he mentioned.
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)
I thank the Chancellor for the £350 help that will really benefit everyone in Rother Valley. Does he agree that it is right that this Government are helping not just those on means-tested benefits, but those not on benefits—the lower and middle-income families—because they also need a helping hand? It is great that this Government reward hard work and those who are doing the right thing.
Rishi Sunak
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. He has championed his constituents who are working hard and doing the right thing, and today’s announcement will give them reassurance that this Government and their Member of Parliament are on their side.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Finally, my former constituent, Mr Holden.
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
Thank you very much, Mr Deputy Speaker; it is always a pleasure to see you in the Chair. Could my right hon. Friend confirm that all UK households will benefit from the £200 smoothing rebate, and that almost 95% of County Durham residents will benefit from the £150 council tax rebate, including those who are off-grid—a similar proportion to the constituency of the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband), who I see has now scuttled away? That £150 is over 50% more than Labour’s VAT plan, which would have benefited the richest people most. Will the Chancellor continue to pursue a one-nation Conservative approach, not an inner London two-kitchen one?
Rishi Sunak
There were so many excellent points in my hon. Friend’s question. The only thing on which I will correct him is that the energy rebate is Great Britain-wide, because the Northern Ireland energy market is devolved and we do not have the legal powers or the regulator to do it there. Everything else he said is spot on, and I can confirm that this Government will continue to be on the side of his hard-working constituents, whom he does a great job of championing. Today’s announcement will give them the reassurance they need that, at a time of rising prices, this Conservative Government are stepping in to help, as we have and always will.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I thank the Chancellor for his statement and for answering questions for well over an hour.
Covid-19: Purchasing Effort
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister for Health (Edward Argar)
With permission, Mr Deputy Speaker, I will update the House on our purchasing efforts in response to the covid-19 pandemic.
A little over two years ago, we and the whole world found ourselves in unprecedented circumstances. We were faced with a virus about which we knew very little, but we knew from day one that our absolute priority was to save lives and protect our most vulnerable. Throughout the pandemic we have worked night and day to make sure those performing heroics on the frontline have the protection they need. This includes making the tough but necessary decisions needed to keep the country safe.
With the pandemic pushing health systems across the world to breaking point, we acted quickly and decisively to protect the NHS and to help it continue providing world-class care to the public. In a highly competitive global market, and with many countries imposing export bans, we were none the less able to secure the personal protective equipment needed. We secured billions of items of PPE, we obtained 30,000 ventilators by the end of June 2020 and we delivered more than 17.5 billion items to protect our frontline workers.
The supply of these vital items helped to keep the NHS open throughout the pandemic, but the scale of the challenge we faced in sourcing them should not be underestimated. The unique and unprecedented situation during the early days of the pandemic led to huge inflation in prices and intense global competition to secure scarce supplies. For instance, the average cost of nitrile gloves increased over sixfold at the height of the pandemic, compared with pre-pandemic levels.
At that time of national emergency, when lives were on the line, we simply had to change our approach to procurement and our appetite for risk. We had to balance the risk of contracts not performing and supplies being priced at a premium against the risk to the health of frontline workers, the NHS and the public if we failed to get the PPE we so desperately needed.
We make no apology for procuring PPE at the pace and volume we did, based on the information we had at the time. The action we took protected thousands of frontline healthcare workers in the NHS and social care. However, now that the world market for PPE has stabilised, the value of some categories of goods is inevitably much lower than the price at which they were originally purchased.
I reinforce to the House that 97% of the PPE we ordered was suitable and fit for use, with only a small proportion deemed unsuitable, and we are actively seeking to recover costs from suppliers wherever possible in those cases. Throughout the pandemic, the Department’s anti-fraud unit acted quickly to investigate all allegations of fraud, and we will be looking to recover any money for damaged or inadequate stock.
We are now in a position where we are confident that we have sufficient stock to cover all future covid-19-related demands, even in the face of the omicron variant. The PPE stocks we secured allowed us to meet demand through 2020-21 and 2021-22, and our existing PPE stocks will continue to support us throughout 2022-23.
We will keep working to maximise value from our stockpile, as the high standards of protection we have set for NHS workers mean that some of it may be able to be used in alternative settings. The Department has set up a redistribution team to identify alternative uses for stock that we do not intend or expect to use. For example, we are donating masks to both the Department for Transport and the Department for Education to aid compliance with face covering requirements on public transport and to support schools following their reopening in March 2021.
Medical professionals in my Department have also been working closely with colleagues in medical surveillance authorities to review stock that has exceeded its manufacturers’ use-by date but is not necessarily unusable. We have also begun a tender for a third-party medical laboratory to provide official testing of PPE products, with a view to extending their shelf life.
During the pandemic, we have taken steps to strengthen this country’s PPE supply chain, including manufacturing more PPE here in the UK. We have now signed contacts with more than 30 UK-based companies, reducing our reliance on manufacturers overseas, and we now have high confidence that we have sufficient stock to cover all future covid-19-related demands.
Getting PPE to those who need it has been one of the toughest logistical tasks of the pandemic. We make no apologies for taking the steps that were necessary so that we could save lives and protect this country in its time of need.
I commend this statement to the House.
Wes Streeting (Ilford North) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for advance sight of the statement. But what a disgrace that the Secretary of State did not come to the House today, to account for the inexcusable and unacceptable level of waste in his Department, or when the Department first published the accounts, or two days afterwards, when they were reported on the front pages of several newspapers and on broadcast news. Perhaps the Secretary of State’s silence and absence tell us that he is relaxed about losing billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money, or perhaps it is simply that he is too ashamed to show his face. He had to be dragged to the House and when he was, he bottled it and sent his deputy.
The Department of Health and Social Care snuck out its annual accounts on the final day on which they were legally required, 10 months after the end of the financial year, and, I am sure by total coincidence, at 5.30 pm on the day Sue Gray published her update. Buried on page 199 was the revelation that the Department lost a staggering £8.7 billion on PPE. That is more than two thirds of the Department’s total spend on PPE written off as losses, double the amount it is spending on the hospital building programme, and almost as much as we spend on the salaries of every nurse in England for an entire year. Why? Because the PPE was unusable, going out of date, and bought in at eye-watering prices because the Government were in a state of desperation having run down our supplies before the pandemic arrived.
We know that many Conservative Members privately—sometimes even publicly—agree with Labour that the national insurance rise is an unfair hit on working families facing a cost of living crisis. How will they explain to their voters that, taken together with the £4.3 billion they handed out to fraudsters, this Government have thrown away more than a year’s receipts of the national insurance rise that they are now imposing on working families?
It is not just that the Conservatives are the party of high taxes because they are the party of low growth; they are the party of high taxes because they are the party of waste and incompetence. Think of what the NHS could have done with those funds. It could have reduced waiting lists and waiting times, improved access to GPs and rebuilt hospitals for the 21st century.
Of course covid came as a shock, but that does not explain why the Conservative Government ran down Britain’s supply of PPE before the pandemic, leaving us exposed to price hikes and profiteering. Perhaps the Minister can explain why a global pandemic necessarily leads to Conservative party donors and the former Secretary of State’s pub landlord receiving special treatment and hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money.
It is not just PPE. Why did the Department fail to collect shipments from ports on time, costing taxpayers £111 million in additional fees? Why did the Department fail to pay its bills on time and incur late fees of £1.6 million as a result? Why did the Department spend £250 million on testing materials, ventilators and medical equipment, none of which can be used?
Is not it the case that when this Conservative Government thought no one was watching, they abandoned any pretence of being careful stewards of public finances, bunged millions to their mates and donors, and now working families are footing the bill? What would Mrs Thatcher, the grocer’s daughter, whose father instilled in her the value of thrift, make of this lot?
Is not the truth that the Conservative party has changed? You cannot trust this Conservative party to show respect to the people or to Parliament. You cannot trust this Conservative Party to keep taxes low. You cannot trust this Conservative Party to spend taxpayers’ money wisely. Indeed, the only thing that has not changed about the Conservatives is the age-old truth that you cannot trust the Tories with the NHS.
Edward Argar
It is always a pleasure to appear opposite the shadow Secretary of State. I will not take it as a personal affront that he would prefer it to be the Secretary of State rather than me.
The hon. Gentleman raised a number of important points. He cited Mrs Thatcher, and suggested that the Government had changed their position. If we are talking about sudden changes in position, I feel that I should quote the present shadow Chancellor, the hon. Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves)—formerly shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster—who, in April 2020, wrote to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster:
“We need Government to strain every sinew and utilise untapped resources in UK manufacturing, to deliver essential equipment to frontline workers. This must be a national effort which leaves no stone unturned.”
She was right. I agreed with her sentiment then, and I still do—and we did do that—but it appears that the Opposition do not agree with it any more.
Let me turn to the hon. Gentleman’s other points. He kept suggesting—it makes a good headline for him, I am sure, but sadly I fear it is simply inaccurate—that this is money lost or wasted. It is not. As the hon. Gentleman knows from his days as a shadow Treasury Minister, this is a reflection of buying PPE at the height of the market, at the height of a global pandemic—
Edward Argar
I will come to that point in a moment. It is a reflection of that, and now, in accounting terms, a reflection of what its value is today.
The hon. Gentleman should also be aware that the vast bulk of that £8.7 billion is down to exactly the same reason: PPE purchased at the height of the market. Now that we have a stable market, we have a sustainable supply. I make no apologies, and I know that my right hon. and hon. Friends will make no apologies, for doing exactly what the shadow Chancellor said we should do, which was to strain every sinew to make sure that the NHS had the PPE that it needed. We achieved that.
Edward Argar
That is an important point, and I will turn to it in just a second.
The hon. Gentleman was also wrong to say that the money was thrown away. He knows that that is not what has happened here. He knows that this is about stock that has been written down in value, not written off. He knows that the vast bulk of that remaining is fit for use. We set very high standards in the NHS, but it is fit for use in other settings, and we are ensuring that we explore those other avenues, so that it can be used.
The hon. Gentleman talked about pub landlords. He will have heard my right hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock) make this point in the Chamber. No contract was awarded to that individual, so I would caution him to be a little bit careful about the allegations he makes, and to check his facts before he does so.
Let me now turn to one of the broader themes raised by the hon. Gentleman. He talked about running down PPE stocks. Can he name any country in Europe that did not also have to buy vast amounts of PPE at the height of the pandemic, at the height of the market? This pandemic was unprecedented. We learned more about it with every day that passed. When we first started purchasing PPE, we were confronted with horrific pictures from hospitals in Bergamo in Italy. We saw the challenges that were faced, and we moved fast to ensure that our frontline had what it needed. We strained every sinew, and we got the PPE that our country needed.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that the revaluation of the stock simply reflects global market price fluctuations? Will he confirm that the PPE is being used? Will he also disregard the comments from Opposition Members, who are peddling known inaccuracies and whose comments on the finances show them to be utterly economically illiterate?
Edward Argar
My hon. Friend puts it even better than I could have done. He is absolutely right to emphasise that this is a reflection of our straining every sinew to buy what we needed at the height of the pandemic, with inflated global prices, to give our NHS workers the protection that they needed. The global market has now returned to normal levels, and that, coupled with the fact that we have helped to stimulate and build a UK manufacturing base for PPE in this country, is a simple fact of economics. The shadow Secretary of State, who I think was formerly a shadow Exchequer Secretary, should know that. Sadly, the fact that that is not reflected in his comments, for whatever reason, causes me to question how much the Labour party has really learned about how to manage our nation’s finances and economy.
Steven Bonnar (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (SNP)
I thank the Minister for advance sight of his statement. Yet again, this Government are set rigid on making the working poor pay for their ineptitude and mismanagement. We know that £4.3 billion has been wasted, written off as covid loan fraud. We know that the Government spent £12 billion on PPE in England up to March 2021, of which £9 billion has been declared by the Government themselves as “wasted”—[Interruption.] We have some chuntering from those in a sedentary position, but I will continue.
Does the Minister believe that wasting all that money spent on PPE is a sign of good governance, when £2 of every £3 spent on VIP lane contracts was wasted due to so-called errors in supply? Now hard-working people will be taxed £12 billion by this Government to pay for their mismanagement, when the Bank of England has just told us that UK households must be warned to “brace themselves” for the biggest annual fall in living standards in 30 years, since records began, and inflation is set to soar to 7%. Why is his Government not vigorously pursuing companies that provided £9 billion-worth of useless PPE equipment to ensure that they pay it back? Will he assure the House that his Government will pursue that with complete vigour?
Kleptocracy is defined as a situation where politicians enrich themselves or their associates through the funnelling of public money and assets to their connections outside the rule of law—a statement we know all too well in this House. Given that the UK Government’s VIP, Tory crony fast lanes for Tory party associates have been declared unlawful in the Court of Session and seen billions of pounds wastefully funnelled to politically connected friends of this Tory Government, does the Minister agree that his Government are fast becoming a kleptocracy?
Edward Argar
In general, and certainly after that contribution, I will take no lessons in financial illiteracy from the SNP. The hon. Gentleman regularly, in that contribution, referred to £8.7 billion or £9 billion—rounding, if he wishes to—as wasted. He will know that, as I have set out, it is not wasted. It is a write-down on the value of stock, but it is not wasted. That stock is available. That is the point I make to him. The vast majority of that stock is available and in warehouses. This is an accounting point about the value of what was paid at the time compared with its value in a recovered market.
I will pick up one point I missed with the shadow Secretary of State, who I hope will forgive me. He mentioned ventilators, and I apologise for not answering that point. In the case of ventilators, we followed the scientific advice at the time, which was that ventilators were the most effective way of treating those who were severely ill. Thankfully, due to amazing advances by our clinicians and scientists and to the action taken by this Government, we did not need them and the treatments available improved significantly. Again, I make no apologies for our being prepared for all eventualities.
To conclude on the contribution of the hon. Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Steven Bonnar), I reiterate the same thing: we make no apologies for having strained every sinew—in a global pandemic, at the height of the market, when some countries were imposing export bans—to purchase the PPE to protect our frontline workers. I also pay tribute to the officials who worked flat out, often through the night, sourcing the PPE. They were the ones assessing it, and they were rigorous in their assessments. I put on record my tribute and my gratitude—
Edward Argar
I think the hon. Gentleman nodded assent, so we may be in agreement on that point. I put on record my tribute and my gratitude to them for all their hard work to protect the frontline.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
In reality, back at the beginning of the pandemic, the Opposition were calling for the Government to go faster. It seems to me that one of the great success stories of this Government is that they got the PPE and the ventilators and, by doing so, saved a lot of lives. Does the excellent Minister agree that, unfortunately, the rhetoric coming from the Opposition now is completely different from what it was at the time of the pandemic?
Edward Argar
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Far be it from me to suggest that hindsight characterises the approach adopted by Opposition Front Benchers, but he is absolutely right. I mentioned the shadow Chancellor, the hon. Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves). She also said in this place:
“Those who look after the sick and the vulnerable deserve our protection, and getting PPE to them is the priority of all of us.”—[Official Report, 4 May 2020; Vol. 675, c. 412.]
She was absolutely right and remains right, and that is why this Government did exactly that. Protecting the taxpayers’ pound is hugely important. Equally, so too is procuring the kit that protects lives. In the unique circumstances that we faced at the time in 2020, I believe that this Government made the right choices.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
For context, £9 billion would have given every NHS nurse a 100% bonus on their salary or it could provide the funding needed to solve the issue of autistic people and people with learning disabilities being detained in inappropriate units because no funding is available to support them in the community. Instead, it is clear that large amounts were wasted on unused and unsuitable PPE, some of which, we understand, will have to be burned. I remind the Minister that we could have had a stockpile of PPE in this country if Exercise Cygnus in 2016 had been handled responsibly. Exercise Cygnus showed gaping holes in our emergency preparedness and we have to learn the lesson from that.
Edward Argar
I am grateful to the hon. Lady; to be fair, we may not always agree, but she always makes thoughtful points and knows this subject well. However, many right hon. and hon. Members across the House have regularly said that Exercise Cygnus gave everyone everything they needed to know in how to manage this pandemic, which is completely not the case. That was a flu pandemic exercise with a number of preconditions, one of which was that, at a certain point, it was assumed that antivirals would become available within—I think, off the top of my head—nine weeks of the pandemic beginning. That was not the case, because we were dealing with a completely new virus, so although there are valuable lessons to be learned, we need to be very careful about drawing direct parallels.
The hon. Lady rightly talked about the sum of money and highlighted the impact. She is right that £8.7 billion is a very significant sum of public money, but she also must acknowledge that that £8.7 billion was not wasted, because the PPE exists. This is an accounting point about what the purchase price was compared with the value now, with a stable marketplace for that. Only a very small fraction of that stockpile has been deemed not fit for use and, in those cases, we continue to investigate, through contractual mechanisms and elsewhere, what we can do to recover that money.
Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)
The embassy of one of our major international partners had to send staff to Sofia with a suitcase of money handcuffed to their wrist in order to procure PPE for their health and social care. Does my hon. Friend not think that the Opposition would be better off celebrating the herculean efforts that meant that PPE could be got to our NHS providers and our local authority and social care providers, rather than engaging in such transparently cynical party political point scoring?
Edward Argar
I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. As I said in response to the SNP Front-Bench spokesman, the hon. Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Steven Bonnar), I hope the whole House could agree on paying tribute to all those civil servants and others who moved heaven and earth to ensure that we got the PPE that we needed for the frontline. That is the most important factor. We did what we needed to get the PPE to protect people and to protect lives.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
Private Eye has uncovered £600 million of PPE contracts awarded to Unispace Global, an interior design company, through the VIP lane. The Department has paid the money to Unispace but it is not shown on the company accounts, so will the Minister strain every sinew and will there be an investigation to account for the £600 million of public money?
Edward Argar
In any circumstance where a contractual obligation has not been met or where goods that have been supplied do not meet that—I am not suggesting that is the case in this situation—we will look into it. The hon. Gentleman mentions company accounts, but that is a matter for the company and its filing of accounts; it is not a matter for Her Majesty’s Government.
James Sunderland (Bracknell) (Con)
There has been a lot of unhelpful speculation about loss and wastage of PPE in recent weeks. Some of this speculation is blatantly false, and it is important that we do not overly politicise the issue, because the Government acted to do the right thing at the right time. The use of language is also really important. Does the Minister agree that this is not about outright loss and that it is about accounting write-down?
Edward Argar
My hon. Friend puts his finger on the issue absolutely. I mentioned in response to the hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley), who is no longer in her place, that a small proportion of this £8.7 billion went on PPE that did not meet the standard, and we continue to pursue those contracts and investigate them. However, my hon. Friend is right to say that the vast majority of this money purchased PPE that was delivered and is usable, and the difference in money reflects the fact that we bought at the height of a global pandemic, doing whatever was needed to get the supplies we needed. Of course, in the two to two and a half years since, that market has stabilised, with significantly more manufacturing also in this country.
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister mentioned in his statement that the Government took these difficult decisions to keep the country safe. The hard-working staff in St Thomas’ Hospital in my constituency took the decision to come to work every day during this pandemic to keep the country safe. The Minister mentions that this is a value of accounting and it is not real money. Can he tell me: how much more could we have got for nurses for that £8.7 billion? My local nurses who are watching this statement are thinking that they could have done with that pay increase.
Edward Argar
The hon. Lady will know that I have not said that this is not real money; I have said that what has been published here in the accounts is what is required for an accounting purpose. The PPE was purchased, and that was done at the height of a global pandemic and at extremely inflated prices, because every country was desperately seeking to acquire the PPE that was needed. That situation has stabilised over the past two years and PPE can now be purchased for a much, much cheaper rate. Again, I make no apology for our purchasing this PPE to protect these very nurses, who did an amazing job in her local hospital, from the effects of covid.
Jacob Young (Redcar) (Con)
This Government acted quickly and decisively to secure as much PPE for the frontline as possible and as many vaccines as possible, while the Labour party carped from the sidelines, attacked the vaccine taskforce and played politics, just as it is doing today. On vaccines, will the Minister join me in welcoming the decision by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency to approve the Teesside vaccine, Novavax, which is being manufactured in Teesside for use in the UK?
Edward Argar
That was a dexterous way of weaving together PPE and vaccines, but my hon. Friend is right to pay tribute to the amazing work done by the vaccine taskforce and by officials and others across Government in meeting the needs of our population during the pandemic. Of course I join him in welcoming the Novavax vaccine and the opportunities it presents for wonderful Teesside.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
I do not think anyone in this Chamber has said, at any point, that things should not have moved quickly to secure PPE. Nobody, on this side at least, has said that this should involve the use of a VIP lane, crony contracts or contracts for pals. I am sure that the Minister will say that all these allegations are entirely unfounded, and I understand his point of view on that. Given that, will he put Government backing behind my Ministerial Interests (Emergency Powers) Bill, to ensure that such actions could not happen in the future without this House being made fully aware of them?
Edward Argar
I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for, as ever, dextrously mentioning his Bill. I think he has done that to me once before when I have been at the Dispatch Box discussing similar issues. I am sure that Ministers, and indeed the Leader of the House, will read it very carefully.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
In the early months of the pandemic, getting PPE to Kettering General Hospital and local care homes was the absolute No. 1 priority. A very sophisticated distribution network had to be established involving the Army to ensure PPE was delivered to the right place at the right time, as best as possible. I believe that, starting from scratch, only 1% of certain PPE products were actually made in this country and over the course of the pandemic that has been increased to 70%-plus. Can my hon. Friend the hospitals Minister assure me that, God forbid, were we ever to have a pandemic again, we could source most of our PPE requirements from British manufacturers and that we now have a robust and resilient supply and distribution chain?
Edward Argar
I am grateful to my hon. Friend and join him in paying tribute to the work of his local healthcare system during the pandemic. He makes a couple of points. First, he is absolutely right to highlight that this was ramped up at pace. Initially, the NHS supplied PPE directly to about 250 hospital trusts and other trusts. In the early months of the pandemic, that was ramped up to supplying it to well over 50,000 different settings. That is a phenomenal ramping up of logistics and distribution capabilities. To his second point, he is absolutely right that, from about 1% of PPE being manufactured in the UK before the pandemic, we now have the capacity to manufacture about 70% of the PPE it is currently assessed we need in this country. That is a great British success story.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
What is absolutely clear from Exercise Cygnus is that the specific recommendations on PPE were not implemented by the Government. That led to the massive rush to purchase PPE during the pandemic. That added to the problem; it was not the only reason for it. The Government’s defence on the scandals of the contracts seems to be that we had to act very quickly. If that is the case, it does not explain why a disproportionate number of the contracts ended up in the hands of people who were members of the Conservative party, close associates of members of the Conservative party, or had given money to the Conservative party. If you were casting your net far and wide, you would not expect that to come to light, would you? You would expect there to be quite a wide number of contracts being issued. So the Government’s excuse does not hold water, does it?
Edward Argar
I take the hon. Gentleman’s point about speed and the context in which we were operating. I have to say all contracts were assessed through an eight-stage process undertaken by neutral civil servants. As the National Audit Office found, Ministers were not involved in the award of contracts.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
As a chartered accountant, I am au fait with the concept of an accounting write down and the scale of this one really does indicate reckless waste. I am sure that, in my constituency of North Shropshire, the £9.7 billion carelessly wasted could have been put to better use. It could have been used to tackle the extremely high ambulance waiting times, to help the local accident and emergency tackle the huge challenges it faces in getting patients through, or to deal with the £50 million black hole that social care in Shropshire is facing in two years’ time. Across the country, the story is very much the same. Local health services are struggling to find the money to deal with those issues. I am sure Members across the House know those issues all too well. That is why £9.7 billion wasted on PPE is so shocking. What are the Government doing to allocate resources to sufficiently recover that money?
Edward Argar
I welcome the hon. Lady to her place. I do not think I have had the opportunity to respond to a question or a speech from her previously, so I congratulate her, slightly belatedly, on her election and welcome her to this place. I will just correct one thing. She mentioned £9.7 billion. The sum involved is actually £8.7 billion.
To the hon. Lady’s point, first, it is not wasted. As I made clear, it purchased PPE. There is a small amount in these accounts which has been made clear. The shadow Secretary of State said that it was snuck out. If I recall, I tabled a written ministerial statement to draw attention to these issues to be open and transparent with the House, as I always endeavour to be. We did whatever was needed at the time, in the context of the highly inflated pricing in the midst of a global pandemic.
More broadly, the hon. Lady touched on NHS funding and pressures. I appreciate that she was not a Member of this House at the time, but this Government have put in record funding for our NHS. One of the first Acts after the 2019 election enshrined in law a £33.9 billion increase by 2023-24, and we are also putting in place the health and care levy to both assist our NHS and provide that sustainable footing for social care in the future. I acknowledge entirely that she was not a Member of this House, so it would be wrong to draw any inference as to how she may have voted, but I want to put that record investment on the record.
I also gently say that the Liberals’ stance on this issue shows, even by their standards, a degree of political contortion and a stretching of credibility. I think I am the only Member who has been a Health Minister throughout this pandemic, and I recall them desperately calling in 2020 for whatever it took to get and buy more PPE to protect the frontline. I agreed with that stance, but now they are suggesting that the Government got it wrong by prioritising whatever it took to get the PPE that the frontline needed.
Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister has said that we were prepared for all eventualities, but I think he knows that the truth is that that was not the case. As illustrated in comments by Members across the House, we did not plan ahead sufficiently for what was needed in a pandemic.
The Minister said in his statement that 97% of the PPE ordered was suitable for use. Obviously, that means that 3% was not. He also said that the Government are actively seeking to recover costs from suppliers where possible in those cases. Does he not realise that that is a very weak way of responding to that challenge? What safeguards were put in place in those contracts, and will he publish for the House updated data on suppliers that are not refunding the taxpayer—suppliers that took public funds and did not deliver the goods?
Edward Argar
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for asking a sensible and serious question. We have already recovered, through prevention or termination of contracts, £157 million of potential fraud. We continue, with our anti-fraud unit, to look into a number of contracts where there is either a contractual dispute or a risk of fraud. There are contractual mechanisms for reconciling or trying to manage situations in which both parties have different interpretations of whether what was delivered is what was ordered. We are already looking into more than 100 contracts in that respect. As those investigations develop, I hope I will be able to update the House further, but it necessarily takes time to have conversations with contractors through those contract dispute mechanisms and to investigate. I hope that, as we are able to bring forward more information, we will make it available to the House.
Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)
Good afternoon, Madam Deputy Speaker. Can the Minister confirm whether any of the promised £350 million a week advertised on the side of a bus as a benefit of leaving the European Union has been used to purchase PPE for the NHS?
Edward Argar
The NHS and the Department get their annual budgets and spend them on what is necessary to meet the health and care needs of the nation. On the hon. Gentleman’s specific point, he might characterise the £33.9 billion increase by 2023-24, which we have enshrined in law, as part of the Brexit dividend.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
And finally, I call Jim Shannon.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
It is always a pleasure to ask a question in this House, at whatever time, Madam Deputy Speaker. May I thank the Minister and the Government for their endeavours during the pandemic? I do not think that anybody in this House does not recognise that, without the Government’s initiatives, these things would not have happened.
I understand the pressure that the Department of Health and Social Care was under at the outset of the pandemic to ensure that staff were not taking their lives in their own hands when they entered hospital. But Minister, reports of £8.7 billion losses are astounding. Will there be a full investigation into the scale of loss and the reasons for the loss? I understand the problems at that time—I really do—but think of the good that that money could have done to address waiting lists and new cancer drugs. Minister, what has happened grieves me in my heart, and I suspect it grieves you in your heart—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. Please will the hon. Gentleman not call the Minister “you”? It is my ambition that he will one day get this right—please, please.
Jim Shannon
It grieves me in my heart, and I suspect that it grieves the Minister in his heart as well.
Edward Argar
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. I have made it clear throughout that our priority was getting the PPE that we needed to give that protection and to save lives but, equally, every pound of taxpayers’ money is valuable. Where fraud or failure to deliver contracts is evidenced, we will go after that money, quite rightly, and seek to recoup it for the taxpayer.
On the amount that is, for want of a better way of putting it, lost through goods not being fit for use, that is £673 million, but that is what we are investigating through those contract dispute resolution mechanisms and through anti-fraud work. The other amounts of money in here did purchase PPE, which was delivered and which we have. Different settings require different standards of PPE, so some that was purchased may not be of the standard for the NHS but can be used elsewhere. We are exploring all options to make sure that the PPE we have, where it can be, is used.
Northern Ireland Border
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
I would like to update the House on current developments regarding the implementation of sanitary and phytosanitary checks at points of entry in Northern Ireland.
Yesterday, Minister Edwin Poots directed his officials in the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs to suspend checks on points of entry for goods from Great Britain from midnight last night. There have been no operational changes on the ground as yet while officials in DAERA seek further advice in response to the direction provided by Minister Poots yesterday.
Although the overarching responsibility for international relations rests with the United Kingdom Government, delivering many of the requirements under the Northern Ireland protocol, including agrifood checks, is a devolved matter and responsibility for doing so falls to the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs in the Northern Ireland Executive. This includes checks that take place at Northern Ireland points of entry.
I spoke to Minister Poots this morning to gain an understanding of his perspective. He explained that he had taken his own legal advice before issuing the direction to officials. He also explained that he had hoped to secure an opportunity for the Northern Ireland Executive to discuss the situation regarding the current implementation of SPS checks at points of entry.
Since the end of the transition period, Minister Poots has been consistent in arguing that the Northern Ireland protocol creates significant challenges for communities in Northern Ireland. The Government recognise that the Northern Ireland protocol is causing significant problems in its current form, which is why we published a command paper last summer setting out an alternative approach to arrangements in Northern Ireland.
We have proposed new arrangements to provide the EU with the assurance that it has requested for its own single market without the need for export health certificates or routine checks at points of entry. Negotiations between my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary and Vice-President Šefčovič are continuing, with a further meeting scheduled for later this afternoon. Throughout these talks, our clear priority is to preserve peace and stability in Northern Ireland and to protect the Belfast/Good Friday agreement in all of its dimensions.
The Government recognise the sensitivities that surround the Northern Ireland protocol within communities in Northern Ireland. That is why we continue to represent the interests of Northern Ireland in our discussions with the European Commission and, in the meantime, my officials will continue to liaise with officials in DAERA to support them while we seek a solution.
Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab)
I shall not wholly thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement, because it arrived in my hand as he got to his feet, but I certainly thank him for making an effort to get it into my possession. We are, again, in a position where the Government are trying to ignore the reality that it was the Prime Minister who negotiated every single word of the Northern Ireland protocol. He told this House that what he had delivered was
“in perfect conformity with the Good Friday agreement”—[Official Report, 19 October 2019; Vol. 666, c. 583.]
and he told the public that it would
“bring to an end far too many years of argument and division”,
but here we are.
The same Government are now arguing that upholding the terms of the deal that they negotiated is not even the responsibility of the United Kingdom Government. Instead, they want us to believe that it is a function of the Northern Ireland Executive. In the last week, the Foreign Secretary and the Northern Ireland Secretary said that the Irish sea border checks are a
“matter for the Northern Ireland Executive”.
The protocol was signed into international law by the UK Government, and now they are bystanders as their deal falls apart, pathetically claiming that it is all somebody else’s responsibility. Let us think of the implications. Is the message that the Welsh Senedd or the Scottish Parliament can break international law too and the Government will have nothing to say about it? It is another piece of vandalism committed against our Union by a reckless Government too busy partying to notice what is going on out there in the real world.
A few moments ago, the Prime Minister’s spokesman said that they had been caught completely unaware by developments—are they kidding? I do not know anyone who did not see it coming. The Foreign Secretary is today negotiating with our EU partners. Does the Secretary of State believe that the events that are unfolding will strengthen her hand in negotiations as she seeks to reassure our partners that we are a credible partner who will stick to our end of negotiations and commitments?
Last year, the Secretary of State wrote to the Northern Ireland Executive to instruct them that work on border control posts must progress “without delay”. He used his powers to do so. The same principles stand today—the same Stormont Minister, the same Conservative Environment Secretary, the same Prime Minister’s deal—but there is a completely different interpretation of parliamentary sovereignty and Government responsibility. That is a total U-turn. Can the Secretary of State tell us what has changed in the Government’s position between now and then?
The situation puts civil servants and council workers in an impossible position. We are already hearing of confusion at ports. Right now, business groups are disagreeing with the Government’s stance. Yesterday, Manufacturing Northern Ireland said:
“Regardless of events, the legal and administrative advice is that these are international obligations on traders and they should continue to meet those obligations whether or not there’s a guy with a hi-vis to greet them at the Port.”
Does the Secretary of State agree with that statement and, therefore, encourage businesses to adhere to the protocol terms? They need a definitive answer.
The Labour party acknowledges issues with the protocol, which is why we fought for a better deal in the first place. There has been positive movement on how it works in the last year and concessions have been made by both sides. Progress has been achieved and more is within reach, but the Government must do more. Can the Secretary of State give us an update on progress with the veterinary partnership agreement?
As the Opposition have acknowledged many times in this House, peace in Northern Ireland is fragile and has been hard-won. Successive Prime Ministers, including John Major, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, all secured progress by being the honest broker that the people of Northern Ireland need. The current one, however, is setting us back by exacerbating divisions and damaging the Union.
Because of the Government’s actions, people across the UK face a cost of living nightmare. On top of that, we are being plunged back into the Brexit quagmire totally unnecessarily. The Labour party would diligently negotiate a position where people and businesses across the United Kingdom can focus on future opportunities, freeing us from Tory failures that do nothing more than trap us in the battles of the past.
George Eustice
The hon. Gentleman asks about the Northern Ireland protocol, which he will know required that any checks that might be put in place should protect trade within the United Kingdom and should not lead to an unnecessary diversion of trade. That is a key principle of the Northern Ireland protocol. Many of the details as to precisely how any checks would be carried out were deferred in the first instance to the Joint Committee, which completed its work and reached some interim arrangements. It was always understood that the talks would need to continue.
The principle behind the Northern Ireland protocol was to try to protect the provisions of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, which requires us to protect all communities in Northern Ireland. It is built on the principle of the consent of all communities and the principle of power sharing. The hon. Gentleman is right that the United Kingdom takes the lead role when it comes to international agreements—which is why my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary is now leading the discussions with her opposite number in the European Commission to resolve some of these issues—but matters such as SPS and agrifood issues are devolved to the Northern Ireland Executive.
For the reasons I explained earlier, Edwin Poots had sought the agreement of the Northern Ireland Executive, or a discussion with the Northern Ireland Executive, following a particular EU audit that took place last year and implied that individual passenger cars should sometimes be searched to look for food items in people’s personal luggage. His concern was that that would cause difficulties for the very principles of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. That is why, he says, he sought some authority from the Northern Ireland Executive. He has made it clear that he still intends to bring a discussion of the matter before the Northern Ireland Executive.
The hon. Gentleman asked whether the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland could use reserved powers to issue directions and so on. As he will understand, the bar for such an intervention is high, and rightly so, and is entirely unnecessary at this stage: the checks are continuing and there is currently no change. Yes, a direction has been issued and officials in DAERA are taking their own legal advice, as accounting officers, on elements related to that. We very much hope that, in the first instance, implementation can be delivered in its right and proper place through the Northern Ireland Executive.
Julian Smith (Skipton and Ripon) (Con)
I support the Government’s negotiations with the EU on improving the protocol, but will my right hon. Friend clarify that for the civil servants in Northern Ireland who are implementing the current rules his letter still stands? We cannot be a country that agrees an agreement and then does not stand behind it. In the absence of the Executive, which looks to be in a difficult position today, the British Government have to back the letter of 1 April and support the civil servants in Northern Ireland who are doing the checks.
George Eustice
My right hon. Friend was very involved in discussions on and elements of this matter and has a great deal of experience of navigating the politics of Northern Ireland and the community tensions there, but at this particular stage the officials in DAERA are taking legal advice, so we are not yet at the position of having to consider any kind of direction in the way that he suggests. In the first instance, we would all agree that it would be preferable if the Northern Ireland Executive reached a resolution to this issue on their own terms and found an ability to discuss it.
Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)
I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement. Let us be clear why we are discussing this issue: because the current occupant of the most notorious party flat in central London has persistently and simultaneously promised contradictory outcomes in respect of border arrangements between GB and the single market, in the hope that others might eventually develop the same kind of casual attachment that he clearly has to the arrangements into which he enters.
Although, by contrast with the economy of GB alone, the economy of Northern Ireland prospers with its dual membership of the UK single market and the European single market, that clearly comes at some cost to east-west trade frictions and, of course, all the political symbolism that entails. Of course, we could legitimately, lawfully and immediately eliminate the problems of sanitary and phytosanitary checks by entering into a direct agreement with the European Union on these matters, which would be hugely beneficial to all parts of the UK. On television last night, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland appeared to try to subcontract responsibility for complying with these aspects of international law in respect of the current protocol solely to the Northern Ireland Executive, and this statement does much the same.
What will the UK Government do to ensure that the UK continues to adhere to its international obligations under the protocol, into which they entered freely? In the Secretary of State’s understanding, from which legal authority should civil servants and, indeed, Ministers of the Crown in Northern Ireland take advice on how to act?
George Eustice
As I said earlier, Minister Poots has taken legal advice. Under the constitutional arrangements in Northern Ireland, I understand that he is entitled to issue this direction. The Northern Ireland civil service and DAERA are taking separate legal advice relating to some of the accounting officer issues, and Minister Poots understands why they would want to do that.
On the hon. Gentleman’s wider point, I come back to what I said previously. The agreement on the Northern Ireland protocol required many things, including that there should be no disruption and no unnecessary checks that would cause problems for trade within the UK, which is why there are still grounds for us to try to resolve some of these issues constructively. That is why my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary continues to have discussions with the European Commission on this particular point.
Sir Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)
I have confidence in and admiration for my right hon. Friend, but I am somewhat disappointed that this matter is being treated as some kind of technical problem when it is actually a constitutional crisis. He says the Northern Ireland Executive should seek to resolve it but, under the Northern Ireland Act 1998, the Northern Ireland Executive resolves matters by agreeing things between the power-sharing parties. They fundamentally disagree on this matter because the Northern Ireland protocol is, in fact, incompatible with the Good Friday agreement. The protocol is also incompatible with the Act of Union, because it has been ruled that it supersedes the Act of Union. And the European Union says there are not enough checks taking place.
Is it not now clear that the Northern Ireland protocol is unfit for purpose and is not delivering on what it said on the tin, which is that it would strengthen and underpin the Good Friday agreement? It needs to be scrapped and replaced by something completely different, and the EU should agree to that. The EU is the only party that has threatened to put infrastructure on the border in Northern Ireland, and we should keep reminding the EU that it is the one threatening the peace in Northern Ireland.
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes an important point, and it is why the UK Government have engaged in negotiations with the European Union to seek important changes. We are motivated solely by our commitment to the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. In so far as the implementation and the interpretation of the Northern Ireland protocol by the European Union to date is incompatible with the principles of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, all parties should seek to adopt a more sensible interpretation that brings it back into line with the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. That is what we are endeavouring to do.
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
Parties have warned for months that there will be a crisis, so no one should be surprised that there is a crisis. I am disappointed by the shadow Minister’s comments, as what he put to the Government today is not honest brokership. This is a serious crisis; it is not about parties in Downing Street.
The Secretary of State says that Minister Poots is entitled to take this advice, which told him that the checks are not lawful. Sinn Féin will not allow a discussion about this in the Executive to try to repair them and make them lawful. Minister Poots therefore has no vires to continue with the operation of the checks. If that is the case, will the Secretary of State affirm that Her Majesty’s Government will not interfere in this process? Will Her Majesty’s Government accept that they must now remove the friction between GB companies and Northern Ireland, as that is where the main problem now rests?
George Eustice
I would express it slightly differently, but would say this: the rationale Minister Poots has advanced is that the EU audit that took place and whose findings were published at the end of last year raised some issues that he believed were contentious and therefore potentially a threat to community relations. Therefore, in his view, part of the threshold test for authorisation to be required by the Northern Ireland Executive has been met. He therefore believes that there should be a discussion; to date, under the power-sharing agreement there has not been agreement that it should be discussed, and that has led to the current state of affairs. So it is too early to say what the legal position is. I know it is the position of Edwin Poots that it is not lawful to continue these checks without the express authority of the Northern Ireland Executive. Others may take a different view, but the UK Government very much hope the Northern Ireland Executive can find a resolution to this, and for our part, as the ones who stand behind the Belfast/Good Friday agreement and are responsible for it and for protecting it, and as the ones who are responsible for international negotiations, we will continue to endeavour through the negotiations with the EU to find an enduring solution.
Sir Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)
My right hon. Friend rightly characterises this as a devolved matter, and the Government, far from making a U-turn, have been very clear and consistent about it. However, the international law dimension of this and the obligations of the United Kingdom Government are also very clear. Would it not have been better for the Minister in the Northern Ireland Executive to have told my right hon. Friend before he decided to make this directive because of the obvious sensitivities and the vital importance of allowing my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary to conduct her negotiations with Commissioner Šefčovič in as smooth and unimpeded a way as possible? We will deal with this through negotiation and resolution at international level, and therefore we need to avoid the elephant traps that unilateral action present.
George Eustice
My right hon. and learned Friend knows from experience that the UK Government have considerable patience for negotiation in order to reach agreement and sensible pragmatic settlements in these areas. He is absolutely right that we seek and would prefer a negotiated reform of the way the protocol is interpreted, and that is what my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary is working on, but I hope I have given an explanation on a number of occasions now about the perspective that Edwin Poots brings to this and why he has acted in the way that he has. I hope my right hon. and learned Friend will also understand that there is a difference between things we are responsible for in international law and things a devolved Administration are responsible for implementing under the devolved devolution settlement that we have.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
It should be a cause of great sadness to all that the act of leaving the EU continues to cause such business and political instability in Northern Ireland. I have listened very carefully to what the Secretary of State had to say and think he was arguing that, while it may indeed be the case that the administration of SPS checks is a matter for the Northern Ireland Executive, the legal obligation under the withdrawal agreement and Northern Ireland protocol to ensure checks are done falls upon the UK Government. So, if the checks do stop, do the Government intend to use their powers under section 26 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998? He talked about a high bar; may I briefly read to him what it says?
“If the Secretary of State considers that any action proposed to be taken by a Minister or Northern Ireland department would be incompatible with any international obligations…he may by order direct that the proposed action shall not be taken.”
George Eustice
Of course the Secretary of State may direct, as the right hon. Gentleman points out, but for all the reasons I have given—for all the reasons that we understand—the bar for using such reserve powers is high. At the moment, checks are continuing. There is no breach, and the Government judge that at this stage, the right thing to do is appeal to the power-sharing Executive in Northern Ireland to find a way through this.
Jane Stevenson (Wolverhampton North East) (Con)
As someone with a large Northern Irish population in Wolverhampton, and being half Northern Irish myself, I have grave concerns about the constitutional crisis that the protocol is causing. Will the Secretary of State commit to urgently reviewing this, to come to a solution that will fully restore and maintain Northern Ireland’s position in our Union? Does he also agree that a Labour solution that would align us back with the EU regulations is absolutely unacceptable?
George Eustice
My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. The Government stand absolutely full square behind the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, which is built on the principle of consent within the communities in Northern Ireland. It respects the role of Northern Ireland within the UK and the importance of unfettered trade between GB and Northern Ireland as a component part of the UK, and I assure my hon. Friend that the Government are absolutely committed to finding a solution. That is why my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary continues to endeavour to get a sensible resolution to this issue.
Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance)
The protocol exists due to the choices made by this Government about the nature of Brexit, and in order to protect the very particular circumstances faced in Northern Ireland. I want to make it very clear that it is already the policy of the devolved Executive from May 2020 that the checks be implemented, and the legal adviser to the Executive is the current Attorney General, not the former Attorney General. Does the Secretary of State agree that we need to find long-term, sustainable and legal pragmatic solutions to the issues with SPS, and also with customs? If we are asking the European Union to subcontract more and more functions around the marginal checks to the UK authorities, trust is essential, and anything that undermines trust is entirely counter-productive.
George Eustice
As the hon. Gentleman will know, the Northern Ireland protocol had a number of requirements, including that there should not be unnecessary checks on goods going from GB to Northern Ireland, ensuring that that trade could continue, and ensuring that the principles of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement in all its dimensions were respected. That is why the UK Government are seeking some changes and modifications to the way in which it is interpreted. Finally, it is not for the European Commission to unilaterally interpret what the Northern Ireland protocol means: its interpretation must be bilaterally agreed.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
Two years on from Brexit and seven months on from the Command Paper, which made it clear that there were sufficient requirements for article 16 to be triggered, with continued disruption to trade between Great Britain and Northern Ireland and with completely unnecessary checks, does the Secretary of State share my hope that the action taken today in Northern Ireland might be the wake-up call that the European Union needs to finally realise that the protocol is undermining the Belfast/Good Friday agreement, and that it should negotiate its replacement sooner rather than later?
George Eustice
We have consistently made clear through our negotiations with the European Union that the UK Government are motivated on this issue solely by our defence of the Belfast/Good Friday agreement. It is because we want to stand behind it and protect the peace that the Belfast/Good Friday agreement has brought that we seek the changes to the Northern Ireland protocol.
Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)
The author of this present problem is the Prime Minister. At a time when Northern Ireland is looming into a real crisis, not simply because of the actions of Edwin Poots but because of the threat to collapse the Northern Ireland Executive, it is incumbent on the Prime Minister to be engaged, and it is disappointing that he is not. Will the Secretary of State undertake to go back and say to the Prime Minister that it is time for him to demonstrate real determination to sort out the overall problem of the protocol?
George Eustice
I can assure the hon. Gentleman that the Prime Minister is absolutely engaged in these issues, as are the Northern Ireland Secretary and the Foreign Secretary. Those of us who were in the last Parliament can all recall that finding a resolution to this particular challenge around trade between GB and Northern Ireland was a difficult problem to solve. The Northern Ireland protocol had a solution, but it required both parties to continue to work through certain details to make it work in practice, and that is what we have been doing.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
Following on from what the Secretary of State has just said, is it not extraordinary that 20% of the checks that the EU has with third countries are between Great Britain and Northern Ireland? It is even more crazy, because the vast majority of those goods are circulating within the UK single market. Will he give the House an assurance that he will always put the interests of Northern Ireland above the interests of the EU?
George Eustice
Through the Joint Committee process and the negotiations led by the then Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, my right hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), we secured easements for the major retailers in particular, and other arrangements that set aside the requirement for export health certificates until a more durable solution could be found. It is the case, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) says, that the European Union has a very legalistic approach to the proportion of goods that it inspects, which bears no resemblance whatsoever to the degree of risk. The UK Government think that there is no sense in such an approach, and our own future border arrangements will be based on a calibrated assessment of risk, not on an arbitrary percentage figure plucked out of the sky.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
I am sure the Minister is aware that the Good Friday agreement, which has been much referred to here today, rests upon the principle of consent, and that controversial issues therefore have to be dealt with on a cross-party basis. That was embodied in the law that set up the Assembly; the Northern Ireland Act 1998 requires that to happen, but it has not happened in this case. The Minister will also be aware that it has not happened in relation to the border posts, which have not been built yet because consent could not be achieved, and that it has not been implemented in relation to the charging of lorries coming through those border posts, because there was no consent on that either. This principle is well established, so instead of listening to the EU cheerleaders in the Labour party, the Alliance party and the Social Democratic and Labour party who want full implementation of this damaging Northern Ireland protocol, would the Secretary of State agree that the real responsibility lies with the EU to stop using Northern Ireland as a whipping boy for the UK leaving the EU, and to treat us with the respect we deserve as a part of the United Kingdom?
George Eustice
As I said earlier, Minister Poots gave me a similar description of the requirements of consent, and his understanding is that this issue should have been discussed and agreed by the Northern Ireland Executive. On the right hon. Gentleman’s wider points, although I would express them rather differently, I have not been known for listening to EU cheerleaders during my political career.
Claire Hanna (Belfast South) (SDLP)
The DUP is executing a series of reckless stunts today to try to regain some political memorandum and distract from the terrible mess that it has made, but removing officials and collapsing the Executive solves nothing. It damages trust, it undermines the culture of lawfulness that many of us are trying to foster and it risks vital legislation on climate, education and many other things that have been left hanging since the last governance black hole. I believe that it will also prevent the Executive from spending the money announced in this Chamber today to mitigate rising fuel prices. It is very disturbing that the UK Government seem content to shrug their shoulders and collude with this. What is the Minister’s clear message to businesses today, including those large retailers that are sending goods into Northern Ireland? Is it that they should continue to follow the legally mandated rules as outlined in the trade and co-operation agreement and the protocol, or should they collude with this stunt and undermine international law?
George Eustice
On the latter point, the legal obligations that exist apply to the relevant authorities, whether that is the UK Government or indeed the Northern Ireland Executive, so businesses should continue as normal. There is no legal liability to businesses for continuing to trade with Northern Ireland under any circumstances. On the former point, I hope that I have made it clear in everything I have said that the UK Government hope that the Northern Ireland Executive will continue and that they will pull together and find a resolution to this problem. That is the right thing to do.
Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)
This is really the most farcical of situations among a number of farcical situations. It seems to me that what the Minister is saying here today is that everything is as was and as normal and traders can continue. Mr Poots seems to have lawyers; I wonder whether the Government’s lawyers are involved in any of this. It seems to me that the Government are involved in wishful thinking, following on from the question asked by my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) about what happens next. Can the Minister tell us what is plan B?
George Eustice
I am here to give the House an update on the current situation, which I am doing in all the detail that I am able to. If events change, I am sure there will be an opportunity to have to further such exchanges.
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)
I do not agree with all the points made by the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin), but on one point he was correct. This is not an operational issue but a constitutional one. Can we expect a further statement from the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland on all the points raised around that matter today?
George Eustice
I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland has been engaged in these matters over the past week or so as events have been developing. I am sure that there will be many opportunities for the Northern Ireland Office to bring such statements before the House should there be anything new to report.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the people of Northern Ireland have been kept in the call waiting queue for long enough? We hear continual EU platitudes that our opinions are important, while they simply entrench further into the protocol. We are determined that now is the time for the call to be taken, for our voice to be heard, for our problems to be addressed and for justice and UK parity to be restored. Does he agree that since the EU and its government have continued to stall, there are now no options available to the people of Northern Ireland other than major steps that were a last resort and are now the only resort?
George Eustice
The Government have been clear throughout that, where there are legitimate grounds to use article 16 of the withdrawal agreement, we reserve our right to do so. We also, as I said earlier, have considerable patience for a negotiated outcome. Our preference is still to get that negotiated outcome. That is why my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary will be having further conversations this afternoon.
Points of Order
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. On the front page of The Daily Telegraph yesterday, I was surprised but pleased to read that the Government intend to extend or make permanent the current legal approval that allows women to undergo early medical abortions at home. I was pleased because this is a welcome development based on strong clinical evidence and the opinion and experience of women who have needed access to abortion during the pandemic. I was surprised because I have not seen an announcement anywhere in the business of the House, a written ministerial statement or any promise of business in the coming weeks, and I am mindful of what Mr Speaker said about Government announcements being made first to the House. The current approval expires at the end of March, and the Government have had a year since they closed the consultation on the matter to place a decision before the House. Have you received notice of a statement on this topic, or will women have to rely on The Daily Telegraph for information about access to their essential health care?
Secondly, Madam Deputy Speaker, if you will indulge me, in business questions today I referenced the morning-after pill. I made a perfectly, as I understand it, orderly request for a debate on access to contraception. In response, the Leader of the House made a misinformed comment about abortion. The World Health Organisation states:
“Emergency contraceptive pills prevent pregnancy by preventing or delaying ovulation and they do not induce an abortion… Emergency contraception cannot interrupt an established pregnancy or harm a developing embryo.”
How can I ensure that the Leader of the House corrects the record, as I think that what he said is a harmful clinical falsehood that I am sure does not represent the Government’s policy?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I thank the right hon. Lady. She has elided two points of order. Let me take her second point first. What a Minister says at the Dispatch Box is, of course, not a matter for the Chair, and I have no authority to correct the Minister. However, if a Minister has inadvertently given information that is not absolutely correct, the right hon. Lady will be aware of the many ways in which she can ask for that Minister to be required to come back and correct the record. Indeed, it is open to her simply to ask that Minister to correct the record. It appears to me that if there is a factual inaccuracy in the matter to which the right hon. Lady has just referred, it is rather important. It is a matter about which I would judge that anything that is said in this Chamber should be 100% correct, because it is not a matter on which we should allow people who would be affected by it to be misled. The facts ought to be straight and I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for bringing that matter to the House’s attention. I hope that Members on the Treasury Bench have noted what she has said and that the message will be passed on to the Leader of the House.
The right hon. Lady’s first point is much simpler. Mr Speaker has made it clear on many occasions—and I have echoed it many times—that announcements about significant matters of Government policy must be made first to this Chamber, so that the duly elected representatives of the people of this country, not the press, are the people who question the Minister. If the right hon. Lady would like to pursue that matter, I am quite sure that Mr Speaker will look favourably upon her request.
Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)
Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. When at-home abortion medication was issued by the Government, it was because of a crisis due to covid. Now that the crisis is coming to an end, have the Government given any indication to the Chair that they intend to bring forward measures to remove those medications as crisis medications?
Madam Deputy Speaker
No, the Government have not at this point given notice of an intention to bring that matter before the House. As I said to the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson), if the hon. Gentleman wishes to pursue the matter, I am sure that Mr Speaker will take his request seriously.
Backbench Business
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Government’s Education Catch-up and Mental Health Recovery Programmes
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con) [R]
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the effectiveness of the Government’s education catch-up and mental health recovery programmes.
I thank the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Kim Johnson) for coming to the Backbench Business Committee to secure the debate. The impact of covid-19 on education has been nothing short of a national disaster for our children. Lockdowns and school closures for most children have heralded the four horsemen of the education apocalypse: a widening attainment gap, a mental health epidemic, increased safeguarding hazards and damage to life chances. Even prior to the pandemic, disadvantaged pupils were already 18 months of learning behind their better-off peers by the time of GCSEs, and only yesterday The Times newspaper, as part of its education commission, reported that 25% fewer poorer pupils achieve English and maths GCSEs compared with their wealthier peers.
Today I would like to focus on three key issues affecting children’s recovery. First, I will start with the ghost children. On Sunday, the respected Centre for Social Justice published a new report, “Lost but not forgotten”, which continues to highlight the worrying situation of the over 100,000 children—and the number is increasing—who have mostly not returned to school since schools were reopened last year. Across the country, 758 schools are missing almost an entire class-worth of children. About 500 children are missing in half of all local authorities across the country. The Government want exams to go ahead, which I agree with, but 13,000 children in a critical exam year
“are most likely to be severely absent.”
As my Education Committee heard from a headteacher last week:
“Pupils need to be physically in school to even start to learn.”
However, the effects of persistent absence go well beyond academic progress. The CSJ again points out that while
“school attendance is not a panacea, it…offers opportunities to detect wrongdoing and intervene much earlier.”
This would prevent safeguarding concerns from escalating and would provide the families with the support they need when they need it. We only need to remember the tragic cases of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson to realise this truth.
Of course, I welcome the Government’s recent announcements
“to tackle the postcode lottery of avoidable absence”,
but this is no way near enough. The Department for Education must prioritise gathering live data about who and where these children are—the data is absolutely crucial—and I urge the Government to use any underspend from the national tutoring programme, as the Centre for Social Justice has recommended, to fund 2,000 attendance advisers to work on the ground to find these children, work with the families and get the children back into school. Charles Dickens wrote in “Oliver Twist”
“of so many things forgotten, and so many more which might have been repaired!”
We must do much more to save this “Oliver Twist” generation of ghost children, who are out in the streets and facing safeguarding hazards, including joining county line gangs, and facing online harms at home and possible high-pressure home situations such as domestic abuse. If we do nothing or we do not do enough, we will be haunted by these ghost children forever.
Secondly, we must consider the efficacy of the Government’s education catch-up programmes. I strongly welcome the catch-up programmes—I campaigned for them for literally the year during lockdown—and I welcome the £5 billion invested in education recovery, but my key worry is that the funding, however welcome, is not reaching the most vulnerable children in our communities.
The national tutoring programme is falling short of its targets: 524,000 children were supposed to start tutoring this year, but only 8% have begun. The Education Policy Institute has found that there has been a marked disparity in the take-up of the national tutoring programme between the north and the south. In the north just 50% of schools engaged with the national tutoring programme, whereas in the south upwards of 96% of schools engaged with the programme. In December, the Department published its own annual report evidencing that the Government believe the risk that their catch-up programme will fail to recover lost learning is “Critical/very likely”. That is a direct quote from the Department’s own annual report.
Headteachers and tutoring groups have described to us the inaccessibility of the hub, and the lack of quality assurance about the tutors on offer. Yesterday, I did a roundtable with heads from university technical colleges —an initiative I am incredibly supportive of—and the principal of Aston University Sixth Form in Birmingham said that, despite receiving about £60,000 of recovery funding and an offer of three NTP tutors, as of yesterday just one had started, and it is now forced to resort to expensive private tutoring. The NTP has the potential to be a really great intervention by the Government to support children’s recovery, but it is not going far enough or happening quickly enough. I strongly urge the Minister to look again at the contract and seriously consider enacting the break clause and working with Randstad to up its game or literally say goodbye.
However, recovery is not just about academic catch-up. We need to look at other measures to support pupils. I welcome the pilot scheme in Wales on extending the school day, in which 14 primary and secondary schools will trial an additional five hours of bespoke activities in art, music, sport and core academic sessions. Let me be clear: when I say we should consider extending the school day, I am not talking about pupils sitting through eight more hours of algebra, although the Minister would probably like that. Instead, as in Wales, a longer school day should be used to support enrichment and extracurricular activities, which have been proven to support academic attainment.
The Education Policy Institute found that a longer school day could increase educational attainment by two to three months. The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport found that an extended school day can boost numeracy skills by 29%. Young people who participate in school clubs are 20% less likely to suffer from mental health problems. Why cannot the Government at least consider implementing a pilot for longer school days, as Wales has done, to help to give disadvantaged children in England the best chance of closing the gap with their peers?
Thirdly, we must address the challenges with children’s mental health. Like the Minister, I go to schools in my constituency and all over the place, and I am struck again and again, when speaking to students, that they talk about mental health in a way I have not heard over the past few years. That has been hugely caused by the damage of lockdown and shutting schools, which we must never, ever do again.
Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for the important points he is making. On the issue of mental health, this week the all-party parliamentary group on pandemic response and recovery had evidence from psychologists of long standing in the field, indicating that one of the greatest causes of stress and mental health problems in young children at school was the continual testing that takes place for covid. Does he accept that, given the way the virus is now moving, we must look at whether such extensive testing is needed, evaluate its significance anyhow, and address this issue, which is putting many children off even wanting to go to school?
Robert Halfon
As so often, the right hon. Gentleman makes a powerful point. My view has always been that we seem to be putting burdens on children all the time, when they are at low risk—thank goodness—from covid, yet we do not do the same to adults. It is children who have really suffered during this pandemic. We have all let them down through some of the policies that have been implemented. I understand why that was done, but our children have really struggled, so I have sympathy for what he says.
Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)
I thank the Chair of the Education Committee for his excellent speech. I agree with him on many of the points he raises. As he knows, I chair the all-party parliamentary group for school exclusions and alternative provision, and we had a meeting just this morning with professionals in that area. There is a crisis in AP at the moment, due to the sheer numbers of young people who cannot be in mainstream education because of the crisis in mental health that he has just mentioned. Does he agree that it is critical that the Government find funding for high-quality AP and offer more guidance to local authorities on how to use their high needs block to ensure that those much-needed provisions are available now in local communities?
Robert Halfon
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Forty children are excluded every school day and, sadly, they are not ending up in quality alternative provision. There is a postcode lottery, despite the wonderful efforts of many teachers in AP. There needs to be a dramatic change. I would like kids to stay in the school but have support training centres in the school. As Michael Wilshaw, the former head of Ofsted, said to our Committee, there should be many more of them so that kids are not just dumped out into the streets and left, often, to their own devices or to poor-quality provision.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
My right hon. Friend knows that he and I have a slight difference of opinion when it comes to the idea of exclusion. However, I always want to be careful about one thing: that we talk about what the school could do. Does he agree that there always needs to be a firm conversation about what more parents can do to support the teachers to ensure that their children do not end up being excluded?
Robert Halfon
Yes, 100%. I like the message coming out of the Department for Education that this is not just about schools and skills, but families, schools and skills. Families are central to this and we should do everything possible to strengthen them. I welcome the hundreds of millions of pounds that the Government are putting into early intervention, particularly to build family hubs around the country.
Let us look at the horrific statistics on mental health: 17.4% of children aged six to 16 had a probable mental health disorder in 2021, up from 11.6% in 2017. Overall, child mental health referrals are up by 60%, so the Government must rocket-boost their proposals to put a mental health professional in every school, not just in 25% of them. We should also ensure—this perhaps relates to some of the question from my hon. Friend—that interventions to support mental health are not seen as crutches, but designed to prevent more serious escalation.
I have mentioned before in this House my visit to Newham Collegiate Sixth Form Centre, which is an extraordinary school. Staff there do not like the words mental health; they talk about mental health resilience. Throughout school life, pupils are taught the tools and tactics that they need to deal with the challenges that life throws at them. Private study periods have desks set up in an exam style to help pupils to familiarise themselves with the setting to reduce their anxiety, and in school assemblies, pupils learn from sport celebrities about the techniques that they use to deal with high-pressure situations. We need to talk about this in terms of mental health resilience.
We should also tackle the wrecking ball that social media has been to young people’s mental health. The Prince’s Trust found that
“social media use in childhood is associated with worse wellbeing”,
and 78% of Barnardo’s practitioners reported that children between the ages of 10 and 15 have accessed unsuitable or harmful content. The platforms provided by companies such as TikTok, in my view—I am not a luddite; I love technology—are a Trojan horse for damaging children’s lives, not just with their huge amount of sexualised content, but through the damage that they are doing because of the images that children see. There should be a 2% levy on these social media companies, which would create a funding pot of around £100 million that the Government could distribute to schools to provide mental health support and digital skills training to young people to build the resilience and online safety skills that they need.
I note my heartfelt thanks to all the teachers and support staff in my Harlow constituency and around the country for their heroic efforts throughout the pandemic to keep our children learning. There has been welcome investment in education recovery and some great work is happening, but there is much more to do. The Government must deal with the problem of ghost children to prevent the creation of the “Oliver Twist” generation that will potentially be forgotten forever. The Education Secretary has a real grip of his Department, and I admire many of the things that he is doing, but he has to make sure that the catch-up recovery reaches the most disadvantaged pupils and works efficiently. Given the scale of the mental health challenges facing our young people, action has to be taken now to prevent this becoming an epidemic.
Finally, I say to the Minister that there are great initiatives coming out of the Department. The home education register, which we supported in our Committee and is recommended our report, is very welcome. Sometimes, however, the education system resembles a whole lot of clothes pegs without a washing line. We need the washing line—the narrative, the strategy, the Government’s plans for education. This problem can be solved. The NHS has a long-term plan and a secure funding settlement; the Ministry of Defence has a strategic review and an additional £20 billion. I urge the Minister to ensure that education has a long-term plan and a secure funding settlement, so we can have that washing line. While many of the clothes pegs are great initiatives, we need a proper washing line to link them all together.
Several hon. Members rose—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. I expect this debate to take until about half-past three, so there is just over an hour left. I know that Members will want to leave enough time for the Minister to answer their questions and, indeed, for the shadow Minister to speak. I hope that we can manage without a formal time limit. If everyone takes about five minutes, everyone will have an opportunity to speak. If that does not work, I will introduce a time limit.
Mr Nicholas Brown (Newcastle upon Tyne East) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon). We have debated this and related issues before, but today’s debate is particularly important to the life chances of our young constituents. If we believe in social mobility and trying to make things better for the next generation than they were for the last, this debate should be at the heart of those ambitions. I agree with a great deal of what the right hon. Gentleman has said, and accept that the Department, and indeed the Government in general, are making some movement in the direction in which I would like to see us go. Certainly there is common ground and much to be discussed between us.
As usual, these matters boil down to “but more needs to be done”. Let me briefly run through the issues that I think are at the heart of this. The education catch-up programme needs to reach into the schools. Eighty per cent. of schools in the north-east of England which responded to a recent survey—I accept that this information is patchy—said that the Government’s education recovery package was not sufficient to address the impact of the pandemic. More than half of them thought that the catch-up would take five years or more. Since the start of the pandemic, each pupil has had an average of 115 days out of school. The north-east of England saw the highest rise in absence compared with anywhere else in the country in the last year, and I therefore consider that our area ought to benefit from the highest response in the form of countervailing measures to help us to catch up with more prosperous parts of the United Kingdom.
I believe that the Government should focus on three key issues to prevent further disruption. I will observe your strictures on brevity, Madam Deputy Speaker. Those issues are testing, classroom ventilation and vaccines.
Testing schoolchildren regularly is essential to ensure that the infected are isolated and pupils can carry on learning in person. I want to see the Government increase communication with parents to raise awareness of the latest testing guidance, and to work with schools by providing tests for pupils to take home and to promote uptake.
Ventilation may seem a prosaic issue, but I am convinced that it is not. I am not critical of what the Government have done in this respect, but I do think that the approach should be more holistic. For some time now, we have been urging the Government to get proper ventilation systems into schools and colleges. Quality learning requires a comfortable environment, not one in which students and staff must wear coats to keep warm in cold classrooms. The Government must increase the supply now, and ensure that every school is provided with an adequate ventilation system.
The vaccine programme is a key tool—it would even be reasonable to argue that it was the key tool—in preventing further disruption to education. About 2 million 12 to 17-year-olds remain unvaccinated. Some 16 weeks after the vaccine was approved, about half of 12 to 15-year-olds have still not received their first jab. The programme is way behind schedule. Again, I do not want to be critical, because I know that people are trying and doing their best, but as ever, more needs to be done. We need to ramp up the vaccination of pupils.
That is my key take on the issue, but I will also say a few words on the mental health recovery programme. We debated it recently, but the issue is growing. Young people have endured such a long period away from in-person learning, largely because of the pandemic. A recent YoungMinds survey found that two thirds of young people aged 13 to 25 believe that the pandemic will have a negative long-term impact on their mental health. We must do everything we can to ameliorate that.
Record pressures on mental health services cause many sufferers to turn to A&E as a last resort, but by that stage, the issues that require attention can be significant and complex. It is a relatively ineffective way of trying to deal with mental health problems, even if there is provision in the A&E, which there is not always. Earlier intervention is possible and would have significant benefits.
Some 50% of mental health disorders are present by the age of 14 and that increases to 75% by the age of 18, but the provision of mental health services in schools is patchy. As we have debated before, there is no legal requirement on schools in England, although there is in other parts of the United Kingdom. School-based counselling is a proven intervention for children and young people experiencing psychological distress. As well as making for better health outcomes, early intervention makes economic sense and ought to relieve pressure later down the line for the national health service.
There is a successful school-based counselling pilot, of which I am very proud, in the Newcastle upon Tyne East constituency. I enthusiastically commend it and everyone involved, as I do the similar projects that are in place. The project’s early results are encouraging: it finds an improvement in educational attainment for around one in three pupils who received counselling. I support demands to make school-based counselling services more consistent across the country.
The Minister’s programme is moving towards my ideal outcome—it is not so far apart—so at least we are talking about the same sort of thing. I back the Labour party’s proposals to ensure that every school has specialist mental health support. If we were looking to spend money—I mean, are we looking to spend money?—to level up and help people, even perhaps because we believed in social mobility, surely the life chances of the very young would be the area in which to make a start. I am trying to build up the current picture of mental health support teams and how they work in practice with children, and the Minister generously offered us an opportunity to take that up with him when we have a meeting arranged.
I hope that my contribution to this important debate is accepted as being bipartisan and as an attempt to draw people together to make progress.
Mark Fletcher (Bolsover) (Con)
It is an honour to follow the right hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), who gave an excellent speech outlining the scale of the problem we are looking to solve.
In my two years and one month as the Member of Parliament for Bolsover, we have had many divisions and many changes to our country. However, what was hardest to support, and which I probably regret the most, was closing schools to the majority of pupils. Bolsover, as the levelling up White Paper outlined, is already behind the rest of Derbyshire and the east midlands. In hindsight, it is difficult to support what we did to schools and I think I speak for many hon. Members on that front.
The challenge for our schools, teachers and families, of finding a way through to catching up, is incredibly difficult. I echo my right hon. Friend’s comments and thank all the teachers and headteachers who, over the past couple of years, have continued to go above and beyond. The scale of the challenge that headteachers face is as big now as it was then, because they continue to lose staff to omicron and so on. It is a constantly shifting jigsaw. We should not lose sight of the fact that they are trying to build a recovery on quicksand, because the situation is shifting so much at the moment.
One very positive development worth noting is that we are again talking about mental health. There has been a total transformation in society over the last 10 years or so in how open we are in discussing mental health. That is a massively positive thing. In recent weeks and months, I visited a number of my schools. The issues fed back to me on attainment, behaviour and mental health were notable. It is amazing how many of my primary schools said that when children, particularly the youngest, returned, they were unable to share space, toys and resources. That is a massive challenge because of covid. More than one headteacher has used the word “feral” to describe behaviour. Pupils returned in a state which meant they really had to be managed in a completely different way and on a scale that schools have not had to do before.
I have seen various hugely impressive approaches to this issue. Bolsover Infant School has taken a back-to-basics approach and I saw last week how that is working. Palterton Primary School has just won an award for its use of physical education. One could see from the behaviour in the school that it was having a huge impact. Other creative ideas, such as the use of forest schools—I say that nervously, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) sits in front of me and does not like such things—have been used by Shirland Primary School and a primary school in Langwith. They have been shown to have a hugely positive impact.
This is the scale of the challenge: record high demands in NHS England data for accessing child mental health services; a 37% increase in child mental health service referrals between April 2020 and March 2021; and a 59% increase in referrals for children with eating disorders compared to previous years. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow said, there is a very clear division between where that does and does not happen. Those who are most affected are those from the worst backgrounds. We must not lose sight of that.
I appreciate that the Government, with £5 billion investment, are putting everything they can into catching up. Two days ago, Derbyshire was identified as an education investment area, which is a hugely important step. I note within that the provisions for additional sixth forms. I know the Minister is very keen to help me deliver a sixth form for my area, because we have no post-16 provision in my constituency. I have to say I did rather like the idea of a longer school day. That is a very good proposal and I am happy to have a go in Bolsover, but my headteachers may disagree.
I will, if I may, just finish by saying that I have had some feedback on the tutoring fund, which is that it is very difficult to make it work locally: there is either a lack of suppliers or some teachers are having to go on training, which takes them out of the classroom, making it a bit of a tick-box exercise. Some schools are even suggesting that they might give that funding back, which seems rather perverse to me. I would appreciate it if the Minister commented on that and could meet me to discuss that issue. The scale of the challenge facing schools and headteachers is incredibly difficult, but we do need to make sure that this is a priority, because areas such as Bolsover were already behind educationally and it is vital that we catch up, and that is a real challenge.
Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)
Quite simply, this debate could not be any more important. The inaction of the Government in catching up the lost learning of our young people will be felt by many of them for a lifetime. Why is it that our children, teachers and schools have been treated as an afterthought at every stage of the pandemic? We have seen the Government: closing schools without a second thought for those pupils who could not log in or learn from home; opening schools back up for less than 24 hours to encourage the virus to run rife; and leaving every announcement until past even the 11th hour—whether it be on exams, on testing, on vaccines.
When it comes to education, the contrast could not be starker. This Government think that they can cut corners on the months of lost learning, but, for Labour, education is so important that we say it three times. The catch-up programme does not even come close to meeting “the scale of the challenge.” Those are not my words, but the words of the Government’s own education recovery tsar whose resignation in June is all the evidence that anyone needs when considering whether the scale of the challenge is really understood. Sir Kevan’s essential proposals were watered down to the tune of less than 10% of the funding that he insisted was required. Why does the Minister think that this issue can be just brushed under the carpet?
While the Chancellor blocks the catch-up funding with one hand, he waves away wasted billions with another: £8.7 billion lost on PPE; £4.3 billion handed out to fraudsters; and a bonus £200 million thrown at the plans to downgrade St Helier Hospital to healthy, wealthy Belmont rather than keeping services where health is poorest.
We are eight months on since Sir Kevan’s damning indictment of the so-called catch-up plan. I take no satisfaction in saying that every word of his damning predictions has come true. It is a catch-up programme that is so inept that the national tutoring programme is even teaching to empty classrooms. An assistant headteacher at a school in Derby shockingly reports that her school was paying a tutor to sit with no pupils for an hour. It is scandalous. How is this possibly a good use of public funds, and how on earth does it help our young children to catch up? The failings are there for all to see. Only one in five headteachers in the north-east of England uses the programme. Many schools have found it impossible to enrol new children onto it, and the scheme is reaching less than 10% of its target pupil number. It is no wonder that tuition providers themselves have described it as shambolic.
Before lockdown, children on free school meals were leaving school 18 months behind their classmates and the gap was getting worse. Schools closed and a quarter of these children did less than one hour’s schoolwork a day. Lockdown was temporary but could have a lifelong impact, with the Institute of Fiscal Studies warning that students who had lost six months of schooling could see a reduction in lifetime income of 4%.
In primary schools, the unavoidable reality is of a covid gap of approximately two months’ learning in year 2 pupils and a widening of the disadvantage gap in attainment. Meanwhile, a quarter fewer poor pupils achieved English and maths GCSEs during the pandemic than their richer classmates, and the divide continues to grow.
There were 415,000 children off school with covid on 20 January, but only 2% of teachers working in schools, serving the most disadvantaged communities, said that all their pupils had adequate access to devices and the internet to work from home.Every click widens the attainment gap, which is why I am calling for every child on free school meals to have the catch-up kit and connectivity that they need to log in and learn from home. The Government may be distracted by the hangover of their party season, but their scant support for our students is no cause for celebration. The Government must address this issue with the gravity it requires or step aside so that we can get on with the job, because our children, particularly our poorest children, do not get a second chance.
Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)
There is no doubt that lockdown has had a major impact on children’s wellbeing, but it has given us an appreciation of the amazing work that teachers do. Once again, I want to pay tribute to every headteacher, teacher and support staff member in Meon Valley. I have been really impressed by the way they have coped in very difficult times. I am also very grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), the Chair of the Education Committee, for securing this debate, as it brings forward many thoughts about how we can best help our children and young people in schools and colleges.
The pandemic has been hugely disruptive to education and there is no doubt that pupils’ mental health issues have increased, especially in secondary schools. I suggest that even before the pandemic mental health and children’s happiness was already becoming an issue. “The Good Childhood Report”, published in August 2020 by The Children’s Society, which looked at the happiness and mental health of 15-year-olds, had observed a notable increase in the proportion of children with low wellbeing—18% had low wellbeing, compared with figures of 11% to 13% in previous years. England ranked 36th out of 45 countries in Europe and North America for young people’s life satisfaction. We had the largest reduction in life satisfaction between 2015 and 2018 out of all participating countries. That is really not acceptable.
The “State of the nation 2020: children and young people’s wellbeing” report points out:
“Children’s wellbeing and their mental health can have a real impact on their development into their full potential both now and as a tool in their futures.”
The report shows a sustained dip in happiness with school and there is strong evidence that fear of failure in 15-year-olds is intrinsically linked to education. I reported about this in my “One Nation” paper on education, as there was evidence that our education and assessment system is no longer fit for purpose and is not preparing our young people adequately for a life of work. We have now heard from The Times Education Commission and the independent assessment report from the National Education Union, which provide more insight into what we can do to improve our curriculum. I think that will improve young people’s views on school and their mental health, and I will come back to that in a moment.
Hampshire’s local authority has created mental health support teams, which my local schools are finding very useful and should be a model the Government should look to continue to invest in, if not put further investment in, as child and adolescent mental health services are overwhelmed.
Dean Russell (Watford) (Con)
I echo my hon. Friend’s thanks to teachers. Does she agree that having mental health first aid training across the community, as I am doing in Watford, where we are training 1,000 people in mental health first aid awareness, would help with this and would support teachers, parents, organisations and especially students as they move forward?
Mrs Drummond
I totally agree with my hon. Friend. I know that the Government have plans to ensure that teachers are also trained in mental health provision. One of my local schools has employed its own psychologist, as well as a mental health co-ordinator, and the number of students in this school receiving external mental health support has doubled in a year. Any further provision within the school would be filled immediately, so the need is increasing.
On a more positive note, “The Big Ask”, launched by the Children’s Commissioner, reached 500,000 children, and young people are now showing remarkable resilience and are determined to work hard and do well. “The Big Ask” report also states that the focus should be on helping every child to reach their goals, but that that needs
“careful curriculum design, early intervention and responsive teaching”.
Mental health is improved by providing subjects that young people are interested in, which is why I am so vocal about a 14 to 18 curriculum. Yesterday I attended the launch of the NEU’s commission on assessment, “A New Era”, and listened to young people talk about their views. It is clear that they are disappointed that the curriculum is limited, as is choice. They were concerned that many of them will fail—one third do because of the nature of the way exams are calculated—and they did not feel that the curriculum prepared them for life. Interestingly that is a theme from both of the commissions that have published so far—another three will be publishing shortly.
There is an overall feeling that young people have become stressed to the extent of asking, “What is the point of exams?” They are being taught to the test and how to pass them, rather than being educated. We need a curriculum that makes sense to young people so that they see a reason for studying, and I include vocational qualifications. We have lost creativity, and teachers have lost the love of teaching. One young person commented, “Teachers teach what they need to teach, not what they would like to teach to pass on their love of learning.”
This is also the case in early years and key stage 1, where children have lost much during the pandemic, particularly social interaction and the building blocks of learning, yet we now have tests in five of seven years in primary schools, at a time when the love of learning should be established, rather than teaching to tests. I am afraid that will continue to happen while we have this system.
More Than a Score says that 93% of teachers want a review of SATs, which are at the bottom of what parents look at when they choose a school. When looking for a school, parents care most about having teachers who care about their pupils and inspire them to learn. When asked how schools should be measured post pandemic, parents said it should be happiness and wellbeing of pupils, pupils making progress at an appropriate pace and a broad, rich curriculum. SATs came at the bottom again.
We need to assess pupils, but we must ensure that it is not at the cost of breadth or depth of education. The school-led tutoring grant has provided money for tutors, and schools are very grateful. However, the money does not fund the full cost of each tutor, and my schools say there is too much bureaucracy to secure it. Will the Minister make it simpler?
Catching up is one reason why I am also calling for an extended school day for everyone, not just to continue maths, English and the core subjects but, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow said, to allow a wide range of extracurricular activities such as music, art, sport and clubs—all the subjects that cannot be fitted into the present school day and that contribute to pupils’ wellbeing. There are examples across the country where this is working well, and I urge the Government to look at them as pilot schemes.
I am pleased that the Government will continue to fund another couple of years of summer holiday schemes, which have been much welcomed by schools and children alike, especially where they give opportunities for children and young people to access a wide range of projects, both for learning and fun.
The world is changing fast. Young people need to be flexible and resilient but, most importantly, they need to be prepared for work and for anything that might be thrown at them. The working person is assessed on what they can do and what skills they offer. The existing education system appears to be designed around what pupils can remember for a short time. This has to change. Parents want it to change, employers want it to change, teachers want it to change and, more importantly, young people want it to change. This will not happen overnight, but let us listen to all these stakeholders and design a curriculum and an education system that helps every child to achieve and to enjoy their school day at the same time.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
I am pleased to participate in this debate, and I agree with so much of what has been said this afternoon.
Children and young people are ambitious and optimistic about their future. As we have heard, education staff have made an incredible effort to keep them learning and to support their wellbeing during the pandemic, but we should not underestimate the impact of the disruption they have suffered, especially those who face the greatest challenges and who experience the lowest attainment.
It is opportune that this debate is taking place against the backdrop of yesterday’s Government announcement of new education investment areas. This initiative has the potential to contribute to children and young people’s education recovery, provided it is properly led and designed; provided lessons are learned from previous initiatives, such as the London challenge and the opportunity areas; provided the right targets and success measures are put in place; provided it is adequately resourced; and provided the professional expertise of teachers and leaders is respected and supported. An overcentralised, over-prescriptive model will not deliver the hoped for benefits.
I echo the hon. Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond) by emphasising the importance of the early years when talking about children’s recovery. We all know that investment in the early years pays the greatest dividends in children’s outcomes, and very young children have seen the greatest proportion of their lives affected by the pandemic. As we have heard, this has adversely affected their social skills, their vocabulary, their development and, indeed, their school readiness.
I welcome the investment that the Government have announced, such as for training early years staff or the Nuffield early language intervention, but more is needed both in resources—the Minister will be aware of Labour’s proposal for an increase in the early years premium to match the primary pupil premium—and in a proper, comprehensive and ambitious strategy for early education.
Funding for schools will not return in real terms to 2010 levels until 2024, and the Institute for Fiscal Studies has shown that by 2024-25, resources for colleges will still be about 10% lower in real terms than they were in 2010, and that those for sixth-form colleges will be 24% lower. It is not clear whether the new funding for education investment areas will redress that injustice. I note that additional funds are to be available only to “some priority areas”, and the programme otherwise seems to amount to little more than forced academisation for more schools.
I echo the enthusiasm that we have heard this afternoon for an extension to the school day. Indeed, the Secretary of State himself has suggested that he would like all schools to consider providing a school day of six and a half hours. Research suggests that an extended school day, delivered by staff with high levels of training and linked to existing classes and teaching, could be important in helping children to make up lost learning. It could allow for time to be allocated, too, for the one-to-one and small group tutoring that we know to be effective.
As we have heard repeatedly this afternoon, however, the Government’s national tutoring programme is failing to deliver that. Ministers were warned that awarding a cut-price contract to Dutch facilities company Randstad would deliver neither the quality nor the volume needed, and that is exactly what has happened. Some 600,000 places per term are needed for children’s education recovery, yet the national tutoring programme is currently reaching only 10% of target pupil numbers. The Government need to do some serious thinking about the quality of tutoring provided and the delivery and reach of the programme, so that all children and young people who can benefit from it have the chance to do so. If Randstad cannot deliver the contract adequately, that contract should be removed from it, and those who can handle it better, including our excellent school leaders, should have the chance to do so.
I agree that making more time for children to engage in extracurricular activities is really important as part of the extension of the school day and to support social and emotional wellbeing. Indeed, it might also increase participation by appealing to those pupils who would otherwise miss out but who could benefit most from extended provision, and ensure that these vital wider activities are not squeezed out even further than is already the case in a crowded curriculum. The Education Policy Institute has said that any extra school time should be useful for activity and enrichment activities, and that has also been recommended by the Education Endowment Foundation toolkit. However, teachers in England already work very long hours, including on lesson preparation and complying with monitoring and reporting requirements. In looking at an extension of the school day, it is really important that we hear how the Government plan to staff and resource it and to draw on the research evidence of what is effective.
Finally, as we have heard, there is widespread agreement on the importance of good mental health for successful learning and wider social participation. That applies right across the education sector, from early years to higher education, for students and for the workforce. Parentkind has shown that exam stress remains a top anxiety for students and that serious mental health issues are experienced disproportionately by children and young people from ethnic minority backgrounds, those with special educational needs and disabilities, and those receiving free school meals. It is not surprising that parents give strong support for Labour’s plan for expert mental health support in schools. I hope that Ministers will look really carefully at that. May I also urge the Minister to engage with the #BeeWell programme in Greater Manchester, which aims to work with young people and a range of partners to improve mental health and wellbeing?
We should also note that university mental health and wellbeing services are supporting a higher volume of students, often with more complex needs, as a result of the pandemic. Increased pressure on NHS services means that university support services have stepped in, but the lack of further detail about a new approach to mental health services for 18 to 25-year-olds, as set out in the NHS long-term plan, is an issue of concern. Increasing capacity in statutory services, with seamless transitions across university and NHS services, will be key to both preventing and treating mental ill health among young adults and to supporting their learning and wellbeing. I hope that the Minister will co-operate closely with his counterparts at the Department of Health and Social Care in order to secure that.
Our children and young people should and must be at the forefront of our thinking as we recover from the pandemic. I hope this debate will encourage a bold and ambitious approach from the Government; the Minister will have heard this afternoon the strong support for him in that endeavour from all parts of the House.
Several hon. Members rose—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. I must protect the rest of the time, so we will now have a formal time limit of five minutes.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
It is an absolute pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), whom I hold in high regard as a parliamentarian. I thoroughly enjoyed our exchanges when I sat here chuntering away and she was on the Opposition Front Bench.
I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) for securing the debate. He is a long-term, passionate advocate, I enjoyed working under him as he chaired the Education Committee and I continue to hear from him.
Let us be frank: the Government have done an awful lot. Not only have they thrown £5 billion at education recovery—including £1.5 billion for tutoring; £950 million direct to schools this academic year and the previous one for evidence-based interventions; £1 billion to extend the recovery premium to the end of 2024; and £400 million for training and professional development—but there was the excellent holiday activity fund, which began in the great constituency of Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke under the leadership of Carol Shanahan, the co-owner of Port Vale football club and the co-chair of the Hubb Foundation with Adam Yates, a former professional footballer. During the pandemic they not only delivered 300,000 meals to families across the city of Stoke-on-Trent but led the way in offering more than 100 different opportunities for the holiday activity programme, not by building shiny new buildings but by using existing schools and their staff and relationships with the people they knew, young and old, bringing them into the building and providing one hot meal every single day. It was a fantastic scheme and Carol and her team deserve all the plaudits they get.
I was delighted to see that the “Levelling Up” White Paper builds on the idea of levelling up and catching up in education. The city of Stoke-on-Trent is now an education investment area, bringing us a new high-quality 16-to-19 free school. I will of course campaign for that to end up in the constituency of Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke. I will not stop there, though: if we are to help catch-up, we need to unlock free schools for 11 to 16-year-olds. I have been working and having conversations with Star Academies and Michaela Community School, which is led by the fantastic Katharine Birbalsingh, who I hope will bring a free school bid for the constituency in wave 15. It is about having high standards, high expectations and a knowledge-rich curriculum and shaking the apple tree in the great city of Stoke-on-Trent so that we no longer accept mediocrity when it comes to educational outcomes and destinations for our young people but send a clear message that we can do this, we expect and we want more for the young people we are proud to serve with.
Let me just correct the record: my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher), who is no longer in his place, said that I might feel some illness about the idea of forest schools, but I can confirm that my daughter’s nursery in Weston has a forest school and I am proud that she can access that. I have seen the benefits of forest schools at first hand at Burnwood Community School in Chell.
I wanted to leave some time for some key things. I introduced a ten-minute rule Bill on the Ofsted inspection of multi-academy trusts, which had the backing of not only Government Members but Members from both the Labour party and the Liberal Democrats. I was very grateful for their support. Even though the Government have sadly rejected that Bill, they have left open the window to more discussions. I will embarrass the Government by reminding them that the Minister’s Parliamentary Private Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (David Johnston), was a sponsor of that Bill, so he knows all about it and will, I am sure, lobby internally to make sure those changes are made.
We need to see more brokerage deals with the good multi-academy trusts to make sure that they can enter the city of Stoke-on-Trent and other areas, because if we are to help with catching up, we need to bring the very best into our city. Currently, too many single-academy trusts are not doing their bit.
As the House will have heard from me from a sedentary position, I absolutely adore the idea of extending the school day until 5 pm or 6 pm—for as long as necessary. Schools are buildings that young people know and where they feel safe. The extended school day would provide the opportunity to build and harbour relationships with parents, who could come into the building and perhaps benefit from educational classes or opportunities through the family hub model that the Government are pushing and for which the city of Stoke-on-Trent is bidding. Hopefully, we will get one hub per constituency—hint, hint, Minister. We want to see that idea going forward. Although some people argue that the extended school day should just be for the curriculum, I believe it should also be used for enrichment. The youth guarantee offer in the “Levelling Up” White Paper indicates that that is the direction of travel.
Finally, we have selective education by religion, by postcode and by house price; it is about time we unlocked selective education by bringing back grammar schools so that parents have opportunity and competition in their local area. I will shortly be leading a campaign to unlock that potential for our great country.
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)
I will try to be brief, Madam Deputy Speaker. I thank the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) for bringing this debate before the House today, because it is such an important issue. When I think about everything that is happening across Richmond Park as we emerge from the pandemic, this is the No. 1 issue in my constituency, particularly the mental health aspect. I have had lots of conversations with schools throughout the pandemic and as we have emerged from lockdown, and this is the most important thing, more than anything else.
The education catch-up funding has been very welcome and has been well used across my constituency, but it is the mental health impact of the lockdown that is having the biggest impact on our youngest citizens. When I speak to headteachers, I hear all sorts of stories. They tell me about the new reception class that started in September 2021: with these four and five-year-olds, so much of their lives has been spent in lockdown that they are suffering extreme separation anxiety from their parents. It is not unusual in any reception year to find that one or two children get anxious and teary about separating from their parents, but they have whole classes who are crying for hours, which is completely unprecedented. I fear for our very youngest as they are entering their school years.
Going up through primary school age, we are finding that, in the older years, the children who spent two years at home sat in front of laptops are finding it really difficult to play with each other. Small boys do not know how to play football in the playground any more. I do not know about anyone else, but it is those little details that I find really distressing, particularly as the mother of an eight-year-old son: the thought that our young people do not know how to play with each other. They do not know how to share in the classroom, or how to talk to each other. As we get through into secondary school, the impact of the past two years is really beginning to show in young people who have spent too much time on the internet over those years. They have become isolated and do not know how to reach out, and are really struggling with their self-image and their mental health. They have spent too much time looking at sites that are frankly unhelpful for their education. Misinformation has been a massive source of problems during this pandemic for all sorts of people, but for our young people most of all.
I want to pay my own tribute to all the teaching staff and everybody involved in education across Richmond and Kingston. They have been absolutely heroic and have really stepped up for our young people, and I am absolutely in awe of what they have achieved, but what is really coming through from them now is that, more and more, they are having to deal with mental health issues in the classroom. They are not trained to deal with those issues, and they have enough to do to catch up on the academic side, particularly for pupils who are approaching exams: there have been so many absences in this academic year, which is a real problem for those staff.
We need to broaden the mental health resources that are available in the community. We need more school nurses, and those nurses need to have training in mental health. We need to open up more access to child and adolescent mental health services, because the waiting lists are a real problem. We need adolescent mental health services at our GPs. We need to give parents more options so that, when they are at their wits’ end with how to help their children, they know where to go, so that they are going not to schools for help—schools that are ill-equipped to give it—but to a range of different sources across the community. I know that time is short, so if this is the only point I can make, please can we have more resources to help our young people with their mental health in schools and outside them? That, more than anything else, is what Richmond Park needs.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
The time limit is now three minutes. I call Jim Shannon.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
As the grandfather of two covid babies who have not had the joy of the local mums’ and toddlers’ groups and who have not been able to build up essential social skills, to which the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) referred, I have real concern about the long-term nature of the lockdown social skills gap. I have seen mothers in churches unable to enjoy the service, as their little one is frightened in creche as they have not mingled with new people their entire lives. We have young children with an enforced early understanding of mortality and with what, for some, has turned into an obsession with hand cleaning. There are long-term issues that we must put in the work to combat.
Some 12.6% of children and young people in Northern Ireland experience common mood disorders such as anxiety and depression. That is around 25% higher than in other nations. My colleague Michelle Mcllveen, an MLA, the Education Minister for Northern Ireland and a former teacher, has put some measures in place. I want to comment on those measures, because I know that the Minister here is always very interested to know what we are doing back home. The Minister in Northern Ireland has put in place the children and young people’s emotional health and wellbeing framework. She has allocated an additional £16 million in funding to that end. She has also set up a text-a-nurse service, a REACH—resilience education assisting change to happen—youth programme, an on-site nursing pilot in five post-primary schools and independent counselling services for schools. I know that the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) is always keen to hear what we are doing in Northern Ireland so I wanted to add that.
A new training programme also provides an opportunity for the entire education sector workforce of 60,000 staff to improve their understanding of trauma, which is really important. The Minister of Education has also put a further £5 million into education wellbeing funding. The healthy happy minds pilot to support therapeutic and counselling services in primary schools has begun and, along with the Engage programme, supports children and young people’s learning in the new academic year.
In response to the Belfast live great big parenting survey, 32% of parents said that their children were struggling to cope with their emotions; 23% said that they had always struggled but lockdown was making it worse; and 15% said that they were having problems with mental health for the first time. The pressure on families is huge and we must alleviate it in a co-ordinated way to ensure that no child is left behind and that every child who is struggling knows that help is available in school and out of school.
Needless to say, we can make a difference, but we must continue to allocate the funding and actively work on restoring that which covid has robbed our children of. Thank you very much Madam Deputy Speaker.
Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab)
I would like to thank the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) for bringing forward this important debate. It could not be more timely, a year on from Sir Kevan Collins’ appointment as the Government’s education recovery commissioner. I want to start by recognising the huge contributions that our nation’s school and college staff, and parents, have made to preserving and protecting our children’s education every day since the beginning of the pandemic. They continue to do so day in, day out. I also want to echo the contributions of colleagues from across the House who have set out the education recovery challenge we face with clarity and compassion.
We have heard from a number of right hon. and hon. Members in what has been a broad debate covering high needs challenges, the crisis in mental health, the level of exclusions and the need for urgency in tackling the issues at scale. My right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) spoke about the importance of communication with parents, and raised concerns about ventilation and supplies of tests to schools. My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh), who is a tireless champion for schools and colleges in her constituency, spoke about the last-minute chaotic announcements and the impact on schools and children. She also spoke powerfully about children not getting a second chance and why we have to get recovery right. My hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) spoke about the importance of adequate resources to meet the challenges faced, investment in early years and Labour’s recovery plan. I pay tribute to her for her tireless hard work on this ambitious plan.
While recovery is vital and the focus of today’s debate, school staff, parents and pupils are still living with the day-to-day reality of covid across the country. Pupil absences are up 35% since the start of January, and a quarter of schools have 15% of their teachers and leaders off work. But on both vaccination and ventilation, Ministers continue to fall short on basic measures that would keep children learning together and playing together. The Education Secretary has yet to tell us exactly how many volunteer teachers have come forward and what his workforce plan looks like. Any member of school staff will tell you that we are not out of the woods yet when it comes to covid. Yet we must act immediately to tackle the generational education recovery challenge we face.
As it stands, Ministers’ complacent and inadequate plans risk widening existing inadequacies and inequalities, compounding the damage caused by a decade of Conservative cuts and stunting the life chances of a generation of children. The Institute for Fiscal Studies found that an average loss of six months schooling could see a reduction in their lifetime income of 4%. This equates to a total of £350 billion in lost earnings for the 8.7 million school-age children in the UK.
This is the stark scale of the generational challenge we now face, and the Government’s ambition must match it, yet the total package of so-called catch-up funding equates to just £300 per pupil. That is just £1 per day that children have been out of school. Let us compare that with the £1,685 per pupil recommended by the education recovery commissioner, the £1,800 per pupil in the US and the £2,100 per pupil in the Netherlands. It is no wonder that Sir Kevan resigned in protest. This meagre package will also compound the damage done by a decade of cuts in school spending. Even with the money announced in the spending review, the IFS says that per-pupil funding remains lower than a decade ago, and the broken national funding formula will see the least deprived schools receiving more money than the most deprived, to the tune of almost 5% by 2023. Despite rehashed announcements this week on levelling up that were big on rhetoric but low on practical delivery, the bottom line is that this Government will continue to hollow out areas of historical deprivation when it comes to education funding and recovery.
Meanwhile, the Government’s flagship national tutoring programme is failing children and failing taxpayers. Recent figures show that the scheme has reached less than 10% of those due to receive support in this academic year. The Government’s contractor is unable to say whether it is hitting targets to engage children receiving the pupil premium who are most in need of support. There have also been huge problems with the tuition partners’ online platform, frustrating engagement for many schools. Three quarters of tutoring providers surveyed recently said they felt that it did not have sufficient resources to deliver the scheme. Will the Minister therefore commit today to publishing information on the reach of the programme by region and among those who had the most time out of school? Will he also say what he will do to work with schools to address the problems that are preventing engagement?
I want to turn now to mental health, which has long been a silent pandemic. Even before covid, the NHS suggested that as many as one in six five to 10-year-olds suffered from mental ill health. The Royal College of Psychiatrists claims that 2020 saw the highest ever number of young people referred for mental health help. The poorest 20% of households are now four times more likely than the wealthiest 20% to have a serious mental health problem by age 11. CAMHS have been systematically cut in the last decade and interventions have been forced to move away from preventive work to crisis response. Once again, however, Ministers have ducked another generational change. The recent funding for mental health support teams will cover just 35% of schools by 2023. This is not nearly ambitious enough to meet the heightened demand or to counteract a decade of underinvestment in children’s mental health. Barnardo’s and others have been clear that there should be a dedicated mental health support team in every school, and Labour agrees.
After 21 months and four waves, this Government are still fundamentally unable to combat the impact that this pandemic is having on our children. The Government response has meant that disruption and uncertainty have become an exhausting normality for teachers, school staff, pupils and parents. That cannot continue. As we learn to live with covid, education recovery presents a historic challenge and we must rise to it. Labour wants to harness the opportunity that this watershed moment provides to tackle long-standing inequalities. Our children’s recovery plan would support our country’s children to play, learn and thrive together once again. Our clear, costed proposals are an ambitious plan that would deliver school activities and breakfast clubs, quality mental health support to every child and every school, and small group tutoring for all those who need it, as well as making a real investment in our teachers.
Schools continue to battle covid in classrooms as we speak. Meanwhile, the consequences of learning loss loom larger with every passing day. Time and again, the Government have demonstrated that they are fundamentally unable to plan for or mitigate the impact of covid on our children’s education. The summit of Ministers’ ambition for education recovery falls well below what our children need and deserve.
The Government are paralysed by the Prime Minister’s repeated scandals, and while they dither, inequalities widen. Without further intervention, the damage of the pandemic will become irreversible and the impact will plague children, the education system and the wider economy for decades to come. Every day this Government waste is another our children will not get back. If Ministers will not step up for our nation’s children, the next Labour Government certainly will.
The Minister for School Standards (Mr Robin Walker)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) on securing this debate on a hugely important subject. We have heard fantastic speeches from across the House. I recognise that I will not necessarily have the time to respond to every point that has been raised, but I wholeheartedly agree with the right hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) that this is a vital topic in all our constituencies.
It is right that this debate cover both education and wellbeing recovery, as we know they are parts of the same thing. Recovery is a key priority for me, as it is for the Government, and a key part of building back better, levelling up and ensuring that we are ready and skilled for a future in which the next generation can prosper.
Many hon. Members have spoken about the ambition that we should do all it takes to ensure our children recover from the impact of the pandemic. I say clearly that I recognise that the education sector continues to face challenges caused by covid. Like so many colleagues in this debate, I thank everyone who works in early years provision, schools and colleges for their ongoing dedication to keeping education and childcare settings operating and supporting children and young people in this vital period.
The best place for young children to be, for their education, mental health and wellbeing, is in the classroom. That is why protecting face-to-face education continues to be our absolute priority. I know that children and young people in particular have had to adapt to the challenges presented by the covid-19 pandemic. My right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow, in his introductory speech, mentioned the importance of mental health resilience. Many children have shown and are showing remarkable resilience in difficult circumstances, but some have found this period especially difficult for their mental health and wellbeing, so tackling that is one of our key priorities.
Education plays a huge role in the lives of children and young people, and it is also a crucial contributor to wellbeing, as we heard from the children’s commissioner. That is one reason why protecting face-to-face education is so important: it can help to combat the understandable underlying anxieties that children have about their life, future and friendships. It is also why we have made clear that the recovery support that schools, colleges and other educational settings provide for their pupils should include time devoted to supporting wellbeing.
We are supporting schools to prioritise attendance and providing extra teaching where needed, to ensure that pupils stay on track with their wider learning and development. However, we must also ensure that schools understand the pandemic’s impact on children’s ability to engage in learning, so that they can adapt their curriculum and pastoral support to help pupils to stay engaged.
I have heard from a number of hon. Friends in this debate, including my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher), about the importance of behaviour. To keep pupils engaged in education, it is crucial that we ensure that schools can offer calm, orderly, safe and supportive environments where both pupils and staff can thrive. Disorderly classrooms not only have an impact on children’s ability to learn, but can equally affect their mental health and cause some children to stay away from school, missing vital learning time.
We also know that dealing with misbehaviour can be stressful for teachers, and too many teachers have left the profession because of such problems. I want to ensure that teachers and schools have the best strategies and techniques at their disposal. That is why I am today launching a consultation on how schools can create a culture of good behaviour, to inform revised behaviour guidance, which will provide practical advice for all school staff on creating positive environments through consistent routines and high expectations.
I have seen on many visits to schools the difference that a strong behaviour culture can make, particularly for some of the most disadvantaged children and those with SEN. Schools and colleges must also be able to respond where children are facing specific issues and may need more expert support. We remain committed to promoting and supporting mental health and wellbeing in our schools and colleges. Our recent £15 million wellbeing for education recovery and return programmes have provided free expert training, support and resources for staff dealing with children and young people experiencing additional pressures from covid-19. Around 12,000 schools and colleges across the country benefited from that support, delivered through local authorities.
We are also taking action to help schools to build their capacity to promote the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people, and their ability to ensure that those who need help with their mental health receive appropriate support. The Government are providing £9.5 million to offer senior mental health lead training to around a third of all state schools and colleges in England in ’21-22. This is part of the commitment we made in our 2017 Green Paper “Transforming children and young people’s mental health provision” to offer that training to all state schools and colleges by 2025. We know many senior mental health leads have already started their training, which will enable them to start to apply their learning this academic year. That will help them build on the incredible work they and their colleagues have done throughout the pandemic to promote and support the wellbeing of pupils.
Throughout the pandemic the Government have put in place a wide range of specialist mental health support for people of all ages who need it. For children and young people we have ensured NHS mental health services remained open throughout the pandemic, offering digital and remote access as well as face-to-face support where appropriate to maintain care and accept new referrals.
In the longer term, we are expanding and transforming mental health services through the NHS long-term plan with additional investment of £2.3 billion per year by ’23-24. This will allow at least 345,000 more children and young people to access NHS funded mental health support. I very much take the points of the right hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) on earlier interventions and will continue to discuss that with health colleagues.
In addition, as part of the Government commitment to build back better, in March 2021 the Department of Health and Social Care published our mental health recovery action plan, backed by an additional £500 million of targeted investment to ensure we have the right support in place for this financial year, including £79 million used to significantly expand children’s mental health services in the financial year. My hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond) and others highlighted the important role of the mental health support teams in schools and colleges, which is stepping up over this period.
We all know that covid-19 has caused considerable disruption to the education of our nation’s children and young people. Evidence shows that while this has been significant for all children, it has been especially so for the disadvantaged and those with the least amount of time left in education. That is why nearly £5 billion has been committed to fund a comprehensive recovery package, following the evidence and providing support to all pupils while prioritising the most disadvantaged and vulnerable and those with least time left.
Our approach provides a mix of immediate and longer-term support, funding those interventions the evidence tells us will be the most effective. Universal programmes such as the £650 million catch-up premium in ’20- 21 and teacher training opportunities will support all pupils no matter where they live. They sit alongside targeted interventions, focusing on those most in need through our targeted tutoring programme, summer schools and the recovery premium, extended in the spending review by £1 billion for the next two academic years. It is right that we prioritise those with the least time left in education: from September 2022 funded learning over the next three academic years will also increase by 40 hours a year, giving every 16-to-19 student the equivalent of an extra hour a week.
Extensive evidence shows that tutoring can be one of the most effective tools to support learning and accelerate pupil progress. That is why we are investing £1.5 billion in tutoring to provide up to 100 million tutoring hours for children and young people across England by 2024. Building on the success of the programme’s first year, more than 300,000 tuition courses began last term: a good start to delivering our ambitious target of 2 million courses this academic year.
An estimated 230,000 tuition courses have been started through the school-led pillar, demonstrating that providing greater flexibility to schools to deliver tutoring is helping us reach as many young people as possible. I have seen fantastic examples of that up and down the country, where academic mentors and school-led tutors are delivering real benefits. I welcome the feedback from the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) on the impact in her patch.
We have set high standards for the programme and feedback from schools shows the positive impact it is having in helping pupils catch up. In the first national tutoring programme satisfaction survey of this academic year, 77% of responding schools said the programme was having a positive impact on pupils’ attainment and 80% said it was having a positive impact on pupils’ confidence.
Although we are making good progress, I recognise that the programme needs to pick up more steam. We are closely monitoring the performance of the programme and its delivery organisation, Randstad, with daily and weekly operational reviews and regular meetings at senior level. A number of improvements have been made since September; for example, tuition partners identified a number of areas to improve the way they work with schools through the tuition hub digital platform, but I recognise there is further to go.
I cannot say everything I would like to say in this debate, but what I can say is that delivering on educational recovery is absolutely crucial and we will continue to work, taking the feedback from across the House in this excellent debate today.
Robert Halfon
I thank all the Members who spoke in the debate, particularly the right hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown), who is leading on children’s mental health. His work is really important. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher) also talked about mental health and the longer school day.
The hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) addressed the digital divide, which we have still got to work on. My hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond) rightly said that we should better prepare and equip people for the world of work. We agree on a lot and she also supports a longer school day.
The hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), who was passionate in her previous role as shadow Education Secretary, talked about early years and also supported a longer school day, which is very welcome.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) talked about the extended school day. He supports grammar schools. I am in favour of them, but it is wrong that only 3% of pupils on free school meals attend grammar schools. That has got to change.
The hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) also talked about mental health, showing the breadth of concern across the House. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) spoke movingly about school closures.
Clearly, there is a consensus across the House for the Government to do more on mental health and more on the catch-up programme and to support a longer school day. Finally, I say to my hon. Friend the Minister that Randstad has got to sort it out or he has got to boot them out. It is not acceptable that all that taxpayers’ money is being spent on that huge company, which is not providing the catch-up and the tuition that our children vitally need.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the effectiveness of the Government’s education catch-up and mental health recovery programmes.
Committee on Standards: Members’ Code of Conduct Review
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the Committee on Standards’ Review of the Code of Conduct for Members of Parliament.
I am grateful to the members of the Committee on Standards, three of whom I see, so we have got a quorum, the Clerks, who work assiduously on the Committee, the commissioner, the registrar and all those who work in this field on behalf of the House.
Let’s face it: we are in a bit of a mess. Voters are quite angry with us at the moment and they think parliamentary standards are a contradiction in terms. I am afraid that the Owen Paterson debacle, the rows about funding the renovations in Downing Street and the illicit lockdown parties are damaging trust in all MPs and in Parliament. That matters because it undermines confidence in democracy. It corrodes the silver thread of our constitution. In the Prime Minister’s words, we need to look at ourselves in the mirror.
Of course, I start from a basic assumption that every Member is an honourable Member. We are all here because we want to change the world. We have different views about how to change it, but we all want to change the world for the better. Sometimes we make mistakes. I have made more than most. In my experience, fortunately, the House is very understanding when a Member apologises or corrects the record.
However, we have to think carefully about the issue of lying in Parliament. It is not simple. “Lies, damned lies and statistics” goes the old phrase. Two people can see the same event in completely different ways. One might think that the other is lying, or call the other a liar. I hate to get religious, but even the Bible has four gospels, three of them supposedly recounting exactly the same events, but with contradictory details: Jesus gave his sermons sitting or standing; he was on a mount or on a plain; “Blessed are the poor” or, “Blessed are the poor in spirit”.
So I am very reluctant to have the commissioner weigh in on whether an MP has lied or misled the House. Parliament must be a place of free speech. Incidentally, the commissioner completely agrees with me on this point. She has told the Committee several times that she has no desire to be the arbiter of truth in the House of Commons.
As the Leader of the House said this morning, some things are a matter of opinion or a question of emphasis —or “em-phasis” as my mother used to say. But if a Member lies and refuses to correct the record and the public can plainly see that the Member has lied, what do we do? Do we force the Member who calls it out to add the word “inadvertent” when we know perfectly well that the Member who uses that word does not mean it at all, so we are forcing them to lie? Do we throw the Member out of the Chamber if they refuse to withdraw? That is what the rules say we should do. Where is the justice in that? Should we refer the matter to the Committee of Privileges? That is the old system. We would do that because the matter would be considered a contempt of the House. That requires the governing party to assent, because there could be a vote on the matter, and members of the Committee on Privileges to act without partisan interests. It effectively means that, at the moment, the only arbiter of whether a Minister or ordinary Member of the House has lied is actually the Prime Minister who decides how to whip.
Today, that puts a phenomenal onus on Conservative Members, but in the past and in the future it will be on Members of other political parties. I heard what the Leader of the House said earlier, but I fear the rules were written at a time when a Member could not imagine anything worse than having their honour traduced in public. Frankly, honour is not what it used to be.
I do not think that the rule, as it stands, will hold forever. I do not have an answer to the question, but, incidentally, I do not buy the argument that it is not a lie if the Member believed it at the time they said it. Just because someone has persuaded themselves or lied to themselves, does not mean that they have not lied to the House.
On transparency, the biggest issue for many voters is whether we are acting in the public interest or in our own interest. We have seen cases of conflict of interest. We pray each day that Members may,
“never lead the nation wrongly through love of power, desire to please, or unworthy ideals but laying aside all private interests and prejudices keep in mind their responsibility to seek to improve the condition of all mankind.”
I am sure that every single one of us thinks we follow that every single day—we all find ourselves innocent in the court of our own opinion—but we sometimes need the harsh light of transparency to reach deeper into our own self-interest.
I am sometimes surprised, and I think Committee members would agree, by some colleagues who simply cannot see the conflict of interest that they are engaged in, which is absolutely plain to everybody else. The key lies in transparency. People should be up front and honest and let the public assess whether they have resolved the conflict properly.
Unfortunately, the system is far too opaque. It is almost impossible to find all of an individual MP’s financial interests online and sometimes it is difficult to understand what they mean without exploring further. The website is a complete mess and we need an overhaul of all the transparency arrangements. Moreover, Ministers, who, of course, by definition are Members of this House or the other, are not required to register hospitality received in a ministerial capacity with the House, so they are held to a lesser degree of transparency than the rest of us. That cannot be right.
In one instance last year, more than a dozen Members received the same hospitality—they were at the same event, drank the same wine or beer, ate the same food and watched the same show—but only the Back-Bench Members were required to register the full details with the House within 28 days. In some cases, the Ministers’ declarations have still not been made public by their relevant Departments nearly a year after the event and I am guessing that they will be going to the same event again in a couple of weeks’ time. That is completely within the rules but, to use the word of Lord Evans, the Chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, it is “bonkers”. It is time we changed that rule. All people should be treated equally under the law and all Members should be treated equally under the rules of the House.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
I am listening with great interest to the debate. The Chair of the Committee is talking about transparency in relation to financial interests. Would he comment on transparency in relation to non-financial interests, which may sometimes set up a conflict of interest for Members?
Chris Bryant
There has been confusion about that in the past, because we have not tended to encourage Members to register all their unremunerated interests whereas, oddly enough, Ministers do have to register them in the ministerial register of interests. I think it would be better if we just registered everything. There was a tendency for Members to say, “By the way, I’m the chair of the village hall committee,” which I am perfectly relaxed about. Why not put it all out there? I think it would be easier for everybody, because there would be no debate and it would make it simpler.
On the issue of second jobs, as the Committee has heard in evidence, many people see it all in a black and white way. They say, “MPs get paid more than double the average wage,”, “You’re in the top 5% of earners,”, “Why isn’t one job enough for you?”, and, “When you take on second jobs, what on earth do you think the corporations are buying other than your influence and the letters ‘MP’?”.
However, even people who say that we should ban all second jobs row back a little when you put some specifics to them. A&E nurse? “Fine.” GP? “OK.” Helping out on a family farm? “Yes, of course.” Running a family firm just to keep it in business? “All right.” A bit of broadcasting or writing? “Well, maybe, if you must.” Chairing a charitable board or a university? “Yeah, yeah”—and so it goes on.
Some have suggested that we should have a list of acceptable posts that MPs can take on, or that we should empower the Committee or the Commissioner to approve any outside interests. All of us on the Committee think that posts involving parliamentary advice should definitely be banned, because that is a clear conflict of interests, but I am concerned that introducing some of the suggestions would lead to the Committee making entirely subjective decisions which should really be made by voters, not by anybody else.
This leaves us with a difficulty. We all know when someone is swinging the lead and devoting far more time and energy to their other work than to Parliament. We see it—we know better than anyone else when being an MP has become the second job rather than the first—but perhaps we, as parliamentarians, should be talking more to our colleagues about that, and the political parties should be doing more in that field.
Some, including the Committee on Standards in Public Life, have said that we should come up with a “reasonable” amount of time that an MP could spend in a year, or a week or a month, on an outside interest, or a “reasonable” amount of money that they should be allowed to earn. The Committee—I think—is not yet convinced of that.
Chris Bryant
I see some nodding. For a start, I do not know how it could be policed. Some have suggested that MPs should fill in timesheets, but I cannot see that happening. Moreover, it seems invidious to tackle an MP’s earned income but not their unearned income, for instance from shareholdings or trusts.
Every constituency is different; every MP is different; and while the political parties should pay a greater role in turfing out those who are swinging the lead, in the end I think that that is what the ballot box is there for.
Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)
I am grateful for the fine introduction that the hon. Gentleman is giving to the debate, and I thank him for his work on the Committee on Standards. One of the issues that we have discussed in the Committee is that of a Member perhaps writing a book—I know that the hon. Gentleman has some experience of writing books—and the income generated by it. Writing a book is something that Members would do in their spare time, and could potentially be called a second job if they were earning from it. It is not clear how that sort of thing could be dealt with.
I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman about timesheets and the like. Does he agree that while some of the suggestions are about certain types of job, such as working in the NHS, there is an understanding that people working in business can also bring valuable experience to the House?
Chris Bryant
I am very upset with the hon. Gentleman, because he said that I had written some books but he did not say “some very good books, which are available in all good bookshops.” However, I declare my interest, Madam Deputy Speaker, before I am reported to myself.
There is a serious point here. I think that voters are well equipped to make decisions about this. It does not quite work equally between marginal constituencies and what are considered to be safe constituencies, but, speaking for myself, I think it would be odd if we were to say that MPs should not be allowed to write. The written word is as important as the spoken word when it comes to pursuing the things that we all believe in. If the House feels differently, however, I will stop writing books. [Hon. Members: “No, no!”] We are not having a Division on that, Madam Deputy Speaker.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
There is a difference, surely, between declaring when one is doing something or has an outside interest, and the activity or interest being banned. There needs to be a clear distinction between those two.
Chris Bryant
This is what I return to. For me, the key issue is the conflict of interests. If you are pursuing a financial interest when you speak in the Chamber, or when you are talking to Ministers, or when you are in the corridors of power lobbying people, that is wrong. It is immoral, it demeans our political democracy, and it is rightly banned. The question is whether the public can come to a clear understanding of how you are operating as an MP, and whether you have resolved any conflict of interests in the interests of the public.
I want to say something about rules and principles. I know that some colleagues have reacted adversely to our suggestion of the inclusion of a new principle of respect—incidentally, I suspect that we may change “respect” to “respectfulness”—but let me be clear: we are adamant that while the Nolan principles of honesty, leadership, selflessness and so on are important and aspirational, the commissioner can only investigate a breach of the rules, not a breach of a principle. For instance, it would be impossible for her to investigate an alleged failure to be selfless enough. It would be equally invidious and bonkers for her to investigate a failure to show enough respect, which is why we are not proposing that she should be able to do so. We will make this abundantly clear in the next report that we produce.
We are not proposing that the commissioner would be able to investigate words said in the Chamber. That is solely a matter for Mr Speaker, or the Chair, and for nobody else. Yes, there are rules about our conduct. Bullying is wrong, and in a workplace such as this, which is hierarchical—I would say overly hierarchical—we forget too easily the power we have. However, what we say in the Chamber is a matter for the Chair, and for nobody else.
My final point is about appeals. We do have a form of appeal at the moment. If the commissioner finds that a Member has committed a serious breach of the rules, the Member can appeal that decision to the Standards Committee. However, it is my firm conviction—I am not sure that the Committee is quite there yet, but it is my personal conviction—that we should go further and create a formal appeal process, with established grounds for appeal on both the finding and the sanction. Sir Ernest Ryder, who formerly ran the tribunals service in England and Wales, is working on that for us at the moment, and I hope he will be able to lay out a firm set of proposals in this area by Easter.
I think that the former Leader of the House, the right hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Dame Andrea Leadsom), who is in her place, is quite right to say that we need more alignment between Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme cases and non-ICGS cases, but I would be reluctant to hive off all cases to the independent expert panel. The Standards Committee’s combination of lay members and Members works. She set it up, it works and I would not abandon it. When we get it right, as I think we did on Owen Paterson, we enhance the reputation of the House.
Several hon. Members rose—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
Order. We have quite a short time for this debate, so I urge Members to take no more than six minutes each.
Sir Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)
I will be as brief as I possibly can. First, I would like to thank the Chair of the Committee, the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), for the manner in which he chairs the Committee, for the way he presented the report, and for his diligence and the work he puts in to this Committee. It is a very arduous Committee, and it has a very heavy workload.
Sir Bernard Jenkin
It is meant to be light duties, and I thought I could combine it with other things, but I have given up other things to stay on this Committee, because I think the work we are now doing on the revision of the code is so important.
I could touch on some of the points the hon. Gentleman made. I think he is right about the key being the transparency of conflicts of interests. We should not be denigrating people in this House who have outside interests. Some of them are unavoidable and some of them are by choice, but I firmly believe that this House is enriched by having people who stay on in Parliament, particularly later in their career, while involved with other interests. Being a senior barrister, for example, may take a Member away for weeks on end on very important cases, but having such people in this House means that we have such resources at our disposal much more readily than if these people felt they were squeezed out and were not welcome here. So I agree with him about the time point, and I agree with him about respectfulness.
I actually joined this Committee because I wanted to be involved in the revision of the code. This is ongoing work, and it has been going on for a very long time—since the previous commissioner first started work on the revision of the code. It is meant to happen every three years, but it has been delayed and delayed. So the report we are discussing actually incorporates the results of a great number of hours of work and thought.
The sad thing is that, if we just look at the Chamber today, we see there are a couple of handfuls of hon. Members here who are engaged with this debate. It has always been the biggest problem, in my view, that people only start engaging with the code when they are accused of something, they are worried about being accused of something or they are trying to steer clear of falling foul of the rules. There is not nearly enough discussion, reflection and understanding of why the code exists, of the principles and values behind the code, or indeed of how we should learn to talk about how we aspire to those principles.
I have always believed that the adjudication process is wanting. The compromise between handing the whole thing over to some independent judicial panel and leaving things as they are is to have an appeal akin to the independent expert panel that we have for the ICGS, but even that would have to be advised by a Member especially appointed for the purpose in serious and contested cases, to advise on how Parliament works and on the moral hazards of being a Member of Parliament.
I was mocked last week for suggesting that Members of Parliament need to learn more about this, but every profession in the world has training programmes to educate lawyers, doctors and other professional people on the moral hazards they will encounter in their career and how they should think about them. The General Medical Council website has a section on how to be a good doctor, and it sets out the principles. They are taught these things.
The problem we have in this House is that, culturally, we consider ourselves to be Members of a sovereign Parliament and to be beyond regulation and beyond question. Article 9 states that everything else is subsidiary to us. If anybody dares question us, well, we are elected, nobody dares gainsay us, and it is up to our voters. I am afraid no other profession in the country operates on that basis.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
My hon. Friend will know that the old military theorist Clausewitz said that war is the continuation of politics by other means. I have often turned that on its head: politics is war minus the shooting. There should be chivalry and absolute civility in the way we conduct ourselves. Although I agree with my hon. Friend, it is often missed that our profession is not like other professions. We are, in a sense, at war without weapons in here. We should remember that and make sure our code of conduct is appropriate to the task that faces us.
Sir Bernard Jenkin
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. The problem is that, when we sit in the Tea Room, we talk about rules; we do not talk about values and principles. People wonder what the rules mean and how to stay within them—“That is allowed, but this is not allowed.” We see it in financial regulation. When banks and financial services operate on the basis of what the rules are, they get around the rules. The rules are gamed, so they constantly have to adapt.
There is no discussion about whether something is a good and honourable thing to do, or whether it is something about which we should feel uncomfortable. The rules are meant to be a fallback. Actually, we should be talking to each other about why we are in politics, what our personal priorities are, what our personal morality is and how we navigate it.
I have very little time and there is much I could say, but I will not address all the proposals. Members complain about the code of conduct and about the commissioner, but this House voted for the code and the commissioner. This House is to blame for the system we have. If Members do not engage with the system at a moment like this, they have nobody to blame but themselves if they fall foul of it. To cry foul and say how it is all a fix and all a conspiracy does nobody any good.
On that point, because engagement tends to be low, the Committee will have to think much more about how we support those who are accused of falling foul of the code. I can think of cases—I will say no more than that—where if the individuals concerned had been taken aside by the right person and given the right advice, and if they had not run for their lawyers, got into a conflict with the commissioner and then questioned the whole system, their life would have turned out very different. Somehow, we need an independent system of support and advice—it cannot be the Whips—to make sure Members have the right advice.
On closing, I wish to draw attention to a particular piece of evidence that the Committee received. It has not had much attention, but I feel that it is by far the most useful thing that we have received. It is a response to our original issues and questions paper from Dr Claire Foster-Gilbert of the Westminster Abbey Institute. She was addressing the first question, “What values, attitudes and behaviours should the Code of Conduct for MPs seek to encourage or discourage?” She notes that the code reads as a document that first began as a response to financial misconduct. She said:
“It is cast as a regulatory instrument, which implies it is a set of rules which can be kept or broken.”
It is now a mixture of rules, guidance and principles. She points out that no one can perfectly embody those principles; that would be impossible. Let us take, for example, selflessness, to which the hon. Member for Rhondda referred. Nobody can be totally selfless, least of all in politics. Our efforts in that regard can never be completely successful. Dr Foster-Gilbert points out:
“For MPs, faced with difficult choices on a daily basis, the task is to learn how to retain their integrity and behave selflessly, even while making those choices”—
about power, about competition with others, and about competition of ideas.
I will wind up now, but I really recommend that people read this particular piece of evidence, because our next inquiry will be much more about training and promotion of the code. People bridle against training, but we need to engage people in the conversation about what the code is for much more than we do.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
It is a pleasure and an honour to speak after such experienced Members: the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin) and my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). I particularly thank my hon. Friend for the work he has done on chairing the Committee on Standards, and I thank the Members and his officers for this excellent report. I also thank my hon. Friend for the clarity and common sense that he has brought to the issue of standards in politics in numerous media interviews, as the issue of the conduct of MPs has had such prominence over the past few months. I do wonder, though, whether he has been taken off the Christmas card list of certain Government Ministers.
Anyone who saw the testimony of Ian Hislop at the Standards Committee last week would have seen at first-hand the labyrinthine nature of our existing transparency requirements, and how difficult they can be to navigate even for an experienced politics journalist let alone for members of the public. What is even more confusing is that there are standards that govern Members of this House, but not Government Ministers, and I shall pick up on that shortly.
I have stood, and been elected, in seven council elections and three parliamentary elections. At each point, when I was selected as a candidate by my party, and then on election, I had to sign up to agree to uphold the core standards expected of me by those who elected me. Eight years into my political career, in 1994, the Nolan principles of public life were established, codifying the essential behaviours expected of all in public life, and not only those elected to office. They gave us a clear set of defined principles; a defined code of conduct against which the conduct of anyone in public life can be measured and judged.
The Nolan principles were introduced at the height of sleaze—the cash-for-questions scandal, which had trapped an unpopular Prime Minister, who was facing revolt from his Back Benchers. That may sound familiar, but I have much greater faith in the integrity of John Major than I do in the current occupant of No.10. In fact, I very much doubt that the Prime Minister would be able to recite the Nolan principles, let alone stick to them.
This is about much more than our Prime Minister. The fish rots from the head and the disregard for ethics has spread across Government in the past few years. When the Prime Minister’s adviser on standards found that a member of the Government had broken the ministerial code, what did the Prime Minister do? He refused to act, whereas his predecessor, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), had, when she was Prime Minister, done the opposite and sacked the right hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel).
Over recent weeks and months, I have had an increasing number of emails from constituents who have told me that, for the first time in their life when they have travelled abroad or talked to friends and family abroad, people have lamented the decline in our political standards here in this Parliament, which is known across the world— perhaps incorrectly—as the mother of all Parliaments. Increasingly, scandal after scandal is weakening our reputation as a Parliament but also as a country across the world. Is that really global Britain in action? What we are experiencing now has happened in the past. Bad behaviour by a few politicians dragged us all down in the eyes of the public. How many doorsteps have we stood at where people say, “You’re all the same”? These scandals undermine us, undermine our Parliament and undermine our country.
The report has many excellent recommendations. I want to focus on the one raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda relating to gifts and hospitality, and the contradiction between the situation for Members—Opposition Members, Back Benchers and Committee Chairs—and that for Ministers. The Commissioner on Standards recommended that
“The Code should require Ministers who are also MPs to record in the Member’s Register the gifts, benefits and hospitality which they receive, including foreign visits, subject to the usual rules and thresholds.”
Take the hypothetical example of the gambling industry, which spends millions in engaging in lobbying all the time, including to oppose some often rather common sense reforms such as the limits on fixed odds betting terminals, which is the crack cocaine of gambling. If the gambling industry gave gifts or provided hospitality to a Back Bencher or Committee Chair, that Member would have to declare it within 28 days if it was worth more than £250, so tickets to the horseracing, with a hospitality box with food and drink, would have to be declared within 28 days. However, if the identical hospitality was provided to a Government Minister, who may well be making and signing off decisions about the gambling industry or horseracing, that gift would not have to be declared in the same way and at the same time. In the time between that and the Minister having to declare, they may push a Bill through Parliament, before the public know about the hospitality they had received.
In conclusion, MPs of all parties go into politics to make a difference, to be a voice for their constituents and to serve. I have worked across party lines on issues from the loan charge to cycling and walking, and I know that many Members across the House care deeply, but the failure to follow the rules and to clean up politics is corrosive. As the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) said, it is like battery acid sometimes. If we do not act and improve our standards, it will spread across all our politics and fuel cynicism and distrust about all of us in public life.
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)
I am not on the Committee. I have been on earlier renditions of it. It is interesting to watch developments and to read through the reports. I need to declare of course, in this debate of all debates, that I am a very, very, very part-time dentist.
The report is an interesting read. Mention has been made of Lord Nolan. If I can mention him again, he stated that the House of Commons must
“contain Members with a wide range of current experience which can contribute to its expertise.”
He also stated:
“A Parliament composed entirely of full-time professional politicians would not serve the best interests of democracy.”
If we are going to change the rules, we have to utilise that and move with it. The Chairman of the Committee, the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), suggested, and I agree with him, that setting an arbitrary limit and policing an MP’s hours on their outside interests, whatever they may be and whether paid or not, is ludicrous and probably impossible. Many outside interests that I think should be declarable are not declarable. Ultimately, the decision on the balance of time spent, as the Chairman said, must remain in the hands of the electorate and that is in the report. Fortunately, the code, and I suspect most of the House, recognises the need for certain professions, in particular medical professions. People need to practise to retain their licence. the House should look at the benefits that MPs’ outside interests bring to knowledge and expertise of our debates and actions.
That point draws me to the paragraph in the report which recommends
“tightening the lobbying rules so that a Member who has a live financial interest is prevented from both initiating or participating in proceedings or approaches to ministers or officials that would confer, or seek to confer a benefit”.
If that is imposed as worded, it will mean that an MP cannot lobby for a direct concern for their benefit, if that MP is receiving a renumeration for the concern. At first sight, that makes sense. It is covered to a fair degree by the rules on transparency. As has been mentioned, a recent incident was a classic example of this, but I hope that the Committee can look at another side, in that such a tightening would lose the House the benefit of Members’ expertise.
There is a plethora of examples. Active farmers, with their family farm, will discuss farming and environment issues—they could be the Chairman of a relevant Select Committee—and will have to raise issues and take part in debates, but that rule would stop it. A practising criminal barrister discussing legal changes in the criminal law is another example. In past years—the Chairman, the hon. Member for Rhondda, might remember this—the House had the benefit of the expertise, at some length, of Bob Marshall-Andrews on such issues. On mental health issues, which were touched on in the previous debate, would we not wish to hear from the practising psychiatrist among us? Of course we would, but he would be banned.
I turn to my own case. For years, I have been lobbying in debates, seeing Ministers and so on in campaigning for the HPV vaccine to be extended to young boys as well as young girls. The Government eventually were persuaded and, as a result, there will be a considerable reduction in head and neck cancer. I cannot conceive of how it would be of financial interest to me, but equally, from some of the letters I have had, I can conceive of attempts to construct such an issue.
I have been involved in the campaign for fluoridation of water supplies for many years. As I said, I am a practising dentist. I am a member of the British Fluoridation Society, I have met Ministers and officials and I have spoken in debates on the issues. In fact, when a previous Labour Government were passing a new water Bill, I was asked by the then Labour Minister to help her in the debate when a misguided Welsh nationalist tried to attach a new clause to the Bill that would, in effect, have made the fluoridation of water supplies illegal. Fluoridation is a preventive measure and, when widespread, would have an effect on day-to-day dental practice. From a financial view, it would perhaps be negative. We should be in a position to promote that, but if we go ahead with this measure, we may not be able to.
To touch on something that the Chairman of the Committee mentioned, I ask the Committee to look, even in a cursory manner, at other interests that perhaps should be declared, even though there is no obvious financial interest. For example, a number of us have dual nationality. I think we should declare that especially when the country from which we have come is included in debate. If it is New Zealand, I declare it. I do not need to—the moment I start speaking everybody knows. I had better make it clear at this point that the Tebbit rule does apply. When England play the All Blacks, I cheer for England, but I have already placed my money on the All Blacks.
Perhaps most importantly, I would like the Committee to consider whether Members can belong to campaigning organisations and speak or seek to influence Ministers without a declaration of their membership. I think that is wrong. Membership of CND when discussing nuclear issues or Campaign to Protect Rural England when discussing planning issues are two possible examples.
Finally, I ask the Committee, in considering the changes, not to tighten the bindings on MPs so as to stifle debate and stop us exercising the diverse knowledge that we all have. The key has to be transparency, not complexity.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
I place on record my thanks to the Chair of the Committee on Standards, the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), members of the Committee, some of whom are here today, and the House staff who support them, for their work on our code of conduct. Clearly, this has not been an insignificant task and they have more hours to come, as they sift through the responses to the consultation, which today’s debate forms part of. I noted the comments from the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin) about his desire to be on the Committee. It is worth noting that smaller parties such as mine do not have that privilege in terms of being on Committees. Today’s debate and other consultations are therefore our only way to engage.
My party and I support all moves to strengthen the standards that we follow in this House. Given the extent of the report, it would be impossible to speak on every finding and proposal. Without wishing to pre-empt the findings of the Committee’s consultation, I wish to speak on just one rule today, which relates to whether a Member can vote on a matter that directly concerns them as an individual. One of the most unedifying aspects of the events of 3 November and the vote on the Owen Paterson report was that he was able to vote against his own suspension from this House. The fact that he was able to do so shows a worrying gap in our rules, about which there was rightly a degree of public outcry.
As with much in this place, there is not a straightforward process to be followed. Paragraph 5.17 of “Erskine May” states that a Member’s vote can be disallowed when a Member has a
“direct, immediate and personal financial interest in a question”.
That clearly implies that it is improper for a Member to vote on a matter in which they have an intrinsic vested interest in the outcome. A Member’s own suspension is clearly a matter in which they have a direct interest. However, the phrasing of the guidance in “Erskine May” is about objecting to votes after the fact and requires another Member to table a motion immediately after that vote. That is clearly impractical, as it requires Members to have sight of where others are voting at the time of the Division and then to have a seat in the Chamber to move the motion.
I was also told anecdotally after the vote on 3 November and by the Procedure Committee in correspondence published on its website that there is a House convention that, although a Member may speak at the start of a debate on their suspension, they should then subsequently withdraw. The clear implication is that the Member would not return to vote in any relevant Division. There is no way, however, in which to enforce this convention. Conventions only last until someone chooses to breach them and the outcome, as always, is a reduced standard of conduct. I was reassured in my correspondence with the Procedure Committee and in my meeting with its Chair, the right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Karen Bradley), that the Committee saw the logic of putting the arrangement on to a firmer footing and the question is just, what is the best way of doing this: either an amendment of the Standing Orders or a change to the code of conduct.
The report of the Standards Committee, in all its 120-odd pages, does look at voting but focuses on whether Members should be able to vote where they have relevant financial interests. Although a suspension from the House would have a financial implication for a Member from a pay perspective, the discussion is focused on where Members have business interests or investments. The report is silent on the far more straightforward question of whether a Member should be able to vote on their own disciplinary proceedings. The convention says they should not and “Erskine May” says a vote could be disallowed, yet we saw this happen. I put it to the House that it is time for this very simple rule to be put on a formal basis and I hope that the Standards Committee will consider adopting the change in its final report.
Whether someone has been elected to this place in 2019, as I was, and as other Standards Committee members who are here today were, or in 1975, as the Father of the House, the hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) was—incidentally, he was one of the two Conservative MPs to support my Standing Order No. 24 application for an emergency debate on standards in November last year—each and every one of us should care about how we conduct ourselves in this place and the means by which we are held to account for that conduct. Our constituents expect it and they simply deserve nothing less.
Dame Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)
I pay tribute to the Standards Committee for a very interesting and incredibly useful report, and to the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) for his time yesterday; we were charging around the Lobby together trying to discuss this issue, which is close to my heart. He knows that in my opinion we need a much bigger review of standards in this place and I want to take a few brief moments to explain why. First and foremost, our constituents want to be able to hold us all to account. Secondly, we want to hold ourselves to account. Lots of colleagues from across the House have said, “We want to behave in a selfless way, with high levels of integrity. We want to be those honourable men and women that we are called to be as Members of Parliament.” We all know of colleagues who have been absolutely devastated—their mental health has been destroyed; they have felt bitterly ashamed; they have left this place under a cloud—because of things they have done. They were not doing those things deliberately or maliciously, but for whatever reason, they have not been up to the standard that this House requires, so it is right that those punishments take place.
For our constituents, too, it is absolutely vital that they understand what they can require their Member of Parliament to do. In these days of 24/7 social media, 24/7 news and theyworkforyou.com, with all of the accusations that are flying at us, all Members will agree: we get constituents saying, “I require you to vote this way”, and when we do not do so, they literally rant at us. We have constituents demanding that we take up their case when we are completely unable to do so because it is a matter for another constituency MP, and what those constituents will do—as this report clearly sets out—is go to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, saying, “This MP is a piece of rubbish. I want to complain about them.” What they get back from the PCS is, “I am very sorry. That is outside of my remit.” That undermines confidence and trust in Members of Parliament, and it is a classic example of how our constituents need to understand what they can expect of us.
What the Standards Committee seeks to do is uphold those principles and those rules, and to judge us against them. That is quite right and very worthy, but it is neither clear to our constituents what we should be doing—because there is no articulation anywhere of what the job of an MP is—nor whether we are here as their delegates or as their representatives. How many times have we heard people say, “I want you to vote this way”? My answer is, “I have 82,000 voters. They do not all agree with you. If you can get the other 81,999 to accept your view, I will vote in line with that absolute confirmation of how my constituents want me to vote.” There is a fundamental problem with how our constituents can hold us to account, and there is a lot more that we should be doing as a Parliament with things like theyworkforyou.com and lobby campaigns. Somebody will literally send me and all of us an email saying, “Dear (insert name of Member of Parliament here). Yours sincerely, (insert your name here).” I will reply to them courteously, and they will say, “Why have you written to me about this?” I have to prove to them that it is because they wrote to me in the first place, so there are some mad things going on, Madam Deputy Speaker—you are laughing because, of course, you get it too, Deputy Speaker or not. There are real problems.
The other key point I want to make is that in this House, we set up the independent complaints and grievance scheme. The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), who is in his place, was a part of it. It was entirely cross-party, it carried the support of this House, and what it was intended to do—rather than what the Standards Committee does, which is set out the principles and judge Members against them—was change the culture of this place. It was intended to make sure that people took on board a behaviour code that did not apply just to MPs, but to everybody who works here. There are 15,000 people who work here; there are only 650 MPs, and there are problems at every level in this place, as we saw only too well when the terrible #MeToo scandal hit Westminster. That is in large part down to the multiplicity of contracts and reporting lines that we have, and the HR processes that we do or do not have. The ICGS set out very clearly that, based on the evidence we took, 80% of the problems we were suffering in this House were workplace grievance issues. Yes, 20% were very serious bullying and sexual harassment issues, but nevertheless we have a culture issue, and the ICGS set out to change that.
It also set out, absolutely fundamentally, the need for proper induction courses for everybody who comes here, so that they know where the Table Office is and what it does; they know what sitting hours are and how to read an Order Paper; and, very importantly, they know what kind of behaviour they are expected to show to each other. Is it appropriate to go down to the bar with a junior member of staff and chat them up? As one Member has already said, issues such as those are taught in business environments: those things are made very clear, not just to MPs but to everybody who comes here, but it is not so at the moment in this place, even though the ICGS said it should be. The second point is about training as a sanction: rather than always reverting to an apology in this Chamber, which serves to devastate a Member of Parliament, or a sacking of a member of staff—which obviously devastates them—what is wrong with implementing the training that the ICGS envisaged? It is simply not happening.
The final point is about exit interviews. We know that there is huge turnover, and in some MPs’ offices there is very great turnover. We all know who they are, but why are their staff not undergoing exit interviews when they leave, so that measures can be put in place, not always to punish, humiliate and destroy people’s mental health, but to make things better, to make this a Parliament that everybody can be proud of? As Members we agonise about how we drag ourselves through the gutter all the time. None of us wants that to be the case. It is soul-destroying for all of us. In recent days we have heard some really good Members say, “I’ve had enough. I’m leaving this place.” A new colleague came to me and said, “I spent 25 years working in the public sector. I don’t want to risk being an MP for any longer, because if you make a mistake, your name and good reputation will be taken through the gutter and you’ll never live it down.”
It is slightly as if we have created a system of disaster, and our constituents cannot rely on it either. I would like to see a big review to address what an MP is there for. How are we actually helping MPs and those who work for us to do their job better, and what can we do to actually make people proud of their MPs and of their Parliament?
Mark Fletcher (Bolsover) (Con)
It is an honour to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Dame Andrea Leadsom), who spoke with clarity and purpose. I enjoyed her contribution.
I want to place on the record my thanks to the Chair of the Standards Committee, the Clerks and the lay and parliamentary members. I serve on the Committee, although I was absent from the recent oral evidence sessions and therefore apologise. My back was spasming in a way that meant that I could neither sit down nor walk, which was not helpful.
I was a little disappointed that the opening remarks did not give some context to this report, which is something we have to do on a regular basis and—given the nature of the 2015-17 and 2017-19 Parliaments—is an overdue piece of work. As we have heard from various contributors, the requirements are constantly shifting and evolving, meaning that when the Standards Committee is doing its very best to solve one problem, something else can appear. I listened mindfully to the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin) about the need to change culture as well as the rules and regulations. In terms of the level of interest, it is depressing, as he rightly pointed out, that there are so few participants present for a debate on an issue relevant to the governance of the whole House. I fear that the same is true of the consultation.
As the Chair of the Committee made clear, its members are not in unanimous agreement on many of the proposals. We agreed to put them forward, but it is important to note that our views differ. I have made my own written submission, so I will try to be as brief as possible in addressing the contents of the document.
On banning paid parliamentary advice, consultancy or strategy services, I think it is quite clear how we got there. The Chair of the Committee was quite kind in his comments about the reasonable definition provided by the 2018 report by the Committee on Standards in Public Life. I think that it is an entirely unworkable and deeply unhelpful suggestion. If the Leader of the House and the shadow Leader of the House will forgive me, I think that the Standards Committee has ended up in a slightly more sensible and workable position than any of the political parties have managed. That is to our credit.
I am disappointed that my hon. Friend the Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa) is not here, but I think he would have focused on the review of processes and roles, and on the need for natural justice and fairness. I am sure that all those words would have appeared in his contribution, and we have appointed a senior judicial figure to ensure that our process is as good as possible.
I agree with what the Chair of the Committee said about appeals in his opening remarks, but I also think it is important to the Committee, as much as to anybody else, that we be reassured that our processes are as fair as possible. One thing I have mentioned perhaps more often than anyone else in the Committee, is the need to ensure that investigations happen swiftly and end swiftly. There are numerous reasons why that has not always happened, and this is certainly not a dig at the commissioner for her work, because she has worked through some remarkably difficult circumstances and cases. However, we must bear in mind that when a Member of this House is under investigation, it places a great strain and burden on them, and it is unfair for that process to drag on for a long period of time. I look to the Leader of the House to say that we must ensure that any resources that are required to speed up that process should be prioritised, because it is important that the investigations happen swiftly.
I treat some of the proposals with a bit of caution: the main one has already been referred to by the Chair of the Committee, and it relates to matters in the Chamber being referred to the commissioner. That has been widely misunderstood to mean, “If you say something that is out of line, you can now be referred to the commissioner and she will slap you down.” That was absolutely not the Committee’s intention. There is a bit of wording in the report that, with the benefit of hindsight, I think we drafted poorly, but it is a matter of quite grave importance that staff members of this House are not necessarily entitled to have things referred to the ICGS or the commissioner if they happen during the proceedings of this House—in a Division, a Select Committee or elsewhere. When that proposal is explained, I think it will have widespread support, but it has been seen as an attack on freedom of speech when it is quite the opposite. I very much welcome the Chair’s comments on that front.
One other thing I want to mention is the feedback on written contracts. It has been pointed out to me that those who do public sector roles often sign a standard contract that has been agreed by trade unions. Therefore, getting a bespoke contract that would say that someone cannot lobby or be involved in certain activities might be difficult, and that is something the Committee did not necessarily consider.
There are two things I am against: first, the bespoke Nolan principles outlined in the report. As they are, the Nolan principles are widely understood, welcomed and easily applied. I think the suggestions that the Committee has put forward are too prescriptive and create an overlap between the rules and the principles that is unhelpful and creates some confusion. I also think they are a little bit pious. The Chair of the Committee looks shocked, but it is one of his favourite words.
Secondly, I disagree strongly with the proposal on the ministerial register of interests. Ministers operate in a separate role and under a separate code when they act in a ministerial capacity, and therefore the Committee is somewhat overreaching. From what I have seen on the Committee, that is not a particularly large problem, and it feels that we are straying into overreach. Other than that, I think this has been a very helpful debate.
Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)
As an aside, while I was preparing to write this speech, a former member of the Committee on Standards sent me a WhatsApp message. I had asked him for advice on whether I should join the Committee, and he said, “I’ve been on this Committee for a couple of years, haven’t seen much action, don’t anticipate that will change—don’t expect to be too busy, in fact you might want to think about joining another Committee too.” How wrong he was.
Standards in Parliament and the conduct of MPs seem to have rarely been out of the news over the past six months. I must say it is a tremendous shame that there are not more hon. Members present for this debate, because this is one of the most important issues that our constituents consider. There can be few more contentious votes in recent times, I am afraid, than the one relating to the former Member for North Shropshire.
The inquiry into the review of the code of conduct, which all hon. Members are expected to follow, is very timely and welcome. It is a 120-page report and I want to focus on just three or four things. First, however, I want to make a point I have made in other debates: we should look at every opportunity to simplify the rules. I mentioned in a previous debate that I get confused as a member of the Standards Committee, and I think my local newspaper ran a headline saying the standards rules were confused and “complicated”. I say this because there are 12 or 13 different codes and sets of guidance that MPs are required to follow, all in different places and most of them adjudicated by different people, and it is very difficult, particularly for new Members of Parliament, to know exactly where to go to get the right information so that they do not make mistakes. That was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin), and training and guidance at all stages of our experience in Parliament and reminders of the sort of things that are expected from a Member of Parliament are very important.
On second jobs—although for some Members it is about not just second jobs, but third or fourth jobs as well—the Committee heard from a number of witnesses and the conclusion I think almost everybody reached after hearing from them is that this is not a simple issue to resolve. Perhaps the most compelling evidence for that view was received from the hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon), who has a private Member’s Bill to ban second jobs. That convinced me that there was absolutely no simple answer. Frankly, it would carve out lots of exceptions to allow people to do all kinds of second jobs, therefore not banning second jobs. We need to think very carefully before legislating, and my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) made the point that we are enriched by having professionals from different disciplines in the House who can contribute to debates.
When I was first elected two years ago, I quickly realised that I did not have time to hold down a second job. My family would not have seen me if I had tried to take on another job in addition to being the Member of Parliament for a very busy constituency, but I do understand that some MPs have time to do other things. Indeed, in some cases they need to do other things to maintain professional qualifications—doctors or accountants, for example—and we should recognise that that is a good thing. However, I equally think that anybody who is recruited on to a board because of their experience here needs to ask why they are being recruited. That is exactly the same as people offering that input into here and Members being required to put input into commercial businesses. We should think very carefully about whether we should require Members of Parliament to hold contracts with such organisations. I think that what is expected of Members of Parliament should be set out so that there is proper transparency.
However, I agree that the electorate are the ultimate decision maker in terms of the work undertaken by MPs. If they believe that their representative focuses more on outside interests than standing up for constituents, they should use the ballot box to make changes when the opportunities arise.
I want to talk briefly about a couple of other points. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher) mentioned the respect principles to accompany the Nolan principles. Everyone in public life is expected to follow the guidelines set out by the Committee on Standards in Public Life and I do not think that a new principle needs to be added there. I agree with the intention, but I think the sentiments are met elsewhere within the seven principles, so doing that could add confusion.
The hon. Member for North East Fife mentioned conventions and I think there is a convention that colleagues on the Standards Committee do not talk to the press about issues in relation to the Committee. We perhaps need a bit more guidance on that. It is important that every member of the Committee acts impartially and without political notions, and I try to hold to that. Making comments to the media about MP colleagues and then finding that colleague in front of the Committee is at some point going to cause problems for the Committee.
I believe that all Members of Parliament recognise that it is a privilege to sit in this House of Commons, and with that privilege comes a set of responsibilities and expectations. Members of the public rightly expect high standards of integrity and behaviour from those they elect to govern.
Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to speak in this important debate, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) on the way he introduced it and on the body of work that he and his Committee have done. It is a fantastic document and a very useful signpost to the type of work we need to do to improve our code of conduct across the House. Our standards and code of conduct are our rules; they are in effect an interface with the electorate we serve. That is how people understand our work; they are the rules that electors appreciate and respect about how we do our work. It is imperative that, when we look at the rules, we manage to take into account what the electors expect of us as Members of Parliament.
The hon. Member for Rhondda was right that our code of conduct and standards have never been so much in the heat of public light and open to such inspection and even controversy. I congratulate the Committee on dealing with the issue in the heat that has been turned on it just now. I suppose we know exactly the moment, day and time when all this changed dramatically. It was about 2 o’clock on Wednesday 3 November when the Leader of the House got to his feet to approve the third report of the Committee on Standards. Of course, he had no intention of approving that particular report. In fact, he did most everything he could to undermine and neuter what was included in the report. We heard things like, “It was an unfair process.” He referred to the lack of examination of witnesses, the lack of an investigatory panel, the length of time taken and, critically, the absence of a right of appeal. It was the first time in history—certainly the first time in my 21 years in this House—that the Government had in effect attempted to overturn a recommendation of the Standards Committee.
More than that, the Leader of House supported an amendment that would have established a Select Committee to revise and review our Standing Orders, undermining and potentially wrecking the very essence of the Standards Committee and its work. This Committee would have had a Government Chair with a Government majority. To call it a kangaroo court would be a massive disrespect to Skippy the bush kangaroo and all his antipodean colleagues. It was a bizarre and clumsy attempt to get Owen Paterson off the hook and, even worse, in the days that followed there were sustained and appalling attacks on the Commissioner for Standards herself. The public hated it and they were appalled at what was going on in this House. It was no wonder that two days later the Leader of the House came scurrying back to the House to have the proposal reviewed and overturned.
What the Leader of the House did that day was to open a Pandora’s box of sleaze, corruption and double standards. It was just sitting there undisturbed since the 1990s and the days of “Back to my place” and cash for questions. The Government should have known not to tamper with it because this box was marked with a skull and crossbones with the very clear message, “Under no circumstances open”. But not only did they open it they took a crowbar to it, and out it all came in a spewing noxious torrent—the whole slurry of cash for access, paid advocacy, cash for honours, cash for questions, second jobs and PPE contracts for their pals. As they tried to put the lid back on, it erupted again, but this time it was like the ark in Indiana Jones when the contents ascended in a hellish mass obliterating everyone in its wake. Parties at No.10, cakes at No.10, do as I say, not as I do, DJs in the basement, birthday cakes, wine and cheese, police investigations, civil servants, and now we even discover that the Prime Minister’s chief of policy has just resigned because of the awful comment about Jimmy Savile that was made by the Prime Minister himself. How the Leader of the House must wish that he had a time machine to go back to that hour and minute on 3 November and that his plan with the Chief Whip to save their pal had been overturned.
The Standards Committee has had to pick this up. It has done well. I do not have time to go over all the details, but I want to pick up on a couple of points that the hon. Member for Rhondda highlighted. The first is the proposal on appeals. The hon. Gentleman has given us a number of options. I exhort him to stick to the status quo. It is right that the commissioner investigates and the Committee considers. That has been the principle at the heart of this, and I urge him to continue with it. I do not think we should reward the Government for what they tried to do by having any sort of look at appeals, and I hope the hon. Gentleman sticks to that.
I support the Committee in its option on second jobs. I would prefer to see a written contract for a second job, but I can live with the proposal that a contract detailing duties and an undertaking that these duties cannot include lobbying Ministers is right. The main thing that irks, frustrates and consumes our constituents like nothing else is the veracity of the things that are said in this House. This is now the new frontline in our standards, and it has to be addressed. Members of the public now believe that a Minister or Member of Parliament can say anything in this House, regardless of its relationship to fact and actuality—
Pete Wishart
I do not have time to give way to the hon. Gentleman, as I have to leave time for the Front Benchers.
I know that this is precarious territory, and the hon. Member for Rhondda has outlined a number of the difficulties, but this is something that we have to resolve. We cannot have a situation where Ministers can say practically anything and expect to be believed but if anyone challenges it, they end up with the prospect of being flung out of the House. That cannot go on. I want to end by congratulating the Committee. This is a great report and we have a good basis for going forward. I hope that this debate has helped the hon. Gentleman in forming his view when considering the final report.
Thangam Debbonaire (Bristol West) (Lab)
This has been an excellent debate, and I find myself observing that every speaker has brought some light to it. Even if I have not agreed with every word, I have appreciated the spirit in which it has been conducted. It is always a great pleasure to take part in any debate introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). As well as demonstrating his intelligence and his ability to get to the nub of an argument, he is also incredibly poetic as he speaks. It has been a great pleasure to take part in the debate, and I congratulate him and all the Committee members—it is great to see so many here—on their very hard work on something that matters so much.
Virtually everyone here seems to agree that standards matter. They are a fundamental cornerstone of our democracy. We may disagree about the wording, and we may debate these issues, but I echo what the hon. Member for Harwich and North Essex (Sir Bernard Jenkin) said about needing more of us in here debating them. It matters so much that many Members seem to get engaged in the process only when they fall foul of it, but standards really do matter and they should be something that we aspire to. It has been a long review, with the Committee looking at the code twice.
Sir Bernard Jenkin
Given that it is just a fact that people do not come to debates such as these, what is the alternative? Do we need to have a proactive engagement policy, rather like the way we introduce new Members to the House now?
Thangam Debbonaire
The Committee has made recommendations about more engagement and more training, and we are going to have to work really hard at that. It behoves all of us here today who clearly do believe in the system to also be the ambassadors for the system. We have to be the ambassadors for it in all its glory.
Others have spoken about the backdrop to the debate and about what happened with the former Member for North Shropshire, so I have cut all that from my speech. I just want to highlight a couple of key points. I have written to the Committee in full with a response to all its recommendations. That is winging its way to my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda and his Committee even as we speak. There are so many recommendations that I strongly support, including those on clarity, on training, on finding more ways to engage colleagues and on ensuring that the independence of the Standards Commissioner and the Standards Committee is maintained. This will help to restore and buttress trust in our Parliament, which is so important.
A key recommendation is that there should be an outright ban on second jobs as parliamentary advisers. That is Labour policy and I definitely agree that there should be an outright ban on any Member acting as a paid parliamentary adviser, consultant or strategist— whatever we call it. This has been a recommendation since 2018 from the Committee on Standards in Public Life. It is long overdue, and I strongly support it. Similarly, there is a recommendation for a contract for outside work with explicit statements. I take the point made by the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mark Fletcher) about the difficulty with contracts, but I still think that it is a difficulty we should push through with. This would help to dispel the misconception that MPs are for hire in any way. It is our constituents we are here to serve, not outside interests, so I strongly support that recommendation.
Thangam Debbonaire
I am not going to take the hon. Gentleman’s intervention, because I feel that I should honour Madam Deputy Speaker’s stricture.
The recommendation to clarify the criteria for serious wrong exemption in the lobbying rules would help to make clearer what constitutes a conflict of interest. In the case I have referred to, the Committee said that that exemption should be treated as a narrow exemption, not a wide loophole. I of course support the recommendation that there should be clarification.
We need to ensure that there is consistency when it comes to standards for MPs and Government Ministers. I therefore strongly support the recommendation, detailed by my hon. Friend, about ensuring that ministerial gifts and benefits can be found in the same place as information about MPs. I also support the recommendation about transparency and ease of use of the website. My goodness, it is sometimes hard to find even one’s own details in full.
I feel that any strengthening of the system—I know that this is outwith the scope of the report—should be accompanied by a strengthening of the ministerial code. The last Labour Government legislated to clean up politics after the sleaze of the 1990s, with various significant measures relating to, for instance, freedom of information, the ministerial code itself, and public registers. We have put forward a plan that the next Labour Government would introduce to strengthen the system, but of course we cannot wait a day longer to protect and strengthen our standards systems. I urge all Members who have not yet read the report to read it in detail. In fact, we could have a quiz—a party game. Who knows what paragraph 174 says? I do. We could also encourage our colleagues to respond to the request for consultation—I think we have another week or so to go.
I hope that the Government have learnt from the fiasco that surrounded the former Member of Parliament for North Shropshire, and I hope that all of us can get behind a new, invigorated system of standards. Wherever we end up, we have to salute and support it, because it says so much about our democracy that we have these standards and pride ourselves on trying to live up to them.
The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg)
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and the Committee on Standards for their assiduous work in conducting a review of the Members’ code of conduct. I am pleased to participate in today’s debate, and I agree with the shadow Leader of the House, the hon. Member for Bristol West (Thangam Debbonaire), that it has been of very high quality, featuring many important contributions from across the House. I hope that it will be viewed as part of the evidence collected through the consultation process.
The hon. Member for Rhondda gave a good account of the complex issues that the Committee has had cause to consider in its review. The code of conduct for MPs rightly remains a matter for Parliament and, as we have said before, it is for the House of Commons to take forward any work on these issues on a cross-party basis. The Government will provide a response in due course on matters relating to the Executive and wider Government policy, but in the meantime I should like to make the following points.
The Government believe that, as public office holders, Members of Parliament have a duty to act in accordance with the seven principles of public life. These ethical principles form the foundation of the members’ code of conduct, and their value lies in the fact that they are applied consistently and commonly to all holders of public office, including Ministers. It is the fact that they are applied universally that gives these principles strength and meaning. I believe that we should maintain a consistent set of principles rather than tinkering with these commonly understood standards.
The Committee has also recommended that an additional principle of “respect” be added to the code of conduct. It is my view that adjustments of this kind, which would undermine the universality of the principles of public life, are undesirable. As drafted, the parliamentary behaviour code strikes the right balance between ensuring that all members of the parliamentary community and visitors to this place are treated with “dignity, courtesy and respect”, and ensuring that different views can be freely exchanged in debate, and Members can fulfil their constitutional duty of representing their constituents.
As for the scope of the code and the potential for consideration of public complaints about the use of social media by Members, the Government believe that in the course of debate, whether online or in person, the views of all participants can be freely expressed and treated with tolerance. It is important to distinguish between strongly felt political debate on the one hand, and unlawful acts of abuse, intimidation and violence that seek to suppress free speech on the other.
We therefore do not support further strictures in this regard within the code. Such changes would risk undermining the fundamental principles of our constitution, or unduly limit the ability of Members to express their views. However, I would note that there is also a role for political parties in this area. The Government response to the report from the Committee on Standards in Public Life on tackling intimidation in public life asserted that each political party should put in place its own individual, tailored code of conduct, which should set out the standards of behaviour expected of its members and representatives. All the political parties represented in the House of Commons now have their own codes of conduct.
The Standards Committee has also looked at the existing rules on the registration and declaration of interests to ensure that they are clear and up to date. The Government see merit in several of those proposals, but at this stage I simply observe that the rules regulating the interests of Members and Ministers are necessarily distinct. The separation of powers is a fundamental constitutional principle and it remains the Government’s view that benefits received by Ministers in their ministerial capacity should not form part of the Members’ register.
I will give an example. In the unlikely event that I were made Minister for Sport—it is unlikely because this speech has been cleared by Downing Street, which did not question the thought that it was—I would see it as a great privilege to go to a test match at Lord’s. I would also receive many other invitations, however, and I am afraid to say that it would be more of a duty to go to the FA cup final, even though many other Members may think that a great privilege. So what Ministers do may be duty rather than pleasure, whereas Members do not have to accept invitations in that sphere, or certainly not normally.
Chris Bryant
I sort of understand the point that the Leader of the House is making, but why should the public not just know? Why should the public have to know about an ordinary MP going to the football or the cricket or whatever, and know the details of them receiving hospitality worth more than £300 within 28 days, but when it is a Minister, they do not have to know for months and months, and in some cases they never get to know the details at all?
Mr Rees-Mogg
The speed of registration is a very fair point, but it is a governmental rather than a parliamentary matter. In terms of the actual declaration, it could give a misleading impression that a Minister, particularly one in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, was attending a constant round of entertainments that were, in fact, entirely in the course of their public duties. That would be very different from a Member of Parliament who had no obligation and was purely attending, if at the same events, for his or her own pleasure.
Sir Bernard Jenkin
The Leader of the House has not been in opposition, but if he was the Opposition spokesman, he would have the same obligation to attend the same event, but would be subject to the House of Commons rules rather than the ministerial ones. What is the difference?
Mr Rees-Mogg
Being in opposition is different from being in government. We have a separation between Ministers and Parliament. The separation of powers is an important constitutional principle.
I will move on to the question of the work undertaken by MPs outside Parliament and how that could, or should, be limited. The Government value the work of the Standards Committee and the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards in applying the conduct rules that the House has endorsed. That is why we support the work being undertaken to
“introduce robust new measures to empower the standards system in Parliament”.
It is evident that, further to the 17 November resolution of the House, there is cross-party support for reforms of the rules on outside interests.
The Government remain firmly of the view that, as the Committee on Standards in Public Life recommended in 2018, Members should be banned from accepting any paid work to provide services as a parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant. There seems to be widespread consensus on that point. The Committee has collected a wide range of evidence from expert witnesses, including the Committee on Standards in Public Life, to consider how reasonable limits on outside work could be defined. As we have discovered during this debate, that is a knotty question without a simple or straightforward answer.
It is apparent that successive generations of parliament-arians have obtained relevant experience through outside work. It is also clear that several parliamentarians continue to use that expertise to make valuable contributions to other areas of public life. First and foremost, however, we are here to represent our constituents and any work outside this place must not come at the expense of their interests. It is sensible that our rules reflect that Members must always prioritise their parliamentary work and serve the electorate who returned them to this place and who will, of course, judge them.
The existing rules require Members to declare their outside interests and positions, but do not explicitly prevent the holding of certain positions, notwithstanding the proposed limits on accepting any paid work to provide services as a parliamentary strategist, adviser or consultant. To go beyond MPs’ central practice of declaration and instead place limits on Members undertaking a much broader range of activity through the application of hard thresholds of time or money would represent a substantive change to the definition of an MP’s role.
As such, there is a question as to whether it would be constitutional to make such adjustments through the Members’ code, or whether legislation would be required. It would arguably be a change to the conditions of membership of this House of similar significance to the provisions set out in the House of Commons Disqualification Act 1975, which provides that those who hold certain offices cannot be Members of this House.
More widely, in order for the standards system to operate effectively, it is essential that it is both robust and fair and also compatible with the constitutional principles that have ensured that this place works at its best. Parliament sits at the heart of our constitutional arrangements and it is of utmost importance that Members are able to participate without artificial impediments in debates on contentious issues that are of great import to the electorate. The compatibility of the standards system with the core principles and concepts of fairness and natural justice needs to be considered with care, so I welcome the appointment of the right hon. Sir Ernest Ryder to conduct a review of fairness and natural justice in the standards system.
Throughout the debate, right hon. and hon. Members made a number of interesting and important speeches, which I am confident the Standards Committee will consider carefully. It is through a shared understanding of the constitutional framework in which we operate, as well as formal rules, that we will ensure that our standards system commands the confidence both of the public and of Members on a cross-party basis. I therefore hope that when the Committee publishes its final proposals, they will form the basis for further discussion and final conclusions.
Chris Bryant
I am grateful to all those who contributed to the debate and look forward to seeing the Government’s written submission when it comes. Of course, I hope the Leader of the House will come to give evidence to the Committee as well. We are interested in hearing from slightly more Members than were able to attend this afternoon, although I understand that lots of Members have constituency responsibilities and need to get to their constituencies, some of which, like mine, are even further away than Somerset.
It seems to me that we need to work through a few issues, one of which is whether we have specific descriptors for the Nolan principles. The Committee on Standards in Public Life—which, of course, originally came up with the Nolan principles—has advocated that, reviewed our version and was supportive of it. We also need to look at the question of respect, or respectfulness, and how that plays out. I have listened to lots of Members on that.
There may be a knotty problem that we still need to resolve in respect of whether Ministers should be treated differently. I remember the Leader of the House coming to our Committee and saying that he did not really believe that the separation of powers was an important principle, but I noticed that today he said it is—we sometimes choose our arguments according to the day of the week. My important principle is that all MPs should be treated fairly and equally under the rules. It would be for the benefit of most Ministers if all Members were treated exactly the same and had to declare everything in the same way.
It would be in the interests of the public if the House was able to make our current register much more readable and accessible. It is strange that we have to go to TheyWorkForYou to find out the history of our register of interests. We cannot go through the parliamentary system without looking at 20 different documents. If someone wants to look at ministerial registers, they have to look, every year, at 122 online documents. I just do not think that, in the end, that does us any favours as a House.
I repeat the point that I made earlier about the issue of telling the truth and lying. The Leader of the House used precisely the right word: it is a knotty one. Like many of the issues we on the Committee face, these issues are not susceptible to very simple answers. I get very cross and abandon my piety when people try to present—[Interruption.] Yes, I have often abandoned my piety; that is a good point. I get cross when people try to pretend that some of these issues are clear cut; they are not.
Finally, the House has heard from three other Committee members, and we work hard on all these issues, but the lay members bring to the Committee a fascinating outside look. Many of them are from professional backgrounds of which we know nothing and that makes for a much more effective Committee, so I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Dame Andrea Leadsom), who set it up in that way.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the Committee on Standards’ Review of the Code of Conduct for Members of Parliament.
Sir Bernard Jenkin
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Is there a means by which you could draw to the attention of the SNP spokesman, the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart), that Mr Speaker made a statement in which he explained
“there are means by which accusations of lying may be brought before the House”?—[Official Report, 2 February 2022; Vol. 708, c. 266.]
I do not think the SNP spokesman has read that statement or understood it.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that point of order. He has rather achieved what he set out to achieve, and he has continued the debate.
Wendy Chamberlain
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. On 31 January, during the Sue Gray update statement, the Prime Minister said the Government
“have been cutting crime by 14%”.—[Official Report, 31 January 2022; Vol. 708, c. 24.]
I understand the Prime Minister took that information from a Home Office news release, which in two places presented the statistics to give a positive picture of trends in crime in England and Wales based on a fall in total crime, excluding fraud and computer misuse, of 17%.
In a letter sent to my right hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael), the UK Statistics Authority confirmed that, if fraud and computer misuse are counted, as they should be, total crime in fact increased by 14% between the year ending September 2019 and the year ending September 2021.
I seek your guidance on how we can get clarity on those remarks from both the Prime Minister and the Home Office.
Madam Deputy Speaker
I thank the hon. Lady for her point of order. Although the Chair is not responsible for the content of contributions made by Ministers, I am sure the concern has been heard on the Treasury Bench. If an error has been made in this instance, I am sure a Minister will seek to correct it as quickly as possible.
Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)
Further to that point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. There is a great deal of interest in statistics. I cannot remember whether the Chancellor or the Cabinet Office is responsible for the Office for National Statistics, but perhaps we could have a Question Time on statistics so that we can bandy around our favourite ones and have them answered by Ministers.
Madam Deputy Speaker
I thank the Father of the House for that point of order. Luckily, the Leader of the House is sitting in front of him, and I am sure he will have heard his interesting request.
Kazakhstan: Anti-corruption Sanctions
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Dame Margaret Hodge (Barking) (Lab)
I thank Mr Speaker for granting this debate and the Minister for joining us. I also thank a host of civil society experts who have helped me—too many to name—but I give special thanks to Professor John Heathershaw of Exeter University, Adam Hug of the Foreign Policy Centre and Sue Hawley of Spotlight on Corruption.
Earlier this week, the Foreign Secretary announced welcome moves to toughen up the sanctions regime against Russia, but we should not be waiting for a potential military crisis before we act against illicit finance at home and corruption overseas. We should act and use the powers we have now.
Today, I want to shine a light on foreign corruption in another state, not simply because that is important in itself, but because I want to highlight the UK’s role in facilitating shameful wrongdoing. Put simply, Britain enables kleptocracy. My ask of the Government is twofold. First, they should act proactively by sanctioning wrongdoers in Kazakhstan. Secondly, now that they have committed to tabling an economic crime Bill in the next Session, they must ensure the Bill’s provisions are fit for purpose, tough, effective and appropriate so that Britain can show by what we do that we are seriously committed to fighting the scourge of dirty money.
It is 30 years since Kazakhstan, a multi-ethnic, resource-rich central Asian state, emerged from the disintegration of the Soviet Union. In those years, Kazakhstan has, by some indicators, been a success. Its GDP growth has outstripped that of many of its neighbours, including Russia. Living standards are higher and until the 2010s Kazakhstan appeared to enjoy political stability.
But there is another side to the Kazakhstan story. The country is ruled by a kleptocratic elite that has grown rich off the back of money stolen from its people. Until 2019, its autocratic dictator was Nursultan Nazarbayev. In Kazakhstan, just 162 people own 55% of the wealth—mostly members of Nazarbayev’s family or close associates. The country has a poor human rights record and little media freedom.
As early as 2006, Jonathan Winer, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Law Enforcement in the Clinton Administration, said:
“I can’t think of a leader in the free world as notoriously corrupt as Nazarbayev… We’ve know about his corruption for at least 15 years”.
Yet in Britain, we turned a blind eye, ignored the corruption and helped the Kazakh regime launder and spend its dirty money.
Three examples confirm my view. Between 2008 and 2015, we issued 205 Kazakh kleptocrats with golden visas to settle with their dirty money in the UK, which was the fifth most common country for users of the Tier 1 Investor scheme. A recent Chatham House report reveals that the Kazakh elite owns over half a billion pounds of property in the UK. Around £330 million of that belongs to Nazarbayev’s extended family, including Sunninghill Park, allegedly bought by Nazarbayev’s son-in-law for £15 million—£3 million over the asking price. The Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project has revealed how Nazarbayev secretly controls four charitable foundations with at least $7.8 billion-worth of assets, invested in everything from hotels to banks. This global fortune is part-owned through a UK listed holding company set up in 2020—Jusan Technologies.
We have opened our borders, our property market and our financial structures to the Kazakh ruling class, enabling them to launder their illicit wealth and spend it. Worse, we do not even enforce our existing laws against any of this wrongdoing.
Why does this matter now? Because the fault lines of the corrupt Kazakh political elite have exploded. Protests, initially triggered by the soaring costs of liquidised petroleum gas, quickly developed into a national movement against the governing regime. The response from the new President, Tokayev, allegedly handpicked for the job by Nazarbayev, was initially to distance himself from the old regime. He then requested support from Russia, which sent in troops. Finally, on 7 January, he deployed the military against the protesters, with a “shoot to kill without warning” order. Protesters, most of whom were peaceful citizens, were gunned down without so much as a warning shot. According to some experts, this shocking, violent suppression has left 225 dead, 4,500 injured and 10,000 arrested.
That terrible loss of life in Kazakhstan should lead to a moment of reflection for us in Britain. We are complicit in what is happening in Kazakhstan. Our lack of transparency over foreign property ownership, our lax regulatory regime and our weak enforcement agencies have all aided and abetted the Kazakh elite.
Yet it is not too late for us to act. The Government have put in place a new regime of anti-corruption sanctions to complement our Magnitsky sanctions. They allow us to designate foreign, corrupt actors, freeze their UK assets, stop them entering Britain and limit their access to our financial or legal enablers. Sanctions are powerful tools, but, Minister, they must be used. That is why the Government should impose sanctions on the Kazakh oligarchs, who have systematically robbed their people to line their own pockets. The recent violence demonstrates the true cost of kleptocracy. It is surely up to us, in the UK, the jurisdiction that has done so much to facilitate corruption in Kazakhstan, to act and hold these individuals to account.
Our all-party group on anti-corruption and responsible tax is co-operating with representatives from legislatures in Europe and America. We have formed the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance against Kleptocracy, and together we are urging Governments in the UK, the US and the EU to issue sanctions against the kleptocrats of Kazakhstan. Today, I am calling for action from the UK to designate anti-corruption sanctions against the following individuals, whom I shall name, all of whom are allegedly involved in asset seizure and bribery. The details I will provide are limited because of time, but every story is shocking.
There is Timur Kulibayev, his wife Dinаra Nazarbayeva —the daughter of Nazarbayev—and their associate Arvind Tiku. Evidence suggests that Kulibayev abused his position to accrue vast wealth. In 2020, the Financial Times showed that Kulibayev benefited from a secret scheme to divert profits from big state pipeline contracts. He has faced money laundering and bribery investigations in other jurisdictions. His worth, according to Forbes, is $2.9 billion, and he owns at least £60 million of real estate here in the UK.
There is Dariga Nazarbayeva and her rumoured husband Kairat Sharipbayev. Dariga is Nazarbayev’s eldest daughter. Her empire, estimated by Forbes at $595 million, is hidden in an incredibly complex system of offshore companies, foundations and trusts. Three of her London properties were subject to a failed unexplained wealth order, but investigators at Source Material allege that Nazarbayeva may have misled the UK High Court. Meanwhile, Sharipbayev is allegedly one of the beneficiaries of a $334 million fraud at Kazakh bank Bank RBK, which has been labelled
“the bank of the Nazarbayev family”.
There is Nurali Aliyev, son of Dariga and grandson of the former ruler. Aliyev was appointed deputy chairman of a private Kazakh bank called Nurbank—after the grandfather—at the age of 21, and chairman at 22. UK court documents show he received a $65 million loan from a bank in 2008, through a company which then made a further loan. According to Nurali’s lawyers, he used some of those funds to purchase a £39.5 million house in Bishops Avenue.
There is Karim Massimov, and his associate Aigul Nuriyeva. Massimov is a former Prime Minister of Kazakhstan who has been subject to bribery allegations, including from UK listed companies, as reported in the FT. He was also implicated in allegations of bribery by Airbus for the purchase of 45 helicopters. Nuriyeva is a Kazakh banker and alleged proxy for Massimov, who is himself implicated in major bribery scandals totalling $64 million with the Swedish telecoms company Teli.
Vladimir Kim is Kazakhstan’s richest man, worth some $4.3 billion. He chaired Kazakhmys plc, the first Kazakh company to list on the London Stock Exchange. A Global Witness report claimed that Kim acted as a proxy owner, and that Nazarbayev actually controlled the company. In 2017, Kim’s daughter Kamila, then 18, bought three flats worth $60 million in Knightsbridge. His associate, Eduard Ogay, is co-owner of Kazakhmys—sorry if I am pronouncing these names wrongly—and is alleged to have given bribes to the country’s Prime Minister.
Kenes Rakishev is a mysteriously wealthy Kazakh businessman worth up to $1.6 billion, with close ties to the political elite, and a close associate of the head of the Chechen Republic, who has been sanctioned by the US.
Sauat Mynbayev was Minister for energy and mineral resources, yet he secretly co-owned a Bermuda-based company worth $3 billion, which won public contracts in Kazakhstan despite the obvious conflicts of interest with his ministerial role. His wife and son own property in the UK.
Alexander Mashkevich, Patokh Chodiev and an associate who died were known as the “Trio”, renowned for their ownership of Eurasian Natural Resources Corporation, a Kazakh-based mining company also listed on the London Stock Exchange. In 2013, the Serious Fraud Office launched a criminal investigation into the company, following allegations of bribery to African political figures.
Bulat Utemuratov is a former chief of staff to Nazarbayev. A US diplomatic cable reported allegations that Utemuratov was the President’s “personal financial manager” and his own website assesses his personal wealth at $3.9 billion.
Bolat Nazarbayev is Nursultan Nazarbayev’s very wealthy brother. In 2008, he purchased a £20 million apartment in Manhattan’s ultra-exclusive Plaza Hotel. He is accused of involvement in armed groups that helped to spark the January violence.
Akhmetzhan Yesimov, chairman of the sovereign wealth fund, allegedly abused his position to give his former son-in-law, Galimzhan Yessenov, related party loans through secretive British Virgin Islands companies to buy a UK entity called Kazphosphate. Yessenov is now one of Kazakhstan’s richest men.
Kairat Boranbayev’s daughter married Nazarbayev’s grandson—it is all in the family. He held a number of positions, including one involved in the notoriously corrupt transit of gas from Turkmenistan. He owns a £25.4 million mansion in an exclusive gated community in Virginia Water, a £60 million flat in One Hyde Park, and three luxury apartments, worth more than £15 million, in Knightsbridge.
Then there is Alexander Klebanov and his son Yakov. Alexander has an estimated wealth of $374 million and chairs the Central Asian Electric Power Corporation. The two act as financial proxies for the former president’s family, and are thought to have helped Dariga Nazarbayeva to avoid the unexplained wealth order.
Nurlan Nigmatulin, Baurzhan Baibek and Marat Beketayev are senior figures in the ruling Nur Otan party and are close associates of Nazarbayev. They are embedded in supporting corruption and allegedly responsible for human rights abuses.
A UK High Court has highlighted how Aliya Nazarbayeva, Nazarbayev’s youngest daughter, moved over $300 million out of the country through complex offshore structures, including in the BVI. Aidan Karibzhanov is accused by his former wife of having profited from his position as a banker by selling the Kazakhstan national telecoms company and, I quote,
“privatization of public assets resulting in huge profits to politically connected insiders at the expense of the state”.
Kairat Satybaldy and Samat Abish are Nazarbayev’s nephews, enjoying significant wealth through offshore structures. Both are key players in Nazarbayev’s inner circle, involved in the current power struggle that is undermining peace and security.
I have named those people. Imposing sanctions on this corrupt elite will not of itself root out evil practices or lead to a radical democratic transformation in Kazakhstan, but it will demonstrate that we mean what we say when we commit to fighting dirty money and corruption. The cost of inaction is high. The reputation of London and our financial services sector is already sullied, with the UK seen as the jurisdiction of choice for dirty money. With swift action, we can begin to restore the idea of a good global Britain and demonstrate to our allies that we will not provide a safe haven for kleptocrats or oligarchs.
I ask the Minister whether he will consider the individuals I have named and impose sanctions on those who have stolen from their country, laundered their money here, used UK structures to hide their ill-gotten gains, used the golden visa route to gain entry to the UK or committed human rights abuses. Will he act now? Only by strengthening transparency, legislating for tougher regulations and ensuring consistent, strong enforcement will we be able to hold our heads up high again as a trusted jurisdiction that lives by the highest standards. We must finally turn the warm words of successive Governments into firm actions in the promised economic crime Bill. Will the Minister confirm that the Bill will be considered this year? If the Government fail yet again on these two fronts, the only ones who will be delighted are people such as the criminal kleptocrats from Kazakhstan who will be laughing all the way to the bank.
The Minister for the Middle East, North Africa and North America (James Cleverly)
I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) for securing the debate and I pay tribute to the work that she has done on these complex issues both in her former role as a Select Committee Chair and as chair of the all-party group on anti-corruption and responsible tax. As my noble Friend Lord Ahmad, the Minister with responsibility for south and central Asia, is in the other place, it is my pleasure to respond on behalf of the Government.
This month, the UK celebrated 30 years of diplomatic relations with Kazakhstan, our largest partner in central Asia. Over the years, we have built a strong partnership in areas such as oil and gas investment, education and financial services, as well as promoting human rights and democratic values. We have had real success in encouraging a more open business environment in Kazakhstan, including through the Astana International Financial Centre.
Hon. Members—though few are here—will have witnessed the violent clashes that took place in January after initially peaceful protests in western Kazakhstan over increased fuel prices. As the right hon. Lady said, the latest estimates are that more than 200 people died during those clashes. There were reports of organised attacks on property and law enforcement officers, and almost 10,000 people were detained. I am sure that she will join me and others in roundly condemning the violence and loss of life.
My noble Friend Lord Ahmad has been engaged intensively on these issues, speaking to senior Kazakh contacts last month, including President Tokayev’s special representative on 14 January. In each of these calls, the Minister has underlined the importance of Kazakhstan respecting its international human rights commitments. President Tokayev has called what happened an “attempted coup” and we are urgently seeking further information about that very serious development. We welcome the President’s decision to establish an investigative commission to ascertain what led to these unprecedented events and loss of life. We support the Kazakh authorities’ commitment that this will be an effective and transparent investigation and have encouraged them to consider international and independent expertise.
In his public remarks, the President was clear that the original peaceful protests were based on legitimate grievances about the socioeconomic situation and that urgent economic reform is needed. We support that message and we seek opportunities, with our international partners, to support those reforms.
President Tokayev has also been critical of an existing social system that has seen economic growth largely benefit a small number of very rich people in society, as the right hon. Lady highlighted. We are well aware of reports on the alleged acquisition of assets by wealthy members of elite Kazakh society, including of substantial property holdings here in the UK. It is, of course, the role of law enforcement agencies to investigate any specific allegations of wrongdoing, as she said.
As a leading financial services centre, the UK can, unfortunately, be the destination for the proceeds of corruption, despite findings from the Financial Action Task Force that the UK has one of the strongest systems to combat money laundering and terrorist financing of more than 60 countries assessed to date. Consequently, the integrated review of security, defence, development and foreign policy committed to take stronger action to bear down on illicit finance, including by bolstering the National Economic Crime Centre and working with our closest allies, such as the United States, to maximise our collective impact against this common threat.
The recent spending review has put new resources behind that commitment: £42 million for economic crime reform from now until 2025. That is in addition to £63 million for Companies House reform and the introduction of the economic crime (anti-money laundering) levy, which will raise around £100 million per year from the private sector, to combat economic crime from 2023. These additional resources will significantly enhance our ability to tackle transnational corruption and illicit finance.
Since 2006, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has funded the National Crime Agency’s international corruption unit, a world-renowned law enforcement capability focused on investigating corruption from developing countries with UK links. Since funding started in 2006, ICU investigations have resulted in the conviction of 30 people and companies for corruption offences. It has also frozen, confiscated or returned to developing countries more than £1.1 billion-worth of stolen assets.
In addition, the UK leads and hosts the International Anti-Corruption Coordination Centre, which brings together specialist law enforcement officers from multiple agencies around the world to tackle allegations of grand corruption. The IACCC significantly enhances our ability to investigate complex, multi-jurisdictional corruption cases. Since its launch in 2017, it has provided support on 88 investigations.
In 2019, the UK launched its economic crime plan that provides a joined-up public and private sector response to economic crime. The success of our public-private partnership is perfectly demonstrated by the work of the joint money laundering intelligence taskforce, a mechanism that enables law enforcement and the financial sector to work more closely together to detect, prevent and disrupt money laundering and economic crime. To date, the joint money laundering intelligence taskforce has helped more than 600 law enforcement investigations. This has directly contributed to over 150 arrests and the seizure of more than £34 million in illicit funds.
Finally, in April last year, the UK launched the global anti-corruption sanctions regime, which the right hon. Lady mentioned in her remarks. This allows the Government to impose asset freezes and travel bans on those involved in serious corruption around the world, and it sends a message that the UK will not tolerate those individuals, or their ill-gotten gains, in our country. The regime does not target countries, but instead targets those individuals or organisations that are responsible. We believe that this is a strong, personal deterrent and it has been used so far to sanction 27 individuals in 10 different countries.
Collectively, these investments significantly enhance our ability to bring corrupt actors to justice. They also send a clear message that we will use the full force of our capabilities to bear down on those who seek to use the UK as a destination for their illegitimate wealth.
Criminals, corrupt elites and individuals who threaten our security are not welcome in the UK.
Dame Margaret Hodge
I am extremely grateful to the Minister, but he has given me a very general response. I named more than 20 individuals, many of whom are members of the same family. Will he undertake to investigate the circumstances that I briefly outlined, and undertake that, if I am correct, those individuals will face sanctions under the new regime?
James Cleverly
The right hon. Lady will, I am sure, understand that it can sometimes be counterproductive to go into details about what future sanctions designations the UK Government might undertake, but I can absolutely assure her that my officials, and indeed the House, will have taken note of the individuals she highlighted in her speech.
In relation to Kazakhstan, or indeed any other country, our law enforcement agencies continue to monitor and, if necessary, investigate particular cases where circumstances require. We know that corruption and illicit finance can have a devastating impact on states and citizens by undermining democracy, bankrolling authoritarian agendas, and enabling serious and organised crime. The UK has shown, on the world stage, that it has both the means and the will to promote responsible financial behaviour. We have shown that we stand ready to take action, domestically and internationally, wherever necessary. I am sure you will agree, Madam Deputy Speaker, that we must now stand together to show that corruption has no place in this country.
Question put and agreed to.
Draft Microchipping of Dogs (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2022
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Chair
I remind Members to observe social distancing and to wear masks when not speaking.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Jo Churchill)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Microchipping of Dogs (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2022.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford.
This draft statutory instrument, laid before the House on 6 January, is short and simple. Its purpose is to extend the sunset clause contained in the Microchipping of Dogs (England) Regulations 2015 by two years, until 23 February 2024. That will allow the 2015 regulations to remain in force until we lay a new set of regulations later this year.
The 2015 regulations made it compulsory for dogs in England over eight weeks of age to be microchipped, unless they are exempted by a veterinary surgeon. The dog’s details must also be registered on a compliant database. The regulations include a requirement for Government to review them within five years of coming into force.
At this point, I must apologise to the Committee that, due to pressures within the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from, first, EU exit and then the pandemic, that review was published only in December last year. At the same time, we published the DEFRA-commissioned research report from the University of Nottingham, which informed the review.
I am happy to report that almost 90% of dogs are now microchipped. The review clearly demonstrated that dog microchipping has had a positive effect on our ability to reunite stray dogs with their keepers, but it also highlighted a number of areas where improvements would be beneficial, and they largely relate to the databases. Since 2015, the number of databases that hold microchip records has increased from four to 17. That expansion provides choice and a diversity of services for dog owners, but it has also generated implications for how the overall system should operate in future.
Key users, such as dog wardens and vets, must be able to access the details linked to the microchip number quickly and easily. That point was echoed by the pet theft taskforce, which also recommended strengthening the checks that are in place for when a dog’s records are moved to a new keeper. We intend to launch a consultation on proposed improvements soon.
Hon. Members will be aware that we are to extend compulsory microchipping to include cats, which will fulfil one of our manifesto commitments. As the existing database system will also record those cat microchip details, it is even more important to address known issues before expanding the scope of the regulations.
Our intention is to lay a new set of regulations before the House by the end of the year, which will incorporate both compulsory dog and cat microchipping. The new regulations will maintain the existing provisions relating to dogs. New provisions, such as the compulsory microchipping of cats, will require an appropriate lead-in period. Members will have the opportunity to debate those in full before they are made.
In the meantime, however, I trust that hon. Members agree that we need to ensure that the 2015 regulations remain in force. The draft instrument before you has that clear and simple aim.
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Efford.
I am grateful to the Minister for outlining the contents of this draft piece of legislation and for bringing us back together to discuss more animal welfare-related legislation. It is an almost daily experience now.
The draft regulations are a relatively simple and self-explanatory piece of legislation. Its purpose, as we heard, is to extend the existing sunset clause contained in the 2015 regulations for a further two years, giving them effect until 23 February 2024. This is a straightforward proposal, and we do not want to see the sunset clause come into force on 24 February as a result of inaction in Committee so, as can be seen from the small number of Opposition Members present, we will not oppose the draft regulations. I will therefore not speak for too long, because I do not want to detain the Committee any longer than necessary—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] I knew that would get a good response.
We do need to think about why a sunset clause was necessary in the first place. I will be grateful if the Minister could address that in her response. I note that the first report on the implementation of microchipping was due to be held within five years. The delay is what it is, but it is important to note that we acknowledge that.
As my noble friend Baroness Jones noted in the other place, and as the Minister indicated, a plethora of microchip database companies have sprung up, making ownership-tracing far more complex. I would appreciate it if the Minister took a moment to explain how the Government will look at the tracing point and the impact on ownership of individual animals. Will the Minister tell the Committee whether that was anticipated, and is she satisfied that we have the right standards for those databases? Are they scrutinised before they are set up, or will further regulations be required down the line? Will she identify whether any constraints exist on how much somebody can charge for using a database? I do wonder if we have so many all of a sudden because they are easy money.
It is increasingly apparent that we should have a single portal of access—or, indeed, one database—which could be agreed through some sort of nomination process. That would certainly make people’s lives easier when trying to trace a dog’s owners or check its history. The review also identified the failure of many breeders to microchip their puppies. Will that be made more emphatic in the new regulations so that before puppies are sold on, the place of their ownership and birth is recorded, and a proper history of the animals is kept? The review also identified the failure of owners to keep their contact details up to date on the database. An outdated database is no help to anybody.
I look forward to seeing the revised regulations later this year, which I hope will provide a comprehensive update of the scheme to ensure that microchipping reaches its full potential. As a cat owner, I am also pleased that, as the Minister mentioned, cat microchipping is now recommended.
In a most extraordinary admission from a member of Her Majesty’s Government, the Minister in the other place, the noble Lord Benyon, admitted that the recent importation of dogs from Afghanistan saw new diseases coming into the United Kingdom. Will the Minister outline a few points on that? When were Ministers notified that the dogs from Afghanistan were not healthy?
The Chair
Order. We are debating the extension of the existing powers. Please refrain from drifting away from that matter.
Ruth Jones
Thank you for your advice, Mr Efford. It would be helpful to have that information, so I will write to the Minister about that.
The regulations have some overlap with the provisions in the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill, particularly with regard to dog theft and the import of dogs and cats into our country. The Glue Traps (Offences) Bill, the Animals (Penalty Notices) Bill and the Animal Welfare (Sentience) Bill are also all currently working their way through the parliamentary process.
Members of both Houses have spent a great deal of time looking at and working on these issues, and I am grateful to have had the chance to do so again. I look forward to the Minister’s response.
Jo Churchill
I am most grateful to the hon. Lady for articulating her support for the measures. Circumstances mean that we cannot have the legislation running concurrently, so we are here for a small technical extension to get the legislation into order.
We are committed to microchipping because we want to give every dog—and, looking forward, every cat—the best chance of being reunited with its keeper. Many of the hon. Lady’s points will be covered in the consultation. We are looking at that review and understand its recommendation that we look across the piece. As she well knows, we need initially to consult with those whom the provisions will affect to make sure that we as legislators can get the right measures in the right place for owners and enforcers, and in a timely fashion.
This short draft statutory instrument will allow us to consult on those changes, which will make the microchipping regime more effective. I think every Member wants to see the regime doing what it says on the tin. I hope that the Committee is reassured that we are committed to ensuring animal welfare in a logical and sensible way, and just allowing the provisions to lapse would not have been logical or sensible. As the hon. Lady said, we are all committed to animal welfare right across the country. Making further improvements will give us the opportunity for further discussion, ensuring that we go further than just taking the review on board. In the meantime, to ensure that the 2015 regulations remain in force, I commend these draft regulations to the Committee.
Question put and agreed to.
Westminster Hall
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Cumberlege Report
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)
Before we begin, I remind hon. Members to observe social distancing and to wear masks.
Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the Cumberlege Report.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I have secured a debate about fulfilling the recommendations of the Cumberlege report because I do not feel that we are making enough progress. We had a debate on the Floor of the House in July and a written ministerial statement on 21 July. To stay in order, Mr Rosindell, I will only say that the Minister’s answer to the debate and the written ministerial statement were disappointing, in many ways. In my opening remarks, I will seek to address why I believe that to be the case and, fundamentally, ask for certain updates. We are talking about people whose lives have been destroyed. Many hon. and right hon. Members will bring their own examples about various parts of the report, whether they are about Primodos, sodium valproate or mesh, but I will focus my comments on mesh.
I will not spend too much time going over the examples I gave during the debate in July, which can be looked up in Hansard, but I will say that people were given an operation that many did not need, which many were convinced that they should have. Some people did not even know it had happened to them. It took many years for the problems that arose to become apparent, and so those people have effectively been dismissed.
Like many Members, I have constituents who have had their lives stopped, especially women, although I will mention how the issue affects men as well. One constituent, who I have mentioned before, was a physiotherapist in her 40s who had had a child. She had mild incontinence after giving birth and was told to have the mesh implant, which she went ahead and did. Her entire life has been destroyed by that. Trying to remove it was described to her as being like “trying to take hair out of chewing gum”. We should consider that image when we think about the difficulty of the operation. We must not forget that the NHS did this, and the NHS has a responsibility to deal with it. I will make that point several times.
I have been contacted by a lady who is a constituent of my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Luke Hall). Her name is Paula Goss and both she and he have given me permission to talk about her case. She set up Rectopexy Mesh Victims and Support in March 2019 after she was unable to find much research or information about the meshes that she had had put in. The group now has over 1,100 members, as well as members who have sacrocolpopexy vaginal mesh and hernia mesh. She is the ambassador and advocate for rectopexy and hernia mesh on the Mesh UK Charitable Trust, which has a further 2,000 members.
She had rectopexy mesh in 2014 as she was unable to clear her bowels. She was ill-informed by the now dismissed surgeon, who, as she found out from her notes, inserted three meshes—in the bowel, vagina and posterior. She says:
“All mesh types don’t necessarily show complications straightaway. My Pre mesh insertion issues started again around 9 months after the op, in which I was passed from pillar to post by all medical professionals saying my issues were the menopause or in my head. This went on from 2015 until September 2018 when I was admitted to hospital with a blocked bowel and bladder and had to have enemas and catheters, still they would not connect this to the mesh, upon doing a CT scan at this time they also found a large ovarian tumour, it was then discussed by my gynae oncologist at the BRI and Southmead NBT to do a joint op to remove the tumour and the mesh, due to the incompetence and lack of mesh removal experience at Southmead I ended up having the ovarian tumour removal in January 2019. Thankfully, after testing it was a large benign fibroma, following up with Southmead they then stated that they wouldn’t remove my mesh but would do an op to give me a permanent stoma—again, brushed aside and fobbed off, I sought a second opinion in London privately, whilst we are by no means rich, you can’t put a price on your health...I had to pay £32,000 for my removal, it took over 10 hours and they could not get all of it…two protacks in particular sit very close to the bifurcation of the inferior vena cava on the left and the common iliac on the right. Pre mesh removal I was found to have a heart murmur and I suffered pericarditis quite a few times. My histology on my meshes showed that I was not a candidate for polypropylene and should not have this inserted again…When I discovered I had hernias again I was neglected by the local hospital who at first refused to do a scan, saying I must have an ulcer. it was thanks to my private mesh removal surgeon who contacted my GP and insisted that I was referred for a CT which then clearly showed two large incisional hernias.
The consultant at Southmead stated he would only fix my hernias with polypropylene mesh. After I told him that I couldn’t have that, there was no option but to again look down the private route. Thankfully, my colorectal mesh removal surgeon was able to do this and a date was set for 6 January 2020. However, my hernia started to strangulate and I was luckily rushed to London by my husband, and had this op done on 28 November 2019. This cost £43,000.
This operation was by far the toughest and took a long time to get over, due to ending up with a seroma and now a hiatus hernia due to the trauma to my abdomen.
My journey has not been, and is still not, plain sailing, but I am one of thousands.
Whilst vaginal mesh gets a lot of coverage, ours does not. Rectopexy affects men, women and children…All three main types of mesh need to be included and talked about—bowel mesh, vaginal mesh…sacrocolpopexy and colporrhaphy vaginal mesh and hernia mesh...One of our rectopexy mesh ladies found out that the surgeon who put mesh in also removed her ovary without consent, she sadly committed suicide due to this event.
One of our rectopexy patients was just 15 when she had her mesh inserted. She’s early 20s now and now suffers complications and doesn’t even know if she will ever be able to have children.
We have other ladies in their 20s and early 30s suffering, who may not be able to have children.
We have many rectopexy bowel men on our sites who feel they have nowhere to go and no one who will listen to them.
This is the same for all hernia mesh victims too.
There are many real victims’ journeys that need to be listened to and taken seriously.”
That is what the report did, and why it was so appreciated by the victims, as they were finally being taken seriously. That is where the report’s value lies. Today, I once again push for it to be implemented in full as far as possible, and for recommendation 3 about redress, recommendation 4 and recommendation 5 to be reconsidered.
Recommendation 1 was for an apology. That apology was received in July 2020, given by the Government, but, as good as it was, their actions depend on whether they can justify what they are doing on recommendation 9. Recommendation 2 is:
“The appointment of a Patient Safety Commissioner who would be an independent public leader with a statutory responsibility. The Commissioner would champion the value of listening to patients and promoting users’ perspectives in seeking improvements to patient safety around the use of medicines and medical devices.”
The Government accept recommendation 2, and I ask the Minister for the latest update on that appointment. On 2 December last year, in the other place, the noble Baroness Cumberlege asked Her Majesty’s Government
“when the process to appoint the Patient Safety Commissioner will commence; and when they expect the Commissioner to be in post.”
In response, the noble Baroness Chisholm of Owlpen said:
“My Lords, we are making good progress towards appointing the first patient safety commissioner for England. We expect the appointment of the postholder by spring 2022.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 2 December 2021; Vol. 816, c. 1443.]
As I said, I would like an update on where we are in that process.
Recommendation 3 is that:
“A new independent Redress Agency for those harmed by medicines and medical devices should be created based on models operating effectively in other countries. The Redress Agency will administer decisions using a non-adversarial process with determinations based on avoidable harm looking at systemic failings, rather than blaming individuals.”
The Government do not accept recommendation 3. As set out in the Government’s statement,
“We have no current plans for a redress agency…We do not believe it is necessary to create a new agency for redress as it is already possible for the Government and others to provide redress for specific issues where that is considered necessary. Neither do we believe that creating an agency would succeed in making products safer as the report suggests, or that grouping existing redress schemes through a single front door would add value for harmed patients.”—[Official Report, 21 July 2021; Vol. 699, c. 72WS.]
I do not accept that it is already possible to provide redress where necessary, because my inbox, and I am sure those of several right hon. and hon. Members, suggests that that is simply not true. It is too vague and takes too long. When I talk about recommendation five, I will discuss where that issue comes to a head.
I come back to my point, which is that the NHS did this to people. I have said it before and I say it again: the problem is very similar to the thalidomide scandal. Eventually we got justice for thalidomide victims. People are just being fobbed off—I have many examples—and that is exactly what happened with thalidomide. Mr Rosindell, can you imagine living an active life, as we all do, and the NHS recommending something that means that you can no longer take part in what you were doing? Imagine being physically and mentally restricted and unable to fulfil your life’s ambitions. A full quango might not need to be set up, but at the very least we need a ring-fenced department in the NHS to bring those areas together.
Sir Mike Penning (Hemel Hempstead) (Con)
Baroness Cumberlege specifically states in her report that her terms of reference prevented her from talking about individual compensation and redress. Is my right hon. Friend suspicious, like me and probably many others, that that was specifically written into the plan so that she could not do what my right hon. Friend is asking for?
Alec Shelbrooke
That is where we have to dig into recommendation 4:
“Separate schemes should be set up for each intervention—HPTs, valproate and pelvic mesh—to meet the cost of providing additional care and support to those who have experienced avoidable harm and are eligible to claim”.
The Government do not accept recommendation 4. That is exactly the same situation as with thalidomide. One of my earliest campaigns in 2012 was to extend the grant to victims, and my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) took that campaign further to make it a permanent grant. People will not recover from what happened, whether it was drug-induced or operation-induced.
My constituent who has had mesh removed emailed me only today to say that four years down the line things are better, but they have not improved to the point where she can really live her life. She says she is mentally exhausted and does not want to go on. She had a thriving physiotherapy career that she cannot go back to. She is only in her 40s and has the rest of her life to live. The Government have a responsibility because the Government run the NHS. I interchange the words “NHS” and “Government”, but the NHS is the Government. That is where this situation falls on the Minister:
“While the Government are sympathetic to the experiences of those patients who gave evidence to the report, our priority is to improve the future safety of medicines and medical devices.”—[Official Report, 21 July 2021; Vol. 699, c. 72WS.]
Trying to prevent further catastrophe is obviously very important—that is one thing—but thousands of people will suffer for the rest of their lives thanks to this treatment.
I will draw the distinction between this surgery and breast-enhancement surgery. Many people have had that done privately and then when there have been complications, they have had the operation to sort it out on the NHS. There is often a lot of debate around whether that is right or wrong. That is not where I want to go today. However, if we are willing to do that for things that people have had done privately, why are we not willing to redress the issues of people who have had things done by the NHS?
We are talking about women from their teens all the way up. Some people think the problem is with the elderly end of the population, but we are talking about those in their teens upwards. As I said, we did recognise the situation with thalidomide. I know that costs come into it, but there is a moral responsibility to redress the situation.
Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)
The right hon. Gentleman is making a powerful speech. Does he agree that there is a moral responsibility? Once the Government—whatever Government that is and wherever they are—have committed to review such a profound issue, and have essentially marched people up to the top of the hill, giving them faith and hope, they must then follow through. Leaving people in a state of suspended animation for such a long time, when they have already suffered so much, is just not acceptable.
Alec Shelbrooke
I am most grateful to the hon. Lady for that intervention. She summarises the entirety of what we are trying to achieve. When I put in the application for the debate, I found no difficulty at all in getting sponsors who were one third Conservative, one third Labour and one third SNP. This is not about the colour of the Government. It is about the NHS, which will be managed through all colours of Government, and has been throughout its life. It is the responsibility of this place, and part of who we are, to do the right thing by people.
I ask the Minister to look at the thalidomide grant scheme and translate it across to those who, as a direct result of the issues raised, will not be able to fulfil their earning potential and will have to deal with physical restrictions and pain for the rest of their lives.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
As well as compensation, which I think is what the right hon. Gentleman was talking about with “redress”, the Scottish Government, at least, are now progressing with a Bill to set money aside for people to get mesh removed through private surgery, fully funded by the Scottish Government. Does he think that that should also be considered by the UK Government?
Alec Shelbrooke
Again, I am most grateful for that intervention, because people are having to turn to private care to get that surgery done—often by the same surgeons. There has always been a conversation about the NHS commissioning private medicine to help it, particularly when it comes to clearing the backlogs caused by the pandemic. That that is important. I will come on to that question in my comments about where we are going.
Recommendation 5 says:
“Networks of specialist centres should be set up to provide comprehensive treatment, care and advice for those affected by implanted mesh; and separately for those adversely affected by medications taken during pregnancy.”
The Government accept the first part of recommendation 5, on specialist centres for those adversely affected by mesh. I regret to tell my hon. Friend the Minister that it is not working. I have a document that I will read from Kath Sansom of Sling the Mesh. She sent me this information. These are women’s voices, in just January 2022. An 83-year-old says:
“I am disappointed. I was expecting help but just offered pain relief and physio. And I now have red inflamed abdominal inflammation. I wanted to know if all these problems were the mesh—the answer was that they don’t know.”
A 64-year-old says:
“Not sure about anyone else, my experience hasn’t been particularly good. For me the wait goes on and on. Offered pain management, didn’t get anything only offered physio. In 14 years I have had enough physio to last a lifetime. Latest offer yet another camera in the bladder, that makes 4 now. First removal 2019, been waiting ever since for stage 2. I feel the longer it goes on, they hope I will give up having surgery at 64 years old.”
Others say:
“After a very long wait to see a specialist in the mesh centre, having scans etc. was told no real problems”—
and—
“Mesh centres are a piece of paper over a cavernous crack!”
Another person says:
“I feel mesh centres are giving us false hope—and then the realisation that it’s all been pointless. They actually admitted at Nottingham that they would watch Leicester removing my mesh so that they could learn how to remove a TOT mesh! They looked disappointed when I said there was no way I was thinking of having it removed. I feel like I would have been an experiment. I’m scared.”
Another says:
“I waited 12 months from referral by GP for my first appointment, then it has taken 3 years of various tests and appointments to get on the surgery removal waiting list. I have been on that list for 15 months so far. In that time, I lost my job that I’d had for over 16 years due to sickness record, I’ve been on the waiting list for pain management for over 12 months, and I am gradually able to do less and less due to the constant pain.”
Someone else says:
“Nottingham mesh centre same pro mesh surgeons that put in mesh in charge of centre referring patients to nearby Leicester Hospital for operation—what’s all that about!! It’s OK having Specialist Mesh Centres, but these doctors need to be trained by surgeons that are doing good jobs.
I’ve been hurt once by these surgeons that put mesh in, I’m not letting anyone near me unless they have done lots of successful removals. the sad thing is, because only 4 or 5 great surgeons do removals, you have to pay private, because their waiting lists are so long.”
Others say:
“Kath, can you highlight the LONG waiting times please and referral to pain management, which has a long waiting list—we are talking years overall when all we want is this damned mesh removing sooner rather than later”
and
“Mesh centres, what mesh centres? Same doctors been under for years. No faith at all. Only know how to put it in, not take it out.”
Another person says:
“Been waiting 15 months, and still no appointment. Was referred to UCHL, which I have heard nothing from, even though the hospital referring has resent the referral a couple of times. Been told I have to go to my local now, which is Southampton which I have heard not one positive outcome from, so basically, funding it myself with credit cards as can’t put up with the pain anymore”
while another says:
“Suffered for years before I found out what it was. My GP referred me five years ago—doctor yawned in my face & denied it was plastic. Told me it was tape. Sent me round in circles for lots of tests and visited 8 different hospitals for mainly painful procedures before I was finally sent to St Mary’s (Manchester) 3 years ago for a translabial scan.
Was sent to Wythenshawe then back to St Mary’s & told I had to see pain management clinic before I could be offered a full removal.
Covid cancelled all appointments in 2020 then I had an SNS trial implant at Northern General Christmas ’21 for bowel control (it failed) & spinal fusion L4/5 year ago for stenosis then got wound sepsis, so back in DRI for two weeks in lockdown last March. Sure the mesh damage caused all this!”
Somebody else says:
“There is a stark contrast between NHS and private, it shouldn’t be like this. I saw Professor Hashim on 1st October, he examined me, confirmed issues and said he could offer me full or partial removal. If I had been able to cough up the money I would probably be getting removal February or March. I am in his area for the Bristol mesh centre so my consultant referred me straight to him after reading his report. I have not had any communication from Southmead Bristol yet, everything I am hearing about Bristol now is that I am going to have to go through the pain clinic and try steroids etc first. Why do we have to jump through these hoops with the same surgeon just because we can’t afford…£15,000”?
Another says:
“Gynaecologist was dismissive and stated that women like me are depriving other women from benefitting from it.”
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
My right hon. Friend has made that point a number of a times during his speech, and it is worth highlighting. I know that my hon. Friend the Minister will do some great work on the women’s health strategy, but time and again my right hon. Friend has said that women’s voices are being ignored and dismissed. They are told that they are imagining things and that it is in their heads. It is not good enough.
Alec Shelbrooke
I completely agree with my right hon. Friend. In fact, I will later make a couple of points on what I have discovered about women’s health. The way women are treated is quite appalling.
Another person says:
“I had my TVT in Exeter 12 years ago. Exeter consultant in 2020 told me I couldn’t be referred to Bristol. He said he would refer me to UCLH but I never heard from them, I rang in 2021 to be told UCLH hadn’t received any referral but they then put me on their wait list from when I’d been told the referral was made. I then heard nothing from them for ages so I paid for a private consultant at Bristol to be told I could have been referred to Bristol on the NHS in the first place. Bristol requested NHS tests in Exeter which were done in August 2021 and they referred me back to Bristol in October, so I am now on Bristol NHS list for removal”.
Somebody else says:
“Took 4 years to be referred to specialist mesh centre, after a lot of pushing and pushing for it, referred to Royal Victoria Hospital in Newcastle upon Tyne. The mesh centre was no better, more lies, gaslighting and a really appalling treatment and total indifference, lots and lots of mistakes, cancelled appointments and no regard for any pain or suffering.”
Another person says:
“Told too dangerous to remove…left in agony...self-catheterising, lost job, pain management referral but they are behind 12 months …invisible and invalid is how I feel…is this my life at 54?”
Somebody else says:
“I went for a consultation for removal in 2020 had a scan then asked to contact his secretary when I’d had an MRI which I did in December 2020. Now still waiting for them to contact me. I leave messages and nothing happens.”
I could go on and on and on, and I am sure that many other right hon. and hon. Members will be raising similar cases. What I want the Minister to comment on in today’s debate is this. There is now, from the relevant royal colleges, the “Purpose Statement for the Mesh Complications Management Training Pathway”. That statement outlines several areas, but I will highlight just the “Mesh Complication Management credential”. Its subheading is “Professional Identity: Clinical Expert” and it states:
“The doctor has the knowledge, skills and attitudes required for clinical assessment of patients presenting with suspected mesh-implant complications…The doctor is able to investigate mesh complications, and interpret the results of tests, appropriately…The doctor is competent in non-surgical management of mesh complications…The doctor is competent to undertake mesh removal surgery as part of a multidisciplinary team”.
This is progress, but I think we can all understand that there is going to be a long time around that, so I say this to the Minister. Can the House please have regular updates on how this training process is going, within the royal colleges, for surgeons, because we need to understand what the process is and how long it is taking to try to deal with the main issue?
That brings me to the other parts of recommendation 5 in the report of the independent medicines and medical devices safety review. The written ministerial statement in response said:
“Recognising the need for enhanced data collection on pelvic mesh, the Government in 2018 announced the provision of £1.1 million for the development of a comprehensive database of urogynaecological procedures, including vaginal mesh, to treat pelvic organ prolapse and stress urinary incontinence. I can update the House that the pelvic floor information system has started to receive live data, including historical data from July 2017 onwards, with an initial focus on supporting specialist services to report every pelvic floor and comparative procedure to this national database.
The report of the IMMDS review also recommends that the information system is accompanied by a retrospective audit of mesh procedures, and by the development of a patient reported outcome measure (PROM) or patient reported experience measure (PREM). I am pleased to announce to the House today that the Government accept both these recommendations. NHS Digital has been commissioned to scope and deliver the retrospective audit. Subject to receiving high quality research bids, a new validated PROM for pelvic mesh procedures will be commissioned through the National Institute of Health Research in 2022.”—[Official Report, 21 July 2021; Vol. 699, c. 73WS.]
Again, I ask the Minister whether she can update us on progress in these areas and, after today’s debate, could she speak to her Department about ensuring, even if it is just through a written ministerial statement, that there is a regular update on the progress being made?
I will give a summary of the points that I have made. GPs are unaware of mesh complication centres and the referral process. Many patients are denied access and offered physio and pain management instead. They pay thousands of pounds for private care. They experience extremely long delays for appointments. Many women end up seeing their implanting surgeons, who then dismiss them. That leads to further deterioration in their physical and mental health. There is a lack of experience, particularly in mesh removal. There are only around four to five surgeons in the UK who can do mesh removal. There is no post-op aftercare.
More positively, on recommendations 6 and 7, the Government announced that the MHRA
“has initiated a substantial programme of work to improve how it listens and responds to patients and the public, to develop a more responsive system for reporting adverse incidents, and to strengthen the evidence to support timely and robust decisions that protect patient safety.”
Recommendation 7 was:
“A central patient-identifiable database should be created by collecting key details of the implantation of all devices at the time of the operation. This can be linked to specifically created registers to research and audit the outcomes both in terms of the device safety and patient reported outcomes measures.”
The Government accepted both recommendations. Again, I ask the Minister for an update.
Recommendation 8 states:
“'Transparency of payments made to clinicians needs to improve. The register of the General Medical Council (GMC) should be expanded to include a list of financial and non-pecuniary interests for all doctors, as well as doctors' particular clinical interests and their recognised and accredited specialisms. In addition, there should be mandatory reporting for the pharmaceutical and medical device industries of payments made to teaching hospitals, research institutions and individual clinicians.”
The Government said that they accepted the recommendation in principle:
“We agree that lists of doctors’ interests should be publicly available, but we do not think that the GMC register is the best place to hold this information”,
so “publications of interest” should be held by healthcare providers. Having approved the recommendation, how is that progressing and how easy is patient access?
Finally, we get to recommendation 9:
“The government should immediately set up a task force to implement this Review's recommendations. Its first task should be to set out a timeline for their implementation.”
The Government accepted the recommendation in part.
Having probed the recommendations to open the debate, I ask the Minister whether she and her Department are able to say positively that they are meeting recommendation 9. Are the recommendations being implemented properly and is she revisiting the recommendations rejected by the Department initially? We can all recognise from the examples that I have given that the mesh centres are not working, that people’s lives have been destroyed and that they will need to support throughout their lives. We cannot just draw a line, have a year zero and say that we hope such things do not happen again. We have to move forward.
Drawing on what my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) said and on my research, it is clear to me that the NHS is constantly failing women. During the pandemic, I read a report—unfortunately, I have not been able to reference this since, so it is open to challenge—stating that gynaecological surgeons were taken off their operating theatres for longer than any other surgeons, being kept on the frontline of the covid wards.
That says exactly where the problem in the NHS lies. That comes up not just in this debate, but next week, in another debate, on problems with endometriosis. It seems that the NHS is—I do not say this in a positive way—gender-blind to the needs of women and the complications that occur. It is an attitude, a built-in psychology, that we will have to address, and we can only start to do so if we take all the aspects of this report seriously.
Although men have mesh issues too, this debate is dominated fundamentally by women’s health. It speaks to that wider assessment of NHS priorities on women. We have to start doing something about that. We must stand up and say that we are not afraid to criticise areas of the NHS, because I am sure that as we go through the debate we will have example after example from which we can draw only one conclusion: women are being failed.
My hon. Friend the Minister, as a practising nurse, will know the importance and vocation of patient care. With her professional eyes, will she allow the NHS to ignore the plight of people who are suffering every day? To be blunt, her predecessor appeared to. I ask her to apply her considerable and dedicated professional expertise to get the Government to direct the NHS to adopt the recommendations, or at least to mirror them. That is the least we can do for the terrible and horrific damage that the NHS has caused to so many people. To finish: the NHS did this, so the NHS must fix this.
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) on securing this important debate, and I thank the Backbench Business Committee for making it possible. As the right hon. Gentleman said, over six months ago we debated this same issue in the main Chamber. We pushed the Government for responses on the recommendations of the Cumberlege report. Many Members spoke passionately at that debate.
Today I want to talk about sodium valproate and the impact it has had. I looked up my speech from last July in Hansard earlier, and my speech today is almost the same. Forgive me if I am repeating from Hansard, but I think it is worth restating these points while giving an update.
Sodium valproate has had an impact on so many people, including children and women who took the drug during pregnancy. I want to talk about my constituent Bethany Dodgson, a young woman affected by foetal valproate syndrome. She speaks up on this issue and does a brilliant job of making people aware of it. She is also a carer for her brother, who is more seriously affected by difficulties caused by foetal valproate syndrome, and does a brilliant job of that.
I want again to pay tribute to Janet Williams and Emma Murphy from In-FACT—the Independent Fetal Anti-Convulsant Trust—who have done so much to campaign on this issue, and to all those other women and other people who have campaigned. As I said last year, it is really scandalous that we still have children being affected by foetal valproate syndrome today because their mothers were not aware of the risk of taking sodium valproate during pregnancy. Emma and Janet have campaigned, as have other people; they have been through the records and talked to people. I am sure many of us here have talked to Janet and Emma as they have gone about their work. They have ensured that women are made aware of the risks if they are pregnant or considering pregnancy.
It is now 18 months on from the Cumberlege report, “First Do No Harm”, and what we have seen is one letter sent some months ago to warn women of the risk. There are still issues to be tackled, and Janet, Emma and others continue to work with GPs and others to ensure that there is awareness of the issue. There have been attempts in previous years, with greater or lesser success, to ensure that doctors were aware and warned their patients, but much more needs to be done actively to ensure that no more children are harmed.
I would like to talk, as others have, about the recommendations of Baroness Cumberlege’s report “First Do No Harm”. First, the Government have accepted the call for a patient safety commissioner; I know that it is in the process of being advertised and that an appointment will be made. That is significant and very helpful. There is some movement, as there was at the debate in July, but we still do not have a patient safety commissioner in place. I hope that will happen quickly. I urge the Minister and the Government to continue to act and to press for swifter action to ensure that a commissioner is in place and is effective in pursuing patient safety issues.
As I said in July, there must be a redress agency. That is one of the recommendations of the report. I am disappointed, as I know lots of the women are, that the Government have now said, “There will be no redress.” I said last July that going to the law for compensation or redress is no answer for people who have suffered from any of the syndromes we are talking about. They have already suffered enough, and going to law is further pain and torture. It is a trial on top of what they have experienced—and, in some cases, continue to experience, as do their children, daily. I ask the Government to think again about that.
I endorse what Baroness Cumberlege said in her report: there must be an independent redress agency, so that people are spared the pain of having to keep fighting in law for their rights. I hope the Government will think again, as the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell said. I join him in calling for a redress scheme to be developed, even at this stage, to ensure that people do not continue to suffer and can cope with their conditions. These people have already had to live for years with the physical consequences for themselves or their family, without their views being heard. Please, Minister, think again, and take away from this debate the fact that there is cross-party support for a redress agency to compensate those people.
We heard about the patient reference group. When we spoke in June, it had been set up and was working. However, now that it has reported, there is no continuing involvement of patients in any successor group or body that would allow their voices to continue to be heard. I urge the Minister to look again at that, and to set up a patient reference group, or something with another name; the name does not matter. What matters is ensuring that the people going through this process are involved in what happens in the future. Please, Minister, look again at that. I am pleased that, since our last debate, the all-party parliamentary group first do no harm has been set up, and that Baroness Cumberlege continues to be involved and engaged on this issue, which is commendable. I know how hard she continues to work on this. However, that group was set up not by the Government, but by Members of this House and affected patients to ensure that their issues are not forgotten.
Finally, I will repeat what I said last year. Let us be clear: we are talking about a medical issue, but this is a women’s issue. It is an issue of women not being listened to and their concerns not being heard, and of action not being taken. Frankly—I will say it again—it is just not good enough. We need to ensure that their voice is heard. As we develop and consult on the women’s health strategy, which the Minister and I discussed in an Adjournment debate the other day, we need to make sure that we learn these lessons, and the lessons of so many other cases where the voices of women have not been heard and listened to effectively. The title of the Cumberlege report is, “First Do No Harm”. It is vital that this principle is looked at when we consider the women’s health strategy.
Mrs Theresa May (Maidenhead) (Con)
As others have said, it is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I add my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) on having secured this important debate. We are here for a significant reason, which is, frankly, to hold the Government’s feet to the fire and press them on why they have not made more progress on this issue. As others have said, it was debated some months ago in the Chamber of the House of Commons, and the cross-party support for Government action was absolutely clear, as the presence here shows, yet we have had to come back to ask the Government why they are not making more progress.
The independent medicines and medical devices safety review was absolutely clear about the damage done by the three medical devices and medicines that it considered: Primodos, mesh—not only vaginal mesh—and sodium valproate. As my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell—
Mrs May
I am so sorry; that must have changed after my time. My right hon. Friend set out very clearly how people’s lives have changed. The hon. Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) has just done that as well.
Lives have been not just changed, but significantly damaged. People have suffered physically, mentally, socially and, in many cases, economically. As well as suffering the direct impact of what was done to them and, in the case of Primodos, to the babies born with defects as a result of their mothers taking it, they suffered constant rejection by the state—by the NHS and the Government, the very bodies that should have been there to protect and support them. The longer it takes the Government to fully implement the recommendations of the Cumberlege report, the more rejection these people suffer. Every week that goes by is a further rejection, because the report was very clear: action needs to be taken.
I was pleased to set up the report, and I commissioned it largely out of the concern I had about Primodos, which had been raised with me by my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning), but also by our former colleague Seema Kennedy, who took up this issue as well. The aim of the review was not just to get to the truth, but to identify what needed to be done to redress the problems that had occurred, to provide support to those who had suffered, and to ensure that it could not happen again.
There are two glaring aspects to these issues. The first is that the natural reaction of the NHS and the medical establishment was—and, I fear, continues to be—to defend themselves, rather than to admit to mistakes, ensure that those who suffered were given the support they needed, and take action to ensure that those mistakes could not happen again. That is still happening.
I spoke to a constituent earlier this week who had an operation a number of years ago, and is still having operations to correct problems that arose from a mistake made in that operation. My constituent Hugh Whitfield, a former consultant surgeon who runs the Independent Medical Negligence Resolution, spoke to me before Christmas about the large sum of money the NHS spends on litigation and on trying to defend cases in court, when a better system would be to just accept that mistakes were made. I have constituents who just wanted an apology. They just wanted to know that somebody had accepted that something had gone wrong, and to be shown that it would not be allowed to happen again. Instead, the NHS spends significant sums of money trying to defend itself in court cases when there is a better solution. That is slightly aside from the main point I want to make about the Cumberlege review, but it shows that the NHS’s attitude is to defend itself, rather than accept that mistakes were made.
I want to pick up on a point made by the three Members who have spoken. Sadly, when we look at the three issues that the Cumberlege review considered, we see a patronising attitude towards women—a pat-you-on-the-head attitude. “There, there. This is the sort of thing you can expect. You’re in pain? Oh well. You’re a woman.” I am afraid that that was the attitude taken on some of these issues—and it was not just that: it was a female doctor, Isabel Gal—a woman who had survived Auschwitz—who first identified the problems with Primodos, but she was dismissed and ignored, and sadly her career was damaged as a result. She eventually left the medical profession. What comes through in the report is that there is an attitude of not being willing to listen to women’s voices, and of not accepting it when women say, “Actually, what you have done to me is causing me extreme pain and difficulty.” Instead of saying, “You know what? I do this, and I get it right. Go away, dear,” professionals should say, “Let’s look into this and find out exactly what happened, and whether we made a mistake.”
I come to three of the specific recommendations, one of which is to appoint a patient safety commissioner. Reference has already been made to this, and it is good that the Government have accepted the recommendation, although they needed a bit of a nudge in the House of Lords to do so. What concerns me is the need to ensure that this patient safety commissioner is not in hock to the Department of Health and Social Care.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell spoke about the NHS. Yes, these are the actions of the NHS, but behind it lies the Department of Health and Social Care, which consistently resisted properly looking into these issues over a significant period. I do not want a patient safety commissioner to be taken over by the Department of Health and Social Care. It has to be somebody who can be independent and can genuinely give patients a voice.
On the recommendation to establish a redress agency, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead is right that under its terms of reference, the Cumberlege review was not able to look at compensation for individuals, but it was asked to look at wider redress measures, and it proposed the redress agency—a proposal that, sadly, the Government have not been willing to accept. I know the Treasury will have heard the proposal as, “Ding, ding, ding! Pounds!”—I have dealt with the Treasury, and we all know what happens—but the agency would have a wider remit than that. The Treasury often thinks these things are just about funding and monetary compensation, but people who have suffered as a result of these issues need other sorts of support given to them—for example, support for children with special educational needs. Redress is wider than monetary compensation, which is often what Government think about.
Recommendation 9 is to set up a taskforce. The patient reference group is a good idea but, as the hon. Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) said, where now? The taskforce would have the job of gripping this issue and pressing down on the accelerator for action. I ask the Minister: who in Government is gripping this issue and pressing the accelerator for action? As I am sure she will gather, most of us here think that nobody is doing that, and that the issue is being allowed to drift. It is important that these recommendations be followed up on.
My final thought is about levelling up—a term that some of us in politics like to use at the moment. The victims of these three issues need to have their lives levelled up with those of people who did not suffer as a result of this. Above all, NHS treatment given to women needs to be levelled up with that given to men, to ensure that women are not just patted on the head and told to go away.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) on securing the debate. Without being facetious, I think it is the first time in my seven years in this place that I have agreed completely with his entire contribution.
The right hon. Gentleman focused on mesh. I will talk more about sodium valproate, but I agree with everything he said, and I have dealt with a constituent who came to me after her life was ruined by a mesh implant. She was suffering from pain and—others have mentioned this—economic hardship, as she had to reduce her hours at work, but she was lucky that she could still work three days a week. On top of all that, her personal independence payment for mobility was taken away, and I had to fight in Parliament to get it restored. That is a further way in which the state is letting down some of these people. They have already suffered from the operation; then they do not get the support they deserve, let alone the redress we are talking about.
I want to make the case for my constituents Mr and Mrs McKerrow and their daughter Claire. Mrs McKerrow was prescribed sodium valproate and Claire then suffered foetal anticonvulsant syndrome, which has affected her entire life. It has also affected her parents, and they have long campaigned for justice. They tried legal action, but were let down. They have been part of support groups. They engaged with and gave evidence to the Cumberlege review, so I can only imagine how hopeful they were when the thorough and comprehensive report from Baroness Cumberlege was printed.
Paragraph 1.38 states that
“valproate has caused physical and neurodevelopmental harm. We believe that the state and manufacturers have an ethical responsibility to provide ex gratia payments to those who have experienced avoidable damage from the interventions we have reviewed.”
The key sentence in paragraph 1.38 is:
“Patients have waited far too long for redress.”
I can only imagine how disappointed and angry people were when the UK Government ignored that in their response in July 2021. What a let-down! How can the Government ignore the key recommendation, which says that those affected by the interventions reviewed have waited too long for redress? As the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) said, every week is another week that those people are waiting and suffering.
As the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell said, the UK Government have accepted recommendation 1 and issued a full apology, but that apology is somewhat hollow unless they consider setting up a redress scheme for those who underwent these interventions. On one level, it feels like an apology from the Prime Minister—absolutely meaningless. We should not be surprised that the Government have so far also ignored recommendation 3 —that a new redress agency should be created. The report states that such an agency should be
“based on models operating effectively in other countries. The Redress Agency will administer decisions using a non-adversarial process with determinations based on avoidable harm looking at systemic failings, rather than blaming individuals.”
That all sounds logical, and one would think that the Government wanted to address this issue, so hopefully the Minister will explain exactly why they have rejected the recommendation. Importantly, what other agencies in other countries have they reviewed? Baroness Cumberlege said that such agencies operate successfully elsewhere; what review did the Government carry out of those agencies before choosing to reject the recommendation?
Prior to the Cumberlege review, my constituents the McKerrows had made significant progress; they dealt directly with the BBC, professors of medicine, GPs and hospital consultants at each and every stage of Claire’s life in order to demonstrate the link between taking sodium valproate while pregnant, the disabilities that their daughter has suffered, and the ongoing impact on her growth, development and ability to have a normal family life. As I said, they took part in a Cumberlege review meeting and gave evidence. Mr McKerrow explained to me that redress, which we know is morally due, as was stated in the review, would put him at ease by protecting his daughter and addressing her future needs.
The Cumberlege review rightly talks about the psychological damage done to those harmed by the various interventions, but there is guilt for the mothers who took a medicine—social valproate—that caused damage to their child. Of course, they are completely blameless, but that is not exactly how the mind always operates. That is another aspect of people’s fighting to get justice, and to right the wrongs of being prescribed a harmful drug.
On redress, I recently submitted a written parliamentary question in the naive hope of getting a more positive response on compensation for the harm caused by sodium valproate. However, the Government’s answer stated again that they
“did not accept the recommendation to establish separate redress schemes for the three interventions in the report, including sodium valproate. Our primary focus is on improving future medicines and medical devices safety and it is therefore crucial that we focus Government funds on initiatives that directly improve future safety (including specialist mesh centres and support for families affected by medicines in pregnancy).”
As the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell said, the mesh centres are not working anyway. In the final part of the answer to my written question, the Government said:
“For this reason, redress schemes will not be established in response to the recommendation in the report.”
Can the Minister honestly look these families in the eye and say, “Look, we’ve apologised. It’s time to move on and look forward. We’re not going to deal with you just now. We want to focus on future initiatives”? Can she not see how absurd that position is? Does she understand that all the people who gave their time to the Cumberlege review in the hope that justice would be served were effectively kicked in the teeth by the Government’s rejecting the recommendation for a redress scheme? Why undertake the review and not adhere to the key recommendations?
I am looking for an explanation from the Minister, but in an ideal world, we would see a U-turn. U-turns can be ridiculed in politics, but sometimes they are very welcome. This is certainly one U-turn that I, my constituents and everybody else who has suffered from such interventions would welcome.
Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
I pay tribute to everybody who has campaigned on this issue. I agree with every word of every previous speaker. I do not envy the Minister in having to reply to the debate, but I offer her an apology in that, because of an inescapable commitment that has been in my diary for many weeks, I will not be present for her reply. I gave my apologies to you, Mr Rosindell, in advance, and to our hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Sir Graham Brady), who will be in the Chair later.
The issue was eloquently summed up by the hon. Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist) when she said that she could have reread her speech of 8 July word for word and it would have been as relevant today as it was then. Interrogating my own website on my contributions on this subject in preparation for the debate, I see that, apart from speaking on that occasion, my first effort on this topic was way back in a debate on 19 April 2018. I have to ask the Minister why, when terrible health disasters happen, it always takes so long to do the right thing. All that does is prolong the agony for the victims. I suppose the people responsible for trying to make recompense feel that they will be out of the picture by the time their successors have to pick up the pieces, but it smacks of the contaminated blood scandal all over again. Everybody knew that it was a horrible disaster, yet it took so many years, indeed decades, before compensation was finally paid.
I want to give a voice to three of my constituents, who have summarised their experiences for me, and if time permits to refer to just a few of the dozen or so multifaceted written questions that I have tabled, with differing success in terms of replies, between July 2020 and November 2021. Let me first précis the summary that my constituent Amanda, or Mandy, has prepared for me. She had a procedure in 2009 for the insertion of TVT—transvaginal tape. She says that
“the surgeons need to take responsibility and ensure that these failings are not perpetuated. The pain and suffering we have endured and continue to endure is traumatic physically, emotionally, and financially”.
She says that she has subsequently had to undergo many surgical episodes that would have been unnecessary, and that
“had I been aware of the risks and the fact that alternatives were available I would not have had surgery in the first instance. Partial removal surgery made things significantly worse. To date I have had 8 operations relating to the TVT.”
Mandy lists some of the costs that it has meant for her:
“Left in ongoing chronic pain
Loss of some independence
No intimacy possible
Relationship with husband negatively impacted which has an impact on work as we run a business together
Negative impact on my family and friends. I used to be happy and cheerful person, but this is now a constant struggle
Emotional stress of trying to appear ‘normal’ takes its toll
Feeling of being a failure as a woman and in my work life”.
The list goes on. Then she comes to the topic of the failure of the surgeon. There are three entries here:
“Failure to discuss risks prior to surgery
Failure to suggest alternatives to TVT
Failure to obtain informed consent”.
On the financial loss, I will not quote from her list, because others have set out the cost to them, but Members can be sure that it applies to Mandy as well.
My second constituent Helen, or Ellie, had two implants, in 2009 and 2011. This is what she has to say about the effects of these unnecessary procedures:
“Mesh has restricted my ability to work full time, due to constant pain, which has impacted negatively on my family…Mesh has cost me financially to travel for hospital appointments out of area. I’ve had to travel to London three times, staying in a hotel twice. Travelling to Bristol 9 times, staying in a hotel 7 times, as I am not able to sit to drive home on the same day due to pain. So not only fuel costs but hotel fees as well…Mesh has impacted negatively as I was told one operation would fix me, so one day’s lost wages, which ultimately has resulted in 9 more operations, each requiring weeks off work, each resulting in loss of income and now ending with one more surgery which could also require more follow up surgeries.”
She says that mesh, as in the case of Mandy,
“has cost me my sex life”
for
“which there is no financial recompense”
and adds:
“Mesh has cost me the ability to care adequately for my disabled husband, who now has to try to care for me…Mesh costs me monthly for my pain medication.”
If time permits, I will refer to the brush-offs I have had when asking if Government would make it their policy to at least exempt these victims of NHS failure from prescription charges, with no success so far.
Helen goes on:
“Mesh costs me the price of a cleaner twice a week as I can no longer manage it all myself…Mesh costs me the pain of sitting in a car for over a two hundred mile round trip each time I go to see my consultant, as I can’t see my local butcher.”
That leads me on to something that has been hinted at before: it is all well and good to set up specialist mesh removal centres, but if the only choice people are given is to go to the surgeon who put the mesh in, who has now, after repeated failures, been appointed to take it out, would they seriously put themselves in his or her care again?
Finally, I want to talk about Emma, who is not only a victim of this herself, but someone for whom I am lost in admiration. She has acted, in a sense, as a focal point and a support for the other victims. Every so often she thanks me for what I have done to support them. I feel a complete fraud when she does that, because we should be thanking her for what she is doing as someone who is suffering from this and reaching out to support other victims. I know she is watching this debate on the feed today, and I express publicly my total admiration for her.
Emma says:
“Mesh has cost me my career. I am no longer able to fulfil the driving element of my job and have lost my Class 1 HGV licence as I cannot pass a medical…Mesh has cost me the ability to work at a desk, in an office, therefore restricting my earning potential, and in turn my pension contributions. It also restricts my ability to find alternative work…Mesh has cost me thousands of pounds in travel, subsistence, accommodation and parking…loss of earnings & annual leave…days off for appointments, surgery, recovery, and mesh-related ill health.”
That has all taken its toll. I could go on, but I will just pick one or two examples from the long list of the consequences of this disaster for Emma. She says:
“The battle to get any form of PIP was traumatic and stressful. The evidence was ignored, the condition insight report was not recognised (despite it being a DWP authored document).”
She goes on to say that PIP
“was only awarded (eventually) at an Independent Tribunal; which means I will have to reapply again, from the beginning, in just over 12 months’ time…All told, the entire situation is extremely draining mentally, emotionally and physically.”
Emma has also communicated with me while this debate has been under way, thanks to the wonders of modern technology, to point out that—as Southampton has been mentioned—there is, as yet, no named surgeon at University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust’s so-called specialist centre.
I conclude by saying that I have been disappointed with the series of responses I have had to my dozen questions, which are all easily accessible for anyone who cares to look on the written questions section of my website. I was most disappointed by the response to question 31274, from 12 July 2021, which asked, in part, what steps the Secretary of State
“plans to take to research new and improved techniques for removal of eroded surgical mesh implants; and if he will make it his policy to establish a unit for developing such techniques in order to train a new generation of mesh-removal specialists to treat people who experience the effects of failed mesh implants in the future.”
Bearing in mind what has been said about the intense difficulty of extracting degraded mesh from the flesh that has grown around it, I have often wondered whether there might be a technique to melt it away, rather than trying to extract it. However, if we do not do the research, we cannot possibly find a solution. The answer came, bluntly, from the then Minister of State, who is now the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport:
“There are no current studies specifically relating to new and improved techniques for the removal of eroded surgical mesh. However, there are five studies ongoing on surgical mesh implants and the National Institute for Health Research welcomes funding applications for research into any aspect of human health, including on the removal or implantation of vaginal mesh. There are currently no plans to establish a unit in order to train mesh removal specialists.”
We know that only a tiny handful of people have successfully specialised in this field. They ought to be empowered to train up a new generation to help these people, whose suffering will otherwise continue indefinitely.
Sarah Green (Chesham and Amersham) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I add my thanks to the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) for securing this debate.
I would like to highlight the excellent work of the Epilepsy Society on sodium valproate. The Epilepsy Society is based at Chalfont St Peter, in my constituency, and its “Safe Mum, Safe Baby” campaign calls on the Government to fund research into safer epilepsy medication for pregnant women. It is a necessary and worthwhile campaign and I support it wholeheartedly. I hope the Government will give it due consideration.
I also pay tribute to my constituent Carol Nunn, who has given me permission to share her experience of surgical mesh. I understand from the Government’s response to the Cumberlege report that their priority is to make medicines and devices safer and prevent future harm. While that is good to hear, I agree with the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell and others that maintaining this narrow focus entirely misses much of what is at the heart of the report, which is improving the lives of people who have already been harmed.
The Government have stated that supporting these women is one of their priorities. If that is the case, I do not understand why they repeatedly refuse to establish redress schemes. The Minister has claimed that there is no evidence that a redress scheme would improve the outcomes for these women. Respectfully, is the Minister really listening? Victims have lost jobs, endured relationship difficulties and financial stress and been left with chronic and often debilitating pain. They deserve redress.
I want to tell Members about Carol. When I first spoke to her last summer, she told me how, four years earlier, she had undergone a hysteropexy and rectopexy using surgical mesh. Instead of resolving her pelvic organ prolapse, the procedures left Carol with a serious autoimmune disease, struggling to walk and unable to continue with her normal daily life. She had to take long-term sick leave from her job as a medical doctor. She told me that she could not remember a day without pain.
I am pleased to say that today Carol is mesh-free following a successful removal surgery last year. She is the first person in England to have undergone successful rectal mesh removal. Although she is still suffering, Carol told me that she feels fortunate to have reached this outcome because, unlike many others, she was able to look outside the national health service and outside the United Kingdom. She feels fortunate because her professional training as a doctor gave her access to the knowledge and resources that allowed her to find Dr Veronikis—I apologise if I have pronounced that incorrectly—and fly out to the United States to have her mesh removed there. I am not convinced that anyone who has had to endure what Carol endured can be classified as fortunate, but I understand her point.
Having lost jobs and shouldered the financial burden of life-changing symptoms, others cannot afford to pay out thousands of pounds for private surgery or international travel to remedy harm that could and should have been avoided. That has now been acknowledged elsewhere in the UK. Last week, a Bill that will allow the Scottish Government to reimburse women who have had to pay for transvaginal mesh removal was passed in the Scottish Parliament. The Transvaginal Mesh Removal (Cost Reimbursement) (Scotland) Bill enjoyed cross-party support. I regret that it excludes the removal of mesh used in other parts of the body, but it is an excellent first step towards justice for mesh victims. I am pleased that patients north of the border now have access to support. I would like to be able to offer the same to my own constituents, which is why I urge the Government to look again at recommendations 3 and 4 of the Cumberlege report and to set up redress schemes.
I want to be clear: the mesh centres set up across the UK are, for many, inaccessible. For those, like Carol, who had rectopexy mesh, there is nowhere in the country offering removal without life-changing surgery involving the removal of organs. Carol, who is herself a doctor, described that type of surgery as barbaric. As has been mentioned, where removal is available the Government too often expect women to have the mesh removed by the same surgeon who inserted it. The choice facing victims is really no choice at all.
At the heart of the report is the recommendation that financial redress should be made available. In denying it, the Government completely miss the point of the report—the need to listen to victims. Baroness Cumberlege and her team met more than 700 affected individuals, mostly women, and found that they were not being listened to by medical professionals. Now they are not being listened to by their own Government. What is the point of commissioning a review if Ministers ignore one of its central findings? I hope the Minister and the Government will revisit the report’s recommendations and look again at offering financial redress, because ultimately it is the right thing to do.
Sir Mike Penning (Hemel Hempstead) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell.
Groundhog day—here we go again. This is almost the identical debate that we had before. If this was in the main Chamber, especially if it was not on a Thursday afternoon, the Chamber would be full, because there is not one constituency that does not have somebody affected by the three conditions. As the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green) said just a moment ago, what is the point of commissioning a report or having an inquiry and then ignoring the key components of its conclusions?
I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) on securing the debate. Sadly, I think we will end up having more. I am a loyal member of Her Majesty’s Government. I am absolutely aghast that we are here again discussing this. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), our former Prime Minister, for her support. The report would not be here today without her.
I congratulate Baroness Cumberlege, along with Marie Lyon, who ran the fantastic Primodos campaign. There was some worry about the experts that the baroness had around her, and we questioned her on those points to make sure that the inquiry was truly independent. At the start, the all-party parliamentary group was very sceptical because we had been let down by the expert working group. What an oxymoron that is! It is an insult to experts. Those on the group might be experts in their particular field, but they are not experts in people.
I want to talk in particular about Primodos. As several colleagues have said, very vulnerable women went to their GP for help, because they thought that they might be pregnant. They were myriad different ages, from myriad different parts of the country and certainly from different economic backgrounds. This touched everyone. They went to their GP and said, “I think I might be pregnant.” That GP, in an NHS GP’s surgery, pulled open a drawer, gave them some tablets and said, “This will tell you whether you are pregnant”—no advice, no concerns, no documentation.
These days, I have to take some medication and it is like “War and Peace” when I open the packet—even if I buy an aspirin. Although that is understandable, as aspirin can be very dangerous, so I will not use that example—perhaps ibuprofen or something. Clearly, that is because the industry, the pharmas, know that they have to cover themselves because they might be sued.
The side-effects for some of those ladies and their families and loved ones have been so traumatic. Some had miscarriages, some were told to abort the child and some went on to have children with abnormalities that were frightening then and today. The type of disabilities were similar to those of thalidomide, and one might have thought that we would have learned the lesson of thalidomide—tainted blood, as my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) alluded to earlier. But no—we have not learned those lessons.
Some people are alive today, but many have passed away. What is the Department waiting for? Is it, as with thalidomide, for these people to die early? That is why the fund for thalidomide ran out—the Department thought there was enough money in the fund, but people lived, because they have character and they survived, so we are about to top up the fund. These people, too, have lived, with unbelievable conditions. We, in Parliament and as a Government, surely should be here for them.
When the initial report of that expert working group was produced, many of us in the Chamber said that it was a complete whitewash. It was indeed a complete whitewash. The all-party parliamentary group had some evidence sessions with members of the working group, and I asked, “Who gave you the authority to change the ministerial guidance on what your report should look like?” They said, “Oh, we just thought that we would change it.” It was all about the evidential base—it was easier for them to come to the conclusions that they wanted to come to.
We said it was a whitewash, and the Government did the right thing: they got Baroness Cumberlege to look at the three areas—I apologise to the other groups, because I completely agree with everything that was said, as I have constituents in the same situations that have been mentioned. But what is the point of saying to these people, “Here’s the report by the baroness, and the Government accept some of it”?
I had the honour of being the Policing Minister when my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead was the Home Secretary. The Hillsborough inquiry report was difficult. Governments of all colours had previously rowed away from the issue, because in general they were probably frightened about the conclusions—the conclusions were frightening. However, we did the right thing and we honoured the report. That is absolutely what should have happened with this report.
The Government, though, are turning around to say to these families that I am talking about today, and to the families involved with the other two conditions: “If you don’t like what we are saying, sue us.” I have been told that we have to be slightly careful not to go too much into the legal side of this, but they have fought all their life to look after their loved ones and to say, “This is not on me.” They were worried about the ladies who took the tablets, but men—the fathers of these children—have been told, “This was probably genetic. That happens.” That does happen, but this happened because NHS doctors gave these tablets to patients in an NHS surgery and did not tell them the risks, even though they knew them. Back in 1967, Primodos was removed because of the risks, yet it was still available in 1978. I had been in the Army for four years in 1978; it was not that long ago. They knew the risks, but they continued.
People ask me why GPs were doing this. It was because drugs company salespeople were going into the GP surgeries and pushing their product at the doctors, promoting it so they could earn more and more money. We need pharmaceutical companies. Many of the medicines that we have today would not have been invented without pharmaceutical companies. However, when they get it wrong, we have to hold them to account. They got it wrong, and the Department of Health got it wrong, and thus Governments—it does not matter what colour they were; I do not care—got it wrong.
We touched earlier on why we are fighting this. I had the honour of serving in six or seven Departments—I lose track sometimes; it was three at one time, I think—and I was told lots of times by my officials that we needed to fight or challenge something. That happened lots of times at the Home Office; my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead is nodding away. I was the Disabilities Minister at the Department for Work and Pensions, and I asked why we were not settling with these people, because we had made a mistake. I was told that the Treasury counsel thought we might have a case, with about a 30% chance of success. Come on, guys.
At the end of the day, Governments are worried about saying, “Excuse me; we got it wrong and we are going to put it right.” The Government are going to put it right, we hope, but mistakes will still happen. That is the nature of medicine, I am afraid. But when we get it wrong, and doctors get it wrong, for once in their lives I wish they would just turn around and put their hands up. That is what I hear from my constituents in the complaints that come through my office; I am sure it is the same for all colleagues in this room. We see these reports and the amount of compensation that is to be paid, and they are challenged, and then eventually people get their money. There is something wrong.
I have sat in the Minister’s chair on more than one occasion and been bombarded, quite rightly at times. However, this is not about the Minister; it is about Government, and the structure of Government. Using the Minister as a conduit, this needs to go further, back up to the top and, at the end of the day, to the Treasury. The reason why people in government are so worried is because this could set a precedent. They are worried about whether it will cost the Treasury lots of money. Let us be honest: it will cost the Treasury lots of money, sometimes in ways that it is not even expecting. We have already talked about PIP and access to work. We could go on about the amount in benefits that this is costing Government anyhow. As well as that, the decent thing to do is to honour recommendation 4 of the Cumberlege report. It does not use the word “compensation” because Baroness Cumberlege was not allowed to use that; the terms of reference given to her were written to make sure that she could not. However, it says that this has been done to these people, we got it wrong, they trusted the Government and the Government have to compensate them.
I will say one final thing. The NHS is a wonderful organisation. Around the world, people look at our NHS and say, “We wish we had that. We wish we could do that.” This is damaging the NHS. This, tainted blood and thalidomide—we could go on about other things—are a danger. We rightly addressed tainted blood and thalidomide, thank goodness; the campaigning by the thalidomide action groups was absolutely phenomenal. This needs to be resolved before it damages the NHS even more. Colleagues will retire or leave. Some people—particularly those affected by Primodos—will pass away. But we will not go away. We will go on and on and on about it in this House until compensation—recommendation 4—is provided to our constituents, and that is the right thing to do.
[Sir Graham Brady in the Chair]
Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)
May I take the opportunity to thank the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) for securing this very important debate?
The Cumberlege report makes nine strategic recommendations, and I will speak later on recommendation 3—to establish an independent redress agency. Other hon. Members have spoken eloquently this afternoon on the devastating effects of vaginal mesh implants and the drug sodium valproate, but on behalf of my constituent Nan McGradie and other individuals and families tragically affected, I will highlight specifically the dreadful harm caused by the drug Primodos.
In January 1975 my constituent, Nan, was prescribed two Primodos tablets as a pregnancy test by her doctor. It was subsequently confirmed that at that time she was about seven or eight weeks pregnant. There is considerable evidence indicating that those women who took the drug, prescribed by their GPs, and were pregnant at the time gave birth to babies with serious birth defects, including deformities and disabilities, missing limbs, cleft palates, brain damage, and damage to internal organs. In some cases the women miscarried or had stillbirths.
At the time, in 1975, Primodos had already been banned for use as a pregnancy test for five years in Norway and Sweden. When my constituent’s daughter, Michelle, was born in August 1975, it was immediately discovered that she had a hole in her diaphragm, which had allowed her bowel and spleen, part of her liver and kidney to be forced into her chest cavity, crushing her lung. Michelle was not expected to live, but thanks to the skills of our NHS she survived and is now 46 years of age. Throughout her life, Michelle has endured numerous operations and surgeries and long, long periods of hospitalisation, has suffered severe health issues, including breathing difficulties, a weakened immune system, numerous bowel obstructions and inflammatory bowel infections, and has been unable to conceive children. The effects of those debilitating physical and psychological medical and extremely challenging health conditions suffered by Michelle for the last 46 years just cannot be adequately described in words.
Let me return to the recommendations in the Cumberlege report and specifically recommendation 3, which states:
“A new independent Redress Agency for those harmed by medicines and medical devices should be created based on models operating effectively in other countries. The Redress Agency will administer decisions using a non-adversarial process with determinations based on avoidable harm looking at systemic failings, rather than blaming individuals.”
The final Government response to it states:
“We do not accept this recommendation. We do not believe that a redress agency would make products safer and support our commitment to patient safety. We also believe it is already possible for government and others to provide redress where this is considered necessary, the government therefore has no plans to establish an independent redress agency.”
The decision by Government not to establish a new agency is callous and cruel and takes no account of the suffering or experience of the people who suffered as a result of a failure by successive Governments to protect them. It was the Government’s responsibility to protect people. The decision not to establish an agency has resulted in anger, frustration and great sadness for all, but especially those affected by the tragic consequences of vaginal mesh implants, sodium valproate and Primodos. Those feelings are perhaps best illustrated by direct quotes from those most affected by the Government failures. They include members of the patient reference group set up under the Cumberlege report. That was designed to be a forum for the Government to listen to the views of the people affected.
The people who took part in meetings of the patient reference group agreed that if the recommendation for an independent redress agency is not taken forward, those harmed by such medicines and medical devices, both in the future and in the past, will never get justice. They strongly rejected the notion that litigation was a viable substitution for a redress agency or as an acknowledgment that patients have suffered harm. Many people just do not know where to seek redress for harm, and many cannot access legal services, primarily because of the cost. It should be noted that many of the victims of such circumstances were women born in the 1950s. They have already been punished financially by the Government’s robbing them of their pensions.
On 24 June 2021, a Minister attended a meeting to listen to those on the patient reference group sharing their experiences of the harm that they suffered. The group also shared the harrowing and distressing experience of their families, which elicited only platitudes from that Minister. The group were advised that litigation was the right way to obtain redress, even though that Minister was fully aware of the cost implications of funding legal action against the Government, whose regulators were responsible for the avoidable harm to those families. The immediate response from that Minister regarding litigation confirmed that she obviously had not listened, as there was neither empathy nor acknowledgment of the dreadful effects suffered by the families.
The patient reference group also felt strongly about the high emotional strain of the few successful cases, and expressed anger about the trauma that individuals and their families are forced to go through to obtain sufficient finances to survive, especially when their daily lives have already been made difficult through no fault of their own. Many expressed anger and insult about public money being repeatedly mentioned as a barrier to redress, and used the term “guilt trip” in response. Many members of the group also felt patronised. Group members clarified that an independent redress agency would provide a place for harmed individuals to recoup the costs incurred by medical failings, and felt strongly that not having a redress agency is “a massive failing” by the Government.
The patient reference group was set up to gather and understand the views of the people most affected, but the Government have clearly not listened. Ministers advising litigation to obtain redress is a disgrace that shames this Government. They fail to accept, or even acknowledge, any moral responsibility for any failings. Immeasurable damage has been done to the individuals and families who have been failed by successive Governments’ lack of action and failure to prevent harm. The Government’s approach has been nothing less than reprehensible and a national disgrace. Setting up an independent redress agency is the right thing to do, and the Government should do it now, without any further delay.
Although the Cumberlege report is appropriately called “First do no harm”, the Government, medical bodies and pharmaceutical companies have not only done harm, but continue to do so by failing to address ongoing issues and the concerns of those affected. The Government now have the opportunity to right those tragic historic wrongs, and I urge them not only to implement the recommendation relating to an independent redress agency, but to implement in full and without further delay all the other outstanding recommendations in the Cumberlege report.
I pay tribute to Baroness Cumberlege and her team for producing the “First do no harm” report, and to Mrs Marie Lyon, the chair of the Association for Children Damaged by Hormone Pregnancy Tests and vice-chair of the patient reference group, for campaigning tirelessly for over 40 years for justice for the Primodos children and families. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi) for her exceptional support for the campaign, as chair of the APPG on hormone pregnancy tests, and to all others who have been involved in campaigning for justice, representation and support for those tragically affected by the consequences of vaginal mesh implants, sodium valproate and Primodos.
Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)
It is a huge pleasure to speak in this debate. I extend my congratulations to my right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) on opening the debate in an incredibly sensitive and thoughtful way. I hope that I can follow his lead and not get angry at the Minister. I do not blame her for this, and I know that she has a very real and personal commitment to the women’s health strategy, which we will see come forward in the spring—I was grilling special advisers on that only this morning. However, I urge her to listen carefully to the voices she has heard today, and to recognise that Members of Parliament speak up on behalf of their own constituents. We hear in our surgeries, week in and week out, about the issues that are affecting women and impacting their wellbeing and health. I urge her to ensure that those voices are listened to ahead of the final strategy being published.
We have heard it all today: sodium valproate; Primodos; mesh. I always hear “the victims of mesh”, and I absolutely regard them as that; they are victims of a surgical process that has left them in absolute agony. Each of us here this afternoon has a different perspective and interest. It is absolutely right that we all have highlighted the particular areas of concern to us.
Of course, I have victims of mesh living in my constituency. I also have a wonderful family whose daughter has been the victim of Primodos. Her story is one that always resonated with me, because she is exactly the same age as I am, and has been living with her disabilities since 1972. However, I really want to talk about sodium valproate. I do not know why that issue stuck with me so clearly, other than the fact that it was through the contribution of two amazing women—Emma Murphy and Janet Williams—who came to see me when I was a very newly-elected MP, and spoke to me about valproate. I am not an evangelist for banning the use of valproate—it is such an important drug, and has a valuable impact on those patients with epilepsy who need it to support them and manage their conditions well—but it is imperative to recognise that the dangers of valproate were known for many decades but not articulated to those women who were taking it and were of child-bearing age.
We have, for decades, had really effective pregnancy prevention programmes for various drugs. I always highlight—as my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning) pointed out, we have been here before—the use of Roaccutane, which I remember taking probably 30 years ago. I had to sign all sorts of bits of paper promising not to get pregnant. Then, when my daughter was prescribed it as an 11-year-old, she had to have a pregnancy test every single month— at 11—to demonstrate that she was not pregnant and that it was therefore safe to give her the drug. The same measures were not put in place for valproate.
Emma and Janet went digging around in archives; they have made endless freedom of information requests, and they have had their work recognised by the World Health Organisation. The pressure that they put on Members to convey the importance of a proper investigation to people like my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) brought forward the Cumberlege report, which was so valuable.
I will give a bit of a timeline: on 8 July 2020 that report was published; on 9 July, I was in the House for the oral statement on the Cumberlege report. I can remember my hon. Friend the Minister’s predecessor, the then Minister of State at the Department for Health and Social Care, my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Ms Dorries), actually giving us hope and confidence.
I listened to her, that day in the House, and thought that she had the tone of her response absolutely right. She promised to take away the issues that we were all raising. She promised to look at all of the recommendations that the Baroness had brought forward so competently and effectively. I had hope, as did the campaigning women from In-FACT, and the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), who is on the APPG. We all had hope that the recommendations would be accepted and acted on with speed.
Then, on 21 July 2021, a whole year later, rather than having an oral statement in the House, when we could ask the Minister what was going to happen, and what action was going to be taken on the recommendations, the Government snuck out a written ministerial statement on the last day before recess so we had no opportunity to bring forward the concerns that we had on so many of the recommendations either being rejected or only accepted in part. Those campaigners felt despair—not the hope that they had a year before, but despair.
The third date that I want to highlight—this is where I will provide some air cover to the Minister—is 15 September 2021. Rarely in a Member’s career does the opportunity come along to ask question No. 1 at Prime Minister’s questions, and on 15 September is was my turn. It will probably never happen to me again, so I carefully considered what issue to raise. We all have brilliant constituency issues that we want to raise or things that we have been campaigning on, and suddenly, in a Zoom call with Emma Murphy and Janet Williams, I went, “Do you know what? I have question No. 1 on Wednesday.”
I used my question to ask the Prime Minister about the specific issue facing the parents of children impacted by foetal valproate syndrome: their children have learning difficulties and additional needs. Some are born with spina bifida, a cleft palate, heart defects or limb malformations. They have all sorts of additional challenges, which are expensive. They need redress and specialist centres where their children can get the support they need, to lead as full a life as possible. Guess what? Their parents also need respite. They need be confident that their children are being properly looked after, cared for, supported and helped to counteract all the challenges they face, and they need a break, but they have been offered none of those things.
So, in September 2021 I asked my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister if he would recognise that there was an additional cost—a fiscal impact—on these families and if would he commit to making redress available. He responded by indicating that the Government was
“committed to making rapid progress”—
I emphasise the word rapid—
“in addressing all the areas that”
the Cumberlege report
“mentions, including the one that my right hon. Friend covered today.”—[Official Report, 15 September 2021; Vol. 700, c. 964.]
Yet we are still waiting for redress and for the specialist centres, and the families are waiting for an acknowledgment that they face additional costs, day in, day out, and they want help with them.
I want to ask a specific question of the Minister, which was provoked in my mind by my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), who sadly cannot be with us for the conclusion of this debate. He made the point about disability and the women who have had mesh implants whose ability to work is impacted forever. I remember being a Minister at the Department for Work and Pensions. We did a lot of work around people who had long-term conditions and whether they should have to go through the reassessment process.
This would be an excellent opportunity for my hon. Friend the Minister to outline to us what work she is doing with the DWP to ensure that these women can be included in that group, so that they do not have to go through endless reassessments time and again to establish whether they are still suffering pain from mesh. That is an important point, because that would give them a sense that we are making some sort of progress. That is my specific question for the Minister, which I hope she will be able to answer.
I will not take credit for my final, really important point, which should be given to my right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell, who passed me a note midway through the debate. We have to make sure that this stops. We must not continue to ignore the voices of women who say they had a procedure that has damaged them, but who are told it is a mental problem and it is all in their head. We cannot have a situation where people continue to be ignored, or where drugs come on to the market and are left in use and circulation for decades, before somebody recognises that there is a problem. If we go back to thalidomide and valproate, it was decades before people recognised that there was an issue.
The point was made earlier that the aircraft and airlines industry has a no-blame, no-consequence reporting system for errors, so that if someone finds something that is wrong, it will not come back on them in their career. As my right hon. Friend said, the career of the doctor who discovered the problem with Primodos was impacted by that discovery, for the rest of her career. We cannot have that situation. Just as the airline industry has a no-blame reporting system, can we also have that in our NHS, so that people have the confidence to report, knowing it will not come back upon them? Then we will not have medicines and devices that do harm, in the same way that we no longer have planes that simply drop out of the air.
Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Graham, and to follow the right hon. Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes). She summed up so well the concerns and the frustration that so many of us have. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke)—I call him that because we have worked so closely on so many of these issues. He spoke with such passion and in such detail about all these issues: about the impact on women and their families from mesh, from sodium valproate and from Primodos, which is what I will focus on while summing up the debate on behalf of the SNP.
My constituent Wilma Ord and her daughter Kirsteen were the very first constituents who came to see me after I was elected in 2015. I cannot believe that I am standing here today, alongside colleagues who were elected at various times, having challenged the Government and asked for action in 2015, in 2016, in 2017, and so on and so forth; for my part, I have been challenging them through three elections now.
As I said earlier, we have marched campaigners and victims to the top of the hill and put them through the trauma and frustration of the expert working group, which the right hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning) so poignantly discussed. I remember going over the road to the conference centre with the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi) to challenge the expert working group, which was essentially a whitewash and a big fat waste of public money.
We do not want the incredible work of Baroness Cumberlege to be another waste of public money, and it is clear that it is not. All her recommendations are so important. An article in The BMJ in 2020 highlighted that the Cumberlege review exposed
“stubborn and dangerous flaws in healthcare”
and a healthcare system that is
“disjointed, siloed, unresponsive, and defensive.”
We must recognise the incredible work that the NHS does, but where there are flaws and where harm has been done, that must be fixed. Some things have struck me in particular about culture and harm, the litigious nature that I think has developed within some elements of the Government, and the unwillingness just to accept when wrong has been done and to see the human cost of it. The human cost to my constituent Wilma Ord and her daughter Kirsteen is just incredible, as it is to campaigners such as Marie Lyon, who has been campaigning for 40 years. She has spent four decades dedicating her life to the campaign, but she has not seen any progress other than these reviews and reports. Those are very important, but she has not seen justice and she has not seen change.
Members from across the House have mentioned the Government’s statement that there is no need for a redress agency because they have the levers and the tools. This is somewhat of a tangent, and we know that such cases are very rare, but a constituent came to me recently about the impact on them of one of the covid vaccinations. I commend the Government for putting in place redress for those who have been impacted, but I found out recently from answers to my written questions that that system has not yet paid out anything to anybody. That is proof that while there may be good ideas, they are not being followed through. A redress agency is crucial to ensuring that we make improvements and that our constituents’ lives are not damaged and dogged by such profound issues.
My constituent Wilma Ord’s medical records have a gap between 27 November 1968 and 27 January 1971, but we know that she was pregnant because she gave birth to a baby, Kirsteen, who was born with cerebral palsy and suffers from deafness. Wilma is not alone among woman who were pregnant at the time in having suspiciously missing GP records. That is a mystery that many women have had to face, and I have seen written evidence to prove it. A document dated 13 March 1964 clearly states that GPs who were worried about adverse reactions would be best to destroy any evidence of records to protect themselves, and I quote, “however wrong” that may be. Schering, the drug company that is now Bayer, sought legal advice way back when it was told it would more than likely be found guilty of negligence by a trial judge.
Marie Lyon and others have had access to these documents, as has Baroness Cumberlege, who recommended that the families who suffered avoidable harm ought to be given redress because there is a strong ethical responsibility to do so. We have heard time and again from Members across the political spectrum how important that redress is. It is surely the first and last duty of a Government to look after their citizens and, where harm has been done, to find redress and do everything in their power to make sure that harm is not done in future.
My constituent Wilma Ord has often said to me that someone who did this or has the power to affect change should walk a day in her shoes, feeling and seeing what it is like for her daughter to be unable to live a normal life. She has had a job but was bullied for being different, and no efforts were made to accommodate her deafness. I would like to think that the world and our society has moved on significantly, but Wilma feels very strongly and has expressed to me directly that it was her fault. It is important that we send a clear message today to all the victims of sodium valproate, mesh and Primodos that it was not their fault and that they are not responsible.
The right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) spoke about the culture that still exists within healthcare today. It discriminates against women and makes them feel as if they are imagining things. It is literally gaslighting them. The wait for redress has gone on far too long. Members have spoken so passionately today, but how often are we going to have to debate these issues over and over again before the Government simply accept the recommendations and put them in place?
Mention has been made of the legislation passed in Scotland. The hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green) did not feel that it had gone quite far enough, but I hope that it has gone some way to redress. We have appointed a patient safety commissioner. We are also quite well on with our women’s health plan. I say this not to in any way bash the UK Government; we are doing very similar work. We might be a bit further ahead, but I hope that our Government and the UK Government can work together on this, because I think many learnings can be shared.
Members have said that it is not the Minister’s fault—that she is just doing her duty in delivering the lines of Government—but please listen to us. Please listen to our constituents’ concerns. Do not make them wait for more decades. Let us try to draw a line under a culture that puts the desires and views of lawyers before people’s lives. That is what we are talking about. My constituent and other victims of Primodos were used as human guinea pigs. That is not acceptable. We need to send them the strong message that we stand with them, but we need every Government across the UK to do everything they can to see redress and to see the Cumberlege report implemented in full, so that victims can be at peace and have the redress that they deserve.
Feryal Clark (Enfield North) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Graham. I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) for securing this important debate and for his continued campaigning on women’s issues. We have heard today harrowing accounts of women’s experiences. It is really important that we hear those accounts and that they are repeated over and again, because we need to remind ourselves that these are real human beings who have to live with this day in, day out. It is important that we record that in this House.
I thank right hon. and hon. Members for their powerful contributions to the debate. As a fairly new Member—I believe I am the newest Member in the Chamber—and having taken some time off for maternity, I have spent less time here than most Members present, so this is the first time that I am hearing about the progress that has been made on the Cumberlege review. It is really depressing to hear that we have not made much progress on the recommendations.
The pressing thread throughout the debate has been the patronising attitude to women’s voices, as was mentioned by the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), which continues. I take this opportunity to pay tribute to campaigners for their tireless work around the Cumberlege review—particularly the Association for Children Damaged by Hormone Pregnancy Tests, without which the review would have never taken place and we would not be here today.
We have heard that Baroness Cumberlege’s excellent review looked into the use of Primodos, the use of sodium valproate during pregnancy, and the use of pelvic mesh implants. Those medicines and medical devices have caused untold physical, developmental and emotional harm to tens of thousands of women. It is almost four years since the independent medicines and medical devices safety review was announced, but it is over 50 years since these treatments started to be used and, as has just been mentioned, women have been trying to get their voices heard for decades.
Sir Mike Penning
The hon. Lady may be new to the House, but she is doing very well in trying to understand the position. In the case of Primodos, that was not a drug that was going to cure anything; it was simply a tablet that told the person who took it whether they were pregnant. There were other methodologies around at the time that were deemed to be safe, but GPs continued to give out Primodos when they knew it was not safe. It is quite a clear, difficult thing: GPs were giving out a drug years after the relevant bodies said it should not be given.
Feryal Clark
I totally agree with the right hon. Gentleman. I am the mother of an eight-month-old, and during my pregnancy I trusted my GPs and everything they said. I was vulnerable, like all mothers, and I believed that they wanted the best for me. It is absolutely devastating that GPs knew the impact of these drugs yet continued to give them out to women. I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that contribution.
I have constituents in Enfield North who were impacted on by these medicines. My constituent Chris was given Primodos in June 1970 to find out whether she was pregnant. Her daughter Emma is now 51 years old and has suffered throughout her life from limb deformation, spinal problems, scoliosis, joint problems and mental health problems. She lives in chronic and intense pain that does not go away, and she can no longer work full time.
The review set out nine ways in which the Government could have delivered justice, made the lives of those affected—such as Chris and Emma—a little easier, and tried to prevent future incidents. Given the shocking accounts that we have heard today—accounts that the Government have been hearing for years—and the evidence in the review, one would have expected the recommendations to be accepted in full, but that is not the case. As we have heard, the Government have accepted four recommendations, but there are two that they have not accepted. They have accepted two other recommendations in part, and one in principle.
I am pleased that there has been an apology and that there is legislation for a patient safety commissioner. I am pleased that there are specialist centres for the care of those with complications from mesh implants, although I hope the Minister will address the serious concerns we have heard about that. I am also pleased about the changes to how doctors’ conflicts of interest are reported.
However, that is not why we are here today. Implementing those recommendations alone is not good enough. The Government have refused to establish a redress agency for those harmed by such medicines and medical devices, or to set up a separate scheme to meet the costs of providing additional care and support to those who have experienced avoidable harm, which would make a huge difference to families in meeting their exceptionally challenging needs every day. My constituent Emma worries about her ability to keep working and her financial stability. If a scheme were available to support her financially, she would not have to worry.
The Government claim to care about women’s health and making a change. Their vision for women’s health, announced in December, is
“to improve the way in which the health and care system listens to women, and to reset our approach to women’s health by placing women’s voices at the centre of this work.”
They then directly cited Baroness Cumberlege’s review, stating:
“Independent reports and inquiries—not least the report of the Independent Medicines and Medical Devices Safety Review…have found that it is often women whom the healthcare system fails to keep safe and to whom the system fails to listen.”
The Government accept the review and use it, but will not deliver on it. They will not truly listen to those who have been campaigning for justice for years and do right by the families. They will not take the opportunity to reset their approach to women’s health and place women’s voices at the centre of their work by implementing all the recommendations.
In November, I wrote to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to ask him to consider establishing a taskforce to implement all the recommendations of the review to put these injustices right. I am still waiting for a response. How can the Government claim that they are taking the review and women’s health seriously if they cannot even respond to a letter from a Member?
Will the Minister please commit to implementing the remaining recommendations? If not, will she explain how not implementing the full recommendations of the Cumberlege review changes anything, or helps to create a system that keeps women safe and listens to them? It is time for her to stand up for the families affected by Primodos, sodium valproate and surgical mesh, and for the Government to stand by their vision by implementing the recommendations in full. Otherwise, we will fail these families and these women again and again.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Maria Caulfield)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) on securing this important debate on Baroness Cumberlege’s review. I was not present for the debate six months ago, so I cannot comment on many of the points that were raised then, but I am keen to update hon. and right hon. Members across the Chamber on the progress that has been made, because I am passionate about improving outcomes for the affected women. Not only do I have a huge amount of respect for Baroness Cumberlege, with whom I am working extremely closely on the results of her report, but she is a constituent of mine. I assure hon. and right hon. Members that she is holding my feet to the fire on all her recommendations.
The findings of the review laid bare the consequences of a healthcare system that has failed to listen and has disregarded the experiences of women. We have heard that movingly in many of today’s contributions, and in many debates in the House, on issues such as painful hysteroscopies, the delay in diagnosis for endometriosis or polycystic ovary syndrome, or women being ignored for years while experiencing symptoms of the menopause. There is a running theme.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) is exactly right that women often call for change on these issues for many years before their voices are heard. That is why I am pleased that we have England’s first ever women’s health strategy; we set out the vision document before Christmas and we will set out the full strategy very soon. It includes the appointment of a women’s health ambassador, who will look specifically at the issues and priorities in the strategy. We are recruiting at the moment and should have someone in post very soon. That is to make sure that women’s voices are not just heard but acted upon, so that in years to come we are not in a position where women and the MPs representing them are saying, “We have spoken every six months, but the situation hasn’t changed.” I reassure colleagues that I take all these points very seriously.
Alan Brown
It is good to hear the Minister’s commitment to listening to women’s voices. Will she listen to these women and, in particular, her constituent Baroness Cumberlege about the need to provide redress for the women who have been harmed by these drugs?
Maria Caulfield
I will come to that point. The Government have apologised on behalf of the health and care sector for the time it took to listen and respond. We are doing more than apologising: we are changing the healthcare system so that it responds to women in a much better way.
As the hon. Gentleman has just raised the issue of redress, I will touch on it now. It is not just these cases where it is often difficult for patients to get redress and compensation. I gave evidence to the Health and Social Care Committee this week on the issue of clinical negligence. This week, we announced a fixed recoverable costs scheme, meaning that, for low-value claims, we can speed up the claims process, reduce legal costs and ensure that, whatever clinical negligence they have experienced, patients are able to get compensation as quickly as possible. The findings of the Cumberlege report highlight mesh, Primodos and sodium valproate. However, across the board, it is very difficult for patients to get redress, regardless of the clinical negligence they have suffered.
Caroline Nokes
I do not want to be too difficult, but I do not think it is any excuse to say that because it is difficult for everyone to get compensation, we should not try here.
Maria Caulfield
I want to reassure my right hon. Friend that changes have already been made. When women were experiencing these problems, particularly with sodium valproate, compensation was mainly run by NHS trusts and individual organisations, which was very difficult and cumbersome.
We have introduced the duty of candour, which a number of Members have raised this afternoon. That duty means that when a mistake happens, hospital trusts and GPs have to be up front, own that mistake and explain it to patients. Very often, women did not realise that the problem was the sodium valproate or the Primodos; they thought something else had happened. The duty of candour means that hospital trusts and GPs are up front, that that apologise and that the process of redress is started as soon as possible.
Now that NHS Resolution has been set up, the process is as easy as possible for anyone with a claim of clinical negligence to come forward. As a result of the new system, between 70% and 80% of claims—I will correct the record if I am wrong—are now settled out of court, which is quicker and helps patients get the compensation they need. They have a fundamental right to that if clinical negligence has happened.
Alec Shelbrooke
I am listening closely to what my hon. Friend is saying. Is that data independently audited, and will it be made available? The reality on the ground is that although these things are in place, there are plenty of examples of people who feel that that is not the case, and that doctors and professionals are carrying on doing the same thing and not feeding back in. I welcome what she has said, but could an auditable trail be published to show what is happening and those who perhaps are not taking any notice?
Maria Caulfield
There are absolutely processes in place, including bodies such as the Care Quality Commission, which audit and inspect to ensure that the processes that have to be in place are being used. NHS Resolution is clear about the work it does, and its chief executive also gave evidence to the Select Committee this week on how the process should work. Of course, if patients feel that it is not working for them, we need to hear about it. We set up these mechanisms specifically to make compensation easy, quick and representative of the needs of those who are claiming, to make sure that they get the compensation they need as quickly as possible. That has not happened in the past; we fully acknowledge that.
The Secretary of State will announce a consultation on wider reforms to clinical negligence very soon, because we recognise that the system has not worked for people. It has been too bureaucratic, and the legal position and fear of going to court has put many people off. It does not need to be like that. We want to make it as easy as possible for people, whatever their clinical negligence claim.
Mrs May
I want to press the Minister. I apologise about that, but she will recognise from the debate that there is real concern about this. I have concerns about NHS Resolution and the way it operates. There are systems elsewhere, in countries such as Australia and Canada, where, at a very early stage, an independent medical expert, who is completely separate from the institution where the negligence has taken place, is brought in, and there is much more of a sense of no-fault compensation and of not needing to go to litigation. NHS Resolution gets involved in litigation, and it can take many years before that is resolved.
Maria Caulfield
Yes, absolutely. Part of the consultation we will announce shortly will look at international comparisons. One concern we have about some of the no-fault schemes is the caps on the amount of compensation that can be given. I think some countries have a £1 million cap. I am not an expert on how much compensation these ladies should be due, but we want to make sure that, if we set up systems like that—we are not closed to those ideas—they actually address the issues that these specific women face. We will look at those options in the round.
Sir Mike Penning
May I press the Minister and draw her back to the Cumberlege report? What she is talking about going forward sounds really good, and the proof will be in the pudding, as my grandmother would have said. But recommendation 4 of Baroness Cumberlege’s report for the Government talks about—this is my word—compensation. That is so important because, as we heard, some of these people have been caring for their loved ones for the last 50 years. They are not going to be here forever, and they feel enormously vulnerable that their loved ones, who they have looked after for all that time, will be left without their needs being met.
This is not all about the ladies who, for instance, took Primodos tablets. It is about the outcomes—in order words, their children, who are living with this today. We quite rightly concentrate when talking about sodium valproate, mesh and Primodos on what happened at the time, but the consequences of that are these people who are now in their mid-50s and 60s. What will happen to them? They will fall back on the state for PIP and other benefits when actually, recommendation 4 says in black and white that the Government should have sorted it out.
Maria Caulfield
I thank my right hon. Friend for making that point. Compensation can be claimed now. Our concern about setting up a specific body to oversee that is that that would not address the fundamental problem of why it is difficult to get compensation. However, it is a fundamental right of anyone who believes they suffered from clinical negligence to seek compensation, and we actively encourage that.
Liz Twist
This is really important. These people we have been talking about all afternoon are, as the right hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning) said, living with the consequences of those actions. Baroness Cumberlege is absolutely clear about setting up a redress agency to
“administer decisions using a non-adversarial process with determinations based on avoidable harm looking at systemic failings, rather than blaming individuals.”
Recommendation 4 is that:
“Separate schemes should be set up for each intervention…to meet the cost of providing additional care and support to those who have experienced avoidable harm and are eligible to claim.”
Going to the law is not an answer for these people. It is difficult, it causes anxiety and it is expensive. We need real action now to address the problem.
Maria Caulfield
I take the hon. Lady’s point, but the vast majority of claims that come through NHS Resolution are settled out of court. We want to make sure that patients get the redress that they are entitled to. There are mechanisms other than going to court in place right now.
Sarah Green
My constituent has approached several legal firms who will not take on her case because the two surgeons who operated on her also work for the law firms advising them on whether such cases will be successful, so that option is not open to her.
Maria Caulfield
If the hon. Lady writes to me about that specific case, I am happy to look at it.
The Government published their response to the review in July last year and accepted the majority of the recommendations for improvement. I want to update Members on those because we are absolutely committed to making rapid progress in all the areas in our response. We have committed to publishing an update on the progress of all the recommendations that we accepted, and we aim to publish that in the summer. If colleagues want to hold my feet to the fire, they will certainly get a formal update in the summer.
We have made strong progress on some of the changes.
Sir Mike Penning
It is fortunate that we have so much time because we can ask lots of questions. Marie Lyon, the Primodos campaigner, has effectively been told by the Minister’s predecessor, “See you in court”. I do not know about the experiences of the other conditions, but the Primodos campaigners do not have money. They have the will, but they are completely exhausted. They pinned all their hopes on the Government accepting the report’s recommendations. These people will not get a no win, no fee arrangement or a pro bono. They will have to try to fundraise, and they will, but is that morally right when the baroness’s report and its recommendations, published by the Government, say that they should not have to go through that?
Maria Caulfield
Specifically on Primodos, there is pending litigation so it is difficult for me to comment while that is in progress, but, depending on the outcome, the Government will respond to that.
Caroline Nokes
I will go for valproate, because there is not pending legislation about that. Have I understood the Minister correctly? Is she saying that if the Primodos case is successful, the Government will review it, and the women who have had mesh implants or who are the victims of sodium valproate will not be expected to have to go down that legal route?
Maria Caulfield
If I touch on the points in my response, hopefully I will be able to reassure colleagues on the progress being made.
Alan Brown
The point is that Baroness Cumberlege says the Government have an ethical duty to consider redress, so what does the Minister say to her constituents about that ethical duty that should be placed on the Government?
Maria Caulfield
I have addressed the points about redress, which is available. We are reforming the process of clinical negligence to make it easier for patients to get compensation without the need to go to court, and we are having some success in that. There is a very different system in place now compared with when many of these ladies were affected.
The patient safety commissioner was mentioned by some colleagues. The consultation proposed details for setting up the commissioner’s role. Baroness Cumberlege is on the recruitment panel for that position and will keep a close eye on the role of the commissioner. The advert and recruitment process is now up and running, and we expect to appoint someone very soon. I reassure colleagues that that appointment will be in place: the recruitment process has started, Baroness Cumberlege is on the panel to appoint the commissioner, and that commissioner will be independent—a point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead—of the Department of Health and Social Care, which will of course work closely with them. The commissioner will be able to scrutinise both the NHS and the Department itself.
On recommendation 5, about specialist mesh services, eight specialist centres are now operating in England, where women who have been affected by mesh implants can access treatment and mesh removal. A ninth is being set up in Bristol at the moment. I remain very open to colleagues’ experience of those mesh services. Women have the option to choose which centre they go to, but I recognise that that might involve great distances from where they live.
If women are not being referred to the centres, however, or if their experience of the centres is that their needs are not being met, I am keen to hear about that, because the whole point of setting the centres up was to ensure help for those women who have experienced mesh implants that have caused huge trauma—I take on board everyone’s points—to them, changing their lives and that of their families forever. If that is not working, the women’s health ambassador, the patient safety commissioner and I will look at that, because that was the whole point of setting up such services.
Maria Caulfield
Valproate should not be being used on women or girls able to have children, unless they have a pregnancy prevention programme in place. That is to ensure that patients are fully aware, if they need to take sodium valproate, of the effect on any potential pregnancy. The NHS also commissioned the paediatric neurosciences clinical reference group to support the development of pathways for care services, specifically to improve patient support and co-ordination on the pathway for sodium valproate.
Mechanisms are therefore being set up for those women and girls who need to take sodium valproate. I think my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) pointed out that, in other settings, a huge amount of work is done to ensure that those women do not get pregnant. Also, a multidisciplinary expert group with experience in responding to exposure has been established. It will report its recommendations to NHS England in March this year. We will follow up on those recommendations, but a piece of work is being done specifically on sodium valproate, which will help to prevent such problems in the future.
Recommendation 6 was on MHRA reform. The review highlighted the need for the regulatory agency to undergo substantial revision, in particular on adverse event reporting and patient engagement. As many Members said, instances were flagged many times by many different people—the women themselves, MPs in this place, charities and other bodies—but people did not listen, although the MHRA has a duty to do so.
The MHRA has now initiated a substantial programme of work to improve how it listens and responds to patients and the public, developing a much more responsive system for adverse event reporting and supporting timely and robust decisions involving patient safety. It has been consulting on a new regime for medical devices that makes patient safety, engagement and transparency more prominent.
To strengthen its commitment to patient engagement, the MHRA recently established an enhanced customer service centre to make it easier for patients to express concerns, whether about medicine or devices that are being used. The MHRA has also appointed a chief safety officer, Dr Alison Cave, who will lead its ongoing commitment to the recommendations.
On setting up a database to collect details of all implantations of devices, which is recommendation 7, we have already legislated for that through the Medicines and Medical Devices Act 2021. The Act created a power for the Secretary of State to regulate for the establishment of a UK-wide medical device information system. Alongside developing those regulations, more than £11 million has been set aside for the work, involving partners across the healthcare system to scope, test and cost options for that workstream.
On transparency for payments, which I think was raised by the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green), who spoke about the conflicts of interest between doctors and pharmaceutical companies or providers of surgical mesh, recommendation 8a highlights the need for greater transparency for payments made to doctors. The recommendation calls for a register of doctors’ interests and for recognised and accredited specialisms to be held by the General Medical Council.
As the Government set out in our response to the review, we agree that lists of doctors’ interests should be publicly available. We continue to hold the view that that information will be most accessible to patients if it is published by healthcare providers rather than by the GMC. We are taking that measure forward and it should be in place by July this year.
We are also working with professional healthcare regulators to be clear that all regulated health professionals—not just doctors—must declare their interests, and that that information must be published by their employers. That approach will give not just women but all patients the reassurance that there are no interests involved in clinical decisions made about their care. We are working with the Care Quality Commission and equivalent organisations, and with the devolved Administrations, to ensure that implementation is monitored and that there is local accountability.
Recommendation 8b touches on the mandatory reporting of the industry. It calls for the pharmaceutical and medical devices industries to establish payments made to teaching hospitals, research institutions and individual clinicians. On 24 January this year—just a few days ago—an amendment to the Health and Care Bill was tabled to give the Government the power to deliver on that important recommendation. That legislation will, I hope, come into law fairly soon. The amendment will enable the Secretary of State to make regulations requiring companies to report information about their payments to the healthcare sector. That measure will benefit patients, who will see payments made to their doctors or hospitals, and it will build on proactive initiatives by healthcare regulators and the industry.
I very much take on board Members’ feeling that it took too long to acknowledge the problems that those women have faced, whether because of mesh implants, sodium valproate or Primodos. Although this may not be of any reassurance for women who have already been affected, we now have measures in place to flag problems in the system. For maternity care and clinical negligence, for example, we have an early notification system so patterns of events around neonatal care and foetal abnormalities are picked up at an earlier stage, to get on top of the causes quickly. We are seeing improvements in maternal and neonatal outcomes as a result of that early warning notification system
We very much recognise that such problems did happen in the past, but measures are being put in place to make sure that they do not happen in the future. I certainly want to make sure that the women affected are getting the care and support that they need. I very much take on board the points raised by hon. Members. I am very happy to keep Members updated on progress. I meet Baroness Cumberlege regularly to address the issues raised in her report.
I reassure colleagues that many of these issues will feature in the women’s health strategy, which we will publish shortly. The women’s health ambassador, the patient safety commissioner and I will be working hand in glove to make sure that women’s voices are heard in relation to their healthcare, and that we end the pattern of women feeling that they are not being listened to, that they are palmed off, and that their concerns are not taken seriously.
Hannah Bardell
Does the Minister recognise that this is not only about compensation, but about exposing the failures so that they never happen again? Eighteen members of the Primodos support group have died in the past two years. That gives an idea of just how long people have waited. They should not have to wait any longer. Those who have died will never see justice.
Maria Caulfield
I absolutely take that point—that is the crux of the matter. For too long in the health service, there was no duty of candour. The health service did not acknowledge when mistakes were made. That is changing; there is now a duty to declare when a mistake has happened. There is also support for staff. I cannot remember who mentioned the whistleblower on Primodos, but there is protection for whistleblowers now. There are freedom to speak up guardians to support whistleblowers in the workplace, and the Care Quality Commission is happy to take notification from patients and staff if there are worries about unsafe patient care. That will trigger an unannounced inspection to look at the data. It is all about creating a culture of learning in the NHS, rather than one of blame that pits patients against clinicians—that is what we want to change. That is how we learn from the mistakes of the past and prevent mistakes in the future.
Alan Brown
I thank the Minister for taking one more intervention. She talks about blame and not pitting patients against doctors or the NHS. Is that not the whole point of the redress agency that was recommended, to take away that adversarial approach?
Maria Caulfield
That is why we introduced NHS Resolution to facilitate a quicker method of getting compensation to those who have been harmed through clinical negligence. I encourage hon. Members to look at the work of NHS Resolution. We are doing more to ensure a better experience for patients, but we are fundamentally committed to ensuring that those who have been harmed get the support they need.
Sir Mike Penning
The Primodos victims—I am not allowed to talk about the court case—have had no choice. They are in court now because the Government would not take on Cumberlege recommendation 4. It is all well and good talking about what will happen in the future, but they are living with this now. They are in court today. Surely the Government should settle with them now. Like the Minister has said several times, these things get settled out of court. Well, settle with Primodos victims now and they will not have to go through that.
Maria Caulfield
I cannot speak on active litigation claims, but between 70% to 80% of claims are settled out of court because that is the avenue we want to go down. It is not in anyone’s interest to go to court. I am happy to keep hon. Members updated. There will be a formal review in the summer, but I am happy to have my feet held to the fire to ensure we deliver on the Cumberlege review for those patients who have suffered.
Alec Shelbrooke
I thank all hon. Members who have contributed this afternoon. Even though many Members have given me apologies for not being able to be present, we have covered the wide-ranging aspects of the review concerning Primodos, sodium valproate and mesh. I thank and congratulate the Minister, who showed in her response that she understands her brief. I will come on to some of the issues we disagree on, but she did not just read out what has been written for her. She has taken the issue seriously and has taken the debate on board. That is a refreshing change from her predecessor.
Let me move on to some of the specific comments. I welcome the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green), with whom I have not had the privilege of being in a debate before. She made an important point when she said that we need to listen to victims. That is the point of the report: the need to listen to victims. We have to be very careful about how we proceed. The report was trusted because the victims felt that they were finally and properly listened to. That is why it matters so much.
Let us be blunt: it does not matter which side we are on, we in this place are all getting a bit of a bad press at the moment. The report is an opportunity to show people that they can have faith in this place and trust it. When we go out, listen to victims, take their views on board and, as a Parliament, say, “The adversarial side of politics can be parked over there, because on these really important issues, we all get together and we can make things happen,” we can do things. I thank the Minister for the progress that she is making on the recommendations, and for giving us the update.
The hon. Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) gave us a shocking revelation. Records were destroyed, rather than people admitting the mistakes that had been made. That is why redress, the databases and all the other things that we want to introduce are so important.
We come back to this point. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes) for her reference to the analogy I gave her about the aircraft industry. The Minister used the word “whistleblower”, and that is the wrong word. We are talking about cultural change, and it follows on from what the hon. Member for Livingston and my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North said. We have to develop a culture in which it is natural for anybody working in a system to feed in, “This is going wrong” or “There has been some evidence of this.” There should be no blame for anybody and no comeback for their careers.
I am a great fan of the TV programme “Air Crash Investigation”—my wife cannot watch it—especially as I spend my life in the air. It is absolutely clear when people watch that programme how the airline industry is now at a point at which it is really unusual for a plane to drop out of the air, because of the no-blame culture. If somebody leaves a spanner somewhere, that gets reported. The tiniest things are reported, which is how that industry’s safety has improved.
Sir Graham Brady (in the Chair)
Order. I am terribly sorry to interrupt the right hon. Lady, but we cannot have interventions during what should be a very brief winding-up speech.
Alec Shelbrooke
Thank you, Sir Graham. The most important point that I want the Minister to take away today is the following. I do not want compensation for people; it is not compensation that I am seeking. I want there to be grants, like the thalidomide grant. People will be subject to these injuries for life, and compensation is not going to cover it. We have a responsibility to deal with the problem, so I hope that my hon. Friend takes that away today. I say this to the Minister: we will keep coming back and keep coming back, and eventually there will be a votable motion on the subject on the Floor of the House and I do not think it will be able to be whipped.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the matter of implementation of the recommendations of the Cumberlege Report.
Written Statements
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Ebbsfleet Garden City: Update
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Minister for Housing (Christopher Pincher)
I am today laying a departmental minute to advise that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has received approval from Her Majesty’s Treasury for a remote contingent liability for the Department arising from Ebbsfleet Development Corporation’s investment in the Ebbsfleet central site.
As part of the 2014 Budget, the Government announced plans to create a new garden city—the first in over a century—at Ebbsfleet, north Kent. The Government also established the Ebbsfleet Development Corporation, a statutory body that reports to the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, to bring forward the development of the garden city.
The Ebbsfleet garden city will help provide new homes and support wider economic growth across the Thames estuary.
The departmental minute describes the remote contingent liability DLUHC will incur in relation to EDC entering into an indemnity with HS1 Ltd. The remote contingent liability will remain for the short time that the works will be ongoing and will cease to exist once the occupiers of the land have signed off the works.
The Department will fund any expenditure should any claims be brought forward against EDC, through the normal supply procedure.
[HCWS581]
Elections
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Eddie Hughes)
The Elections Bill brings forward changes to our electoral system which are vital to ensure our democracy remains secure, fair, modern and transparent, and I am pleased to update Parliament today with further information on the implementation of two key changes, the extension of the franchise for British citizens living overseas, and the introduction of an online application service and identity verification for absent votes. In addition, today the Government are providing their response to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee’s report on the Elections Bill to the Committee.
Overseas electors policy statement
The Government’s 2019 manifesto included a commitment to “make it easier for British expats to vote in [UK] parliamentary elections, and get rid of the arbitrary 15-year limit on their voting rights”.
Through the Elections Bill, the Government are extending the franchise for UK parliamentary elections to all British citizens living overseas who have been previously registered to vote or previously resident in the UK. In addition to extending the franchise, the changes will facilitate participation by making it easier for overseas electors to remain on the register with an absent vote arrangement in place ahead of elections.
The Bill, and the secondary legislation which will flow from it, will also deliver improvements and consequential amendments to the registration process for overseas electors, including the processes by which applicants have their identity and connection to their relevant previous UK address verified.
To provide further information on these proposals, I am today publishing a policy statement setting out the key changes in the Elections Bill, as well as the Government’s intention for associated secondary legislation, which will set out further requirements regarding how those changes will work in practice.
The approach we are proposing to take is subject to ongoing engagement with stakeholders and, ultimately, will be subject to parliamentary scrutiny.
Identity verification for absent vote applications and an online application service policy statement
As set out in my statement to the House on 6 January (HCWS525), a measure to introduce an identity verification for absent vote applications and an online application service was introduced to the Bill via Government amendment at Report stage of the House of Commons. I am therefore pleased to be also publishing a policy statement on these measures to outline further information on the Government’s plans for how the policy will operate in practice.
Digitising the absent vote application process will also benefit overseas electors who typically vote by post or proxy, and will complement the Bill measures that remove the current 15 year limit on the voting rights of overseas electors.
It is our expectation that all the measures in the Elections Bill will be in place within the lifetime of this Parliament and implementation will be staged over a sensible and pragmatic timetable; it is imperative that this is done properly and with sufficient time for the elections sector and for voters to prepare for the new requirements. It is our ambition for rollout of the changes for overseas electors and the new online application service for absent votes to take place in parallel, alongside changes to the arrangements for renewals of absent vote applications, thereby improving efficiency of the system for both electors and administrators.
PACAC response
On Monday 13 December, the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC) released a report on the Elections Bill. Today the Government are providing its response to the report.
The associated policy statements have been placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
[HCWS584]
Commission for Racial Equality Pension and Life Assurance Scheme
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Steve Barclay)
It is normal practice, when a Government Department proposes to undertake a contingent liability in excess of £300,000 for which there is no specific statutory authority, for the Minister concerned to present a departmental minute to Parliament giving particulars of the liability created and explaining the circumstances.
I wish to notify Parliament of a contingent liability that the Government have entered into in the form of an indemnity connected to the winding-up of a pension scheme managed by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, an arm’s length body which is sponsored by the Cabinet Office.
The EHRC is the successor body to several anti-discrimination bodies that were dissolved by the Equality Act 2006. One such body was the Commission for Racial Equality, which set up a pension and life assurance scheme—CREPLAS—in 1974.
The winding-up process is now nearly complete. The scheme has surplus assets of c. £7.4 million, and when winding-up is fully completed the trustees will refund the surplus, net of tax, to the Treasury via the EHRC.
The Treasury granted the CREPLAS trustees two lines of protection in the form of (a) post-wind-up indemnity against future claims and (b) the power to purchase private insurance. The Treasury is satisfied that its handling of this unusual case should not set a precedent for other existing or future cases both within Government or for other public sector bodies.
The residual risk borne by EHRC/Treasury under the proposed indemnity has been estimated at under £3 million, and is acceptable to the Treasury. In relation to this, I have today laid before Parliament a departmental minute giving notice of the Department incurring this contingent liability.
The contingent liability will in due course be included in departmental and ALB annual reports and accounts.
[HCWS580]
Capital Spending
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Mr Robin Walker)
Today, my noble Friend The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the School System (Baroness Barran) made the following statement:
Today, we have published the Government’s response to the consultation on prioritising remaining places in the school rebuilding programme. We have also published guidance on how schools can be nominated for the next prioritisation round, which also opened today.
The school rebuilding programme was announced by the Prime Minister in June 2020. We have already announced the first 100 schools to benefit from the programme as part of a commitment to rebuild or refurbish the poorest condition buildings at 500 schools over the next decade. Replacing poor condition buildings with modern designs that will be net zero carbon in operation will transform education for hundreds of thousands of pupils.
The first projects in the programme are now under construction, and the finished buildings will bring pride to the students, staff and communities who use them. The programme also represents a close partnership with the construction sector, enabling us to invest in skills, drive growth and build back better as we recover from the covid-19 pandemic.
We will continue to make the best use of remaining places in the programme by prioritising schools with buildings in the poorest condition, or with significant issues that could pose a risk of closure.
In its consultation, the Department proposed an approach to assessing nominated schools using consistent, national data on school condition. Bodies responsible for school buildings would also be able to submit additional professional evidence of severe need, such as structural issues. The majority of consultation respondents agreed with these proposals.
The approach we are putting in place for selecting schools will, for the first time in this programme, allow academy trusts, local authorities and other bodies responsible for school buildings to put forward schools for consideration in a straightforward way that minimises burdens on the school sector. This approach also harnesses local insight into the schools with greatest need and maximises value to the taxpayer.
In addition to our building programmes, we also support the school sector with annual capital funding. We have allocated £11.3 billion to improve the condition of the school estate since 2015, including £1.8 billion in financial year 2021-22. Allocations for 2022-23 will be set out in due course.
Further details, including guidance on how schools can be nominated in the upcoming prioritisation round, have been published on gov.uk. Copies of the consultation response and Equalities Impact Assessment will be placed in the House Library.
[HCWS583]
International Teacher Training Qualification
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Mr Robin Walker)
The Department for Education has today confirmed who will pilot a new international teaching qualification called iQTS. The new qualification will support those who already deliver excellent teacher training in England to meet global demand for high quality professional development and provide more opportunities for teachers around the world to train to high standards. Six providers have been approved to deliver the pilot from September 2022. The selected pilot providers are available at: Introducing the international qualified teacher status (iQTS) pilot - gov.uk (www.gov.uk)'>www.gov.uk)
In February 2021, the Department for Education and Department for International Trade published an updated International Education Strategy, where it was announced that the Government would consult on plans for a new international teaching qualification.
The consultation set out the proposed framework for iQTS, built around methods and standards of English initial teacher training, with contextualisation to reflect the local setting in which the qualification would be delivered.
The proposals for iQTS received significant support and in August 2021 the Government response was published, announcing the intention to launch iQTS with a pilot in 2022. The response is available at: Introducing international qualified teacher status (iQTS) - gov.uk (www.gov.uk)'>www.gov.uk)
In November 2021, the Department for Education published guidance on iQTS, available at: Introducing the international qualified teacher status (iQTS) pilot - gov.uk (www.gov.uk)'>www.gov.uk). This set out further detail around the iQTS framework, criteria and pilot for institutions and trainees. Pilot providers will use this guidance to deliver robust iQTS programmes from September 2022. The guidance on gov.uk confirmed:
iQTS will be recognised by the Department for Education as equivalent to English qualified teacher status (QTS), subject to the will of the Parliament, and delivered in English.
Only accredited English ITT providers will be able to offer iQTS.
All of the English Teachers’ Standards will be included for iQTS, with guidance for how to apply them in different international contexts.
The core content framework will be used in its entirety, with guidance for international application.
The entry criteria will remain aligned with domestic requirements for ITT courses.
Six pilot providers have been approved to deliver the iQTS pilot from September 2022. This follows the completion of an exercise where accredited English initial teacher training providers were invited to apply to join a year-long pilot to test and improve the design and delivery of the iQTS qualification.
[HCWS582]
Levelling Up Missions: Education and Skills
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Minister for School Standards (Mr Robin Walker)
I have announced a number of new education and skills reforms which support delivery of two of the Government’s 12 levelling up missions which can be found in full on gov.uk.
The missions that the Department for Education will lead are:
Education: By 2030, the number of primary school children achieving the expected standard in reading, writing and maths will have significantly increased. In England, this will mean 90% of children will achieve the expected standard, and the percentage of children meeting the expected standard in the worst performing areas will have increased by over a third.
Skills: By 2030, the number of people successfully completing high quality skills training will have significantly increased in every area of the UK. In England, this will lead to 200,000 more people successfully completing high quality skills training annually, driven by 80,000 more people completing courses in the lowest skilled areas.
Plans to deliver our ambitious education mission will be underpinned by proposals for 55 new education investment areas that will target investment, support and action that help children from all backgrounds and areas to succeed at the very highest levels. Education investment areas will cover the third of local authorities in England where educational attainment is currently weakest, plus any additional local authorities that contain either an existing opportunity area or were previously identified as having the highest potential for rapid improvement. A list of all 55 education investment areas can be found on gov.uk.
We will also open new free schools where they are most needed and prioritise education investment areas in doing so. This will include new specialist sixth-form free schools, helping ensure talented children from disadvantaged backgrounds have access to the highest standard of education this country offers.
The UK Government will create a transformative new online UK National Academy. It will support pupils from all backgrounds and areas to succeed at the very highest levels. This support will be made available across the UK.
I am announcing a joint project to be launched between DfE and the Food Standards Agency to design and test a new approach for local authorities in assuring and supporting compliance with school food standards. The UK Government will promote accountability and transparency of school food arrangements by encouraging schools to complete a statement on their school websites, which sets out their whole school approach to food.
In addition, the UK Government will invest up to £5 million to launch a school cooking revolution, including the development of brand new content for the curriculum and providing bursaries for teacher training and leadership and training for governors and trusts.
To make our skills mission a reality, thousands more adults will soon be able access free, flexible training and get the skills they need to secure careers in sectors including green, digital and construction as part of up to an additional £550 million boost to expand the popular across the country.
To better understand the skills gaps, I am establishing a new future skills unit which will look at the data and evidence of where skills gaps exist and in what industries. Furthermore, we are working with the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education to roll out higher technical qualifications from September 2022, which have been approved against employer-led standards as providing learners with the knowledge, skills and behaviours required for a given occupation.
Employers must be at the heart of reforming local skills infrastructure. To realise this, the 2021-22 skills accelerator is piloting new employer-led local skills improvement plans and supporting providers with strategic development funding to help shape technical skills provision to better meet labour market needs.
So that in future we can achieve greater alignment to the delivery of employment and skills interventions, in Blackpool, Walsall and Barking and Dagenham the Government are trialling new pilot pathfinder areas to bring together local delivery partners from the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Education, to support people into work and better identify progression opportunities for those in part time employment.
Alongside launching a further nine institutes of technology, taking the total in England to 21 and exceeding our manifesto commitment, the Government will secure their long term-position as anchor institutions in their regions, on a par with the UK’s world-leading historic universities successful institutes of technology will in future be able to apply for a Royal Charter.
We will also increase access to HE particularly in towns, cities and rural locations without access to this provision.
As part of the launch of the £2.6 billion UK Shared Prosperity Fund, adults across the whole of the UK will benefit from the multiply programme, offering national and local support for people to gain or improve their numeracy skills, worth £559 million over the SR21 period.
I will place a copy of the full list of the education investment areas and the methodology for their selection in the Libraries of both Houses.
[HCWS585]
Covid-19 Vaccinations: Condition of Deployment
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Sajid Javid)
In December 2021, Parliament approved legislation requiring vaccination as a condition of deployment (VCOD) in health and wider social care. This was due to come into force from 1 April 2022.
On 31 January I announced the Government intention to revoke the regulations making vaccination a condition of deployment in all health and social care settings. This is subject to consultation and Parliamentary process.
I have listened to the best clinical and scientific advice and considered how we can achieve public health and safety with the minimum number of restrictions or requirements on people’s lives. The changes in the pandemic as a result of the omicron variant and the continued success of the vaccination programme mean it is right that we revisit the balance of risks and opportunities that guided our original decision last year.
Whilst vaccination remains our very best line of defence against covid-19, and all people working in health and social care settings have a professional duty to be vaccinated, the view of this Government is that it is no longer proportionate to require vaccination as a condition of deployment through statute.
Following this announcement, I am now providing further clarity on how this planned revocation impacts on the 3 February deadline for a first dose of covid-19 vaccination for those currently working in CQC-regulated health and wider social care settings. I am aware that, based on the guidance already issued, those who employ or engage staff working in health and wider social care settings may have begun to prepare for formal meetings with staff if they remain unvaccinated.
With the announcement of our intention to revoke this legislation, the Government’s clear advice is that those employers do not serve notice of termination to employees in connection with the VCOD regulations.
NHS England has written to healthcare employers requesting that employers do not serve notice of termination to employees affected by VCOD regulations. Furthermore, my Department has written to the adult social care sector and advised that employers in wider adult social care do not serve notice of termination to employees in connection with the VCOD regulations.
I want to acknowledge the incredible efforts of the health and social care sector over the past year to encourage staff to receive their covid-19 vaccinations. These have been very much appreciated. Since September there has been a net increase of over 127,000 people working in the NHS who have been vaccinated. During the same time, we have also seen a net increase of 32,000 people vaccinated in social care including 22,000 people in care homes and 10,000 people working in domiciliary care.
My Department will move quickly to publish a consultation as legally required, and will continue to keep all those affected updated.
[HCWS587]
Covid-19 Testing: Transparency
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Sajid Javid)
I am today laying in Parliament a set of documents in response to the Humble Address motion of the House of Commons passed on 17 November 2021.
The Department of Health and Social Care has followed a rigorous process to identify and quality assure all relevant-documents. Specialist document review software was used to identify references to “Randox” across 56 ministerial private office and special adviser email accounts. The Department also asked current and former ministers and special advisers who could have been involved in correspondence about the specified meeting and contracts to provide relevant records from their private systems. The Department reviewed approximately 11,000 records to identify the documents laid today.
We are committed to ensuring transparency in order that Parliament is able to scrutinise and hold the Executive to account. However, the Government also have a responsibility to consider whether it will be in the public interest to place information into the public domain. This necessitates balancing the need for openness against other important and long standing, and often competing, principles, such as the need to protect legal confidentiality and Cabinet papers for reasons of collective responsibility, and legislation, such as the Data Protection Act.
This has been a costly and time-consuming exercise. Initial searches identified 1.5 million pieces of information relating to Randox. This was narrowed to the approximately 11,000 documents which then needed individual review in order to determine whether they were relevant or in scope of the Humble Address. Those which have been identified as in scope have been published, subject to public interest considerations such as the application of data protection principles towards named staff. Had this been a Freedom of Information Act request or Parliamentary Question, this exercise would have passed the disproportionate cost thresholds.
As noted in the Government Response to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee's Fifteenth Report: “Status of Resolutions of the House of Commons” in March 2019, “the Government therefore agrees with PACAC that this device should not be used irresponsibly or over-used. As the Committee notes, such powers lack statutory force and if they cease to be exercised responsibly, the Government will have to reflect carefully on what measures may be required in order to protect how it should respond in the public interest.”
As the public would expect, at the start of the pandemic the Government took every possible step to rapidly build the largest testing industry in UK history from scratch, this has played an important role in stopping the spread of covid-19 and saving lives, and the service Randox provided was integral to that response.
There are robust rules and processes in place to ensure that all contracts are awarded in line with procurement regulations and transparency guidelines and that any potential conflicts of interest with respect to commercial matters are appropriately managed. Ministers are not involved in the assessment and evaluation process for contracts.
Building the scale of testing needed at an unprecedented speed required extensive collaboration with businesses, universities and many others, to get the right skills, equipment and logistics in place as quickly as possible. We make no apology for working at an incredible pace to tackle the biggest public health emergency in living memory.
I want to take the opportunity to reiterate my thanks everyone who has worked tirelessly across Government, the private sector and beyond to help deliver one of the biggest testing programmes in Europe.
[HCWS586]
Grand Committee
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Arrangement of Business
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Healy of Primrose Hill) (Lab)
My Lords, Members are encouraged to leave some distance between themselves and others and to wear a face covering when not speaking.
Cost of Living
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Whitty
That the Grand Committee takes note of the cost of living, and in particular (1) the rising cost of household energy, and (2) the role of the consumer protection regulatory regime in energy markets.
Lord Whitty (Lab)
My Lords, I obviously had great prescience in going for this debate on this day. Unfortunately, it means that Ofgem and the Chancellor have stolen some of my thunder and limelight. I actually had my coat on to come here when the Chancellor was speaking, but I heard most of what he said.
I propose to focus largely on the energy market failure, but let us start by putting it into broader context. Higher gas prices are coming, while shop price inflation rates doubled in the last month, rents are at their highest level for more than a dozen years in real terms, house prices for first-time buyers are at their highest level ever, food prices are rising in the post-Brexit situation and general price inflation is at its highest for about 30 years. That means unprecedented numbers of people are taking out loans, and incomes are not keeping pace. Wages, benefits and pensions are all falling in real terms in the face of this inflation, and all taxpayers are about to be hit by the surcharge on national insurance. As a result of these costs and pressures, according to Which?, more than 2.5 million households in the month of January alone defaulted on at least one regular payment—rent, mortgage, energy, loans or credit cards—placing those families in financial difficulty and often under serious mental stress.
That is the background, but the energy price rises are the most spectacular feature. Another enormous hike in the energy price cap of nearly £700 was announced today. This is before we all have to face up to the very substantial cost of transitioning away from gas heating entirely, and the need for a just transition to a non-fossil-fuel-based home heating system.
I will return to that longer-term issue in a minute, if I have time, but the Government and Parliament need to recognise the stress and hardship that all of this is causing to vulnerable individuals and households, particularly to low-income families. As I understand it from the Chancellor’s Statement an hour or so ago, the Government recognise that the hike in the energy cap is a problem. The Minister will correct me if I am wrong, but the Chancellor intends to offer an offset to the potential £700 rise in household energy bills by giving all bill payers an undifferentiated £200 each, unrelated to household income, energy bills or property conditions. This is to be delivered via a sort of indirect loan to suppliers, which then have to repay the Government. The costs of this will eventually be passed back to consumers, thus adding to potential household cost pressures and indebtedness down the line. In addition, over and above what was rumoured, the Chancellor is announcing a rebate to lower council tax bills.
There are aspects of what the Chancellor said that I welcome. I do not think he has done it in the best way, but he has recognised some of the problems. However, it still deals with only half of the potential impact on households. The £200 is not much of an offset on £700, and, frankly, using council tax is an incredibly bureaucratic and inefficient way of getting help to the most desperate families.
Yet the Government did not need to invent new mechanisms. Fuel poverty groups and, indeed, the Labour Party have proposed a number of immediately available interventions that the Chancellor could have used—for example, post-Brexit freedoms to remove VAT, temporarily at least, from domestic energy prices. He rejected that and I can in part understand the reasons; nevertheless, that was an immediate and beneficial option. He could have expanded the warm home discount to lower-income families. There is a reference to that in the Chancellor’s Statement, and I should be grateful if the Minister could spell out exactly what it means. The Chancellor could have extended winter fuel payments to a further 2.4 million vulnerable households. He did not do that. He could have offered a one-off rebate for low-income households this winter, which could have helped at least 4 million of those households. He could have given more help on rapid repayments of utility arrears; I am not whether his Statement covers that. Of course, he could have moved on the reintroduction by energy suppliers of a social tariff for the long-term benefit of the most vulnerable households—a move I strongly advocate.
In addition, we and campaigners have called for a return to an England-wide programme of effective household insulation and energy-efficiency measures. Over the medium term, that would reduce energy consumption and hence costs to households. There was some reference in the Chancellor’s Statement to that, but it looks pretty miniscule to me, at first sight.
We need also to look at the underlying reasons for and effects of the price rise, and the role of the Government and the regulator in consumer energy prices. Of course, the immediate cause of the increases has been the indirect effects of the dramatic rise in world gas prices. But, frankly, the British economy of all economies ought to have been more resilient and insulated from the effects of Russians playing politics and the Qataris controlling the shipment of LNG. Storage and flexibility measures have not been adopted or invested in. That is partly due to a failure by Ofgem to provide suppliers and the system with the means to do so, but Ofgem has also failed in its role as regulator on behalf of consumers, particularly vulnerable consumers.
About three years ago, I chaired a group convened by Energy UK, the industry’s trade body, to identify means through which to provide a better service and more appropriate pricing structures for vulnerable consumers. To be fair, a lot of larger energy companies have adopted some of those recommendations but there is much more to be done. That has been at the behest of the companies themselves, not Ofgem. Over the past decade, Ofgem has regarded the main means of improving service to consumers as being an increase in competition. That helps significantly in most circumstances, but the way in which it has been done has actually caused more problems than it resolved for consumers, the Government and the regulator.
Obviously, the old oligopoly of the big six was rightly challenged but the number and variety of challenger companies that were nodded through and licensed by Ofgem, thereby relieving some of the obligations regarding poorer consumers, meant that, over a period of about five or six years, the oligopoly moved to becoming a cut-throat market of some 70-plus companies, many of which were new and untested. The sustainability of many of the rest was also suspect. It is clear that in this vital part of its obligations, Ofgem just allowed the establishment of dozens of novice companies through the licensing system, with totally inadequate financial resilience tests, superficial checks—if any—of the management structure and investment sources, and no stipulations on customer service in general or in particular in relation to vulnerable and low-income groups.
Citizens Advice has provided us with a litany of those failures and Ofgem’s failure to meet even the basic requirements. Yet in recent years, there has been only one Ofgem formal customer service investigation. It made no use of its powers to stop a supplier taking on customers when there were customer service concerns about the company. In the four years before the gas price crisis, the number of people working at Ofgem on consumer service had fallen by a quarter.
As Citizens Advice says:
“Regulatory failings led to a culture of non-compliance”
among many of these new companies and the rush of company failures has duly followed, with dire consequences and uncertainties for consumers and messy transfers of customers to the larger companies, increasing the pressure on consumers and the recipient companies.
It is true that early last year Ofgem introduced a new supplier monitoring and checking system, yet only one of the 20-plus companies that failed last year had any sort of customer continuity plan in place to protect their consumers in the event of financial collapse. That is a serious failure by the regulator and one which the Government and the regulator need to address to decide the size of the market we can cope with. The big six was clearly wrong but a market of 70 or 80 small companies, poorly based, is also not the right answer.
The other thing is that, if we have not been able to cope with a traditional gas price rise and preserve and increase customer service during that period without hitting consumers and without the Government having now to bail them out through the interventions the Chancellor announced today, then there is something seriously wrong in the regulatory system. I have it in mind that we will have to cope shortly with a much bigger issue—the transition of the 80% plus of our households which are on gas supply at the moment to as-yet-unknown forms of alternative low-carbon or no-carbon fuels. That is a massive operation, and it needs planning now. Yet, we still need key decisions from the Government and industry, and key questions are likely to be asked of the regulator.
That is going to be a massive transformation. The last time we did it, when we replaced town gas with North Sea gas, it was organised in every household that used gas by employees of a nationalised corporation —most of whom were members of my union—who went into every household. That took time and it needed planning, but it was a simple structure. We no longer have those simple structures. We no longer have the clear strategic decisions, and yet we are going to place on top of this system, rightly, in order to meet our carbon obligations, a whole new system of heating for pretty well four out of five households in the land, and many businesses and offices as well.
Ofgem and the department are going to face a much bigger problem than a global gas price rise. They are right to face it because we need to change our whole heating system, but we need to know how we are going to do it. We need to know that consumers’ interests will be protected in doing it. We need to know who is going to deliver it. We need to know some basics, such as what kind of fuel we are going to use and whether there be one system in different parts of the country. The Minister will know that I have asked questions on this before, but we still have no clear answers. If we postpone decisions on how we will heat our buildings in future, the chaos we are facing in relation to one big world problem is going to be compounded as we try to implement a change to meet our carbon objectives.
I am very worried about the immediate situation, and thousands of households are extremely worried and unable to meet the costs implied, even allowing for the Chancellor’s claim that he is going to cover half of the system—in a way that I do not regard as optimal. But even if he does that, there will be cost increases which thousands of households will be unable to meet.
The Government face a serious economic crisis in the form of the energy price, and a serious social crisis in terms of the impact on families and households. There is also a serious strategic and political crisis, in that we have to change the system of regulating this market and make clear to the industry and consumers the way we are going. I hope the Minister can give a few answers today, and that the Government as a whole can address these problems in the coming weeks.
Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)
My Lords, I declare an interest in energy price-related issues, as in the register.
My brief contribution to this superbly timed debate—it really is perfectly timed—will be more about preventing the reoccurrence of this problem, which otherwise will hit us again and again, than the immediate amelioration which is certainly needed. No doubt we shall hear from the Government about what is proposed to prevent widespread suffering and address the real fear in many households, and disruption throughout key parts of industry, when energy prices go super-volatile as they are doing now.
There is a simple—perhaps over-simple—one-word answer to the question of what we can do to prevent recurrence: back-up. We are in the midst of a gigantic energy transformation which is the biggest for over 200 or 300 years, since the Industrial Revolution. It is a fundamental reorganisation of our entire energy system into a new pattern. This is huge, and no system—certainly not this one—will work without the full availability of fall-back energy supplies, 24/7, which can kick in when the inevitable disruptions, breakdowns and crises occur. It does not matter whether we talk about green energy or traditional fossil fuels: there will be, as there has been in the past, occasional and sometimes devastating interruptions, and that is why we must have full back-up facilities in place. Do we have them?
Look at the scene. We have ruled out coal. Obviously, that is the right thing to do but frankly, I am afraid that it will not make any difference to rising emissions worldwide or to climate control, because of course the main coal emitters are roaring ahead. There are 8,200 coal-fired stations in the world, all puffing fumes into the air, and several more are being built despite the Glasgow undertakings that they would not be. So, coal will continue to drive emissions upward, but at least we can demonstrate our good intent by closing it down. So that is that—although I note, slightly cynically, that to keep the lights on in Glasgow and the conference going, they had to open up a couple of coal-fired plants.
Investment in more gas is being strongly discouraged. It is an amazing thought that years and years ago, when this country, or the Government, had the misfortune of having me as their Energy Secretary, 1% of our electricity came from gas, and even that was resented by Sir Denis Rooke and others. Now it is running at roughly 43%, although I note that last week 55% of our electricity was coming from gas. That is dangerously high. I remember when Helmut Schmidt told Mrs Thatcher that Germany was going to rely on Russia for a quarter of its gas—just a quarter—she said, “Helmut, you’re crazy: this is going to lead to terrible trouble”. He replied, “No, don’t worry, communism is a reliable business partner and it will all be all right.” It was not all right.
Obviously, we are discouraging pensions from investing in oil and trying to run down our international oil companies, so we are handing the ball back to OPEC there, and we will feel the rough edge of that as petrol and oil prices go whizzing up.
We had high hopes in my time of building a reliable and solid back-up system through modern nuclear power. That was the plan. We aimed for nine PWRs and only got one built, but the world moved on and oil and gas were cheap, so we managed to get by with the one at Sizewell B. Now we are trying to revive our nuclear replacement programme and I am not at all happy about where we are going. It seems that we are at a Y-fork in the road in the development of civil nuclear: between large-scale repeat such as Hinkley or maybe like Sizewell C, and going for SMRs which, according to Rolls-Royce, could be produced at about the same time.
That is a big choice and I hope that the Government get it right because, if they do not, we will end up with a lot of further disappointments and difficulties and a lack of the back-up that we need. In particular, I have to note that getting out of large-scale nuclear building and attracting private capital, which we will never get into the big-scale stuff, even with the proposed reforms in financing systems, is made 10 times more difficult by the fact that, of course, we are deeply involved with the Chinese. Somehow we will have to get out of the Chinese involvement in Sizewell C, Hinkley Point and other projects, and do that smoothly, if we are not to bring the whole house of cards down.
I am afraid that what I have said is slightly gloomy, but if people just hang on to the word “back-up” they will understand that we can save ourselves from the horrible volatility of prices. Behind the volatility, of course, comes the prospect of actual outages. We must have a resilient and diverse system. That is the big lesson, which I am not sure has yet been learned.
Lord Monks (Lab)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, on his prescience in the timing of this debate. Barring a Russian incursion into Ukraine or more wine o’clock Downing Street shenanigans, inflation is very much at the top of today’s news. It is not good news, as has already been spelled out: we are in very difficult waters at the moment and things show all the signs, in the coming period, of getting worse. With inflation now at a 30-year high and a record increase in energy bills expected from April, poorer households are under particular pressure, as essentials such as energy and food form a larger proportion of their shopping basket than discretionary items. We also have the increase in national insurance to come, adding to the pressure on jobs and living standards. I believe that to be a bad idea, certainly at this time in the cycle of our economy.
I recognise that the Minister is very much bound by the Statement on energy made by the Chancellor today. These new measures, and the inclusion of a government-backed £200 discount in bills by offering loans to suppliers, as well as the council tax rebate of £150 for those in lower-cost housing, are welcome and a recognition by the Government that we have a big problem. They are welcome, but they will not offset the other measures that we are going to experience with the Ofgem price cap announcement, which could catapult the average home bill to £2,000 from April. That is a lot of money for many households.
I had hopes—there is no surprise here, with my background—that rising real wages would help to ease the position of working people. Indeed, labour shortages and union action in a number of industries have secured impressive pay rises for some. For example, I read in the paper the other day that the GMB has secured a very decent rise for binmen in Eastbourne, while Unite has secured good settlements to disputes in South Yorkshire, Mercedes Benz and Nottingham. But this is not the general picture: the majority of workers face a fall in real pay and the heroes of the public and related services, who have done so much in the current pandemic, will be poorer at the end of it than they were at the beginning, despite being showered with thanks and claps by a grateful nation.
Worryingly, firms and employees do not expect the squeeze to end soon; we will have to live with this for a while. So what can we do about it? Some things are being done about it and I have mentioned my welcome for those. I hope that the Minister can undertake at some stage to revisit two other areas to help the low paid and hard pressed. These are raising the national living wage more than it has just been raised. Wages are too low in many sections of our society and raising them will be crucial to the success of any levelling-up agenda. If we do not raise people’s spending power in the weaker regions, we will not get very far with the levelling-up agenda. The other thing that I hope will be revisited is the premature withdrawal of the £20 uplift to universal credit, which helped many get through lockdown. That and the furlough scheme were two massive supports for the economy and for the hardest hit at a time when they were most needed and I unapologetically welcomed them at the time.
More generally, will the Government not make the George Osborne mistake? In the last period when we had recessionary pressures after the financial crash, the then Government tackled our indebtedness with growth-killing policies of austerity. It was a disaster from which we are still reeling. We should have given growth a better chance than was done at the time and I hope that the orthodoxy of that time has now passed. This time, the economy should be allowed to expand. The Government should be looking at other areas for their revenue. Lower capital gains tax payments are an obvious area for attention, as are windfall taxes. Can the Minister encourage us today by saying that those things are still on the table and are being considered?
Lord Shipley (LD)
My Lords, I remind noble Lords that I am a vice-president of the National Energy Action advisory board. I join others in extending thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for this timely debate.
The rise in energy costs announced this morning and in the cost of living generally is now being described as a pending cost of living catastrophe. Unless the Government change course, even with this morning’s announcement, I fear that that is what it is likely to be. It most certainly is for those on low incomes, who face rising inflation, likely to be 7% in April, this massive hike in energy prices, rising taxation—not least national insurance, council tax and the freezing of thresholds—and rising interest rates, increased to 0.5% about two hours ago.
The StepChange Debt Charity has estimated that a third of households are now having difficulty meeting their bills and many of them are now borrowing to cover their basic needs. There is now a real risk of a national debt crisis. One partial solution is to restore the cut in universal credit—that seems essential—but there are others.
I hope that the Government will act on the need to reflect the true rise in the cost of living for those on low incomes. The CPI index does not reflect the rising cost of basic food products or the cutback in the value range of supermarket products. Perhaps the supermarkets might look at what they can do to keep prices down. There should be an index that does not include car costs or consumer goods, so I am glad that the ONS will be producing an inflation index based on tracking basic food prices. I hope that the Minister will confirm that the Government will want to use it.
We heard just now that the energy cap has been increased this morning by 54%. It is estimated that a quarter of UK households will be paying more than 10% of their budgets on energy in April, but many of the poorest households we will be paying much more than 10%. For that reason, it is welcome that the Government are introducing some further financial support. It is, however, inadequate. As the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, pointed out, it is only half the increase and other measures need to be taken to support people on low incomes. Loans are being used when it is estimated that gas prices are likely to stay twice as high as they have been until at least 2025.
The Government have a responsibility to help people on low incomes now, not to keep their costs high so that tax cuts can be delivered nearer the next election, which is rumoured to be the Government’s intention. I very much hope that the Minister will confirm that that is not the Government’s intention and that the people who need help now will be helped now.
The council tax discount at bands A to D is £150, but it will not be sufficient to meet the 54% increase in the energy price cap. I have concluded that we need a windfall tax on oil and gas companies. The announcement this morning of Shell’s enormous profits points to such a Robin Hood windfall tax being justified. As I understand it, Shell has announced $6.4 billion in profits over its fourth quarter. The priority must surely be to cut the heating bills of vulnerable and low-income households, perhaps by doubling the warm homes discount and expanding it to all those on universal credit. This should be funded through a one-off Robin Hood tax on the record profits of oil and gas producers and traders.
We know that the lowest-income households spend twice as much on food and housing as do better-off households, so the current crisis hits the poorer more than it does the better off. The national insurance rise should be abandoned. The public now see it as the equivalent of the cost of unused PPE and fraud in the business support system. Those two things are the same as the projected income from the national insurance rise and I think that the NI rise really cannot be justified now. The Government should use general taxation instead, as many commentators suggest.
Mention was made by the noble Lord, Lord Monks, of the Levelling Up White Paper, but you do not level up poorer parts of the country by increasing so substantially the amount of tax that people who live there have to pay. The noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, reminded us of the need for back-up. We need that and more. We need to relaunch the green homes grant scheme, we need more local networks for renewable energy sources, we need greater investment again in insulation and we need much more research on how to store renewable energy. In the medium to longer term, those should be the Government’s priorities.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Lord. I declare my interest as president of the advisory board of National Energy Action. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, on securing the debate, but especially on securing it today; it could not have been more timely. I entirely endorse his comments about the role of the regulator, which raises a lot of questions that I will refer to in my short contribution.
I approach this primarily from the perspective of rural areas, such as North Yorkshire, Northumbria, Cumbria, County Durham and many isolated and deeply rural parts of England especially. Residents of rural areas have been particularly hard hit during the energy crisis since wholesale gas prices increased in October. I do not think that this has been sufficiently addressed by my noble friend the Minister, who I welcome to his place today, his department or the Government more generally.
Those who live off the grid in rural areas are not currently covered by the price cap. They have been left to rely on oil, LPG and solid fuels, which are not and will not be covered by the cap. My first question to my noble friend is: what assessment have he and the department made of the impact of rising energy costs on rural dwellers in general?
I am sure that my noble friend and the Committee will accept that there are pockets of deprivation in rural areas, which are often overlooked. There is also the challenge of an increasingly elderly population living in rural areas on fixed incomes, who are particularly challenged by the increasing cost of food, to which the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, referred, and the cost of heating and electricity, which is before us this afternoon. Like others on low income, this winter they are frequently faced with the choice of whether to heat their homes or eat.
There are currently 4.5 million people in fuel poverty and it is generally understood that, come April, another 1.5 million may be pushed into poverty. National Energy Action has costed a number of its proposals, which I ask my noble friend urgently to consider. For what reason could BEIS not adopt those mentioned by the NEA? One is a one-off rebate, or crisis income support, to cover the 4 million low-income households before April. Another is to expand the GB-wide warm home discount, to which the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, referred, so that everyone currently eligible will receive the support that they deserve. Another is to provide support for an additional 2.4 million low-income working-age households across the UK by expanding the winter fuel payment. Another is to accelerate the repayment of utility debts across the UK and, by next winter, to supplement these measures with deeper price protection or a new mandatory social tariff to help those in the cohort of low-income energy users to make their energy more affordable.
The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and others have referred to a windfall to the Treasury in addition to the price increases since October, yielding an estimated £100 million extra in VAT through domestic electricity and gas bills. Also, the doubling of households bills from April to £2,000, as was referred to, will apparently yield an extra £77 million for the Treasury. There is also the increase in respect of UK ETS permits, yielding an additional £3 billion.
The Treasury, for some reason, has not sought immediately to recover the £4.3 billion in fraudulent Covid loans identified so accurately by my noble friend Lord Agnew. I pay tribute to his work in the Treasury in this regard. I understand that up to £30 billion more of such money has been identified across all departments. The noble Baroness, Lady Crawley, and I served at the same time in the European Parliament, when the level of EU fraud was a source of some embarrassment. It was an appalling disgrace, as we were told by our British colleagues in the Westminster Parliament. It was, but so is this national ongoing fraud. The money must be recovered; it would add to the funds available to the Treasury in order to finance what National Energy Action is asking it to do.
Also, climate change presents greater challenges. We have seen three catastrophic power failures already, not helped by the fact that 30% of energy is lost through overhead line transmission. That has to be addressed.
Finally, I turn to the role of the regulator. Clearly, competition is not working in this sector as it was intended. Recent failures of energy companies mean that the cost has been passed on to the customer. An additional 25% of our energy bills is going on green levies. Why is the energy sector alone allowed to fund its increases through the customer, whereas others such as the water sector have to go to the market? I urge my noble friend to address these issues as urgently as he can.
Baroness Crawley (Lab)
My Lords, I applaud the timing and the work of my noble friend Lord Whitty in his chairing of the Commission for Customers in Vulnerable Circumstances and much more. We have also worked together as vice-presidents of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute.
April can be a cruel month, as TS Eliot might have put it, and it is certainly looking that way for millions of British households. Emerging from the biggest health crisis in a century, many UK families will be facing a painful cost of living crisis this spring, with energy price increases, rising inflation, more taxation promised and the burden of Brexit becoming more evident every day. Many British household budgets will be stretched to the limit and, in the poorest households, where fuel poverty is already a fact of life, there will be the realisation that there is nothing left to stretch.
According to the ONS’s latest stats, growth in income of the poorest fifth of people has not kept up with inflation, which has led to the median income of the poorest fifth falling by an average of 3.8% between 2017 and 2020. Meanwhile, income for the richest fifth continued to steadily grow between 2017 and 2020. This means that income inequality increased substantially over this period—before Covid, the soaring cost of energy or the increase in inflation. We know that households on low incomes spend proportionately more than richer households on essentials such as housing costs, food and transport, as noble Lords have said. According again to the ONS, households in the lowest decile spent 54% of their total weekly expenditure on these things, compared with 42% in the highest-income decile.
It is against this architecture of inequality that we have to view the alarming energy situation post April. Households in Britain could soon be spending more of their money on energy than any previous generation, including those who lived through the oil shocks of the 1970s and 1980s—some of us are old enough to remember those. Of course, these aggregate numbers do not represent the experience of specific households, particularly those in very low income and low expenditure households. They may see their energy burden rise to 13% of total spend or above.
As we know, this crisis in living costs comes on the back of the loss of the £20 a week Covid welfare boost, as my noble friend Lord Monks said, which finished in September. Some people are already not putting on their heating through this winter, and the 14% of people on absolute low income in this country are finding it very difficult to keep themselves and their children warm right now. As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, said, eat or heat is the dilemma. At the start of the pandemic, the Government rightly launched a project called Everyone In, which took all the homeless off the streets and into accommodation. This cost-of-living crisis needs the same urgent focus for those on low incomes: “Get Everyone Warm”.
The mitigating measures announced by the Chancellor today may take the edge off some bills, and we should recognise that, but they are ill thought out, too little and too late. The Labour Party has called for VAT on energy to be cut, and that should have happened. A one-off windfall tax, as the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, has called for, also should have happened. Paul Johnson of the IFS has suggested a one-off uprating in benefit payments this year—quite right too. While I understand that the warm home discount will finally be increased, and that is welcome, I ask the Minister: what is happening to the household support fund available to local government beyond 2022?
My noble friend Lord Whitty knows better than most that the underlying problems of a badly regulated energy market need fixing urgently, and he has set out a way forward today. There is no real resilience of suppliers, and customer protection by Ofgem’s own standards is often completely ignored by companies. The market is a shambles; meanwhile, many British children and pensioners shiver in their cold homes. It is shameful, and the Government’s response falls short of what is needed in the medium and long term.
Baroness Scott of Needham Market (LD)
I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for securing today’s debate. It is easy to say that it is timely: it has almost been too timely, as announcements have been coming thick and fast and we have all been hastily rewriting. The announcements about the energy price cap and the Chancellor’s response have meant that we are focusing largely on energy, but we are all aware that the general cost of living crisis is the context in which this debate sits. I particularly note the Bank of England’s prediction today that inflation will reach 7%; it has been some time since we have seen that.
As the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, said, both medium and long-term issues come into play here. I want to use most of my time to speak about a longer-term issue—energy efficiency. Research by Carbon Brief has shown that a series of cuts to energy efficiency measures has meant that today’s bills are around £2.5 billion higher than they might otherwise have been. The number of homes getting their lofts insulated fell by 92%, and cavity wall insulation fitting dropped by 74% when the grants were cut. A year before it was due to be introduced, the zero-carbon homes standard was scrapped. As a result, around 1 million new homes have been built since then with lower energy efficiency standards, meaning higher energy bills for occupants and owners facing expensive retrofitting.
The decisions to scrap those schemes were made because gas prices were high and energy bills growing. However, the decisions were short-sighted and there is a lesson for us to learn now because the answer to high gas prices is not more gas, as the evidence clearly shows; it is to double down on renewable energy sources and home efficiency improvements. If we do not act now, the peaks and troughs of fossil fuel prices will continue and we will be in this position over and over again.
State intervention is needed to deal with the problem of an inherently energy-inefficient housing stock in this country. I shall explain why. By their nature, many energy efficiency measures require up-front cash and often take some years to pay back. For those in the private rented sector, neither landlords nor tenants have any incentive to invest in those measures, even assuming that they can afford it. In the social rented sector, a lot of good work is done by local authorities and housing associations to reduce energy costs for their tenants, who quite often lack their own financial resources. But those bodies are themselves increasingly strapped for cash and unable to finance the energy efficiency measures that they know are required.
However, the majority of us are owner-occupiers. In a country with high levels of home ownership and a flexible job market, houses are no longer seen as places where people live for a long time. Houses are not just homes nowadays; they are property and often the main or only financial asset. Putting scarce cash resources into measures that take years to pay back and do not really add to the value of the house does not look like an attractive option for many people. Take the example of a heat pump, which can cost between £6,000 and £8,000. If we are to improve the energy efficiency of our national housing stock, government intervention is required. I remind the Committee that around 22% of UK carbon emissions comes from domestic energy consumption, so there is a significant contribution to net zero to be made.
As other noble Lords have said, Shell announced today that it made £17 billion profit in the past year. I agree with all those who said that it is beyond time that we thought about—indeed, introduced—a windfall tax. Like the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, I pondered on the extra VAT that has accrued to the Treasury, which ought to be available to help people. The cost-of-living increases and today’s announcements on energy will hit everyone but the impact on the poorest is absolutely devastating. The Chancellor’s package is not sufficiently aimed at helping them. The council tax rebate is an untargeted, blunt instrument. A scheme that helps people this year but has to be paid back in future years is just a gamble on gas prices falling. If they do not, at best the pain is postponed but it could get considerably worse.
It seems to me that by far the easiest way to target help to the poorest would be to reintroduce the £20 a week universal credit uplift. There is a strong case for having a look at the grant situation. I am sure that other noble Lords received a briefing from Marie Curie, which set out the difficulty that terminally ill people are having in receiving grants. That is a desperate situation; you do not get more vulnerable than people who are dying at home and are cold because they cannot access things—so we need to look at that.
A coalition of 27 charities has written to the Government urging them to respond to the energy crisis with measures that create a green, fair and affordable energy system, and I am afraid that the Chancellor’s response does not do any of that today. It does not help the worst off and does not provide any means of longer-term security through energy efficiency.
Lord Young of Norwood Green (Lab)
My Lords, I, too, would like to offer my thanks to my noble friend Lord Whitty for initiating this important debate. I could not help smiling when he referred to the conversion to gas boilers. I remember it well: the sheer delight of coming down in the morning and not having to rake the ashes out of the grate and start the coal fire again, because it had been replaced by a gas fire.
What I would say about the current situation is that it is a very dynamic one. There is not going to be one system in the future, by any means, but one thing we do know is that gas is going to be with us for the next 20 to 30 years. That is a reality, and one that lots of people do not like to face, including some of those sitting alongside me. No doubt I will be chastised and told that it is not true and we can do it all with renewable energy, but that is a very debatable assessment of the situation.
When I say that it is a dynamic situation, well, carbon capture and storage is there and it needs to be refined, but it is certainly something I believe will happen. However, there is a supreme irony in the current situation, and this Government have to take the blame. We decided that fracking was not acceptable any longer, and nobody seemed to worry about the fact that they are still fracking in the USA and Qatar. Could the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, tell us why it is acceptable to ship liquid natural gas all the way from the USA and Qatar, then deliquefy it and use it? We do not want fracking in this country, but we do not care how it happens elsewhere. We could have had a safe, reliable system and created thousands of jobs; it was ready and there, but a hysteria was created about it. We were told that we had to stop drilling, because we had 0.5 on the Richter scale. If a lorry rumbles past your house, it would be more than that. It was an absolutely ridiculous decision to make. I can understand the political pressures, and why it was made, but it is a situation that we are paying for and will continue to pay for—and it will not do anything about improving the environment.
Of course I believe in renewable energy. I was a bit puzzled when the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, said that nobody was going to invest in their houses. Plenty of people around me are investing in solar panels, even though the subsidy has gone, and there is a good return on them. She is shaking her head, but you only have to look at roofs if you do not believe that. I want to make a plea, when we talk about renewable energy and nuclear and so on, or hydrogen, that we have a holistic analysis and not the idea that there is just going to be one solution.
The noble Lord, Lord Howell, referred to small-scale medium reactors, and it looks like a promising area—who knows? There is hydrogen as well. I also think that there are some possibilities, without wanting to seem patronising to people, and ways in which you can save energy. You can save by the way you cook, and by wasting less food, which makes an important contribution. Trying to educate people in their lifestyle is important, and the Government should be thinking about that, in my view.
Of course I believe in things such as the green homes scheme. I am puzzled why that has been abandoned because that would have a long-lasting effect. I also agree with noble Lords who have referred to things such as the windfall tax. I am looking forward to the Minister being able to address all these issues. There is a real challenge—and not just for the Government—in how we analyse the best way to help people in the future when we know the cost of living is rising. Is the only solution to increase benefits? Part of the solution, in my view, is getting people back into employment. Not only is that better for them individually; it sets an example to their families, so that another generation of young people do not feel that the only income coming into the family is benefits.
I hope that people will recognise that I am trying to make a serious contribution on things such as fracking and the need for a more holistic analysis.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, I shall try not to turn this into the Oxford Union but the noble Lord, Lord Young of Norwood Green, put some direct questions to me and, in responding to the debate, I will also provide some answers to those. His comments about lifestyle change are really quite insulting to the people who are struggling so hard that food banks are having to make up parcels of no-cook food because they simply cannot afford to cook. The noble Lord said that some people around him were investing in their homes. We are talking about the cost-of-living crisis. There are very large communities where very few people have any money at all to maintain their homes, let alone invest in them.
However, I will agree with the noble Lord that we cannot do it all with renewables. Indeed, the powerful and informative speech from the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, covered that very well. The cleanest, greenest energy is the energy we do not have to use. The quality of our housing stock is disastrous, and saving energy is the other side of using renewables.
I will go back to where I was planning to start, which is by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for securing this debate and, as many others have, congratulating him on his extremely good timing. What we are seeing today is pretty well the rest of the country following where the Green Party has led. Back in the autumn of 2021, we called for a payment of £320 to every household—a winter fuel payment to help people through the winter. Voilà: today we have a payment to most households of £350.
As the noble Lord said, a lot of this, effectively, is expected to be paid back. It is a debt. Households enormously laden with debt already are using debt to pay their grocery bills because they simply do not have the money, and the Government are effectively putting more debt on them. There is a very large question to be asked about the process.
I referred to what we were saying in autumn 2021, when we called for a temporary cut in VAT on domestic energy bills. It may have been a Boris Johnson promise in 2018, and Her Majesty’s Opposition, I believe, are now calling for that. Also in autumn 2021, we called for a windfall tax on oil and gas companies, which I understand is also now Labour policy. As the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, made very clear, it is obviously the time for that windfall tax on oil and gas companies.
Yesterday’s Financial Times had the headline: “Big Oil groups regain swagger with largest profits in years”. In the climate emergency the last thing we need is fossil fuel companies swaggering around the world, using their windfall profits to seek out even more oil and gas fields, building the carbon bubble even further. It is a huge threat to our financial security as well as our fragile, overheated planet. Returning to what the noble Lord, Lord Young, said about fracking, creating a new industry that you are going to have to immediately shut down makes no sense at all—and no, we should not be shipping LNG, but we are doing that because we did not invest in home energy efficiency or renewables.
The Motion refers to the role of the consumer protection regulatory regime in energy markets. For my final period I want to focus on that and in particular on what that regime cannot do. The fact is that, while we rely on gas, we will be at the mercy of world markets, even without the other environmental considerations about using that gas. I will cut down what I say on this, because the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, has already covered it so well, but we are now building homes—people are picking up their keys for them today—that immediately need to be retrofitted, not only for environmental reasons but also so that people can afford to live in them. That is an absolute disgrace and a huge government failure.
There are also renewables. I was talking about oil and gas profits. How much better if people in the more prosperous communities that the noble Lord, Lord Young, referred to were able to invest in community energy schemes, putting solar panels and local wind turbines up and fuelling schools, doctors’ surgeries, factories and homes through that? Yet I keep asking the Minister: where is the funding for that and the plan for it that was promised last June? I got a Written Answer, which pointed to a bit of money going to farms. That is the only thing that the noble Lord could point me to.
I also want to look at the structural issue of privatisation. The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, said that competition is not working and the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, spoke in his introduction about the absolute mess of the privatised utilities. The last figure that I have been able to find is from November—I would be interested if the Minister could update me on this—when the cost of the collapse of those privatised energy companies was £3.2 billion, or £120 for each household. That is the cost of ideology going on to those heavily indebted, struggling households. If we could just run these essential services, such as our energy and water companies, for public good, not private profit, we would take some of the pressure off our heavily indebted households.
Lord Sikka (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, for this timely debate. It is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle.
People are facing a twin threat of rising prices and shrinking incomes. The announcement of the new energy cap comes on the day when, as some have mentioned, Shell has announced that its profits have risen from $4.8 billion to $19.3 billion. It is so awash with money that it is paying an extra $8.5 billion to its shareholders in the shape of a share buyback. In the last decade, oil and gas companies have paid £200 billion in dividends while the regulators have been twiddling their thumbs and doing absolutely nothing. Over the last decade, the big six energy companies have paid £23 billion in dividends, which is 82% of their pre-tax profits and six times the amount of money that they pay in corporation tax. The sad truth is that the UK, unlike Ireland, cannot even produce its own electricity—it has to import it. It does not even have enough storage facilities for gas; thanks to the Government, they have been run down. Our gas storage facilities are equivalent to only 2% of our annual demand compared to—
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lord Callanan) (Con)
Ireland does not generate its own gas—it gets it from us.
Lord Sikka (Lab)
Other countries are better at handling it, if you like. Let us look at Norway. Norway collects about $21.35 for each barrel of oil extracted from the North Sea because it kept a large part of it under public control. The UK gets only 8% of that: $1.72 per barrel—those are the figures for 2019. Why? Because of this obsession with light-touch regulation and privatisation being good, while people are basically struggling. It is shameful that as a nation we are not even able to generate our own electricity—enough to meet our needs.
Today’s announcement by the Government does not really help that much: £693 or £700 extra. Perhaps the Minister will be able to tell us how much additional VAT will be generated as a result of this hike in the energy price and exactly where it will go. The Government should have listened to the Labour Party and its call for a 5% cut in VAT. The imposition of that 5% is highly regressive: the poorest suffer the most. The Chancellor said today that he did not really want to reduce it because that helps the rich. That is interesting: the Government have been handing all kinds of tax cuts to the rich and he never complained, but now he says that this would help the rich. Of course, the Government could claw back the equivalent amount from the rich by, for example, increasing the highest rate of income tax from 45% to 50%. That option is always available, but not exactly exercised.
The 2% electricity discount is also highly deceptive. It is not a discount at all. If I go to a supermarket and it is selling something on a discount, that does not mean that I have to repay that amount over the next five years, which is what people are being forced to do here. They will have to repay about £40 over the next five years. The £150 council tax rebate does nothing for the poor or those living in rented accommodation. It would also be helpful to know who is paying the cost of that. Will central Government be bearing the cost of that £150 discount, or will it lead to a further cut in local authority budgets as they are forced to bear this cost? Even if this £150 gift, as some people are calling it, is accepted by some, what happens to the other £350 of the cost of energy that people will have to bear?
The Government need to rethink their entire economic policy. They need to help the poorest. They have already cut universal credit by £1,040 from 4.4 million people. They are offering only a 3.1% increase in the state pension, while the CPI is likely to be double that rate. The increase in minimum wage is 6.6%, while RPI is already at 7.5%, so that does not really do anything. Winter fuel payments have not changed since 2011. The Government need to offer an immediate increase in the state pension of £500, double the winter fuel allowance and increase universal credit and the minimum wage at least in line with RPI to give people a cushion.
Although we have talked about energy prices, we have not said much about what is happening to retail prices. Just in the past six weeks, the price of 18 essential, staple items has gone up by more than 8%, and supermarkets, now owned by private equity, are basically lapping it up. Morrisons has increased its price of those 18 items by 15.3% in the past six weeks and Asda by 13.6%. Why are the Government letting private equity rip and increase the cost of living?
Lord Jones (Lab)
My Lords, it is always instructive to follow my noble friend Lord Sikka. I thank my noble friend Lord Whitty for his choice of debate. I know of his union life, when he devilled at the highest level brilliantly for the low waged. As a director of the apparatus of the party, he presented manifestos that sought to enhance the lives of the unemployed and the underprivileged.
Born in 1937 and growing up during World War II and the immediate post-war years, one recollects the frequent complete loss of domestic power for many hours. The great winter of 1947 tormented us all and Lord Manny Shinwell’s Cabinet career collapsed when he could not deliver coal to the power stations. In those days, there was only one warm room in the house; it is a history of when we were all in it together. Of course, there was heating—personal heating by hot water bottle. It was a time when one woke up to ice on the inside of the windowpane and when chilblains denoted the cold house and the bus stop queueing routine, as my noble friend Lord Young recalled.
Much has changed. However, climate change has not abolished the contemporary cold house. The cold house does not add to the hope for human happiness. It destroys morale. It makes the young children therein quarrelsome and can impinge on the everyday health of its tenants. Eating and sleeping in a constantly cold house can be soul destroying. There are households where there is always a wintertime contest between the semblance of warmth and debt—for example, the manipulation of the credit cards that the householder might have. There is the predicament of the low-waged having weekly recourse to the church or chapel food bank. The noble Lord, Lord Bird, has great insights here.
We in your Lordships’ House live here, swathed in our ermine and surrounded by carvings, statuary, murals, Axminsters and gilt. We septuagenarians and octogenarians notice the Chamber temperature and the difference between our Monday sittings and the rest of the week. Our civilisation puts man on the moon and speeds us in five hours from London to Edinburgh, while millions of our fellow citizens live in homes where daily payment and warmth are for ever in consideration.
An Englishwoman’s home is her castle and it should not be a bone-chillingly cold castle. We do not convincingly enable the young single mother, with her several youngsters, to face those six or so draughty, cold months surrounded by warmth. She and they may well be on benefits and, at the grass roots, it is a daily life of difficult decisions and stress. It is wrong, unjust and hurtful to the young ones. How many such households exist? Is it in the tens of thousands? Perhaps it is hundreds of thousands in our nation of 60 million-plus—a nation still fissured by wealth and poverty, class and expectations. Will the Minister make an estimate? If he can, our debate should then have better context.
These households exist in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland as well as in England. As a one-time Prince of Wales said, in the lovely land of Wales—one’s own homeland—something must be done. It is still a truism. Some homes today have had their gas and electricity turned off. Does the Minister have any idea of the numbers? It is a fact that the household budget of even the comfortably off is dominated by major day-to-day outgoings: first, of course, the gas and electricity bills; then the council tax; then the filling of the tank of the still-ubiquitous petrol and diesel cars; and then all those other necessitous direct debits to the public utilities and the ever-growing number of insurers. It is getting harder and harder.
Over many decades, successive differing Governments have offered up bureaucratic, credible alibis on energy, but still the problem remains. The bald, cunning, devious Kremlin gangster has not even started yet. In all this, what of the high-energy-demanding British steel industry? What, indeed, of manufacturing generally?
Lord Oates (LD)
My Lords, I follow other noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, on the timely nature of this debate, coming on this day when we have seen a staggering increase in the energy price cap, the Bank predicting inflation at 7.25% by April and the Bank rate rising by a further 0.25%, impacting on millions of borrowers and current mortgage-holders on variable mortgages, plus all the people who will enter the mortgage market in the coming years. It has been estimated that the average rate is likely to rise from 1.6% to 2.5% by the end of this year. So there is a whole series of pressures—not just home costs and energy costs but the knock-on effects on the wider economy. The one thing about energy inflation, of course, is that it feeds through our whole economy and will continue to do so for some time.
Back in 2015, I had a conversation with Stewart Wood—now the noble Lord, Lord Wood of Anfield—who was at the time working for the then leader of the Opposition. He was talking to me about the Labour Party’s proposal for a price cap and what the Liberal Democrats’ view of it was. I gave him my personal view: I lived for some time in Zimbabwe, where the Government thought that they could cap prices. The impact was that there is no decent electricity supply in Zimbabwe anymore. Stewart perhaps thought that I was trying to compare the leader of the Opposition at the time to Robert Mugabe, which was not the point. The point was that, at the end of the day, no Government can insist that a business, or even a public utility, should supply goods in the long term at a lower cost than they cost them. It is just not sustainable.
Of course, this is not the moment to lose price caps, but we have to understand that, in addition to this 54% hike that people are going to see—indeed, for some people it will be up to 100%, because they may be coming off fixed rates—we also have the costs that will be piled on to energy bills to pay for the collapsed energy companies. Some have estimated that it will cost as much as £94 per household to cover the cost of those that went bust. I would be interested if the Minister could shed some light on that.
On top of this, the Government are now proposing that part of the way out of the current situation is a solution that will put further costs—a further £40—on bills later. As the Resolution Foundation said today, it is about slightly smaller bills today for even bigger ones tomorrow. That is no solution in the long term. On top of that even, the Government are proposing, in a Bill that will come into the House on 21 February, something called the regulated asset base model for the funding of nuclear, which will pile yet more money up front on the bills of millions of consumers.
At the same time, as many noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, have mentioned, we see Royal Dutch Shell and all the oil and gas majors showing record profits. I do not intend to get into a debate about who proposed what first with the Green Party, the Labour Party or anybody else, but as my noble friend Lord Shipley said, the Liberal Democrats proposed a windfall tax—a Robin Hood tax, as he called it—on those oil and gas majors, which would help to provide a doubling of the warm home discount, a doubling of the winter fuel allowance and a £500 million fund to assist energy-intensive industries, which the noble Lord, Lord Jones, mentioned.
However, the truth is that we are where we are because of an abject failure of energy policy on the part of the Government. It starts with their failure on home insulation. My noble friend Lady Scott of Needham Market set out clearly the nature of that failure. We should, however, put that in the context of what the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, said, which is that the best energy saving is the energy that one does not use. Contrary to much that we have heard from the climate chaos fanatics who, sadly, are not represented here, and who say that it is all about us pumping not enough gas or putting too many green levies on bills, the truth is that the price rises are to do with fossil fuel, not green levies.
Total household expenditure on energy between 2010 and 2019 fell from £27.7 billion to £23.4 billion. One of the main reasons for that was that domestic gas and electricity consumption also fell in that time, from 43,717,000 tonnes of oil equivalent in 2010 to 34,282,000 in 2019—a 21% drop. A huge reason for that was some of the efforts made by the coalition Government, in particular by my right honourable friend Edward Davey as Energy Secretary, to push home energy efficiency. In March 2015, just before the end of the coalition, there were 53,894 monthly installations. In March 2019, that had figure fallen to 13,929. I have used the 2019 figures in all those statistics so that people cannot say, “Oh well, that’s just to do with Covid”. That has been costing households, as my noble friend Lady Scott said, an absolute fortune. In addition, as she also mentioned, the zero-carbon homes standard of the coalition was scrapped by George Osbourne—another one of his mistakes.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Young, who thinks that somehow if there were more fracking or we were pumping more gas from the North Sea it would solve our problems, that I am afraid the truth is that it would not. The astonishing fact is that between September and November 2021, the latest period for which figures are available, the UK exported 31,975 gigawatt-hours of gas. Between September and November 2020, the figure was 15,830 gigawatt-hours—less than half. In case people say that that was just because of Covid, the figure for the same period in 2019 was 19,633 gigawatt-hours. The truth is that we are operating in a market, and all that would happen if we pumped more gas is that we would export more of it. The idea that whatever we could pump would materially bring down prices, unless we somehow seized those assets and nationalised them, is for the birds.
The inflationary impact of energy is massive, but it comes amidst so many other inflationary pressures. The impact on the lowest paid, as we have heard from my noble friend Lord Shipley, the noble Baroness, Lady Crawley, and many others, will be particularly acute, and I join him in calling for a realistic price index that really reflects the impacts on the lowest paid.
In conclusion, we must have a radical overhaul of our energy system and economy, so that we can get to a stage where the Government are not boasting about the funding they are giving to food programmes and holiday activities, but are ensuring that we have an economy in which people can earn a decent wage and have a decent life.
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
My Lords, I start by declaring my interest as a vice-president of the LGA. I also add my sincere thanks and congratulations to my noble friend Lord Whitty. Originally, I think the cap announcement was scheduled for next Monday; I wonder whether they brought it forward in acknowledgement of my noble friend’s contribution to the debate today. Indeed, this is such an important issue, and we on this side cannot possibly keep up with the announcements made in the other place this morning. I am sure that we will get more insight into that by the end of the debate.
I am especially grateful to my noble friend for his summary of the role of the regulators, which was extraordinarily helpful in the context of today’s debate. I think we will all have found the excellent Library briefing very useful. The debate today has been first class, as I am sure we can all agree, and the contributions have helped to move us forward. As we have heard from the many valuable contributions, we are talking about policy failure on a catastrophic scale. The impact on our most vulnerable and on an ever-increasing number of people experiencing fuel poverty is, frankly, unforgivable, as is the impact on our businesses, particularly those that consume lots of energy to manufacture steel and glass, for example. The impact on all businesses will have profound repercussions throughout the supply chain and, ultimately, will put more pressure on our hard-pressed consumers.
As we heard in today’s announcement, electricity and gas bills for a typical household will go up by 54%, or £693 a year from April—even higher than the predictions discussed in the past few weeks. I am sure we have all read the heart-breaking case studies from Age UK, the citizens advice bureaux and others who have been doing their best to highlight the circumstances that people who are experiencing fuel poverty are enduring. Do any of us in this Room really understand the choices that some of our old-age pensioners are having to make between heating and eating? What must it be like to be forced to live in one room, and to be able to afford to put the heating on for only one hour in the morning and two hours in the evening? What is it like for parents going without food so that they can heat their homes and feed their children? I, too, have spoken to people who have asked food banks specifically for food that does not require heating, because they cannot afford the heating bills.
I just want to add another insight into the impact of austerity. One thing that we have not mentioned today is the impact of austerity on local authorities, forced to close public buildings such as libraries, community centres, children’s centres and, particularly, daycare centres—heated environments, often with free food as well, to which older people and parents with children could go during the day.
The context to this, as we have heard, is that the eye-watering energy price rises come in addition to the steep rise in inflation, the proposed national insurance rise, councils being forced to raise council tax as they are further starved of resources and, as my noble friend Lord Monks ably highlighted, the impact of the fall of real pay and the need to address all the issues around the real living wage and insecure employment. Basically, we are witnessing the results of the low-growth, high-tax trap that government policy has led us to, adding up to predictions of the average household having to pay £3,000 more tax in total by 2026-27.
Eleven years of this Government’s failed energy policy, characterised by dither, delay and incompetence that have created an energy crisis felt by everyone, have left us uniquely exposed. As we have heard, the Government have failed to invest in and expand our vast potential in British renewables and nuclear energy. They have also failed to invest in insulation and energy-efficiency schemes, whether in new-build homes or in retrofitting existing properties. All this is despite warnings over many years and ignoring the experience of many of our European neighbours in particular, who are well ahead of us in these areas. Examples include the reduction of the green homes grant scheme and, as the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, said, the failure to compensate for heat pumps, which have such an important potential future use.
One area that I hope the Minister will help us on is the exploration for alternatives, such as hydrogen. An enormous amount of work has been done up and down the country in this area, but we do not seem any closer to having the answers. Hydrogen was portrayed as one of the solutions for the issue of the need to refit our gas appliances, for example. These things all deserve serious investigation and we are not getting the progress that we need.
On top of this, as we have heard, there is the abject failure properly to regulate our energy market and the consequent devastating impact across all sectors. It would be helpful to understand how and why the decision to slash the amount of gas storage that we have was made. Where were the considerations around energy security factored in? Why have our exposure and vulnerability been treated so lightly? As the noble Lord, Lord Howell, asked, where are the back-up schemes? We know how vulnerable we are from the different climate emergencies that we have suffered, whether from flooding or wind, and the devastating impact that communities face when their electricity or gas supplies are cut off. Running through this whole debate is the need to address the requirements on the agenda around achieving net zero.
As my noble friend Lord Whitty outlined, this regulatory failure must be addressed by immediate measures to counter the real hardships faced by so many. I share his concern at the proposed use of council tax rebates. This is a blunt instrument with no guarantee, as it is a property tax, that it will help all those most in need. I echo his hope that the Government will accept Labour’s immediately available interventions.
In conclusion, I hope that the Minister can give us an update on the proposals put forward by the Chancellor today. We await the analysis with interest. It would be helpful to have a sense from data, which I am sure the Government must be gathering, of the scale of the problem that we are facing. It would also be useful to know whether the Government are considering, as most parties have outlined, the potential that a windfall tax could bring to help to alleviate the problems. None need that more than those 1 million extra households predicted by National Energy Action to be at risk of fuel poverty. They are the ones that need the answers that I hope we will get today. Although welcome at first sight, help of £350, which is just over half the latest price increase, will be woefully inadequate.
Lord Callanan (Con)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and admire him for his prescience in selecting such an appropriate subject for debate today. He must have had more advance notice than even I had of when the Government’s announcements were coming, so congratulations to him on a very timely and informative intervention. Of course, I am grateful to everyone who has contributed today on this topical but also extremely vital subject. I will try to address as many of the points as possible that noble Lords raised, but this has been a wide-ranging debate and, if I do not manage to cover everything, I am sure that we can catch up in writing.
The Government of course recognise and understand the pressures that people are facing with the cost of living and we will continue to listen to people’s concerns, as we have done throughout the pandemic. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Monks, and many other speakers in recognising that this is a timely debate, with the energy regulator’s announcement just a few hours ago and the Chancellor’s announcement on the back of that. The regulator’s announcement was for the period April to September 2022.
In a recent debate secured by my noble friend Lady McIntosh, I set out that wholesale energy prices have been rising, as we all know, due to increases in the price of wholesale gas, to which multiple international factors have contributed. I start by reiterating that energy security remains an absolute priority for the Government and we are confident that our energy security will be maintained. We continue to work closely with key industry organisations, including Ofgem and National Grid gas, to monitor both supply and demand. In response to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, we meet around half of our annual gas supply through domestic production and the vast majority of our imports come from reliable suppliers such as Norway.
As I have said before in the House, the energy price cap has, for the last six months, protected millions of households during the winter period from the volatility seen in wholesale gas prices. The Government have committed to retaining powers to implement a price cap beyond the current long-stop date of 2023, should that prove necessary. However, as noble Lords will know, sadly, the rising wholesale costs of energy have now fed into the price cap’s methodology, leading the independent—I emphasise that—regulator, Ofgem, to increase the level at which the price cap is set. Recognising the impact that this will have on households, I am pleased to update the House, as the Chancellor did this morning in the other place, that the Government are taking action on the back of this.
Today the Chancellor announced a £5.6 billion energy bills rebate, which will help households to deal with the unprecedented increase in energy bills that we have seen this year by helping to smooth the costs over subsequent years. The rebate, which will shortly be consulted on by my department, will provide households with a payment of £200, which will be credited to their energy bills by their current energy supplier. This rebate will likely start issuing payments to energy suppliers to pass on to their household customers from autumn this year, which of course is when households will need it most as we head into the winter period next year.
In response to the point from the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, let me make it clear that while the mechanism will be subject to consultation, this scheme is not a loan. No interest will be charged on the upfront funding provided by the Exchequer. The Government will seek to recoup the funding at a later stage, smoothing out the cost increases we have witnessed in the wholesale energy markets. The department will work closely with industry and consumer groups on how we can best deliver this policy, with a consultation planned for the spring.
This is an important and timely measure, which will help households at a time when they need it most. In addition, the Government have announced further support for delivery outside of the energy system to help with the wider cost of living. We have also today announced a £150 payment for the 80% of English households in council tax bands A through D. This measure will be worth the equivalent of more than 2.5% of net income in 2022-23 to the poorest 10th of households, compared with less than 0.5% to the richest 10th. In addition, there is £144 million of discretionary funding for local authorities to support households who need support but for some reason are not eligible for that council tax rebate. The combined package could see some households receive £350 over the coming financial year to help them with the cost of living. This is worth some £9.1 billion.
This new support package is on top of the existing set of measures in place to support families, worth around £12 billion a year. These include energy-specific measures targeting the fuel poor. The noble Lords, Lord Whitty and Lord Oates, and my noble friend Lady McIntosh mentioned the warm home discount scheme which provides support with energy bills through rebates, helping households stay warm in the winter months. The scheme currently provides over 2 million low-income and vulnerable households with a £140 rebate off their winter energy bills. I am pleased to confirm to noble Lords that BEIS has already consulted on proposals which would expand the scheme from around £350 million to £475 million per year, at 2020 prices, which will help the scheme reach 3 million households from winter next year onwards.
On the very important subject of energy efficiency, I am afraid I have to tell the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, that she is simply wrong. The energy company obligation has already installed 3.3 million measures in 2.3 million homes. We are increasing, not cutting, the amount energy suppliers invest in energy efficiency measures for low-income households. From April this year, the start of the next financial year, this will be extended until 2026 and we are boosting its value from £640 million to £1 billion a year, helping the poorest households to install the energy efficiency measures that many noble Lords referred to.
In addition, for the benefit of noble Lords who raised the issue, such as the noble Lords, Lord Oates and Lord Shipley, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Scott and Lady Bennett—amazingly I agree with one point the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, made—the best form of green energy is indeed not using it in the first place, through energy efficiency measures. This is precisely why we are investing over £2 billion a year in energy efficiency schemes, through projects such as the home upgrade grant, the local authority delivery scheme, the sustainable warmth competition and the social housing decarbonisation fund. All of these are helping to provide long-term solutions by improving the energy efficiency of the homes of the poorest people in society—exactly those who should be deserving of our support.
In addition to all that, the Department for Work and Pensions has a set of measures to support households with their energy bills. The £500 million support fund was announced last autumn to help those most in need this winter. This includes provision for utility costs, including energy. The DWP also continues to provide support for vulnerable users and pensioners through its winter fuel payment and cold weather payment.
Picking up on some of the points made by noble Lords, the debate was well introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, who asked a number of questions, as indeed did the noble Lord, Lord Oates, about the retail market and supplier failures. As a result of high gas prices, some 26 suppliers have exited the market since the beginning of August 2021. The current situation has been precipitated by unprecedented conditions. In the vast majority of those cases, the Government and Ofgem have utilised the supplier of last resort process, which has been set up to protect customers when their supplier fails to ensure that they do not suffer any disruption or lose any of their credit balances. Ofgem and the Government will continue to look at ways to reduce the costs that arise from a supplier of last resort process, but it is clear that it is a vital safety net that has protected millions of consumers. Last October, Ofgem published a letter to industry setting out the actions that it will take to reform the retail market. This includes reviewing licence conditions to strengthen the financial resilience of suppliers and help restore stability to the sector.
I was also asked about retail market reform. The Government want a retail energy market that continues to protect consumers now and as we transition to net zero, while engaging them with positive choices about their energy supply. We want a competitive market whereby companies invest in innovation and offer products and services that help us in our drive to decarbonisation.
The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, talked about retail market regulation to support progress to net zero. In considering these reforms, the Government will take account of the lessons of the current market. In fact, we published a call for evidence on the future of the retail energy market. A strategy will be published as soon as possible once the current market situation has stabilised.
The noble Lord, Lord Oates, raised the issue of funding our future policy costs to deliver net-zero policy. He will be aware that, as set out in the heat and buildings strategy, we will publish a fairness and affordability call for evidence to set out the options for energy levies and obligations to help rebalance electricity and gas prices and to support green choices, with a view to taking final decisions in 2022. Consumers will be at the heart of those decisions.
Lord Oates (LD)
The one question that the Minister has not answered is what the Government’s estimate is of the added cost to bills as a result of the 26 energy company failures that he mentioned. Citizens Advice estimates that it has put £93 on bills. Do the Government have a figure?
Lord Callanan (Con)
I do not have a precise figure in front of me. It is a complicated issue because it depends on exactly where the costs fall but if the figures are available, I will write to the noble Lord with as much information as I am able to provide.
In response to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, on national insurance rises, the lowest earners will, of course, be protected from the levy. The highest-earning 15% will pay over half the revenue and 6.1 million people earning less than the primary threshold or lower profits limit will not pay the levy at all. Regarding the rebate adding costs to bills further down the line, the aim of the policy is to reduce energy bills for households in Great Britain in 2022-23; it is to be paid back automatically and interest-free over the next five years. This is a fiscally responsible approach that helps customers to manage the unprecedented increase in energy bills by spreading the increased costs of global prices over time.
My noble friend Lord Howell of Guildford, as he normally does, made some good points about our overall energy strategy. He will be aware that the energy White Paper set out a vision for transforming our energy system, backed up by practical action. We will address the decarbonisation of the power sector on a whole-system basis so that we deliver low emissions and maintain high levels of reliability and resistance, while ensuring that the cost of the transition is fair and affordable. The Government are taking a range of important steps to decarbonise the power sector, while establishing business models to support hydrogen-fired generation, new nuclear and CCUS-enabled generation, and to support the development of flexible storage.
I agreed with many of the sensible comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Young of Norwood Green, from whose expertise in this area we have benefited. He reminded us—it is worth making this point—that these are difficult, complicated issues, which need long-term holistic solutions. Of course, we are all searching for a simple, easy answer, but many of these issues take decades to come about. One issue that I could highlight is that of new nuclear. The noble Baroness, Lady Blake, criticised us for not developing new nuclear, but these projects take decades to bring about. The main reason for the decline in the nuclear industry in the UK was that Labour abandoned our nuclear programme when it came to power in 1997. For the whole of its period in government, no progress whatsoever was made on new nuclear. We are now reversing that and proceeding with new nuclear developments, but it takes many decades to bring them online. I believe that, in considering our energy system, that decision will prove to be one of the biggest mistakes in energy policy over recent decades.
The noble Lords, Lord Shipley, Lord Monks, Lord Sikka and Lord Oates, the noble Baroness, Lady Crawley, and other noble Lords raised the issue of a windfall tax. It is worth pointing out that the UK Government already place additional taxes on the extraction of oil and gas, with companies engaged in the production of oil and gas on the UK continental shelf subject to headline tax rates on their profits that are currently more than double those paid by other businesses. To date, the sector has paid more than £375 billion in production taxes. We are always considering a full range of options to support consumers and businesses through the current high price challenges, but it is important to remember that any action that we take must not have broader negative consequences for the economy.
All Peers have referred to the importance of attracting investment and achieving our energy goals, which will require vast investment from the private sector in our energy system. If the Government woke up one morning and imposed windfall taxes, however attractive that might sound, that would massively impact the amount of inward investment that we attract into the country. While the dividends of those companies have been criticised, we should never forget that many of those dividends go into paying the pension funds that help to pay the pensions of the many pensioners that noble Lords highlighted who might be suffering from fuel poverty this winter. There are never any easy, simple or straightforward solutions to these problems, however much we might want to think that there are.
My noble friend Lady McIntosh raised the important issue, as she often does, of off-gas-grid consumers. The Government believe that it is essential that consumers of LPG and heating oil get a fair deal. In our view, the LPG and heating oil markets do not share the monopoly characteristics of network utilities and are therefore not subject to price regulation under Ofgem. However, I can tell my noble friend that the energy rebate announced today is being passed through to suppliers to pass on to domestic energy users, including off-gas-grid consumers, who are, of course, electricity customers.
The noble Lord, Lord Jones, asked for estimates of the number of homes struggling. We regularly publish updated fuel poverty statistics, including projections for 2022, taking into account the price cap increase and the measures announced today. We will publish those on 24 February. In addition, Ofgem regularly publishes its statistics on vulnerable consumers and indebtedness through its consumer protection and vulnerability reports.
Lastly, the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, spoke about the important subject of hydrogen. We are committed to the development of hydrogen as a strategic decarbonised energy carrier for the UK. We are currently taking a twin-track approach, covering both electrolytic hydrogen from renewables and methane reformation with carbon capture, usage and storage. Both methods of production are covered by innovation schemes and policy development.
As I have set out, the Government have listened, recognised and acted on the concerns of families struggling with the cost of living. As I said at the start, the energy bills rebate will provide over £5.6 billion of support to households later this year, ahead of the next winter period, while the additional support for English homes in council tax bands A to D will further help households with the cost of living—a total package worth £9.1 billion. Of course, the Government will continue to engage with industry, consumer groups and other stakeholders as we progress these measures and I am sure that we will have further debates as these policies develop in the coming months.
Lord Whitty (Lab)
My Lords, I genuinely thank the Minister for that comprehensive reply, in which he gave some additional information about the Chancellor’s announcement, which I shall look forward to reading in detail, and made some other points that we need to take on board in this context. It is an extraordinarily complex issue that we have been addressing today but, at the end of the day, the immediate problem, as well described by my noble friend Lord Jones, is that of families living in cold and in debt. We have an opportunity, if we can get this right, of making sure that what has happened today does not make their situation worse but begins to ameliorate it.
The bigger point that I am making—big and emotive though that is—is that there are three different things that we need to address. We need to address the immediate impact of the gas price rise on the poorest families and on all families, in many respects, and on our economy. I hope that the Chancellor has gone a little way towards that, although I do not think that he has gone far enough and I think that some of the means that he is proposing are very odd. It is very odd to use council tax as a way in which to give back money; it is similar to using national insurance in the way that the Government have done to raise money for the health service and social care. There is a tax system that we should be using for these purposes, which would be much more progressive than what he proposes and much better targeted. However, he has done something and I appreciate that.
The second crisis, of course, is the one that the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, and others clearly outlined: the present regime with Ofgem is not effective in creating a market where competition really works, as distinct from one that is very vulnerable, or one that protects the more vulnerable consumers. I am glad to hear that we are having an assessment of consumer regulation under Ofgem, but we need to make that serious and effective. I look forward to seeing progress on that as rapidly as possible. The Minister made a pointed remark that Ofgem is independent; it is sort of independent, in the sense that it is at arm’s length, but it works within a framework defined by government and by legislation. I am looking forward to the next White Paper and energy Bill—I am not sure that the Minister is, but I am.
The third issue is that we need to ensure that our energy system and its interrelationship with consumers and industry prepares now for the transition away from fossil fuels. Given the failures that we have had recently on the relatively easy part of protecting consumers, the way in which we take the economy and consumers through a massive change in energy supply, in every house and flat in the land that uses gas, will have to change. We do not at this point know how it will change or what it will cost. The immediate answer put on the table by the Government is to have air pumps, which is putting people off because of the current cost of air pumps, and particularly putting off those who may have to adopt them early, such as the rural consumers that the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, mentioned.
Energy efficiency is a vital part of this, as the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, and others emphasised, and as the Minister accepts, but the intervention to change how we heat our homes and provide basic warmth for our children and elderly people will have to be much more substantial than the inadequate response from the industry and regulator to the gas price hike. It is a much bigger issue and we need to make sure that we have a regulatory system that is capable of taking it on and taking consumers with it. The Minister has a big task to resolve all those issues, but at least he has given us some indication of how the Government are thinking today and I thank him and everybody who has contributed to this debate.
Autocrats, Kleptocrats and Populists
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Browne of Ladyton
That the Grand Committee takes note of the impact on global democratic norms and values from autocrats, kleptocrats and populists and the case for a coordinated response by the United Kingdom and her allies.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, I am conscious that we are having this debate on the day that Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin are, as the Times has reported,
“cementing an alliance to make the world safe for autocrats.”
I am also conscious that we are debating this on the day we hear that the First Minister of Northern Ireland is intent on resigning and possibly paralysing the Government of Northern Ireland, which definitely defeats the democratic intentions of the people of Northern Ireland. But I am confident that by the end of this debate we will be in a position, because of your Lordships’ contributions, to allay the fears of the people of the world in respect of this global alliance, and of the people of Northern Ireland as to how their democracy is not under threat either.
Democracy is in retreat and authoritarianism is on the rise. According to the University of Gothenburg’s V-Dem Institute, non-democratic countries outnumber democracies for the first time in 20 years, and 2021 was the fifth consecutive year in which more nations moved towards authoritarianism than democracy. In December, President Biden convened a virtual summit for democracy around an agenda that challenged authoritarianism and sought to fight corruption and kleptocracy and promote human rights. He said that
“we stand at an inflection point”,
with the future of democracy facing
“sustained and alarming challenges”.
In fact, the V-Dem Democracy Report 2021, which reflects analyses based on an assessment of nearly 30 million data points and aspects of democracy such as the freedom and independence of legislatures, judiciaries, the media and civil society, and human rights, shows the continuing global decline of liberal democracy. Electoral autocracies are still the most common regime type and, along with closed autocracies—ones in which the people are denied elections—they are home to 68% of the world’s population.
The data shows a drift of democratic backsliding engulfing 25 nations, or one-third of the world’s population. G20 nations such as Brazil, India, Turkey and the USA are part of that drift. Poland wins the shameful title of the country which declined the most during the past decade. I am confounded by that, given the history of Poland.
The process of decline follows a predictable pattern. Once elected—fairly or, more likely, after some manipulation of the electoral process—autocrats tend, if possible, to quickly remove the time limits on their term of office. They maintain power through centralised control of information and resources; political opposition is either forbidden or strongly curtailed; and individual freedom is limited by the state. First, they attack and repress the media and civil society and polarise societies by disrespecting opponents and spreading false information. Then, they undermine elections.
Dominant party authoritarian regimes exploit Western legal and financial systems against Western media where it is critical of their regimes. They sue the media, or they buy it. Russian companies have acquired large ownership stakes in foreign media companies and influenced their operations. They have engaged in disinformation campaigns that exploit weakness in our freedom of speech protections.
It is now common knowledge that Russian-controlled agencies and businesses played a strategically vital role in interference in the US 2016 presidential election, showing that it is possible to interfere destructively in the most powerful Western democracy. The ISC Russia report found credible open-source commentary suggesting that Russia undertook influence campaigns during the Scottish independence referendum. Although accepting that the evidence about the EU referendum campaign was less clear-cut, the committee recommended that the UK intelligence community produce and publish an assessment of possible Russian interference in the EU referendum to reassure the public that our democratic processes are safe. I should like to see that reassurance.
Rule by thieves arises when a country’s elite begins systematically to steal from public funds on a vast scale. Undermining democracy and the legal system, it gains control over vital economic assets and amasses substantial wealth. No longer is kleptocracy a corrupt political system in a few poor nations. It is a global network, with members including world leaders and powerful businesspeople. Assisted by corrupt professionals with the expertise to launder their wealth through a maze of shell companies, they secure it in luxury assets in the West or in our banks. According to the IMF, as much of 5% of the world’s GDP is laundered money and only 1% of it is ever spotted.
Collectively, developing countries have lost $16.3 trillion to elicit leakages since 1980. Their people struggle, they starve, they die, while their Governments export the country’s wealth and become net creditors to the world’s economy. Some of the money is hidden right here. Prime UK properties provide an attractive conduit for securing and legitimising the laundered funds. Despite much rhetoric, progress on paper and repeated parliamentary calls for change, the UK remains a haven for dirty money, a great deal of which comes from Russia and Eurasia.
It is not just money that is laundered but reputations as well. Family and key friends and allies of the thieves merge into our UK society at the very highest level. Some acquire British citizenship following receipt of a “golden visa”. Settled here, they donate to charities, threaten journalists with legal actions and make political connections and political donations. The Government have failed adequately to address this problem and, in the meantime, the provision of services by British professionals to kleptocrats corrupts our world-leading financial services and corrupts and undermines the famous efficiency of our legal system. Worse, it degrades our international reputation as a beacon of democracy and honesty.
The Government placed combating serious organised crime at the centre of their foreign policy but seem not to recognise the intimate connections that UK society and institutions have with kleptocratic states and their elites, who continue to find a welcome in London. The number of times that parliamentarians have drawn attention to this issue in reports, debates and Questions are too numerous to list. Yesterday, the Treasury Select Committee published but the latest example. In its report Economic Crime, one paragraph says it all. I refer to paragraph 230, which I will read short in the interests of time:
“Reform of Companies House is essential if UK companies are no longer to be used to launder money and conduct economic crime.”
It says that there is change:
“However, the pace of change is slow. The problems with UK company structures were identified by the Government in 2014 in the UK Anti-Corruption Plan. While there have been welcome innovations, such as the People with Significant Control register, on current plans it will have taken over 10 years to improve matters, during which time a large number of UK companies may have been put to criminal use by a wide range of criminals.”
I qualify that, on my part but not on behalf of the committee, by saying that companies have been used in a criminal way by a wide range of criminals, including kleptocrats.
In Europe alone, populist politicians have recently risen to power in the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland and have gained momentum in France, Spain, here and elsewhere. In Hungary and Poland, this has been accompanied by an erosion of the rule of law, democratic backsliding, greater authoritarianism and an increase in the persecution of minorities. In the words of Jan Kubik from UCL, contrary to Viktor Orbán’s rhetoric, there is no such thing as an illiberal democracy.
Populist parties and politicians divide societies into “the people versus the corrupt elite” and argue that politics should express the general will of the people. By “the people” they mean their people. They erode the informal norms of democracy, question the loyalty of the opposition and decry criticism as fake news. As winners of democratic elections, they fail to constrain themselves and instead hollow out and politicise formal institutions of that democracy. They undermine formal institutions such as the courts, legislatures and regulatory agencies as creations of a “corrupt elite”. Rather than tolerating a free press and political opposition, instead they try to undermine their legitimacy and, most insidiously, they redefine “the people” by excluding vulnerable ethnic or religious minorities, immigrants and marginalised economic groups. The result is majority rule without minority rights. Mainstream political parties, the backbone of representative democracy, have so far largely failed to address these threats and some centre-right parties have become populist instead.
In his remarks at the Biden summit, Boris Johnson announced that we in the UK
“are working with our friends to ensure that”
we are using
“emerging technologies … designed to safeguard our shared values”,
helping
“developing countries to build clean and green infrastructure with transparent projects, that are open to scrutiny”
and deploying new
“national sanctions to target those responsible for … human rights violations.”
Further, he promised in the “Year of Action” to
“take even stronger measures against the illicit finance that undermines democracy everywhere, strengthening our … powers to go after the criminals who”
exploit our lax corporate structures, bringing
“openness to the purchase of properties in the UK”
and taking forward
“new laws to safeguard our democratic processes and institutions from those who would do us harm.”
As the RUSI report makes clear,
“2022 has the potential to be an impressive year of action for the UK. But it requires the prime minister to acknowledge the UK’s global illicit finance responsibilities and reverse his current irresponsible disinterest in a topic that—as it does the US—threatens the UK’s national security interests.”
It also requires our Prime Minister candidly to accept that, if democracy is to begin at home, this requires more self-awareness than hitherto he has been capable of. If he genuinely wishes to be seen as a global leader for democracy, he needs to be clear that he and his Government are learning lessons too.
During his time in office, our Prime Minister has progressively degraded norms and standards, such as with the unlawful Prorogation of Parliament and the failure to dismiss the Home Secretary for bullying, to name but two examples. It seems that this Government are still on course to assault our democracy. We need look no further than our present and upcoming parliamentary business: an election Bill that affronts the right to vote, a policing Bill that sought to criminalise protests and a Nationality and Borders Bill that has been described as stripping British citizenship with the stroke of a pen.
What is more, this Government appear set on limiting the courts’ power to hold public bodies to account through judicial review and intent on tearing up the Human Rights Act and placing legal constraints on whistleblowing and journalism—and all this against a background where the Government whipped their vote through Parliament to support a Motion that ripped up parliamentary standards in a doomed attempt to save the disgraced MP Owen Paterson, who had lobbied for companies that paid him hundreds of thousands of pounds. The reality is that our Prime Minister has presided over a culture of corruption and clientelism. What other words are there to describe a politics in which political donors are given privileged access to a VIP lane for lucrative Covid contracts? I have but one question for the Minister, whom I admire greatly, as I know do many of your Lordships: what is the plan of action for the year of action? I cannot find one anywhere in government documents.
Lord Balfe (Con)
My Lords, I hope that we are not going to deteriorate into a sort of two-party or three-party squabble, because the Question that the noble Lord has put on the agenda is a fundamental one in European and wider terms. In 1979, Jim Callaghan noted that the age of post-war consensus politics was coming to an end. He probably did not realise how true the words that he spoke were. Today we have not only a very unsatisfactory democracy for those of us who grew up in the immediate post-war world but one that is largely underwritten by the population. This is something quite new.
I spent most of my active political career travelling around the world in many different guises and visiting other countries with many different forms of democracy. When I started in 1979, most of them at least subscribed to the idea that they were doing the best for their people. But by the end of that era, where we are now, we have not only a situation that is quite unsatisfactory but, I put it to your Lordships, a system that has far more support from the grass roots than we should be happy with.
I spent 20 years in the European Parliament as its rapporteur on Turkey. I saw it from the rule of General Evren and the colonels right through to the present President, Mr Erdoğan, who was Prime Minister when I finished. We may not like it, but we have to accept that Erdoğan has won all the elections that he has stood in. They have all been observed by Council of Europe and OSCE delegations and been passed as, on balance, acceptable. The people of Turkey have consistently voted for the policies that their President has wished on them, even though most of those policies are a big abnegation of anything that we could call democracy.
The same can be seen in other countries. My son studied in Moscow. I visited Moscow around the time of the Crimea incident, among other times. It was clear that the Russian population were overwhelmingly behind Putin, and they still are. He still has a roughly 60% positive rating, which is something that Keir Starmer or Johnson can only dream about.
My point is that it is fine for us to feel unhappy about the decline in democracy, and I indeed do. I share a lot of the reservations the noble Lord, Lord Browne, mentioned but I also think that we need to look beyond where we are and see why it has come about. I think one of the reasons is the genuine collapse in confidence of ordinary people that politicians can make a difference to their lives. That is probably the thing we need to direct our attention to.
Politics has become far too professional. I remember when I came into politics in the 60s—this was after 1966—they used to say we have 300 members of the parliamentary Labour Party, 100 of them are totally unfit for office, another 100 do not want office so that gives us 100 people from whom to fill 80 ministerial posts. If you look back, Ministers lasted a long time. Now, virtually everybody in Parliament is capable of being a Minister, but I am not sure that they are capable of relating to the people who elect them to this building.
There is a fundamental challenge. I do not think it is a clash between two parties; it is a challenge for us to get our act together and start building democracy back and promoting the values on which it is based.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, that we have to say something about the UK’s standing as a democracy because that affects our ability to respond to the current situation. We all agree that we face a global push-back against democracy and the rule of law. It is led by China and Russia, supported by the central Asian states that emerged from the USSR, and now also by Turkey, with governing parties in two EU members, Hungary and Poland, drifting into that camp.
I want to stress the role that Middle East autocracies are actively playing in this development. We have seen the wealthy Governments of the UAE and Saudi Arabia actively working to suppress the democratic efforts of the Arab spring, supporting the military coup in Egypt, funding anti-democratic forces in Libya, helping to undermine democracy in Tunisia and contributing almost as much as Iran and Israel to the destabilisation of Lebanon. Their elites also penetrate open democracies such as the UK, employing PR companies and buying football clubs to bolster their reputations. They buy mansions and country estates and gain acceptance within our political and social elites. The current rise in energy prices will increase their ability to extend their influence through societies like ours.
The global reputation of democratic government has been shaken by recent events in the United States and Britain. The American Republican Party, which some in our Conservative Party still see as a model they wish to follow, is engaged in voter suppression and election-fixing. Here, we have a Prime Minister who has broken the Ministerial Code on numerous occasions and stretched the boundaries of reasoned debate, respect for opposition and the rule of law.
The Lords will shortly be scrutinising the Elections Bill—it was originally entitled the election integrity Bill but has now dropped the claim to integrity—which has been designed to tilt our democracy further in favour of the Conservative Party. That will be followed by the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill, an almost direct copy of Republican efforts within the United States, which is intended to extend state influence over university teaching and appointments.
Populist Ministers in our Government repeatedly attack the BBC for its failure to present the government line uncritically. The Prime Minister loves to talk about Britain as a “soft power superpower”. I remind the Minister that the integrated security strategy published a year ago noted five key elements of British soft power as the BBC, the global reputation of our universities, the generosity of our international development efforts, the work of the British Council and the strength of our cultural sector. All have been undermined since then by government decisions and ministerial attacks.
Our populist Prime Minister loves to talk of Britain “leading” a group of democratic nations across the world. Sadly, we are in no position to lead the democratic world now. A glance at overseas media across continental Europe, south Asia and North America shows that the political antics of recent years have replaced respect with ridicule. I sympathise with the Minister, who must of course defend the Government; he is somewhat better than this, but he will be painfully aware of the damage that current events have done to Britain’s global reputation.
However, at least we can do something to reduce the penetration of British politics, society and business by kleptocrats from authoritarian states. One of the most disturbing statements in the Intelligence and Security Committee’s Russia report, in paragraphs 50 and 53, was that the integration of post-Soviet oligarchs into
“the UK business and social scene … cannot be untangled, and the priority now must be to mitigate the risk”.
Boris Johnson’s attempts to downgrade and delay government action in response to the recommendations of the Russia report are one of the most disgraceful aspects of his premiership.
Priority in the next parliamentary Session must be given at last to the economic crime Bill and revision of our outdated Official Secrets Act. I hope also that the Government will accept the amendment I have tabled to the Nationality and Borders Bill to suspend the tier 1 investor visa scheme, which has allowed oligarchs to import corruption into the UK and buy access to the top of the Conservative Party. Such changes will reduce the damage that has been inflicted on Britain by corrupt and hostile foreign influences. But other changes will be needed to restore our damaged global reputation as a democratic, open society.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Faulkner of Worcester) (Lab)
We were due to hear from the noble Lord, Lord Hacking, but he is not here. Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, would now like to speak.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)
My Lords, the last century, the one in which many Members of your Lordships’ House spent most of their lives, opened with a world dominated by empires and autocracies, and with true democracies very much in a minority. The century closed with democracies in the ascendant, the empires largely gone and something close to a rules-based international order having emerged from the ashes of two world wars and one long Cold War. Any complacency that that progress might have engendered has long since dissipated, with several autocracies or quasi-autocracies prominent, and with the rules-based order under threat, from within as well as from outside, as supporters of unfettered national sovereignty espouse policies that are inconsistent with their countries’ obligations under international law. So, today’s debate is timely and I warmly welcome the initiative of the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, in securing it, and his excellent introductory speech.
What needs to be done to check the trends of the last few years and to secure what was once described as
“a world safe for democracy”?
First, we need to ensure that our own democracies are in good working order and that they are promoting, in practice as well as in rhetoric, policies that strengthen other democracies worldwide and further respect for human rights, as laid out in the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. We also need to ensure that our democracies encourage effective international co-operation to address the great challenges of our time: climate change, pandemics, the risks of nuclear proliferation and war, and trade protectionism. That will not be the work of one year or of one Government. It will require concerted effort over decades, and it is not happening—yet, at least.
Should this effort involve a more or less formal grouping of democracies? I rather doubt whether that is the right direction in which we or others should be moving. Such a grouping would raise plenty of problems—first, what is described as the “sheep and goats” problem. How do you decide, and who decides, which countries are truly democratic sheep and which are undemocratic goats? It is not easy, and certain to lead to many difficulties over borderline cases. Moreover, while such a grouping can apply policies and make rules for its own members, it cannot hope to make such policies and rules binding on others. Where globally applicable rules are needed, as with the global challenges that I mentioned earlier, this grouping will simply not be able to deliver the goods.
So, while it is right for democracies to work very closely together, I also suggest that they would best do so within global institutions, many of which already exist, even if their efforts are so far inadequate. Yes, we ourselves should be working to strengthen other democracies and working with regional bodies such as the European Union and the African Union, which are mandated by their founding charters to uphold democracy; but we should not regard democracy as something to be imposed by force nor, conversely, as in the case of Taiwan, to be reversed by force.
Those global institutions I referred to may not be working very effectively, but should they be replaced by something different? In my view, that would be an act of folly. Is there really any likelihood that they would be replaced by something better? Just read the UN charter, if you want an example, and ask yourself whether that document could be negotiated today. More likely, the world would slip back into the law of the jungle which prevailed in the first half of the 20th century and from which it had to be rescued by the democracies, with the expenditure of much blood and treasure and massive human suffering. What is needed, surely, are policies of incremental reform, which will make those global institutions more fit for purpose. I hope that our own country will play a prominent role in shaping the reforms needed, as we did with honour in the past, and that we will act by example and not just by assertion.
I have to say that some of the legislation that has come before your Lordships’ House in recent years—the internal market Act, the external operations Act and the Bill before the House this afternoon on frontiers and border protection—is inconsistent with our obligations under international law. The Minister can stand at the Dispatch Box and say that this Parliament is sovereign and can change these things if it wishes, and that is correct—but another Minister cannot succeed that Minister at the Dispatch Box and say that we are the great supporters of the rules-based international order.
Viscount Eccles (Con)
In following the noble Lord, I very much agree with him that we should refer ourselves back to the creation of the United Nations, the World Bank, the IMF and the other institutions. Indeed, the Motion refers to co-ordination, which is a very important point.
I move on to sub-Saharan Africa, where there is a quarter of the world’s poorest countries. It seems a very good example of the struggles to arrive at a proper understanding of the norms and values of democracy. It has been said, and I think it is right, that the best thing about democracy is that it enables you to change your Government without violence. In sub-Saharan Africa, that is by no means universally the case. Another thing that one could say is that some countries that have been mentioned today, including our own, have arrived at an understanding of the norms and values of democracy and are now being accused of backsliding—what you might call the Capitol syndrome. But many other countries have never got there. It is important that we think differently about the countries that have never got to the point where they had regimes that respected the norms and values of democracy.
When one thinks about sub-Saharan Africa, one is looking for something positive—that is to say, what are we going to do about it? Do we have any responsibility to do anything? If so, what will we do? Of course, that takes one back to the international organisations. In reading about the World Bank’s operations in sub-Saharan Africa, I get the impression that it is rather tired. It is not the World Bank I remember from 20 or 30 years ago.
The positives we need to find are headed by economic development. We know that if you want to have a reasonable regime, it is important to be able to collect some taxes and to have some public expenditure. If your economy simply does not support that approach, you are not very far along the road to having an acceptable regime. In thinking about acceptable regimes, it is risky to assume that the default position is our understanding of democracy. All the evidence shows that this is not the case and that there may be many other ways in which people will continue to think about their politics and their regime that do not conform to our understanding of the norms and values of democracy. We have to approach all this rather cautiously.
I want to cite two examples in sub-Saharan Africa: Burundi and Cameroon. They were both brought under German colonial control in 1884. At the end of the First World War, they were both taken away from Germany and, by a co-ordinated effort of the League of Nations, one became Belgian and one a mixture of French and English. We now have virtually no relationship with Burundi, but we have a sanctions regime. It seems to me that to apply a sanctions regime to Burundi, which is similar to that we might apply to Russia, does not make any sense. I think the British Government have forgotten Burundi. On Cameroon, I have just one last sentence: there is conflict there, again created to quite a large extent by the League of Nations decision after the First World War and by independence and what happened in 1971. I think our Government’s reaction is that Cameroon is too complicated for us to have an opinion about what should be done there. After Brexit, we now need some opinions about what needs to be done in sub-Saharan Africa.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, the speaking time for Back-Benchers is five minutes. If we go over that, we will cut into the time that the Minister has to respond, so can we please keep an eye on the clock?
Lord Hain (Lab)
My Lords, Bain & Company presents itself as a reputable global consultancy operating across the world, with an office in London and recent contracts worth £55 million with the Cabinet Office alone. Yet in South Africa, Bain brazenly assisted former President Jacob Zuma to organise his decade of shameless looting and corruption, with the company earning fat fees estimated at £100 million—or 2 billion rand—from state institutions.
South Africa’s State Capture Commission, a judicial inquiry headed by Deputy Chief Justice Zondo, indicted Bain’s work with the South African Revenue Service as “unlawful” and recommended that all its South African public sector contracts be re-examined with a view to prosecution. At the time, Bain South Africa’s work was endorsed by both its London office and its US headquarters in Boston. Bain has also been disgracefully smearing Mr Athol Williams, a key whistle-blower praised by the Zondo commission who recently had to flee to the UK for his safety.
Given the scandalous collusion of Bain UK and Bain USA. I am asking that the UK Government and the US Government immediately suspend all government contracts with Bain. I wrote three weeks ago to the Prime Minister requesting this, and he has just replied stating that the Cabinet Office will
“look into this matter with urgency”
and the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster wrote to me yesterday saying that the Government will be contacting Bain. I hope that those contracts will be suspended and that that is the case for all public sector contracts in the UK.
However, Bain’s shamefully shady behaviour is just the tip of the iceberg. The prodigious looting, corruption and money laundering under former President Zuma would not have been possible without the complicity of Bain, KPMG, McKinsey, SAP, Hogan Lovells and the banks HSBC, Standard Chartered and Bank of Baroda. Those fee-clutching global corporates and turn-a-blind-eye Governments from London and Washington to Dubai, Delhi and Beijing helped to rob South African taxpayers, contributing to a catastrophic loss of South Africa’s GDP of around one-fifth. Economists estimate the full cost of the Zuma state capture to be a monumental £750 million or 1.5 trillion rand. The Government’s total annual expenditure is just 2 trillion rand annually. These global corporates all obtained sweetheart state contracts, which helped Zuma’s business associates, the Gupta brothers, to loot the state. Global banks such as HSBC, Standard Chartered and Baroda transferred this looted money through their digital pipelines to less regulated jurisdictions such as Dubai and Hong Kong, or British Overseas Territories in the Caribbean, to then clean the money by mingling it with other funds, disguising its origins and enabling it to be more easily spent.
Lawyers and accountants assisted the Guptas to set up complex shell, or front, companies, hiding their true owners—the Guptas or their associates—and enabling money to be moved to a country where there is low transparency. Dishonest audits left suspicious transactions hidden. Estate agents received laundered money during Gupta property purchases. Global brand names from KPMG to McKinsey, from HSBC to Standard Chartered, all profited while the Guptas hid and spent their stolen funds that could otherwise have been destined for essential South African public services, job creation or infrastructure, leaving South Africa’s public finances near-bankrupted and its growth stalled.
I therefore find it completely unacceptable that Bain is licensed to operate commercially in the UK, the USA or anywhere else in the world—at least until it has repaid all its fees earned from the South African state during the Zuma-Gupta years and answered charges in the courts there. Unless the UK, US, Chinese, Indian and UAE Governments co-operate with each other, state capture will happen again, either in South Africa or other countries.
The truth is that international criminals continue to loot and money-launder with impunity through centres such as London, New York, Hong Kong, Delhi and Dubai. Ministers talk the talk on corruption but refuse to take the necessary tough action against guilty big corporations to stop it. Meanwhile, financial crime is estimated by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, to be worth around 5% of global GDP, or $2 trillion, each and every year.
Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Browne, on mounting this debate. He has been absolutely tireless in promoting more international co-operation and co-ordination on all the really existential issues threatening the world in an extremely dangerous time for us all. This debate is a marvellous further step in that direction.
I also agree with my noble friend Lord Balfe that we need to start on this question of defeating the autocracies by looking at and repairing our own weaknesses in democracy. I agree with most of what the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, said on the same theme. I think I was a bit naive in agreeing with my noble friend Lord Balfe that there was going to be a non-partisan approach to these totally new issues, but I am afraid that was soon disabused. Maybe my naivety will have to be put aside.
We have to know what the weaknesses in the democratic pattern are in this digital age. About a year ago, the Cambridge Centre for the Future of Democracy produced an extensive and extremely alarming report examining the views of millennials and Generation X—the people born after 1990—who, by a large majority, delivered the view that they were losing faith in democracy. I think it was rather a general question. They did not really mean that they were against democracy; what they meant was that the systems of democracy that are around are not delivering for these people in the way that perhaps they did for my generation and those in between.
I therefore think we have to be ready to move outside the old western camp view of thinking and maybe search into Asia where, frankly, all the great growth, all the booming economies and possibly all the biggest dangers will be over the next 10 or 20 years, and see what additional lessons we can learn in a world that is no longer ideological in the old Cold War language, with neat ideological divides between the systems and so on. I do not think the world is at all like the sort of thing that George Soros was wrongly stating the other day, with two economic systems lined up against each other. The reality is that the economic, social and therefore political mixtures ahead, in all continents, will turn out to conform neither to the isms of the past nor to the clichés of 20th-century European political discourse.
Just as what we continue to call democracy in the West seems to many people not very democratic at all, so what the Chinese, for instance, call socialism is really not very socialist either. Wise leaders should avoid attaching the old ideological labels to either of these models and recognise instead that revolutionary technology has fundamentally changed the behaviour of individuals to one another, of businesses to one another, of economies and of nations. A new kind of populist connectivity is pushing its way through just about everywhere, regardless of the doctrines and labels to which officials continue to cling.
I was particularly supportive of the concept advanced by the Foreign Secretary, Elizabeth Truss, when she talked about the need for understanding the world in terms of networks, and in particular a “network of liberty” of like-minded countries broadly dedicated—not always succeeding—to democratic values in lining up a security and defence chain, as it were, against the outright flouters of democracy, which are obviously to be found in Moscow and Beijing. This is the new pattern, which I think we have to apply our minds to.
I would like to see a prize awarded to the genius in the vanguard of thinking who can come up with a new language to explain to, inspire and guide confused millennials and the younger generation just about everywhere. Just as our forefathers invented the words “capitalism” and “socialism” only a couple of centuries ago to describe the new industrial world emerging, so we need the same inventiveness to describe the digital world that has replaced it. It is a challenge for thinkers and leaders in both East and West.
Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lord Browne and begin with a Polish question. What is the difference between an optimist and a pessimist? A pessimist says things cannot get any worse and an optimist says, oh yes they can. We can surely apply that to the position of democracy today. There is certainly a recession, a backsliding.
Consider the position perhaps 30 years ago. We had the end of the Berlin Wall, which led to the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Soviet Empire—
“Bliss was it in that dawn”—
and the end of apartheid in South Africa and, indeed, Namibia. It was the end of a chapter of colonialism. We had the time when the United States was the only hegemon and was not challenged by an authoritarian China.
A little later, there was the pent-up anger against autocrats which led to the Arab spring. Now, what is left of the Arab spring? Some may say, Tunisia, but the jury is out on Tunisia, and everywhere else where there was the Arab spring there has been a deterioration. The situation has changed very much indeed.
Secretary Blinken on his visit to Africa last year spoke of a “democratic recession”. There has been a series of military coups. There has been a series of civil conflicts in Sudan, Somalia and Ethiopia, and generally, as the Library notes show, reports from a series of well-respected international organisations illustrate that recession.
Even in Europe, there is a fragility in our democracies. In France, the 25 January edition of Le Figaro showed the disillusion with democracy there. Some 39% of the 11,000 French people polled would welcome an elected strong man, but more than 50% would welcome a government by experts, not by elected people. The majority thought that, on the whole, the political elite was corrupt. Perhaps the position in this country is less fragile—we do not have the Bonapartist tradition—but look elsewhere around Europe and see the position of illiberal democracy in Hungary and the position in Poland.
My second reflection is that the contrast between democracy and autocracy has never been so stark, but there is a continuum, with perhaps North Korea at one end and the Scandinavians at the other. It is a problem of more so, less so. To illustrate that, I invite noble Lords to look at the Council of Europe and the fact that Russia is there. Russia invaded Georgia in 2008 and Crimea in 2014, yet it is a member of this major human rights organisation. Even, alas, our Commonwealth has deteriorated, with most countries backsliding. The position in South Africa, certainly under Zuma and the state capture by Zuma and the Gupta brothers, has been well illustrated by my noble friend.
Finally, yes, there should be co-ordination but the D10 cited by the Prime Minister is clearly a non-starter, as the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, said. Co-ordination is important for Magnitsky, but the best response is not only soft power but also the question of leadership. On that, I would say that our leaders should be people of integrity and honesty. They should respect the constitution and the role of judges and parliamentarians. They should honour the international treaties they have signed and should adhere to the rules and regulations they have made. This is the best antidote to authoritarianism. We should look in the mirror ourselves, try to be a model, be vigilant, avoid the slippery slope and remember that dictatorships normally die through epileptic fits, democracies die by slow decline, often from the top.
Lord Harries of Pentregarth (CB)
My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Browne, set out so powerfully and as others of your Lordships have reinforced, the situation today is an extremely distressing and depressing one. Countries such as India, which once rightly took pride in its democracy, have shown increasing disregard for basic human rights. Countries such as Turkey, which once stood on the very threshold of the European Union, have similarly regressed. One could go on. However, I want to do something different. There is no point in working for a co-ordinated response to defend democratic norms and values unless we have confidence in those norms and values in the first place. Whereas their abiding validity would once have been seen as obvious and taken for granted, it is now in different ways being subtly undermined. There are several reasons for this.
First, there is the widespread relativism of our times: the view that one stance on life is as good as another, that truth in any serious sense is unobtainable and we cannot and should not make judgments about how other societies operate.
Secondly, there is the widespread feeling that attempts to bolster or create democratic regimes in other parts of the world have been failures leading to massive loss of life, and that we should no longer intervene elsewhere on the assumption that they need democracy.
Those two tendencies have come together in some minds to conclude that different societies just do things differently from ourselves and we should simply accept that. We should put aside the arrogance of liberal progressivism and not assume that other countries would be better off if they had what we have.
The salutary point in this critique is that we should put aside any sense of arrogance and acknowledge that our democracy is deeply flawed. We should also acknowledge that if we are simply talking about the way of life of another culture, whether it is Chinese, Arab or indigenous, of course we should acknowledge that people choose differently and that they do so all adds to the variety and richness of human existence. But when it comes to democratic norms, we are talking about something different. At its heart is the most fundamental value of all: the equal dignity and worth of every human being, whatever their gender, religion, race or sexuality. This belief, rooted in the Christian faith and built on by secular rationalism, is indeed foundational for Western culture but is, I believe—somewhat unfashionably today in some quarters—a universal truth. That is why we have the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the range of other covenants and conventions that flow from it. That is the first point.
Secondly, there is the knowledge, derived of bitter experience, that state power has to be contained. It is this that led the great Reinhold Niebuhr to write that our
“capacity for justice makes democracy possible; but”
our
“inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.”
It was a combination of these two factors—the equal worth and value of every human being and the need to protect him or her from the overweening power of the state—that led to the great human rights movement after World War II. The insight of those giants who brought about that achievement still stands today. Human rights and the democratic norms which go to protect them are not just part of a way of life which people are free to choose or reject as they prefer. They are, I believe, universal moral insights now, quite properly, expressed in legal norms. Of course, I am familiar with the Marxist argument, which has some truth in it, and excessive liberal individualism does indeed need to be balanced by the insight that we are social beings, and persons only in and through our relationship with other human beings.
Whatever flaws there are in our democracy—and they are manifold—and whatever lessons need to be learnt from ill-judged foreign interventions in the past, we should not give up on the idea that democratic norms and values are a real achievement and are worth aspiring to for all human societies, not because they are Christian or Western but because the insights they express and safeguard belong to humanity as such. It is worth making a co-ordinated response because they are worth defending, and they are worth defending not just in terms of practical political steps that can and should be taken but intellectually and morally against certain insidious currents which have the effect of undermining their universal validity.
Lord Hannan of Kingsclere (Con)
My Lords, which keeps us awake at night—the prospect of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan or the prospect of a Russian invasion of Ukraine? Consider the disquieting possibility that both may happen on the same day by prearrangement. The noble Lord, Lord Browne, in introducing this excellent debate, spoke about the coming together of the two great illiberal powers. It is a very real coming together: the largest military exercise that the Chinese have been involved in with another country was conducted last year with Russian troops in north-western China, where J-20 stealth bombers were used. A signal went out that the two countries that have the most to gain from overturning the current world order and from a revanchist and autocratic alternative are working together. That same message has been heard on every continent and in every archipelago.
I spent part of last month in Pakistan. It was my first visit—it is a very beautiful country—but everywhere you see the spore of China, of the Chinese military and of Chinese society. Of course, Pakistan is a special case: its alliance with China goes back a long way, and it has always seen it as a counterweight to India. None the less, I was struck when I heard the Prime Minister of Pakistan, a man of very British sensibilities and education, saying that perhaps multiparty western democracy, which had been held out as the only alternative, was inferior to the more meritocratic Chinese alternative. I do not think we would have heard that 10 years ago, and certainly not 20 years ago. We would not have seen ambitious politicians learning Mandarin rather than English, or ambitious young army cadets studying at the People’s Liberation Army university rather than aspiring to come to Sandhurst.
Around the world, people hear the melancholy long withdrawing roar of western influence. We can sanction Lukashenko—it does not stop him kidnapping and murdering opponents or massing troops on the Ukrainian border. We can sanction Ortega—it does not stop him stealing the election in Nicaragua. The same has happened in Nigeria, in Burma and all over. The only part of the otherwise excellent speech by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, that I would question is when he said that the jury was still out on whether Tunisia is a democracy. When I see troops in the streets and Parliament dissolved, I do not think that the jury is still out. The last country that could still have been held to be a success 10 years after the Arab spring has joined the rush to autocracy.
We should all guard against the availability heuristic—it is always possible to pick examples of what is going wrong—but it was interesting how the noble Lord, Lord Browne, began by giving an empirical assessment of how democracy is in retreat. In addition to the source that he gave, almost everyone who studies this says the same thing, including the Economist Intelligence Unit, Freedom House and the democracy index. Seven years of solid advance at some point in the past decade have stalled and gone into reverse. I want to explore why that has happened.
Of course, part of it is simply that people no longer care as much about what the western powers think; there has been a change in the balance geostrategically. Part of it, frankly, is due to the pandemic and the associated lockdowns—not just in the obvious sense that we gave up liberties, could not travel and were interned and so on, but in the more dangerous and insidious sense that a common threat of that kind tends to make people more authoritarian. It is a well-observed psychological phenomenon, whether it is a war, a plague or a natural disaster. People coming out of it become more intolerant of dissent and more demanding of the smack of firm government and strongman rule.
Perhaps the most disquieting thought of all is whether, in the scheme of things, it is not the last couple of hundred years of democratic and liberal advance that are the exception. All the things that various noble Lords spoke about—the kleptocracy, the institutionalised looting of state resources, the seizure of power by small elites—was pretty much how every civilisation was run for most of the last 10,000 years. The lot of almost every human being was servitude of one kind or another: back-breaking labour in the fields from dawn until dusk, while small elites systematically looted the state. We are exceptionally lucky to be here in a place and at a time when we have found mechanisms to keep the Government under control and when a measure of law and liberty can flourish, whereby we have elevated the rules above the rulers—but that is not the normal state of play.
I wonder whether we might be coming towards the end of a brief interglacial period between the long ice ages. That is why it is so important to keep educating and elevating the idea that process matters more than outcome, the rules matter more than the rulers and the individual matters more than the collective. That is why we should keep a sense of perspective in attacking different parties within a democratic system. If we lose sight of those precepts, the bleak landscapes stretch ahead of us, dark, cold and grim.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My noble friend Lord Browne of Ladyton has chosen an excellent Motion to table because democracy around the world is under threat and needs urgent action to protect it.
Never forget that modern kleptocracies rely on some of us here in the West to help them launder money. Lobbyists, lawyers and accountants in democracies keep kleptocrats in power, often by hiding their money in offshore tax havens, and get rich as a result. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime reports that the prevalence of these tax havens, many of them our dependent territories, and a general trend towards financial deregulation have made it increasingly difficult to identify and sanction criminal assets.
That brings me to a report from Chatham House—not a party-political organisation, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Balfe—which said that Boris Johnson’s Conservative parliamentary party
“may be open to influence from wealthy donors who originate from post-Soviet kleptocracies, and who may retain fealty to these regimes.”
The Conservative Party received £3.5 million from naturalised British citizens of Russian and Eurasian backgrounds between 2010 and 2019, and the volume of donations has increased.
Kleptocrats are cementing their power in the United Kingdom by cleverly forging ties with political and business leaders, creating charitable foundations, seeking the support of think tanks and elite universities, and buying prestigious commodities such as football clubs, as the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, rightly said. Access to these points of entry must be tightened. Sadly, Putin will not take our threats seriously if we allow this to continue. There is a growing need for action nationally and internationally.
For example, the US sanctioned Latvia’s ABLV Bank in 2018, which eventually led to the collapse of the firm, cutting off at least one source of funding for the North Korean Government. Europe also needs to follow the money. Restricting the flows of illicit finance that run through our markets and institutions, public and private, is key to tackling the threats posed by Russian electoral interference, Chinese competition and democratic backsliding in central Europe. We cannot tackle these challenges alone. The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance against Kleptocracy is an excellent example of how democracies are joining forces to make real progress against a rising tide of corruption, but much more needs to be done.
I want to highlight the case of Belarus. According to the Global State of Democracy 2021 report, Belarus is undergoing a year-on-year democratic decline, which is relatively rare. The only other countries where a similar trend was observed were Palestine, Côte d’Ivoire and the Central African Republic. According to Freedom House’s annual report, in Belarus:
“Political rights and civil liberties have become even more restricted than before, and democracy remains a distant aspiration.”
Russia, as we know, is using Belarus as a base to amass troops to threaten Ukraine. We have seen the effect of that; they are now within easy reach of getting to Kiev. Russia’s primary objective in Belarus is to avoid a colour revolution resulting in the installation of a new, pro-western, democratic Government seeking closer ties with us in Europe and NATO. All this is underpinned by Lukashenko’s autocratic regime. Libereco, an independent German-Swiss NGO dedicated to the protection of human rights in Belarus, reports that there are currently more than 900 political prisoners there, including women and men, young and old, from all strata of Belarus society. They only exercised their basic rights to freedom of expression and assembly and campaigned for a free and democratic Belarus.
According to Amnesty International, adopting political prisoners can have a hugely beneficial impact on their mental health and help to protect them from further abuse by the state. I am one of a number of UK Peers, including my noble friend Lord Griffiths of Burry Port, and MPs who have adopted a political prisoner: in my case, Stefan Latypov, who I keep in touch with to offer support and hope. I hope others here today will follow that example.
Baroness Kramer (LD)
My Lords, the crisis in Ukraine has finally put on the front pages an inconvenient truth largely, if not deliberately, ignored by the Government. The safe haven and money laundering which the UK provides to kleptocrats and oligarchs sustains, enables and rewards pretty much any and every corrupt and autocratic regime on the globe. In 2016, the UK Government estimated that the amount of corrupt money flowing into the UK had reached £100 billion a year.
The Government introduced legislation, particularly the Proceeds of Crime Act, to tackle some aspects of economic crime transacted by what I might call traditional organised crime, but they have notably avoided the key pieces of legislation necessary to stem the laundering of money from oligarchs and kleptocrats. Their money is laundered particularly through UK property. Transparency International has identified at least £1 billion in property bought with suspect money from Russia alone. That will never be stemmed until we have legislation to require not just a register but a public register of the beneficial owners of property in the UK, enabling civic society and activists across the globe to aid our woefully understaffed and fragmented enforcement bodies and regulators, described by Chatham House as "weak and under-resourced”. That legislation was fully drafted weeks—possibly months—ago but, for some reason, the Government have chosen to halt it. Perhaps the Minister would tell us why. We also need proper verification of the Companies House public register of the beneficial ownership of companies. Will the Government tell us when we can expect its introduction—we have been waiting for months—and the other reforms of Companies House regulations?
Other gaping loopholes exist in some of our overseas territories and crown dependencies which do not yet have public registers of the beneficial owners of companies or property. We in the Lords thought that we had, in recent Financial Services Acts, fixed this problem, but the Government have used every strategy they can muster not to force changes. Will the Minister now update us? While UK property is at the heart of what is now known globally as the London laundromat, the other locations which make up the British financial family are almost as important to the kleptocrats.
The Americans have stopped being polite about the problem. The Center for American Progress, very close to the Biden Administration, has called for a joint US-UK counter-kleptocracy working group; in other words, they just do not trust us to take effective action on our own. I ask the Minister: will we agree to it? I suspect we have all read this quote:
“uprooting Kremlin-linked oligarchs will be a challenge given the close ties between Russian money and the United Kingdom’s ruling Conservative party, the press, and its real estate and financial industry”.
However, Government laxity, some might say collusion, is far from the only problem. As other have said, we need to go after the enablers—I quote the CAP again—
“the law firms, accountants, real estate firms, and investment firms that all profit from integrating Russian oligarch wealth into the West.”
Will the Government introduce a “failure to prevent” to stop such enablers? Speaking of prevention, will the Government end their disgraced golden visa scheme, described by Chatham House as a national embarrassment?
Free ports are now being introduced to the UK, with a proposal that there will be a register of beneficial ownership of businesses in them but that it will not be made public. Will the Government accept my amendment on this issue, recognising the importance of a public register, not a secret one, particularly given our weakened enforcement agencies? Will they take up my Private Member’s Bill to create an office of the whistleblower to provide proper protection for whistleblowers, who are presently ruined by their disclosures, but whose actions are vital to effective enforcement against powerful people such as oligarchs and kleptocrats?
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, we are all indebted to the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Ladyton, for initiating this important debate. It is a reflection on our times that it has become commonplace to compare the current geopolitical situation to the 1930s—a decade when autocrats and populists manipulated public opinion, preying on insecurity rather than hope, and drew their personal power from the fears, cynicism and prejudices that divide people, rather than the qualities of compassion and generosity that can unite humanity. It is equally commonplace—we have rightly heard it during our debate today—to call for politicians to take a more co-ordinated response, especially when nations disregard international laws and conventions. Ministers regularly assure us that the Government consult our partners when international norms are violated yet, in practice, global Britain too often speaks alone.
By contrast, Beijing’s increasingly effective tactics are to single out and punish those nations which dare to contradict the Chinese Communist Party’s increasingly paranoid narrative—banning exports from Australia, incarcerating innocent Canadian citizens without due process, or intimidating Lithuania—without even talking about what has happened in Hong Kong, Xinjiang or Tibet, or its subversion of international institutions, from the United Nations Human Rights Council to the WHO.
So what might we do when institutions are subverted? By way of example, might the United Kingdom lead by suggesting to its partners that we join an informal and temporary coalition of countries to simultaneously recognise on the same day the sovereignty of Taiwan—a vibrant and brave democracy which has been referred to during this debate, where the rule of law is upheld and diversity and difference are respected? Does the Minister agree that there would be relative safety in numbers if 40 or 50 nations found the courage to make a joint announcement recognising the sovereignty of Taiwan, thereby with one diplomatic gesture turning the tables on the CCP’s bullying posturing, or does our fear of losing diplomatic face immobilise us in the face of tyranny? I hope the Minister will commit to exploring a much more robust approach with our partners.
As we have heard, this is beyond urgent. During exchanges in the House on Monday, I specifically asked the Minister about the co-ordinated action which is greatly needed to face off the Kremlin’s aggression and metamorphosis from managed democracy to outright dictatorship. If Russia does invade Ukraine, does the Minister agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Hannan, said earlier that it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that Beijing might seize the chance to take one or two of the small islands around Taiwan, or indeed Taiwan itself? There are memories here of the Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia and the enfeebled procrastination that emboldened the dictators of the day. Our piecemeal condemnation after the fact will have no more impact than the proverbial wailing and gnashing of teeth. The time for mass recognition of Taiwan’s sovereignty by the free nations of the world is now.
In this ugly and deliberately intimidatory environment, do we not have one particularly cost-effective weapon in our soft-power, smart-power armoury: the BBC World Service? It is among Britain’s greatest exports, but it is also the most cost-effective weapon in our soft-power armoury. Do memories of beleaguered peoples—from the French Resistance to the dissidents of the Soviet Union—not remind us of the huge importance of sustaining World Service broadcasts? After all, it was Mikhail Gorbachev who admitted that even he had listened to the World Service during the Cold War in order to learn the truth. In the Far East, especially in Hong Kong, where champions of democracy are incarcerated or forced into exile, and in Taiwan, mainland China and North Korea, the BBC remains a link with truth. I hope the Minister will agree that millions of people who are being bombarded by poisonous propaganda each day rely on the World Service to cut through the fog of misinformation and assure us that funding for the World Service will keep pace with inflation.
To end, it was Robert Kennedy who famously described how each tiny ripple of hope, when joined with others, could create a current which could sweep down even the mightiest walls of oppression. When faced with the spectre of totalitarianism, we must surely project the message of hope—the message we saw in 1989 when the walls came down in Berlin—to all those who suffer at the hands of dictators and despots and who yearn for the freedoms, privileges and liberties which we all enjoy.
Lord Griffiths of Burry Port (Lab)
My Lords, we are indeed grateful to my noble friend Lord Browne for giving us this opportunity to discuss these important matters. I hope that he and other noble Lords will forgive me for starting in a different place from others, for I lived for 10 years in an autocracy, a kleptocracy with populism pretty much reigning on all hands. It was the 1970s; it was François Duvalier, followed by his son Jean-Claude. I met Papa Doc twice—he died shortly afterwards, but I do not think there was a causal link. Kleptocracy was certainly something I was more than familiar with. The school I was deputy head of had educated Jean-Claude Duvalier. We knew all his inside helpers. I taught members of the Tonton Macoute and of the diplomatic corps, as well as people with no money whose fees were paid by those who had stolen it from somebody else.
In the time available I must speak in headlines, for the democratic world has reduced Haiti to the frazzled rump it is now. From the time of Haiti’s independence, France took it ill and imposed an indemnity that independent Haiti went on paying back until relatively recently—just 20 or 30 years ago. The Americans have played a pretty bad hand in Haiti. I can assure your Lordships that an occupying force of redneck southern marines policing the first black republic in the world left its mark. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, then Assistant Secretary of the Navy, rewrote the Haitian constitution and set up a rigged plebiscite in order that foreigners, previously not allowed to own land, could. American corporations rushed in. Sisal and sugar were exploited, as were minerals and other things. The Haitian national debt was taken from the Bourse in Paris and sunk in Wall Street, and used to leverage loans for a railway system that Haitians did not want but the sugar industry run by American corporations certainly did.
Denmark, Spain and, I am afraid, the United Kingdom played their own bit parts—cameo parts—in the reduction of Haiti to its present state. In particular, a book by a British ambassador in the 1870s vilified Haiti and fed the voyeuristic tendencies of a British readership for a cannibalistic, voodoo-dominated state, which Haiti certainly is not and never has been. I have briefed five consecutive British diplomats who have gone on to serve on the island of which Haiti is a part, and they need to know the full story of exploitation, rape and violation. That is an important aspect of what we are considering now.
I must very quickly say that since the Duvaliers left in 1986, it has been downhill all the way: a President assassinated last July, 250,000 people dead in an earthquake in 2010, 2,500 dead last August in another earthquake, gangs, drugs, insecurity, no democratic norms and no judiciary or criminal justice system. It is simply a mess. I am helping to run the campaign of a man who I hope will soon be the new President of Haiti—God, what a job he will have. After a visit I helped to organise to eastern Nigeria for 12 Haitian leaders just two weeks ago, he was arrested in Miami on his way back to Haiti, interrogated and accused of going to Nigeria to have dealings with Boko Haram—which is ludicrous fantasy—to assassinate his character ahead of the elections, because the Americans certainly do not want him.
All I can say at this stage is that I have become convinced of the situation. I have used Haiti for illustrative purposes because we can think of other people across Latin America and other parts of the world who have been favoured by democracies but turned out to be the kleptocrats and autocrats. With the permission of my noble friend Lord Browne—perhaps I will not ask his permission but impose it on him—I may turn this around and say that I would have loved to have moved that the Grand Committee take note of the impact of countries with democratic norms and values in creating autocrats, kleptocrats and populists.
Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD)
My Lords, strategic litigation against public participation, known as SLAPPS, is abusive lawsuits pursued with the purpose of shutting down freedom of speech. They have been used against journalists, media outlets, whistleblowers, activists, academics and NGOs that speak out on matters of public interest.
The UK has become a global hub for financial crime and corruption. As the Prime Minister would say, we are world leading. My noble friend Lady Kramer referred to £100 billion a year. Along with that, our courts possess the tools to shut down reporting on such matters—cases for libel taken not for their legal merit but for the effect of silencing a critic by locking them into a long legal struggle. We have developed a class of lawyers who call themselves reputation managers.
Chatham House reported on the Abramovich action against the journalist Catherine Belton and her publisher HarperCollins. She had lived and worked in Russia for many years and had claimed in her book Putin’s People that Abramovich had purchased Chelsea Football Club at the behest of the Russian president Vladimir Putin. A statement from the firm Harbottle & Lewis, solicitors representing Abramovich, claimed that Belton’s book, “falsely alleges that” Abramovich “acted corruptly” —a claim that was struck out in the early part of those proceedings. However, a further three Russian billionaires and the Russian state oil company Rosneft followed Abramovich in filing civil claims against HarperCollins, Belton’s publishers. It is much to their credit that they stood by their author and the claims were apparently settled satisfactorily.
The chilling effect of this type of litigation is most visible in the threat of action rather than action itself. Karen Dawisha, the author of the 2014 book,Putin’s Kleptocracy, was forced to change publishers due to legal concerns in the UK. Her publisher, Cambridge University Press, dropped her on the grounds that those implicated would sue and that the disruption and expense would be more than it could afford. The book was published in the US. There are numerous examples. The Maltese journalist Daphne Galizia, who was murdered by a car bomb, was facing 47 libel actions brought by Maltese politicians and others for her unbending and brave journalism exposing corruption. After her death, her family accused Mishcon de Reya, a British firm of solicitors, of “hounding” their mother.
There are rules of court that make it possible to strike out actions in this country but this power is not used often enough. We have fallen behind. Other countries, specifically Canada, have introduced primary legislation to deal with the problem. Its Act with the section, Prevention of Proceedings Limiting Freedom of Expression on Matters of Public Interest (Gag Proceedings), was recently approved and upheld in the Supreme Court of Canada.
Following that Canadian precedent, I have drafted a Bill to reduce the risk that participation by the public in debates on matters of public interest will be hampered by fear of legal action. The Bill would give a judge the power to strike out an action at an early stage where the respondent satisfies the judge that the proceedings arise out of a communication that relates to a matter of public interest. The burden would then shift to the claimant to show that the proceedings have merit, the respondent has no defence and that the communication is sufficiently serious that it is in the public interest for it to proceed. In determining that public interest, the judge would consider the right to freedom of expression, the right of public participation in democratic discourse, the chilling effect of the proceedings and any disproportion between the resources deployed by the claimant and the amount of damages that might be awarded. The court would have power to award damages if the proceedings were brought in bad faith and award costs against the claimant on an indemnity basis. I hope that your Lordships will hear more about this Bill and I look forward to the Minister’s comments.
Lord Hastings of Scarisbrick (CB)
My Lords, while in preparation for this debate, for reasons I cannot explain, my phone decided to throw up some old pictures that I had kept in archive. A particular photograph came from 1975, of Idi Amin forcing white diplomats to bow down to him to give him subservience and obedience and take an oath of allegiance to his Government. We easily wrote him off then as a tyrant, an autocrat and a man who was intent on showering shame on those he despised and manipulating and destroying their lives.
Well, here we are many decades on, and we have recorded information this week that the former recent President of the United States spent the last weekend in Texas, assuring those who bowed down to him a year ago that he will pardon them when he returns to office and release them of the charges for which they were accused for leaping up on Capitol Hill to destroy the stable democracy of the United States, and that he spent weekends while in the White House destroying and ripping up official papers which members of his Government, in Civil Service terms, literally sellotaped together to provide to the inquiry in Washington.
We so easily used to point at African leaders as despotic and despairing and we now have them in abundance in the West. We have to learn to take account of what is clearly a major failure in our ability to display democracy to the rest of the world when we cannot see it in the places we once revered or even consider home.
I have reflected strongly on this issue, largely because I have felt a deep sense of despair at the state of our own country’s affairs. Before I leave them, I remind noble Lords who are followers of American political writing of a quote that appeared in the Baltimore Evening Sun on 26 July 1920—100 years ago—written by the leading political author HL Mencken:
“As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and a complete narcissistic moron.”
In subsequent writings, HL Mencken went on to explain that
“the inner soul of the people”
was corrupted when the public were lulled into indulgence and indifference by consistent pleasure and abundant choice. He said that this allowed them to take the low road of ease and disengagement, which he called the cul-de-sac of hopelessness. If we care about democracy, we have to ask ourselves: what are we allowing people to be and to do carelessly—and social media fits well into that paradigm—that causes them to be lulled into persistent pleasure and indulgence?
While we have been here, in the course of this debate, the Prime Minister’s chief adviser, Munira Mirza, has resigned, accusing the Prime Minister of slurs against the leader of the Opposition, saying that:
“There was no fair or reasonable basis”
for the assertions made at the Dispatch Box in the House of Commons. She continued:
“This was not the normal cut-and-thrust of politics; it was an inappropriate and partisan reference to a horrendous case of child sex abuse. You tried to clarify your position today but, despite my urging, you did not apologise for the misleading impression you gave.”
How can we preach democracy and authoritative, intelligent leadership to a world that now so desperately needs it when those at the centre of our own politics cannot seem to display it?
These things are inconsistencies, and I wonder whether the Minister might reflect when he makes his reply on whether he believes the assertions in the Economist of the last week that at the heart of our problem is the “childish lack of seriousness” at the heart of government and the failure of the Government to tell consistent truth. The Economist says:
“Treating voters as dopes to be bought off with bombast is a feature of the demagoguery that Mr Johnson rode to power. It is an example of the contempt with which populist leaders treat the people they govern. So, alas, is the other trait that has infected post-Brexit Britain: lying”,
consistently in public. We cannot preach democracy to the world if we cannot deliver integrity at home.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, began this debate by saying that he hoped that it would not become party political. I would agree with him, in that although the geography of this place divides us into two sides, there are more than two sides in British politics. I will say that this problem is much broader than one side of government, although I very much agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Hastings, just said: things have got much worse in the past decade.
None the less, we have spoken a great deal about golden visas, and I would point out that they were introduced in 2008. There was what is known as the blind faith period, when checks on applicants and the source of their wealth were done neither by the banks nor by the British Government, and more than 3,000 people came in that period between 2008 and 2015. We have to say that responsibility for that sits on both sides, if we divide the House that way in your Lordships’ House. This is not a two-party issue but a systems issue; we have a broken system here and around the world.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Browne, for introducing this debate so powerfully and for giving us the chance for such an interesting discussion. In his introduction, he focused on the financial sector, a haven for dirty money where reputations are laundered and political donations accepted. I am really pleased to see the turnout today, and I contrast it to the kind of turnout that we saw in debates during the passage of the Financial Services Act, when frequently we were debating controls on the financial sector, controlling legislation, and we were lucky if half the number of people who are in this Room today were involved in those debates. I note that at Second Reading of that Act, the noble Lord, Lord Agnew of Oulton, said:
“We need to show to the rest of the world that this will be a soundly regulated environment.”—[Official Report, 28/1/2021; col. 1877.]
We know how the noble Lord thought that went along.
The noble Lord, Lord Howell, talked about two economic systems lined up against each other. Of course, the world has only one economic system now: capitalism. I am not a Marxist—I do not believe that the superstructure is determined by the base, and that is very clear in that we have a base of capitalism and the structure around the world that we have now. If we look at that not philosophically but practically, the Russian model was developed on the basis of advice from US and UK advisers—the kleptocratic model. The Chinese adopted the capitalist market system underneath their own political frame. So where we are today is not a degradation but a continuation. The incredibly powerful speech of the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, spelled that out so beautifully.
Power and resources have, from the colonial period through the post-colonial period to today, been held in the hands of the few to the impoverishment of the many. We have treated nature as a mine and a dumping ground. Today, to bring it up to the current day, not all the superyachts being built and sailed around the world are sailed by kleptocrats and autocrats; quite a lot of them are people who are residents of our own countries.
My next point is on the question of them and us. The authoritarian tendencies that we see in other parts of the world are to be found right here at home as well. What are typically described as liberal democracies are neither liberal nor democracies. If we look at the treatment of minoritised communities and indeed of women by our police forces, and at the treatment of desperate refugees by the Home Office hostile environment, that cannot be described as anything but authoritarian. To quote the late feminist social theorist bell hooks, we live in a “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.” This is a system that benefits the few and represses the many.
The noble Lord, Lord Howell, said that systems are not delivering and perhaps we should look to Asia and other places. I suggest that we should instead look to the ignored people in our own societies, who are repressed, oppressed and dispossessed in our own societies but who are building up from the grassroots alternatives and different ways of doing things. If we look at the global frame of freedom and liberty, where do the ideas come from? If we go back to the human rights framework, that was very much driven by campaigning from civil society that forced the introduction of those things that built up towards the UN and the human rights framework. More recently, looking at Magnitsky-style sanctions, where did they come from? They come from civil rights campaigning that was then implemented by government.
In conclusion, we are responsible for the state of the world today. To prevent a world dominated by autocrats, kleptocrats and populists, here and abroad, do not look outside—look inside.
Lord Londesborough (CB)
My Lords, as we have heard this afternoon, there is little doubt that democracy has been on the slide: the recent report from Freedom House pointing to 15 consecutive years of declining freedom and democracy makes a depressing read. I wish to focus on the decline in democracy rather than the rise of autocrats and kleptocrats, specifically during the last two years of the global pandemic, when the ability—or, should I say, appetite—of the so-called leading democracies to collaborate and work together for the greater global good has largely evaporated.
As the noble Lord, Lord Hastings, so eloquently stated, the rise of populism and nationalism among major democracies was evident in the years running up to the pandemic. The election of Donald Trump in the US heralded four years of division—aided and abetted by social media—and a combative approach to the UN, NATO and many other multilateral organisations. Here in the UK, a deeply polarising Brexit referendum, where quality of debate, trust and objectivity took a back seat, has been followed by two to three years of an equally divisive Johnson Government, where—to put it very mildly—domestic issues have pushed critical global issues into the sidings. Sadly, there has been little sign that other countries in the G7 or indeed the G20 have stepped up.
I shall briefly compare and contrast the world’s response in 2008 to the global financial crisis to the current response to the global pandemic. Facing a pyramid of toxic debt from European and American banks, the G20 stepped up—with our Prime Minister at the time, Gordon Brown, to the fore—to assemble a $1.2 trillion-rescue bailout to avert the impending collapse of the world’s financial system. Some 14 years on, and we are in the midst of a far more serious world crisis. The IMF estimates that the damage to the global economy wreaked by Covid-19 will reach $12.5 trillion by 2024. It could be considerably more than that. In humanitarian terms, the pandemic numbers are even more chilling: nearly 6 million deaths so far, 160 million people dropping below the poverty line, hundreds of millions of children missing out on education, and tens of millions more added to ever-lengthening waiting lists for critical—and in many cases life-dependent—operations.
The tragedy of this is that the cost of vaccinating the world does not run into trillions; far from it, the figure is more like US$25 billion to US$50 billion. That is little more than 2% of the cost of the banking bailout and less than 0.5% of Covid’s estimated economic damage but, with wealthy nations focusing on their domestic vaccination programmes, it has been left to a critically underfunded COVAX to act like a charity, begging for vaccines to inoculate middle and lower-income countries. It is way behind its target of vaccinating 70% of all adults by September this year. The 1 billion jab milestone was finally reached in January, whereas 2 billion vaccines had been touted as a target for the end of last year. Currently, 3 billion adults across the world are totally unvaccinated.
Where is the leadership and collaboration from the so-called leading democracies? Where, indeed, is global Britain and what are the prospects for foreign secretary Liz Truss’s call at Chatham House in December for
“a network of liberty that spans the world”?
Vaccine inequity leads to a disturbing form of vaccine diplomacy, with China and Russia to the fore. Beijing has granted 53 countries free shipments of vaccines, including Pakistan, the Philippines and many countries in Africa. By the way, those countries are receiving the Sinopharm and Sinovac jabs, which evidence strongly suggests produce a much weaker immune response than the mRNA vaccines we all have here.
Sadly but, perhaps, inevitably, Covid-19 has presented autocrats and leaders in countries such as Venezuela, Belarus, Serbia and Sri Lanka with the excuse further to clamp down on civil liberties. The title of this debate raises the case for a co-ordinated response by the United Kingdom and her allies. Vaccinating the world surely provides that compelling case.
Viscount Waverley (CB)
My Lords, I hope the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, will accept a cup of tea to serve as an apology for my jumping up before time, as I do to all noble Lords for speaking in the gap, but will speak for no more than two minutes.
Democracy stands for accountability to the people, expressed by popular mandate. The noble Lord, Lord Browne, drew attention to the upcoming meeting between Presidents Xi and Putin: a joint security statement will be forthcoming. I suspect that it will be a statement of non-interference in each other’s internal affairs. While both aspire to a different form of communism, an alliance between the two will attract others into an axis—Iran is the most likely candidate—driving a wedge between two forms of governance: democracy over autocracy.
Leading on from that, we have just witnessed events in Kazakhstan. During the time of his presidency, it was said that President Nazarbyev commanded great popular support. Fast forward and, with the recent mayhem, it is abundantly clear that that support was entirely artificial. Autocrats do not have the support of the people, which is why an exit route must be found whereby they should be encouraged to leave, otherwise they will surely stay. A way must be found for free and fair elections as the only solution in everyone’s best interest.
Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)
My Lords, I declare an interest as chair of the UK board of a global peace-building charity, Search for Common Ground, and am an associate with Global Partners Governance, a UK-based not-for-profit focusing on supporting representative politics. During the February recess, I shall be in Baghdad and then Beirut, working with those wishing to strengthen their Parliaments. The Minister knows of my declared interest in Sudan and the retrograde step of moving away from the transition to democracy there. In all those three countries, brave young people and, primarily, women have been in the vanguard of supporting the basic and fundamental democratic norms that we are debating today. I commend the noble Lord, Lord Browne, for bringing this vital debate to us today. Far too many people this year alone, as well as last year, have lost their life fighting for a cause which we here take for granted.
The noble Lord, Lord Hannan, referenced Tunisia. Literally just before this debate, I was on a call with our ambassador in Tunisia through the Inter-Parliamentary Union. We discussed the retrograde step of military courts being used against civilians, the displacement of opportunities for many people and the move away from a parliamentary system. That is just one example of global goal 16—supporting institutions and building the rule of law—now under assault.
The debate seems to be broken down into three broad areas: the global counter-democracy movement towards absolute rulers, theocrats and autocrats; the lack of a coherent and credible UK approach to counter it; and the urgent need to clear our Augean stables here at home. A reliable indicator, the democracy index, states that only 8.4% of the world’s population live in a full democracy, with more than a third under authoritarian rule. My noble friend Lord Wallace highlighted the sweep of those who wish to maintain degrees of authoritarianism and absolute rule.
The UK’s trade with China, to give one example, has doubled over the last decade. We now have a trade deficit with China of £40 billion—unprecedented in history—and are seeking ever-increasing foreign direct investment from the Gulf states into the UK. What leverage do we have in reality against those we seek to build a “network of liberty” against? These are hollow words when we are dependent on many of them. As my noble friend said, the silence on democratic norms in the Gulf is matched only by the volume of the arms we sell there.
The noble Lord, Lord Londesborough, mentioned the pandemic, and in many ways he is absolutely right; it has exacerbated these areas. Not only is there vaccine nationalism and condescension for many countries, but we slashed our development co-operation at the height of the pandemic. In many respects, we are not a leader in this. But the pandemic has also had deeper elements that should trouble us: data harvesting of many populations, with data now a commodity to be traded as well as a tool for Governments against their people; open-ended emergency powers; and fraud in the response, which we hear of at home. It was right to mention the governing party having a VIP stream for contracts that were not made public, as well as youth displacement and other challenges.
My noble friends Lady Kramer and Lord Thomas highlighted that here at home we do not lead by assertion; we have inaction. The assertion that we are ridding London of its reputation is not matched by action. The world’s leading laundromat status for London is a stain on our global reputation. I have been to too many events around the world to count at which UK Ministers have sought to persuade other countries to crack down on corruption, only for people in those countries who are desperate to do exactly that to say to me and others that London is one of the key problems and the greatest facilitator of all.
It is remarkable to me that President Xi, Putin and other autocrats say their style is no different from that of our new western leaders, as the noble Lord, Lord Hastings, indicated. They say they are not hypocrites and would not ask them to do anything that they would not do.
The noble Lord, Lord Balfe, asked us not to be partisan. Let me just quote from the resignation letter of Munira Mirza, the Prime Minister’s former head of policy, who resigned today:
“This was not the normal cut-and-thrust of politics; it was an inappropriate and partisan reference to a horrendous case of child sex abuse … you did not apologise for the misleading impression you gave.”
In too many areas we are now using a playbook that autocrats and others we seek to move away from are using. We will never be a global Britain if we reject the corrective of seeing ourselves as others see us. The tragedy in all this is that we in our country, which I am desperately proud of, in many areas have built the norms of democracy and supported others in that great ambition, but we are not offering more. Our actions, and not assertions, are playing into the very hands of those we are concerned about in this debate.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, I, too, thank my noble friend Lord Browne for his excellent introduction to a wide-ranging debate. I also thank all noble Lords for raising such important issues.
As we have just heard, the UK has had a pivotal role in promoting globally the rule of law and democratic values through multilateral institutions, as a permanent member of the Security Council, as a significant player in NATO and, as the noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, reminded us, as a principal contributor to the World Bank and IMF. We should also not forget our leading role in promoting globally the UN target of spending 0.7% on ODA, and the leadership role we played in initiating the UN’s global goals, which established a reputation for the United Kingdom as a trusted partner across the world.
Our influence is not restricted to relationships with Governments. As the noble Lord, Lord Alton, said, our renowned institutions such as the BBC World Service, our universities, as well as the export of music and other cultural assets have given us huge soft power that we should not underestimate. However, I should say to the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, that the ingredients of a thriving democracy are not limited to Parliaments and parliamentarians. Civil society organisations such as women’s organisations, charities, faith groups, trade unions and other organised communities have all demonstrated their role in defending democracy and human rights.
When nations fail in their most important task of providing safety, security and freedom for their people, it is always civil society that leaps first to their defence. As the noble Lord, Lord Howell, highlighted, the Foreign Secretary said in her Chatham House speech that efforts to build a “network of liberty” must be firmly anchored in human rights and civic freedoms.
We must strengthen our ties with civil society, too. Unfortunately, there was little of substance on this in the Integrated Review, a situation that I hope will be corrected in the development strategy due in March. Clearly, in promoting our values we should work with our democratic allies bilaterally and multilaterally through the UN and other institutions. However, as my noble friend Lord Browne said, we do so against a backdrop of a series of states falling backwards into autocracy, kleptocracy and populism, and led away from the principles that have defined us as a country. As the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, highlighted, it is vital—I repeat, vital—that our words match our actions both at home and abroad.
The noble Lord, Lord Londesborough, reminded us of the Freedom House reports. Other democracy indices show that autocracy has been spreading for the past 15 years. That was recognised in the Integrated Review, which outlines how the UK will respond, including through the Westminster Foundation for Democracy and other organisations that support good governance and civil society around the world.
We talk about how important that is, but my understanding is that the WFD’s funding has been cut. Surely, at this time, it should be increased to support the fight against autocrats—and, as the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, said, at a time when global Britain, which led the way on 0.7%, cuts that and breaks the law. I hope the Minister will talk about how we will return to 0.7%. We have also seen the cuts to the BBC, the very thing that the noble Lord, Lord Alton, highlighted. The impact on the World Service will be disastrous, particularly in Russia and Ukraine, where it plays a really important role.
On the borders of Ukraine, we can see all too clearly that autocracy is a danger to global security. Russia’s aggression towards its neighbour is a product of a political system that also starves people of their human rights. The United Kingdom should be a more confident supporter of a free civil society in Russia while also acting domestically to confront those who attempt to export their kleptocracy through illicit finance.
I remind noble Lords—as I did earlier in the week—that a 2018 report by the other place’s Foreign Affairs Committee warned that
“turning a blind eye to London’s role in hiding the proceeds of Kremlin-connected corruption risks signalling that the UK is not serious about confronting the full spectrum of President Putin’s offensive measures.”
That is so true, as we have heard in the debate today. Like the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, I would like the Minister to answer the questions I put to him on Tuesday on the full implementation of the ISC Russia report. Also, when are we going to properly tackle the scandal of how 700 Russian millionaires were fast-tracked for British residency via the so-called golden visa scheme? The Foreign Secretary’s response on Monday was not satisfactory, and I hope the Minister can properly deal with that. I also repeat the call: when can this House expect to consider the economic crime Bill, which is such a vital tool in addressing these issues?
Following President Biden’s virtual summit for democracy last year, what steps have Ministers taken to mark the agreed year of action? Since the summit, President Biden has spoken of the need for political leaders to look inwards at how they can strengthen democracy at home, but under this Government our norms and standards have been undermined. The criminalisation of peaceful protest under the policing Bill was just one example. They lessen our legitimacy to stand up for democracy globally, which is vital.
As the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, said, our leaders need to uphold those standards. The disgraceful attack on Keir Starmer by Boris Johnson has resulted in his own director of policy resigning today. I hope the Minister will be able to address the contents of the letter that she wrote to Boris Johnson; it actually says why it is important that we uphold those standards.
The United Kingdom should be a proud champion of democratic principles and standards, and their promotion should define our foreign policy—but we must also invest in those standards and in democracy at home.
The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)
My Lords, I first thank all noble Lords for their participation in what has been an excellent and, as ever, informed debate on a subject which—as I said to the noble Lord, Lord Browne—was all-encompassing and quite broad. Equally, noble Lords have drawn attention to some consistent themes. I wish to put on record my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Browne, for tabling this very important debate and for getting the insights from across your Lordships’ House. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, pointed out, the attendance today demonstrates both the insights and experience on this important issue, even though we may have different perspectives on the issues that have been discussed.
I will address a couple of issues right from the outset. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Hastings. It has been the greatest honour of my professional and political career to represent my country on the world stage. It is important that we reflect on who we are, what we are and what we stand for. It is also important to lead from the front and to look towards our own backyard and demonstrate that we stand up for the values that we all believe in. On this, the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, was spot on. As someone with a particular heritage who is proud of my faith, I value the fact that my country allows me to celebrate both. Equally, I am proud of my country, the United Kingdom, which allows me to do that.
But these values are not unique to the UK. As the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, pointed out, they are embedded in the common humanity that we all share. Equally, as we take the messages of strengthening democracy, we need to reflect on our own history, both recent and past, to ensure that, when we talk of human rights, we talk not by pointing a finger but through sharing experience, and when we talk about sharing and strengthening democracy and the rights of women, we do not say, “Look at us today”. We should reflect on our past and the hard struggle for democratic rights within our country.
Therefore, leadership is important and I assure the noble Lord, Lord Hastings, that in my engagements I put that very much at the heart of our diplomacy. As a country we believe in democracy. What we are seeing today is democracy very much in action—the ability for a government Minister to respond to challenges and criticisms. It is right that any thriving democracy allows that to happen. As my noble friend Lord Balfe said, it is important, whichever party we come from and whatever perspectives we bring, that we seek to defend them both individually and collectively.
We have seen, as the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, said, human rights eroding. We should look to ensure that human rights, the rights of communities and people, are protected both internationally and at home. As the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, pointed out, many institutions took immense challenge to create, including the United Nations. It is not perfect in every way but, as a P5 member and a committed member of the multilateral system, we must do our best to change from within so that the institution itself is strengthened along with others.
From the economic strong-arming of China to the bullying tactics of Russia—the noble Lord, Lord Collins, pointed towards Ukraine, which is rightly taking up the bandwidth of many people in your Lordships’ House and beyond; we stand in solidarity with Ukraine against further Russian aggression—autocratic regimes are looking towards a democracy in terms of our strengthened, or indeed weakened, position. What happened in Afghanistan should not be lost on us. Countries will test us. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Alton. He knows both from our public debates and from private discussions that the Chinese authorities are watching very carefully. They are looking at unity, not just of language but of purpose and action.
What has worked well recently? The Covid response was a matter of discussion for many months; indeed, more than two years. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Londesborough, that we saw the best focus and prioritisation of humanity and the interdependence of humanity, from academia to research to manufacture and delivery. I fully accept that there is so much more still to do, and we are focused on that. While it is far from a perfect outcome, one hopes that as we evolve as established democracies that were at the forefront of the vaccination, we do not forget smaller countries—developing nations that are yet to receive the vaccine in the way they require—and that we invest in their infrastructure, support and distribution. Now is the time for the free world to stand together.
As the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, pointed out, we have seen the decline of democracies around the world. As my noble friend Lord Balfe pointed out, democracy does not necessarily mean the election of Governments and Administrations who meet with our own aligned values.
Equally, when we look towards Russia, democracy also means that those in government protect those in opposition. It means that, after what we saw in the dreadful, awful and continuing case of Alexei Navalny, we stand together to show that democracy is not just about ensuring that your own position is secure—the Opposition are also free to challenge and be critical. That is why the UK is working with like-minded friends to build that network of liberty that my noble friend Lord Howell spoke of, and he knows very well the strength of that network, with its links to key institutions, including the institution of the Commonwealth, which brings together 54 nations. As my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary has said, we will continue to build that network of liberty to promote democracy and freedom around the world.
The noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Alton, talked about soft power, particularly of the BBC. I assure noble Lords of the fact that we continue to provide support to the BBC—this year, the budget is £94.4 million—and, as the noble Lord, Lord Collins, also pointed out, to the Westminster Foundation for Democracy. On the current settlement, although we are still going through the process at the FCDO, I agree with noble Lords that those institutions play an important role. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, pointed to our universities, and I agree with him. He pointed to the cultural sector and the British Council, and I agree with him. All those institutions are an important part of what the United Kingdom does internationally. It means that together we build a powerful alternative for countries which, unhappily, do not share the strength of democracy.
We have heard about autocrats and populists; we must stand firm against that. That means building stronger security ties and a network of allies to protect our people, our friends and our freedoms and to show adversaries that they do not have a free hand to achieve their objectives through force. Therefore, it is important that we continue to build alliances, as we have done recently through the AUKUS partnership with the US and Australia, which will help to protect sea routes and stability across the Indo-Pacific, while deepening our work with Canada to cover the Arctic and beyond.
It is key that, in building these alliances, we continue to stand up for free market economics and argue for trade and technology as tools of liberation, not control. It means offering a compelling alternative to low-income countries whose balance sheets are loaded, as several noble Lords pointed out, with debt to China. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, pointed out, inequality is real and in front of us. In the alternative that we present, empowerment through the economy and economic empowerment must be based on equality and not on debt reliance. That means cutting our strategic dependence on authoritarian regimes, starting with Europe’s unsustainable reliance on Russian energy. We have seen that Russia can and will weaponise that, and the United Kingdom is responding to all these challenges.
We are building new and improved trading ties with like-minded nations, with two-thirds of our trade now covered by trade deals. We will continue to explore new areas of work. Many noble Lords focused on the issue of illicit finance and money laundering, and I am conscious that there were many detailed questions, but I shall seek to provide a framework to many of the questions that were asked. I pay particular tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Hain, for drawing attention to particular issues that have arisen, and I know that my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has written to him on the specific issues that he raised. I hope that he would acknowledge that, on the issues that he raised and the follow-ups—I was conscious of a letter pending—we will follow up and take action, as we have done when exercising sanctions.
The noble Lord, Lord Browne, talked of the year of action, as did the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and others. It is right, and the UK has recognised that, as home to one of the world’s leading financial centres, it is a problem—but we need to face up to the challenge and work in partnership with others who face similar challenges. The corrosive risk of dirty money, including from Russia, being laundered in the UK poses a serious and dangerous risk to our national security, and we have consistently reinforced our ability to crack down on illicit finance in the UK through legislation and the strength of law enforcement response. Money obtained through criminality or corruption is not welcome in the UK, and more needs to be done. In 2018, the Financial Action Task Force found that the UK had one of the strongest systems for combating money laundering and terrorist financing of more than 60 countries that it assessed. We will also ensure the full weight of law enforcement will crack down on those who look to use, move or hide their proceeds of crime.
The noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, and the noble Lords, Lord Browne, Lord Purvis, and others, raised the important issue of money laundered within the City of London. I acknowledge that the UK has one of the world’s largest and most open economies. I was in the City of London for over 20 years: you see the international finance infrastructure and yes, it is the world’s most attractive destination for overseas investors, including Russia. These factors include a range of viable corporate structures, making the UK attractive for legitimate business. However, I recognise, as noble Lords have pointed out, that that also exposes the UK to money-laundering risks, including those relating to Russia. We are well aware of individuals with links to the Russian state who may seek to further damage the reputation and influence within the UK, but also to use their own influence through strategic investments. We will continue to look at those cases in closer detail to ensure that we can act accordingly.
The noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, referred to Transparency International. I am sure she is also aware of a recent report that gives the UK a score of 78 out of 100 in Transparency International’s 2021 corruption perceptions index. I believe we were just outside the top 10, with Germany ahead of us. However, that does not mean that we rest on our laurels; there is more to be done. We will take robust action to crack down on dirty money. For example, we have broadened our sanctions regime through the global anti-corruption sanctions regime, and we are delivering on the UK Economic Crime Plan and the United Kingdom Anti-corruption Strategy. I note of course the concerns noble Lords have expressed about the economic crime Bill, and I assure them that we are following that up directly with our colleagues in the Treasury.
I say to the noble Baroness and the noble Lords, Lord Purvis, Lord Collins and Lord Browne, that the Financial Action Task Force is an important institution that feels that we have one of the strongest systems in the world. However, we will continue to work to ensure that we take further action. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, mentioned specific questions he has asked me. I have literally just signed a letter to him, so on receipt of that, I am sure we will have further exchanges.
The issue of Russian influence on elections in the UK is of great concern. The Government themselves concluded that
“it is almost certain that Russian actors sought to interfere in the 2019 General Election through the online amplification of illicitly acquired and leaked Government documents.”—[Official Report, Commons, 16/7/20; col. 384WS.]
I will not comment any further at this point, as a criminal investigation is ongoing.
The noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, talked about the overseas territories and the legislation which has been passed. We are working closely with the OTs and indeed the Crown dependencies on the issue of public registers, and they have all committed to public registers of ownership by 2023.
The noble Baronesses, Lady Bennett and Lady Kramer, mentioned tier 1 visas. I have noted the detail of the specific questions asked. The noble Lord, Lord Collins, pointed to the response my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary gave. The Foreign Secretary and the Home Secretary are both seized of the important issues relating to the use of tier 1 visas, particularly those granted before the date of renewal, which was 5 April, and the use of such visas by those who seek to bring further disrepute to the United Kingdom. I will follow that up and will update the noble Baronesses accordingly.
Various countries were mentioned during what has been an intense debate about the actions taken. The noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, talked about Belarus. I pay tribute to his work and to that of others in your Lordships’ House in the Council of Europe. I met with the leader of the PACE delegation, and I am now the Minister looking after the Council of Europe; I look forward to engaging. Noble Lords referred to the importance of discussion and debate in the Council of Europe, particularly when the likes of Turkey and Russia are present. Certainly, from my own experience—others may challenge me—even with the worst foe or those you may feel most challenged by, you should never give up on the importance of discussion. I assure your Lordships that no one is taking aim at me. Nevertheless, this is an important point to consider, and I look forward to working with the delegation. I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, in particular, for adopting a prisoner. He has taken a very noble decision and perhaps others should reflect on that action. I am inclined to learn more about that initiative.
The noble Lord, Lord Alton, talked about Taiwan. The Government’s position has not changed, but as I have already acknowledged, the concerning situation and the ever-assertiveness of the Chinese Administration in the Taiwan Strait is a cause of great concern. This matter was very much discussed at the G7, and it continues to be an area of focus.
The noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, talked about Haiti. One thing I will share with noble Lords is that there was a crisis in Haiti in the midst of the Afghanistan crisis, and I was proud of the fact that, notwithstanding the challenge and the scrutiny of our response to Afghanistan, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office also stood firm in its support of Haiti at a time of great challenge. This comes back to that central issue of values and action. Notwithstanding criticisms and challenge, we stand by those countries that need us—but, equally, this should be a co-ordinated, sustainable and long-term response.
My noble friend Lord Hannan and others talked about the situation in Tunisia. We saw Tunisia as one of the countries that came through the Arab spring positively, and it is important that we watch very carefully what happens there. My noble friend also talked of Pakistan, and there is a read-across to China. As we seek to strengthen, build and invest in relationships, particularly our people-to-people links, we also see the influence of other players, particularly China, in Pakistan—as he will have seen through my own direct engagement with the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister and the Human Rights Minister. One challenging question from my side to theirs was: what about condemning the treatment of Uighurs? The response was deafening silence, so there is work to be done as we counter this.
The noble Lord, Lord Purvis, talked about Kazakhstan, as did the noble Viscount, Lord Waverley. As the Minister now responsible for central Asia, I am watching it very carefully. There is one positive we can take in terms of the support given by Russia and Belarus, as we have seen the structural withdrawal of those troops from Kazakhstan’s territory.
Other areas are part and parcel of our work on the world stage. I could talk about the work that we do through cyber and digital, which my noble friend Lord Howell pointed to, which brings both opportunities and challenges. The noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, pointed out the equal dignity of human beings. That should be the central aim of how we stand strong when it comes to human rights, whatever we stand for.
My noble friend Lord Hannan also talked about the importance of law and rules rather than the people who become the rulers themselves. Through our independent sanctions regime we are targeting those responsible for corruption and human rights violations around the world—in Myanmar, Belarus, China, Pakistan and Venezuela, to name a few. We also continue to lead on the Human Rights Council and the UN, which remain important parts of our focus.
On women and girls, as Nelson Mandela said:
“An educated, enlightened and informed population is one of the surest ways of promoting the health of a democracy.”
However, that can be put forward with strength only when we tackle gender inequality. That is a core part of the Government’s mission and right at the centre of the Foreign Secretary’s priorities.
During our G7 presidency, we rallied a new commitment to democracy. At the Cornwall summit, leaders pledged to harness the power of democracy. Yes, I assure noble Lords that whether it is in sub-Saharan Africa, on which my noble friend Lord Eccles focused, or with the multilateral initiatives we take—which were a mainstay of the contribution made by the noble Lord, Lord Hannay—we will continue to work and strengthen our work, including the Summit for Democracy, which was held in support of these aims and objectives.
To say a final word on the Council of Europe, that remains central to our thinking. I look forward to working with noble Lords quite directly to see how we can link in the work of what the Government are seeking to do with the important work of the Council of Europe, particularly on human rights.
To conclude, this has been an enriching debate. Again, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Browne, for the specifics that he drew attention to. There is an action plan on various areas of work, including tackling illicit finance and money laundering, but also standing up and strengthening democracies globally—as I said, not in a lecturing way, but in a way where we can share our rich and diverse experience for the health of democracies around the world.
I was asked questions about leadership and how we often look towards ourselves and our motivations. I am proud of the fact that our country is what it is—one that provides equality of opportunity. I am also reminded, as the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, reminded us all, that we must create a world in which democracy cannot just exist but flourish and thrive.
I end on the words of one of my personal heroes, Mahatma Gandhi, who said the following:
“Keep your thoughts positive because your thoughts become your words. Keep your words positive because your words become your behaviour. Keep your behaviour positive because your behaviour becomes your habits. Keep your habits positive because your habits become your values. Keep your values positive because your values become your destiny.”
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, we have had an excellent debate and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Ahmad, for characteristically, carefully, generously and respectfully responding to the debate. I thank all noble Lords for their valuable contributions. We have had a wide-ranging and informed debate—informed by significant awareness and self-awareness. I shall come back to that point.
I do not intend to respond individually to any or all contributions and would not be able to do that in the time left to me, in any event—I would not have the ability to respond to quality of the contributions and the points made. All that I can say is that every speech was an adornment to the debate, and I am extremely grateful for them.
I want to make just two points; it is really one point with two halves. I should make it clear that I come away from this debate conscious that we all have a shared responsibility for the defence of democracy. I say specifically to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, that we all have a shared responsibility for the history that has got us into this difficulty in the first place. I think that we all recognise that. There is a great deal of self-awareness, and that was obvious in this debate.
The phrase, “to see ourselves as others see us” has been used. That is interesting, because we are nine days away from 25 January, the day on which the people of Scotland celebrate the birth of Robert Burns, the poet. My noble friend Lord Foulkes of Cumnock had the pleasure and honour to represent a part of Ayrshire where every word that anyone remembers that Robert Burns wrote was written. When my noble friend retired, the boundaries were rearranged and I inherited the very town where those words were written, Mauchline in Ayrshire. I represented it for a period, and Burns was a significant part of certainly my late winter life as a Member of Parliament. I have been to more Burns suppers than I ever want to go to again, I have to say!
For those noble Lords who do not know where that phrase comes from, it is from a poem that contains a moral lesson for mankind. The poem was, characteristically for Burns, written about a scene that he observed in a kirk, in the congregation of a church—a church that still exists. There was a preening young woman in that church because she was attracting gazes from everybody. The fact of the matter was that the other members of the congregation were not looking at her but at the insect on her bonnet. Burns wrote this moral lesson with the words that you should pray for the gift,
“To see oursels as others see us!
It wad frae monie a blunder free us”.
I am not going to take that any further because the name of the poem is, “To a Louse”. Given the context in which that was made, I would perhaps be being a bit too party political. We should remember that poem.
In the seconds left to me, I will do what I should have done when I first spoke. I apologise for not doing so. I beg to move.
House of Lords
Enterprise Investment Schemes
Lord Leigh of Hurley
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the opportunities for reforming the eligibility criteria for UK-based companies to access investments through the (1) Enterprise Investment Scheme, and (2) Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme, following the United Kingdom’s departure from the European Union.
Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)
My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. In doing so, I draw your Lordships’ attention to my register of interests, which includes investments in EIS companies.
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the Enterprise Investment Scheme and Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme are world-leading in their generosity, with more than £2 billion of funds raised across the schemes in 2019-20. They provide a range of reliefs for investment in small and growing companies with a permanent establishment in the UK. The Government keep the schemes under review to ensure that they continue to meet their policy objectives in a fair and effective way.
Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)
I welcome my noble friend back to the House. The EU state aid rules, in particular the risk finance guidelines, are the reason why these important incentives for small and growing businesses are restricted. For example, they cannot be more than seven years old, there is a sunset clause and there is a cap on SEIS investments. Many restrictions were imposed on business by the EU, so now is the time for us to unwind them—particularly those that will facilitate investment into private companies by private individuals. Will my noble friend agree to facilitate a meeting between me and others interested in this area with Treasury officials to discuss this matter further?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the schemes referred to by my noble friend are targeted at new and younger companies where asymmetry of information can make it difficult to attract the investment needed. However, we recognise that there is a scale-up gap in the UK, which is why we have other schemes, such as the British Patient Capital scheme, to support UK companies with high growth potential. I will happily take my noble friend’s request back to the Treasury, which is always looking at what more it can do to support British business.
Baroness Kramer (LD)
My Lords, many companies have been putting pressure on HMRC as part of the revision of regulations to remove the requirement that investors should be identified in applications for advanced assurance that they meet the parameters of tax relief schemes and will be included. Indeed, removing disclosure seems to be an important theme in the simplification that is being asked for. As we look at kleptocracy and much of the abuse of the London laundromat, surely now is not the time for us to be focusing on removing disclosure, particularly the disclosure of who the investors are in companies that will receive especially favourable tax treatment.
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the Government are committed to ensuring that any state support they deliver is done in a fair and appropriate way. In saying that, we keep all our schemes under review to ensure that they are doing that. We will always do that in a fair way.
Lord Flight (Con)
My Lords, I declare an interest as chairman of the EIS Association. I entirely support the issue raised by my noble friend Lord Leigh. There are two particular restrictions on eligibility that serve no purpose but are there as a result of the EU requiring them. One is the sunset clause, which effectively means that, if it is not changed, EIS will come to an end in 2025. The second is the seven-year rule, which serves no purpose other than adding to legal costs. I echo my noble friend’s request for a meeting to discuss these matters. I just want to make the point that EIS has now raised nearly £30 billion for small companies, and has been thoroughly successful and much better than the systems in other countries.
Baroness Penn (Con)
My noble friend is correct about the success of the EIS scheme in terms of the amount of money raised. It is world-leading in that fact and has managed to do that under its current design. However, as I have said, I will take my noble friend’s request for a meeting back; we are always looking at what more we can do.
Lord Sikka (Lab)
My Lords, the Office of Tax Simplification has stated that the Government give more than 1,100 tax reliefs, most of which have not been quantified by HMRC. The National Audit Office cannot verify them. We have absolutely no idea whether they achieve the assumed economic objectives. When will the Government look into that?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the Government are confident that the Enterprise Investment Scheme and Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme we are talking about today are effective schemes that have proven to give much-needed support to many British businesses over many years.
Lord Londesborough (CB)
My Lords, I declare my interest as an EIS investor in start-up companies. Do the Government plan to conduct an impact assessment in relation to EIS and SEIS-invested companies? I ask this question because these companies show a very high failure rate, and we should be clear about the cost-benefit in the long term of granting such tax subsidies.
Baroness Penn (Con)
The Government are always keen to ensure value for money in those tax benefits or subsidies that they give. As my noble friend noted earlier, there is a sunset on these schemes, and I am sure that, as part of any process around that, we want to ensure that their impact is appropriate and value for money for the taxpayer.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, the Government’s Levelling Up White Paper is severely lacking. Both the EIS and the SEIS schemes could be said to highlight entrenched economic disparities across the country. Half of investments go to firm with registered addresses in London. That climbs to two-thirds when including the south-east. Do the Government plan to roll out these schemes into the levelling-up agenda, or will the two approaches continue to be at odds?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I am not sure that I agree with the premise of the noble Lord’s question. However, he is right to say that one way to judge whether the levelling-up agenda is having the effect that we would want it to have is having greater take-up of these schemes for companies outside, as well as inside, London.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, this is the latest example of one of the disasters of Brexit. Yesterday, we heard at the European Affairs Committee about Horizon Europe and the problems there. We are about to see the resignation of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland. There is disaster after disaster, yet we were promised £350 million a week for the National Health Service. As a Treasury Minister, could she tell us when that is going to come?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, we have put more than that sum of money into the health service, although I am not sure what that has to do with the Enterprise Investment Scheme. However, I can tell the noble Lord that those have continued to have success since our departure from the EU: £2.7 billion of funds were raised across three schemes last year and investments in VCTs are up 437% this year.
Bird Control Licences
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Hayman of Ullock
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the GL42 general licence to kill or take certain species of wild birds to prevent serious damage, updated on 1 January, what assessment they have made of the numbers of wild birds that will be killed annually to protect game bird interests.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Benyon) (Con)
My Lords, I declare my farming interests as set out in the register. An assessment such as the noble Baroness describes is not required, as control of wild birds under GL42 has already been assessed to carry a low risk to the conservation status of those wild birds.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, the Minister may have seen coverage over the weekend of Nottingham magistrates’ court sentencing a gamekeeper for bludgeoning two buzzards to death inside a cage trap. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has recently highlighted the systemic problem of raptor persecution in the UK in a report that included more than 70 recommendations to improve action on wildlife crime. How do the Government intend to take forward the recommendations of this report, especially its recommendations on licensing gamebird shoots, with the buzzard case as a very recent example on what happens when there is no real accountability in the shooting industry?
Lord Benyon (Con)
There are very strict sanctions against wildlife criminals in this country: unlimited fines and up to six-month custodial sentences can be awarded where people commit these hideous acts. They represent a very small proportion of a sector that does enormous good for conservation and wider natural wildlife benefits in this country.
Lord Robathan (Con)
My Lords, three years ago I spent some days walking on the Pennine Way, west of Leeds. I was so thrilled to see clouds of lapwings and a great number of curlews on large parts of it. Suddenly one would get almost to a desert, where all one saw were crows. The difference, of course, was that where the lapwings and curlews were, there were keepers, whereas where the crows were, there were not. I would be delighted to take the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, with me to walk the same area if she would like. Does my noble friend think that an area with just crows is better for biodiversity than a place where ground-nesting birds, such as lapwings and curlews, flourish?
Lord Benyon (Con)
I am enjoying the image of the noble Baroness and my noble friend enjoying a walk in the countryside. There are three legs to the stool of nature conservation: providing habitat, providing good feed sources and legal predator control. When those three are put in place, extraordinary things happen. It helps us hit our 2030 target of no net loss of biodiversity.
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, shoot owners contribute £250 million and volunteers contribute 3.9 million volunteering days every year. What assessment has the department made of the value of this contribution to our country’s environment?
Lord Benyon (Con)
There are various data sources about the value of shooting to the wider rural economy. There are, of course, other measures that have shown the wider conservation benefits of properly managed countryside. In order for lapwing numbers to thrive, you need to be fledging 0.7 chicks per pair. It is very interesting to see where, in the country, that is being achieved and where it is not.
Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton (Con)
My Lords, do these fines also apply to the sovereign base areas in Cyprus? In 2016, more than 900,000 songbirds were illegally poached in these sovereign base areas. Thanks to the Ministry of Defence, that poaching was reduced down to about 250,000 in 2019. Can I simply ask my noble friend whether he will ensure that, notwithstanding other commitments of the Ministry of Defence, they will continue this counter-poaching operation in the sovereign base areas?
Lord Benyon (Con)
We are all grateful to my noble friend for kicking this off when he was Armed Forces Minister. What is happening in the sovereign base areas is excellent, but it needs to be copied in other places such as Malta. For those of us who are passionate about seeing the turtle-dove recover in this country, we are going to have to take action. International action will have to be taken to prevent this amazing bird being shot, and there are many other species of songbird which, unfortunately, are killed in this way.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, the weight of captive-bred released non-native gamebirds in the UK is the same weight as that all of the native birds in the UK. These eat reptiles in particular. I was speaking to a herpetologist who was very concerned about the impact on reptile populations. But a fifth of the pheasants released are estimated to be eaten by foxes. Those foxes, with their artificially inflated population, also eat many native birds. Would the Minister acknowledge that we would possibly see many more lapwings and other ground-nesting birds if those foxes were not being fed by those gamebirds?
Lord Benyon (Con)
There is an enormous amount of data on the diet of predators such as foxes, and I do not think it is as simple as the noble Baroness makes out. In the vast majority of areas, there is a net gain for biodiversity by the moderate actions of shooting estates. There are, of course, individual cases where they may be a net negative, but in the vast majority of the country, game covers and hedgerows and management of woodland create extraordinary habitats. That is an investment which does not cost the taxpayer anything but is of huge benefit to our natural capital.
The Earl of Kinnoull (CB)
My Lords, I refer to my interests in the register. I am an organic sheep farmer, among other things, and we are worried all the time about crows pecking out the eyes of young lambs. We are also worried about pigeon families setting up in our sheds and causing disease in our organic ewes. Can the Minister confirm how important general licence 42 is to operations such as ours, to allow us to control the birds and give our sheep the opportunity for life?
Lord Benyon (Con)
The species of birds on general licence are ones for which it is estimated that there would be no impact to their conservation status if they were controlled. Certain species are controversially not in the general licence, such as rook and jackdaw. This is constantly being looked at by Natural England. It is very important to understand that they are controlled not just for game bird management but very often for the protection of crops and livestock. We must be mindful of that and make sure that farming businesses around the country have the protection that they need.
Lord Harlech (Con)
My Lords, independent scientific research in numerous case studies by the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust shows that proper game bird management has a net benefit to songbirds and biodiversity in general. How will the Government be compensating farmers and land managers for increasing those songbird numbers?
Lord Benyon (Con)
Under our environmental land management schemes farmers will be rewarded for doing what we call public goods, and that includes creating habitat for wildlife and protecting species which will otherwise, on our watch, become extinct. I could go on about the curlew, as I do every day in Defra, a species for which you can map the point at which it will become extinct in a decade or two’s time. We do not save it then, we save it now, and so we must deploy every measure that we can, whether it is in government grants or activities that we allow land managers to perform to protect them.
Lord Cormack (Con)
We should be grateful to the noble Baroness for initiating a brief but enlightening debate. I thank my noble friend for his answers, but can he add another factor? Game is about the most nutritious food that you possibly can eat. If the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, had a few more pheasants, she might find life a bit more agreeable.
Lord Benyon (Con)
My Lords, it is not my position at the Dispatch Box to prescribe noble Lords’ diets, but I entirely agree with my noble friend about the health-giving benefits of natural food.
Lord Newby (LD)
My Lords, following on from the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, and as someone who really enjoys pheasant, in many cases game birds are shot and not used for food at all but put into landfill. Have the Government any plans to reduce that practice?
Lord Benyon (Con)
There may be cases where that happens, but I imagine that it is very rare. Recently, the British Game Alliance was created, which has sought to develop new markets for this very healthy food. I do not have any evidence of what the noble Lord talks about but, if he can produce it, I will be happy to discuss it with officials and with Natural England.
Viscount Trenchard (Con)
My Lords, predator control is necessary for many reasons, including maintaining populations of rare ground-nesting birds. Does the Minister agree that, besides this, the revocation of the general licence would have a serious negative effect on the rural economy and the levelling-up agenda, placing at risk much of the £2 billion and 74,000 jobs that game shooting contributes to the countryside?
Lord Benyon (Con)
The question suggests that there has been a change in government policy. There has been no change in the definition of species that can be controlled under licence since the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. My noble friend is right that, whatever people feel about the rights and wrongs of shooting predator species, the value that it brings to some of the most remote parts of these islands and to maintaining the rural economy is huge.
School Absences
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Blunkett
To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many children in (1) primary, and (2) secondary, schools in England were absent the weeks commencing (a) 10 January, (b) 17 January, and (c) 24 January.
Lord Blunkett (Lab)
My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. I declare an interest, in that my 10 year-old grandson, Oscar, currently has Covid.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Education (Baroness Barran) (Con)
My Lords, I am very sorry to hear about the noble Lord’s grandson. I hope that he recovers speedily.
Absence data is collected by the department on a termly basis, but we publish fortnightly data on on-site attendance in state-funded schools. The latest data, from 17 to 20 January, shows that average secondary attendance was 86.7%, unchanged from the previous week, while primary attendance was 89.4%, down slightly from 91.8%. Absence figures specifically for Covid-related reasons are published fortnightly, and were 5.7% and 3.4% in primary and secondary in the week of 17 January, and 3.7% and 3.5% in primary and secondary in the week of 10 January.
Lord Blunkett (Lab)
I am very grateful for the kind words of the Minister.
The latest ONS figures for last week show over 600,000 primary school children not in the classroom. This would be worrying at any time, but obviously with the statistics relating to the national tutoring programme at a miserable 15% of their target, the remedial action that is needed is clearly not working. Can the Minister go back to the department and work out what has happened with the contract which was relet last September?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Lord is right to raise the issue of the 600,000 primary-age children not in school, although I remind the House that there is a clear expectation that all schools offer high-quality remote learning. We are working very actively on the national tutoring programme contract and are confident that we will reach our objectives.
Lord Storey (LD)
My Lords, as well as the absentee rates in schools, as the Minister knows we have hundreds of thousands of children not in school at all. They are missing from the system. Some may be home tutored, but we do not know that. What plans have the Government got for those home tutors to register their children, so that we know they are safe and know where they are?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I am pleased to update the House that, this morning, we announced our response to the Children Not in School consultation and have confirmed that we will be setting up a register of home-schooled children.
Baroness Greengross (CB)
During the pandemic schools were provided with laptops to support students during the national lockdown and any future school closures. These laptops were delivered without software, anticipating that schools would need to install the programmes applicable to their own school context. However, in some cases, these devices still have not been used, as this added to the already stretched capacities of existing IT staff, who did not have the additional hours needed to install software or set up the laptops sufficiently. Do the Government have any information about how widespread this problem was and how many laptops remain unused?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The laptops that were distributed in the department’s Get Help with Technology programme are owned by the schools, trusts, local authorities and further education institutions concerned. It is those institutions which are responsible for making sure that they are safe and secure. We are offering support to those organisations to take urgent action to reset devices and to apply their own safeguarding measures, and we are making grant funding available to them to contribute to the technical support costs to which the noble Baroness refers.
Lord Haselhurst (Con)
My Lords, I declare an interest as the grandfather of two primary school children who have caught Covid and who are now at home. Is my noble friend confident that the catch-up plan will be robust enough to deal with the slightly uncertain total number of children who are missing vital education at this stage? That is the assurance that many parents who are now returning to work would be very pleased to have.
Baroness Barran (Con)
My noble friend is right to highlight this. I will try to set out for the House that our approach is genuinely comprehensive. Last week, we announced a consultation on new attendance measures and we are consulting on behaviour and exclusion, which, less at primary but more at secondary, is a material issue for attendance. We made direct investments through the £1.3 billion of recovery funding and the £1.5 billion tutoring programme. Schools have the flexibility to direct that to the most disadvantaged children, so that they can catch up fastest.
Baroness Blackstone (Ind Lab)
My Lords, following the answer the Minister has just given, I wonder if she is aware that, unsurprisingly, a survey by Teach First found that teachers in the most disadvantaged schools strongly believe that attainment would be greatly improved if attendance could be improved. What specific measures are being brought in to improve the attendance of children, particularly in primary but also in secondary schools? What kind of monitoring is being done to find out which of these measures are most effective and which do not work?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I am grateful to the noble Baroness for giving me the opportunity to set this out in more detail. Attendance is an absolute priority for this Government, both because children obviously cannot learn if they are not in school and because of the well-recognised impact on their mental and physical health. We have already announced a team of attendance advisers, who will support schools, and we are open to piloting new approaches to supporting attendance. The Secretary of State has established a national attendance action alliance with key actors from across the sector and we will focus in the consultation on getting consistency in both the attendance policy of a school and the use of different sanctions for non-attendance, which very much vary across the country.
Lord Brownlow of Shurlock Row (Con)
My Lords, I declare my interest as a donor to various charities in the children’s sector. Given what the Minister has just said, will there be any special focus in those measures and the catch-up programme on children with SEND?
Baroness Barran (Con)
My noble friend is right to focus on children with special educational needs. School is absolutely the best place for them to be, too. Throughout the pandemic, we have consistently prioritised children with special educational needs—for example, through the education recovery funding and by providing additional uplifts for those who attend specialist settings, including specialist units in mainstream schools. I am sure that, for the most part anyway, the House will share in the good news that at-risk children aged five to 11 are now eligible for the vaccine and its rollout has started.
Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab)
My Lords, the ongoing disruption caused by absences of pupils and teachers is evidence that the Government have failed to get a grip on the measures required to keep children learning, whether that is from the supply of testing kits or classroom ventilation. Schools that ended the requirement for pupils to wear face coverings last month, in line with government guidance, are now reinstating it because of the upsurge in Covid cases. Part of the effect of the January disruption was that some pupils were unable to sit their mock exams. What plans are in place to ensure that those pupils are not disadvantaged as a result when it comes to the real thing?
Baroness Barran (Con)
I think the noble Lord is being a little harsh: 99.9% of schools have stayed open. I know that he, with me, will recognise and deeply thank head teachers and all the teaching and associated support workforce for making that happen and for the flexibility they have shown. On Monday, we will announce the advance information about exams. The evidence from the VTQ January series of exams is that it has gone extremely well.
The Lord Privy Seal (Baroness Evans of Bowes Park) (Con)
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, wishes to speak virtually and it is a convenient point for me to call her.
Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]
My Lords, DfE guidance to schools, updated on 20 January, told heads that
“A director of public health might advise you that face coverings should temporarily be worn in communal areas or classrooms”.
What would the Minister say to the head who is asking all pupils to wear masks until further notice, as one of their pupils has leukaemia and is severely immuno- compromised? Why have the Government, whether the Department for Education or the department of health, not given advice to these pupils, their families and their schools?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The noble Baroness raises a very specific point. The department’s advice would be to talk to the director of public health and our teams, who are available and have been offering support to schools around the country, throughout the pandemic.
Benefit Sanctions on Jobseekers
(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Lister of Burtersett
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of their policy to impose benefit sanctions after four weeks rather than three months if an unemployed jobseeker fails to seek or take work in any field; and whether they will publish their evaluation of the effectiveness of such sanctions.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and Department for Work and Pensions (Baroness Stedman-Scott) (Con)
No assessment has been made. We are not changing the reasons why we may apply a sanction, including refusing to take a job that has been offered, nor the rates applied. As part of the Way to Work campaign, we are changing the period in which a claimant can limit their job search to their usual occupation to promote wider employment opportunities, supporting people into work more quickly. As the noble Baroness knows, we no longer plan to publish a report.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, given the general view that tougher sanctions will have only a limited impact on labour supply in today’s market, the inability of the Government’s evaluation to assess their deterrent effect, the independent evidence that they typically push people out of the formal labour market or into poor jobs at the cost of longer-term better-quality jobs, and that they are associated with serious hardship and ill health, what justification is there for introducing a significantly harsher policy now without even public consultation?
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
I make it absolutely clear that we are not having tougher sanctions. We are reducing the period for which people can look for usual work, as I said. I went to Hastings jobcentre last week, and it was busy helping people to look for work. There were employers in there doing interviews, not rubbing their hands saying, “We can sanction more people”. The whole Jobcentre Plus network is enthralled by this new opportunity. We will be helping people to get a job quicker, but we will not stop helping them to get a job in the field they want to be in.
Lord Lamont of Lerwick (Con)
My Lords, I appreciate what the Minister said—the Government are altering not the sanctions, merely the period of time—but I confess to being surprised when I heard this. A month seems a very short period in which to expect somebody to find work in their usual area. Could it not be extended a bit?
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
The decision about the four-week period has been made. I can go back and say that noble Lords would like it to be longer, but that will probably not come as a surprise to the Secretary of State. The other factor is that we are inundated with employers wanting to recruit people to their workforce. In my experience, you are much more able to get the next job if you are in a job, than if you are sitting looking for jobs that do not exist at the moment.
Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Lab)
My Lords, as my noble friend Lady Lister said, there is no evidence that sanctions are effective in encouraging people into sustained long-term work. As universal credit statistics show, new claimants flow quickly off. In view of this, will the Minister ensure that the Government adopt the safety valve of preparing people with independent advice before bringing in these sanctions? What action will the Government take to publicise and inform claimants of the easement regime, which can protect people from such sanctions, notwithstanding what the Minister has said already? A month is a sanction.
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
Sanctions apply only if claimants do not comply with their agreed requirements for no good reason. That is not changing at all. If claimants refuse to apply for roles, attend interviews or take up paid work without good reason, they can be referred for a sanction. If a claimant disagrees with the sanction decision, they can ask for it to be reconsidered. We have a well-established system of hardship payments available as a safeguard if a claimant demonstrates that they cannot meet their immediate and most essential needs due to a sanction.
Baroness Fookes (Con)
My Lords, if a sanction is applied, what arrangements are there for someone who feels unfairly treated to ask for redress? In particular, is it simple or will they have to run through a whole series of bureaucratic hoops?
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
Building on the answer that I just gave the noble Baroness on the opposite Benches, if a claimant disagrees with their sanction, they can ask for the decision to be reconsidered and can subsequently appeal against it. There are hardship payments. To emphasise the point, I rang a district manager this morning and said, “Tell me about this Way to Work”. She said, “We love it. We’re very excited about it, we’ve never had so many jobs, and the last thing in the world we want to do is sanction somebody in this environment”—and I believe her.
Baroness Meacher (CB)
My Lords, the Minister referred to the inundation of employers, and I can imagine that, but has any work been done to assess the willingness of employers in different sectors to take on people with no experience in that sector? It is very important that workers on the front line understand.
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
The noble Baroness makes a very good point. The work coaches are well trained and their relationship with employers is gathering momentum. In fact, I heard today that employers are more prepared to take people with no experience in their industry and in fact are also considering taking people they would not normally have taken, such as ex-offenders and those with autism. So, yes, I agree.
Baroness Sherlock (Lab)
My Lords, let us take a step back. What the Government are doing is saying to somebody who has lost their job, “If you don’t get back into your own field within four weeks, you should go and find any job and get in there fast”. The Government put out a massive press release last week saying, “We’re going to get half a million people into over a million vacancies”, and the centrepiece was the idea that you could be sanctioned within four weeks—ironically, before you even get your first universal credit payment, which takes six weeks.
Given that only 3% of universal credit claimants are even in this category—and given that all the evidence shows that most of them get back into work really quickly anyway—rather than blaming people who have lost their jobs, why not focus on long-term unemployment, people leaving the labour market and people retiring early? Let us concentrate on the real problems. Would that not be a better idea?
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
I am afraid that on this occasion I cannot quite agree with everything that the noble Baroness said, or indeed the sentiment in which it was said. That will come as no surprise to people. The fact is that we have been working with long-term unemployed people to try to overcome their barriers and put solutions in place. I say again that when someone does not have a job and they cannot get one within the field that they are used to and skilled in, their skills can be applied to other sectors, so they can take jobs and be in work and then, when a job comes up in the field they want, we can help them apply for it. So I do not hold with what the noble Baroness says.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
Putting pressure on people to take jobs with the threat of benefit sanctions has a known link with deteriorating mental health. Indeed, some medics have pointed to a link between benefit sanctions and suicide. In the past, the Government have refused to assess that impact and publish the results. Will the Minister now look at that evidence and make sure, for transparency’s sake, that we all see it?
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
Let me go to the point about the publication of the evaluation and so on. We committed to using UC administrative data to look at the impact that a sanction has on an individual. However, durations could not be compared as we did not have robust legacy data and could not develop counterfactual information without legislative changes to allow for the testing of different approaches. Therefore, we were not able to do it and come up with a meaningful comparison.
I understand exactly the point that the noble Baroness made about mental health. Our work coaches are trained in mental health and to watch out for people. As I say, the last thing they are going to do is threaten people. It is only when there is no good reason for turning down an opportunity that a sanction will be imposed. Sanctions are running at 0.78%, which is lower than pre pandemic.
Baroness Seccombe (Con)
My Lords, some people seem to find great difficulty in securing a job, so what has been done by the Government to help these people to secure employment?
Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)
I am pleased to say that the Government have doubled the number of work coaches. They are spending more time with people, finding out in more depth the issues that are stopping them working and putting interventions in place to help them overcome their barriers. We have our plan for jobs programme. More and more employers are coming into jobcentres to interview people, understanding the barriers that people face. When all is said and done, we are doing a lot for people.
Nationality and Borders Bill
Thursday 3rd February 2022
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Nationality and Borders Act 2022 View all Nationality and Borders Act 2022 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 82-III(a) Amendments for Committee (Supplementary to the Third Marshalled List) - (3 Feb 2022)
“(4A) In section 16 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 (Establishment of centres), after subsection 2 insert—“(2A) Accommodation provided under this section must—(a) have a capacity of no more than 100 residents, and(b) provide any non-related residents at the centre with an individual room in which to sleep, such that residents are not required to share sleeping quarters with people to whom they are not related.”” Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would amend the 2002 Act to ensure that accommodation centres are not too large and that residents are not required to share sleeping quarters with anyone they are not related to.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendments 57, 59 and 60 in my name and those of the noble Baronesses, Lady Neuberger and Lady Hamwee, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham. I also express broad support for the other amendments in this group. The amendments reflect the concerns of the British Red Cross together with many other organisations, and I am grateful to them for their help. Together, the amendments would place restrictions on who could be accommodated in the accommodation centres proposed under Clause 12 and for how long, the numbers to be accommodated in a centre and the sleeping arrangements, and would ensure that if children were ever accommodated in those centres, they would not be prevented from attending local maintained schools.
Under Clause 12, as signalled in the new plan for immigration, accommodation for asylum seekers will move from what has been the dominant dispersal model, in which asylum seekers are housed in local communities, to accommodation in reception centres, using a power provided by the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002. No detail has been provided, so one purpose of the amendments is to try to elicit more detail than was provided in the Commons. In particular, how many accommodation centres are planned, and where? Will they be purpose-built or will they use existing sites such as Napier barracks? What criteria will be used to decide whether such existing sites are designated as accommodation centres or contingency accommodation?
What the Government have made clear is that they will use Napier as asylum accommodation for a further five years, and that this will allow testing and piloting to inform the final design of how accommodation centres will operate. In view of the High Court judgment about the inadequacy of the accommodation provided, and having sat on an inquiry held by the APPG on immigration detention into quasi-detention centres, I find the idea that Napier could provide the model for future accommodation centres profoundly worrying.
The evidence we received—both from stakeholder organisations and from those with experience of living in Napier or in another centre, now closed—was overwhelmingly negative. Typically, such centres are in remote areas. This spells isolation and a lack of easy access to support services. It is not conducive to integration. On the contrary, it creates what HOPE not hate describes as “targets of hate”. It warns that the use of such centres is likely to lead to increased harassment of asylum seekers.
As noted in the joint evidence from Doctors of the World, the Helen Bamber Foundation, Forrest Medico-Legal Services and Freedom from Torture, the use of dormitory-style accommodation means a total lack of privacy. This can be particularly problematic for LGBTQ+ residents. It also results in serious sleep deprivation for many. The impact of this deprivation on mental health and well-being was described very powerfully in evidence to the inquiry by those with experience of Napier barracks.
The use of former military barracks can be retraumatising for those who have suffered abuse and torture. As a dozen organisations, including Doctors of the World, the Helen Bamber Foundation, the BMA and various royal colleges warned the Home Secretary in a joint letter, this makes them inappropriate for people seeking asylum. They also warned that the kind of accommodation centres envisaged represent a real public health risk and impede adequate medical care.
It was clear from our inquiry and from the experience of a range of health and refugee organisations that such accommodation is bad for mental and physical health. It undermines any sense of agency and hope. According to the Helen Bamber Foundation,
“the use of institutional accommodation of this type is extremely harmful to survivors of torture”
and its features
“have the same impact as open prisons with groups of people with little to motivate or occupy themselves becoming increasingly desperate.”
It is not surprising, therefore, that the Refugee Council has warned:
“Proposals to extend these forms of accommodation are ill-thought out and dangerous, and undermine the UK’s duties to support and protect those making asylum claims.”
It advised that international examples of the use of congregated settings, including in the Republic of Ireland, have shown that this kind of accommodation is completely inappropriate for housing those seeking asylum.
The amendments will not prevent the use of such accommodation centres—the power for which stems from earlier legislation, as I said—but they would go so way towards addressing their most inhumane features. Amendment 57 would, with some additions, give legislative force to what is supposed to be current policy—of not housing groups with particular vulnerabilities in such accommodation. Our inquiry, British Red Cross research and the experiences of stakeholders all indicate that, all too often, people with vulnerabilities are housed in such accommodation. It is therefore essential the safeguards are spelled out in the legislation. In the absence of such legal safeguards, what assurances can the Minister give that the use of accommodation centres will be accompanied by more robust screening and protection than exist at present?
With regard to children, in the Commons Committee, the Minister assured Members that the Government had “no intention” and “no plans” to accommodate children. Welcome as such assurances are, they are far from a cast-iron guarantee. We need to spell it out in the legislation. I do not see why the Government would resist this—if this is their intention. I invite the Minister to give an absolute assurance on the record.
Without a firm—preferably legal—guarantee, Amendment 60, which assures children’s access to local maintained education facilities, is still needed. At present, Section 36 of the 2002 Act prevents a child who is resident in an accommodation centre being admitted to a maintained school or nursery. Section 29 allows for education to take place within the centres. The prior information notice for accommodation centres, published by the Government last August, includes provision for education services. It surely cannot be in the children’s best interests to segregate them from children in the local community in this way.
Amendment 56 would limit the number of residents in any one centre to 100. The larger such centres are, the less the residents feel that their humanity is recognised and the more likely the centres are to attract hostile attention and to work against social cohesion and integration. In the Commons Committee, the Minister said that such a limit would undermine a key objective of resolving asylum cases more quickly on site. It is not clear how it would do so. Could the Minister please explain?
The other part of the amendment would ensure that residents were not required to share sleeping accommodation with anyone to whom they were not related. This reflects a recommendation made five years ago by the Home Affairs Select Committee—that room-sharing should be phased out across the asylum estate. It would help address lack of privacy and public health concerns.
The Minister was rather dismissive of this in the Commons Committee, but he did not seem to appreciate what it is like for people seeking asylum to be housed in dormitory-style accommodation, as opposed to sharing a bedroom in accommodation in the community. It is all very well saying, as he did, that torture survivors receiving treatment should not share sleeping quarters, but in practice, all too often, inadequate screening means that torture survivors and others who are vulnerable do so.
Amendment 59 would remove the power given to the Home Secretary in Clause 11 to increase the maximum period for which someone can be accommodated. At present, there is a limit of six months in most cases. The Explanatory Note gives no indication as to how the new power might be used, other than to argue that it provides flexibility. The UNHCR has expressed concern that, unless there are necessary safeguards and support services, prolonged accommodation in such centres is likely to harm well-being, increase the need for future support and delay refugee integration. The 90-day limit in the amendment reflects current practice at Napier. We know the damaging impact on mental health caused by the absence of any clear time limit. It should not be replicated in accommodation centres.
In conclusion, I will quote from residents of Napier and of Penally, which is now closed. One told the APPG inquiry:
“When I arrived, the fear completely overwhelmed me. The design of the camp was oppressive, the high fences, the sheer numbers of people, the security who … looked like they were from the military. It was terrifying and I could feel it through my whole body. It reminded me of the military camps in [my home country]. I was in complete shock for the first few days. I did not sleep at all … It reminded me of [my home country] and I could not function.”
Another suggested:
“It would be difficult to design a system that more perfectly delivers despair and deteriorating human health and mental capacity than these asylum camps.”
A third said:
“I did not feel like a person when I was there.”
These quotes show quite clearly the experience of dehumanisation. The JCHR suggested, in one of its reports on the Bill, that such dehumanisation and distress are not inevitable in accommodation centres. It also made it clear that it was imperative that the Government learn from the poor treatment of asylum seekers housed in former military barracks. The amendments in this group give the Government the opportunity to demonstrate that they have learned from the overwhelming evidence of the damaging impact of such accommodation. I beg to move.
Lord Horam (Con)
My Lords, I strongly welcome my noble friend’s initiative in building and setting up reception centres of this kind. I appreciate that the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and others, are, in effect, probing amendments to find out more about the Government’s exact intentions. I fully understand that. It is perfectly reasonable.
I do not think that the noble Baroness objected to the principle of reception centres of this kind. At the moment, first of all, people are visited on local authorities, which are asked to accommodate them. Inevitably, these are not local authorities in London and the south-east, where accommodation costs are very high, but in areas such as the Midlands, the north-west and the north-east. I come from the north-west, so I know it particularly well. Here there is the largest concentration of people of this kind in council flats and so forth. They are, in effect, in competition with local people on the council waiting list, who may be rather resentful if they find they are asked to wait rather longer because of the need to accommodate people who have just come across the channel on a boat. This is not conducive to good community relations, as well as being quite unfair on people who have long been resident in this country.
Secondly, if they cannot be accommodated by local authorities—indeed, it is increasingly difficult to find appropriate council accommodation because of the shortage of housing, even in areas such as the north-east and north-west—they are sent to local hotels. I know this particularly well because I happened to spend part of my youth in Southport. Southport has a splendid main street called Lord Street. The Committee may not know it, but it was visited by Louis Napoleon, the Emperor of France, when he was in exile in this country before he became the emperor. On the basis of Lord Street, he created the Champs-Élysées in Paris. In Southport we always think of the Champs-Élysées as being the French Lord Street.
Baroness Neuberger (CB)
My Lords, I rise to speak in support of Amendments 56, 57 and 59 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham. I have added my name to these amendments. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Horam, that we are not talking about illegal immigrants; we are talking about asylum seekers. It is legitimate to seek asylum in this country.
In 2021—last year—a British Red Cross investigation found that unsuitable and poor facilities were having a severe effect on the well-being of asylum seekers, including children. I join the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, in asking the Minister to clarify that these accommodation centres will not be used for children in any circumstances because that is really important, and we really would like that on the record.
We know that people housed in asylum accommodation are generally not registered with a GP and face significant challenges in accessing appropriate healthcare, particularly for more complex mental and physical health conditions. People who are not registered with a GP and do not have an NHS number are also unable to access Covid-19 vaccines through the regular channels, which makes them largely dependent on outreach and walk-in clinics. I can tell noble Lords, as someone who has been very involved in the vaccine delivery, that it is a serious problem. It poses a huge challenge for timely follow-up and identification of those who need additional doses as a result of their clinical vulnerability.
The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, mentioned the judgment about those who were in Napier barracks. Noble Lords will know of the judgment, which was brought in June 2021, where it was made very clear that there were inadequate health and safety conditions, a failure to screen for victims of trafficking and other vulnerabilities and false imprisonment of residents. Evidence presented to the court showed that the Home Office continued to house people at the barracks against advice from Public Health England. A Covid outbreak was found by the court to be inevitable and it occured in January 2021, with nearly 200 people testing positive. Yet this is the model the Government are using.
We need to understand from the Minister and know more about how exactly this is going to operate and how we are going to ensure that anybody in an accommodation centre has their health protected and gets decent health services. We know that the risks to the health and well-being of people in these large-scale accommodation centres are clear.
If you add in the most vulnerable of people—children, women, people with disabilities, those who have been referred to the national referral mechanism and others who are vulnerable—the system will not be able to cope. The accommodation centres will apparently provide basic healthcare services, but access to medical care and infection control in current asylum accommodation settings has been notoriously poor, drawing widespread condemnation from healthcare professionals across the UK.
This amendment would mean people in vulnerable circumstances, including children, survivors of torture and those who have been subjected to human trafficking or enslavement, are not accommodated in the new accommodation centres. The Home Office recognised that most vulnerable people should not be accommodated in Napier barracks but Doctors of the World—I am extremely grateful to Doctors of the World and other organisations which have provided excellent briefings on all of this—data shows that 70% of Napier barracks residents accessing its clinical services disclosed an experience of violence in their home or transit country and 38% had applied for asylum because of an experience of violence. Of course, people who have experienced violence and associated trauma are unlikely to regard an accommodation centre that is prototyped by an ex-military camp as a place of safety, exactly as the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, has said. It is likely to trigger a trauma response. Talk to some of the psychiatrists who know about this and they will tell you that. It is likely to lead to the deterioration of an individual’s mental health and well-being.
Amendment 56 would mean that accommodation centres would not become overcrowded and would not place unnecessary pressure on local health services. It might also improve conditions—the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, has perhaps said enough about that—because if you hear the experience of people who have been living 20 in the same room, you can almost not believe it. I t makes one stretch one’s eyes. The lack of privacy living in large, shared rooms is a major cause for concern for people’s mental well-being. By limiting the number of people accommodated at a site, this amendment would contribute to better access to mainstream health services, a better chance—not a great chance, but a better one—of social integration and possibly a chance of maintaining some sort of well-being.
There is a further point. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, has referred to what is happening just across the Irish Sea in the Republic of Ireland. The Republic of Ireland has, for nearly 20 years, been providing something called “direct provision” of housing for asylum seekers. I know about that because we have a holiday home in Ireland. However, because of the poor health experienced by residents, deaths within the centres and the same arguments being adduced here, the Irish Government are changing their system and have promised to phase out these so-called direct provision centres by 2024. Their new centres will be smaller, but not small enough, will be for a maximum of four months, which is not short enough, and will look out for the health and well-being and integration of the residents. If the Irish are removing these large centres, for all these reasons, should we not be thinking again, as well as protecting the most vulnerable from being housed within them, and reducing the length of stay permitted?
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I point out to the noble Lord, Lord Horam, that the stresses and strains being experienced by local economies and local people have actually been created by his Government, the Conservative Government, over the past 12 years. Their levelling-up message—I will not call it a campaign—is only to repair some of the damage they have done in the past 12 years. Please, I want no lectures about making things easier for people, because this Government have made things much harder for many millions of people.
I also express my admiration for the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, who has shown incredible perseverance, persistence, bravery and toughness in keeping on about this subject. Her deep knowledge is informing the House. I really hope that we can listen to her, hear from her and learn from her; I include the Conservative Front Bench in that.
The way that asylum seekers have been detained in unsuitable accommodation in this country is a national outrage—a national disgrace. We should be deeply ashamed of it. If these conditions were not in violation of international law, then frankly we ought to be fighting for a change in international law, because no country should treat people like this.
The amendments in this group would have a two-pronged benefit, by improving the standard of accommodation and reducing the time for which people can be detained. I hope that the Minister will reflect deeply on the impact that this government detention is having on people’s lives, and accept these amendments.
The Lord Bishop of Durham
My Lords, in rising to support these amendments, to some of which I have added my name, I declare my interests in relation to both the RAMP project and Reset, as set out in the register.
Where we live and sleep is fundamental to our health, well-being and ability to live our lives fully. It should be a place we feel safe, from where we can build our lives. The majority of people who claim asylum will be granted refugee status or humanitarian protection. From day one in this country, they should therefore be treated as future citizens—a gift to us rather than a problem or inconvenience. They may well have endured persecution and trauma, but they also have skills and experience that they want to actively use to contribute to our society. This should inform the whole asylum process, including how they are accommodated.
I am deeply concerned about the planned accommodation centres for asylum seekers. The Home Secretary has said that the continued use of Napier barracks may inform the final design of how accommodation centres will operate. This does not bode well given the serious concerns raised by the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons and the findings of the High Court of fundamental failures by the Home Office in ensuring that the barracks were suitable accommodation for vulnerable asylum seekers.
I am now in the position, unlike anyone else in this House I think, to say that I visited Napier barracks last week with two Members from the other place: the honourable Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale, Tim Farron, and the right honourable Member for Romsey and Southampton North, Caroline Nokes—herself a former Minister for Immigration. We were accompanied by the Bishop of Dover and three members of the RAMP project team. I put on record our deep gratitude to the Minister for her support in ensuring that the visit took place, and for intervening when it looked like it might get cancelled at short notice. She worked tirelessly for us, and we thank her.
It was clear from our visit that efforts have been made to improve things in the light of the previous inspection and the court case. The conditions are far from ideal, but the deeply shocking conditions we have learnt about at Napier and Penally camps should never be repeated, and they are not currently being repeated. Good-quality asylum accommodation should be provided from the outset, not forced following inspections and legal challenge. I have a number of observations to make and questions to ask of the Minister that apply to the different areas of our four amendments.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)
My Lords, one rises to talk in this debate having heard speeches from the noble Baronesses and the right reverend Prelate which are based on great experience. My experience, which is much less and can therefore be dismissed as anecdotal, causes me to raise a couple of questions which I have told the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, I would raise. It is the question of the inflexibility that may be imposed if the system has too many conditions attached to it and, in particular, of the maximum number of 100 in a centre.
My anecdotal experience—I accept that it is anecdotal —is that the numbers are not the problem; what people want is proper management and not an absolute focus on numbers. As we all know, those unfortunate people arrive here traumatised, as the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, pointed out, and, for them, to some extent there is safety in numbers because in their previous experience they have been kept on their own. Therefore, having people around them can be helpful and not traumatising—in fact, it reduces trauma and does not compromise their humanity in the way the noble Baroness described. Of course, the smaller we make the group—the maximum—the more we run the risk of having to break up families because family groups cannot be fitted together. That seems undesirable by any measure. When the noble Baroness replies at the end of the debate on her amendment, I hope that she will be able to explain why 100 is the right number and some of the other issues that arise around this point.
My noble friend the Minister will know that I support the direction of travel of this Bill, but I am afraid that for the rest of my remarks I am going to be perhaps rather less helpful. The Committee may be aware that I chair the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. We looked at 901 regulations last year, and all human life is there. Amid 901 regulations, things pass in a bit of a blur, but one or two—a dozen, 15 or 20, over the years—stand out. I am afraid that No. 962 did that. As we heard from several earlier speakers, it concerned the special development order for Napier barracks. Noble Lords have spoken extensively about the drawbacks of that—I shall not go into them now; apart from anything else, I do not want to rain on the parade of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, because I know that he happens to have tabled a regret Motion about this matter, and no doubt he will wish to take that forward at a future date. However, consideration of that order revealed a shocking series of cases. I was pleased to hear from the right reverend Prelate that he thought that things had improved. I was pleased to hear about how he thought things could be further improved. I am not sure that we can go quite as far as he would wish—I find it quite difficult to see how we can interfere with military journeys in this country. People should be able to understand that the Army, the Air Force or the Navy are not coming for them; it is part of their training.
The Lord Bishop of Durham
My point was that I just do not believe that they should be right next door to military barracks.
Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)
I accept that point, but I do not accept the point that large centres cannot work if they are properly designed and managed. That is not necessarily a reason for rejecting the possibility of there being larger reception centres, albeit that they may be built around buildings that have existed before.
When my noble friend the Minister replies, I am looking for her to say that we have no more Napier barracks hidden away somewhere, that we are moving in the direction of travel given by the right reverend Prelate and that, with that provision, we should continue to be prepared to provide centres that may be larger because they answer some of the requirements and traumas that those unfortunate people are experiencing.
Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws (Lab)
My Lords, I support these amendments and pay tribute to those whose names are attached to them, because they all raise important issues. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Horam, that there was something of a Freudian slip when he suggested that we were here dealing with illegal immigrants. Perhaps the tabloid newspapers are having too much of an effect on his view of what is happening.
Lord Horam (Con)
Surely in many instances we will not know the state of their claim when those people are accommodated in the reception centres. They will not know, and we will not know, what their status is.
Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws (Lab)
It was the assumption that we were talking about illegal immigrants. The vast majority of the people coming through are asylum seekers and have good reason to be seeking asylum.
The reason I got to my feet was not really to reprimand the noble Lord, Lord Horam; it was to raise a question that came from my own experience. When it became public that we had been evacuating judges and prosecutors from Afghanistan, because they were in mortal danger, to a lily pad—a temporary location—in Greece, the number of communications I received from people and families up and down the country with additional accommodation and offering to make it available to any of those seeking refuge from persecution was extraordinary. I know that the answer will be given from the Front Bench that of course we encourage people to contact a central line and to put their names down to say that they might make such an offer, but many of those who contacted me, where I gave them that advice, told me that no one had ever contacted them. I just wonder whether the good will of the British people who could offer accommodation is really being tapped into, rather than piling people into camps such as this one.
Lord Etherton (CB)
My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 61 in my name. Unlike the previous amendments that have been discussed so eloquently, this is not based on specificities in relation to the nature of the accommodation and particular people; it is a compendious description of the standard of accommodation that should be provided to a refugee, in the light of and against the background of the unsatisfactory accommodation provided to date, which, as I said, has been so eloquently elaborated upon by previous speakers.
The compendious description is in three parts, which are as follows. The accommodation
“must be provided in the United Kingdom”,
which ties in with Clause 28—I will deal with that more fully under that heading. It
“must be consistent with the European Convention on Human Rights”—
there can be no objection to that, for obvious reasons. It must also
“be such as is appropriate for the safety and welfare of that refugee having particular regard to any protected characteristic asserted by the refugee, within the meaning of Chapter 1 of Part 2 of the Equality Act 2010, which is innate or immutable.”
I will say a little bit about that last particular part of this compendious description of the appropriate accommodation that should be provided. An asylum seeker who has “innate or immutable” protected characteristics may have particular vulnerabilities—we have heard quite a bit about that—which need to be taken into account in determining what would be appropriate while their particular claim is being assessed, and even if it has been rejected. In the case of LGBTQI+ and single women refugees, for example, it has been clearly established that they may well encounter bullying, sexual harassment and physical violence from other refugees coming from the same or similar countries, such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Uganda, Nigeria, Iran, Iraq and Syria—or, indeed, in the case of LGBTQI+ refugees, any of the more than 70 countries where sex between two people of the same sex is illegal. There have been comprehensive analyses and accounts of this type of abuse in detention centres, and one can find them in Stonewall’s 2016 report No Safe Refuge: Experiences of LGBT Asylum Seekers in Detention, Stephen Shaw’s 2016 report to the Home Office on his Review into the Welfare in Detention of Vulnerable Persons and the 2020 recommendations of the University of Sussex’s School of Law, Politics and Sociology on people seeking asylum in the UK on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
In relation to the suggestion in the Bill that there could be offshore centres, I will describe in more detail criticisms of the state of accommodation and examples of the sort of violent and oppressive treatment that I have described—particularly the appalling events that have taken place in some of the Australian offshore centres in Papua New Guinea.
Lord Cashman (Lab)
My Lords, I rise briefly to speak to these amendments and congratulate my noble friend Lady Lister of Burtersett on so eloquently moving the amendment. I also congratulate the other speakers who have spoken in favour.
I particularly welcome Amendment 61 of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, because, as he said, he introduces into it elements—human rights and the regard to the special provisions within the Equality Act —of which we should be proud and on which we should lead internationally. I give my wholehearted support to that because, as noble Lords have heard me say before—I make no apologies for saying it again and again—in each of these situations, I imagine what I would want as an asylum seeker or refugee. I must imagine myself in that situation. Some who read our newspapers would believe that it is a picnic and a party; it is certainly not at the moment in the United Kingdom. I believe that the signal that we are sending out with the Bill and with these amendments is that asylum seekers and those seeking refuge are not welcome.
To reiterate the points made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, I remember that, when I was a Member of the European Parliament many years ago, I was approached by a person whose partner was a gay man from Belarus who was seeking asylum here. His asylum process was going through and, suddenly, in the very early hours of the morning, he was arrested and detained at a detention centre. Let us make no bones about it: Clause 12(9) introduces detention centres—they are called “accommodation” centres, but asylum seekers are detained and cannot leave them at will. This is why the minimum conditions that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham outlined are a basic and bare necessity to which we should adhere. This young gay man was placed in a detention centre for a number of weeks and had to sleep in shared accommodation; we managed to get him out because his partner could afford a rather brilliant lawyer to plead the case. While he was there, he contemplated suicide on an hourly basis. This young man is now in a senior job in the United Kingdom, paying his taxes, his dues and his national insurance and abiding by the same rules and laws as everyone else. But he still lives with that scar every single day, and I do not want any other person to experience that.
Placing vulnerable people back into these situations, as outlined by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, only increases stress and the damage to mental health. If LGBTQI people are put back into the communities from which they have fled, they face further oppression within places that should be safe, and it makes it much more difficult for them to prove their LGBTQI status to others.
Someone once said to me, “Oh, being trans is just a feeling, isn’t it?” Well, I cannot prove to anyone that I am a gay man; it is a feeling and one that I have when I look at another human being—although not every single man, interestingly enough. Therefore, we have to deal with these particular issues, not only of LGBTQI people but all of these vulnerable asylum seekers.
I will finish with this. In roughly 1600, Shakespeare co-wrote a play; it was the only play that he co-wrote and it is “Sir Thomas More”. Sir Thomas More is called to London because the citizens of London are rebelling—they had probably read the tabloids of the day—because “the strangers” had made their way from Calais via Dover to London. In a parenthesis to a speech, Thomas More comes out, and with one hand silences the crowd. In that silence, a voice shouts, “Remove them!” Thomas More replies: “You bid that they be removed, the stranger, with their children upon their back, their families at their side, their belongings at their feet. Imagine you are the stranger, with your children upon your back, your family at your side, your belongings at your feet. Imagine you are the stranger and bid that they be removed and show your mountanish inhumanity.” It is a great privilege and pleasure to support these amendments.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, I support all the amendments in this group and I ask the Minister to address in her response a couple of issues, particularly in relation to Amendments 57 and 61, about restricting the placing of vulnerable people in accommodation centres—military barracks. When a similar amendment to Amendment 57 was tabled in Committee in the other place, the Home Office Minister, Tom Pursglove, said it was
“unnecessary because there are no plans to place those with children in accommodation centres”.—[Official Report, Commons, Nationality and Borders Bill Committee, 21/10/21; col. 295.]
If the Home Office has no such plans, which is a welcome commitment, why will it not accept a statutory shield against placing at least children in those centres?
Wider than that, I am grateful to the British Red Cross, which has reminded us that there is a Home Office policy document, of which the latest update was in May 2021, called Allocation of Accommodation Policy. It has a section on “Asylum seekers considered unsuitable for Napier”, which starts with the statement:
“Women and dependent children are not suitable to be accommodated at Napier”,
before listing further cases, including potential survivors of modern slavery, people with a disability and those with complex health needs. The tablers of Amendment 57, which I support, say the list should be longer and should include those under Amendment 61. If the Home Office has these policy commitments, it is my contention that it ought to accept the amendments restricting the types of people who would be sent to these accommodation centres. I would be very pleased to hear the Minister agree and therefore accept at least Amendments 57 and 61.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
My Lords, noble Lords will not be surprised if I strike a somewhat different note; none the less, it is a note that needs to be heard. I think we need to stand back before addressing this group of amendments. We cannot and should not assume that everyone who claims asylum in this country has a case and is a genuine asylum seeker. The Home Secretary said recently that of those crossing the channel, 70% were more likely to be, and were in fact, economic migrants rather than genuine refugees. A historical view, I think, gives a figure of something like 50% of asylum seekers whose cases were rejected after very careful legal procedure. So, I think we have to stand back and not simply assume that all applicants have two wings and a halo.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord but, according to the Refugee Council, which did a very careful analysis of those coming over on boats—and this was an analysis, not just throwing out statistics in the way the Home Secretary did, perhaps—the great majority would be expected to receive refugee status. So, yes, of course, there are always going to be some people who are not “genuine” asylum seekers, but surely the assumption should be that they are until proved otherwise, rather than that they are not until it is proved that they are. The noble Lord seems to be assuming that they are not genuine asylum seekers and there is no evidence to support that.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
I think we need to be careful not to make an assumption in either direction. I was quoting the Home Secretary in the expectation that she has information to back that up. Even without that, and the noble Baroness did not address this point, the historical record is that 50% over the last 10 years have had their cases refused. I leave it at that. My point is clear on that matter.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
Does my noble friend agree that it would be helpful to the Committee if, when the Minister comes to reply, she provides two specific facts? One is about the number of people, said to be 125,000, awaiting decisions on their asylum claim; and the other is the average length of time it is now taking to expedite those decisions. This returns to the point made by the right reverend Prelate earlier about the pressure that would be taken off accommodation if those matters were attended to in a much more efficient way.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
Yes, 125,000 is correct, and I think that many—most—are waiting for more than a year. But if I may continue with my point—which does not address that; what I am addressing is the way this discussion has gone—the issue of scale is an important one. I have some sympathy with the Home Office: it is having to deal with a very large problem that is extraordinarily difficult to deal with. It is clear that the situation in the channel is a shambles. It is also clear that it is going to get worse. The number who arrived last year was 30,000 just on the channel, with another 10,000 elsewhere. We could, this year, have something like 60,000 arriving and claiming asylum. That is a massive logistical task and we should have that well in mind in making recommendations to the Home Office.
It is clear that the system is already buckling under the strain. One major problem is, of course, accommodation. Provision of accommodation in four-star hotels does nobody any good: it does the Government no good, it does the cause of refugees no good and it should not be taking place. That, presumably, is why the Government are now legislating in connection with accommodation centres, but the response to that legislation is to propose eight amendments that, taken together, would make it unworkable, given the scale of applications that we can expect. For a start, if we limited it to 100 for each accommodation centre, we would have to build something like 100 centres. If we get to the higher end of what I have just been describing, it would be 200. We have to be realistic and recognise what the Home Office has to deal with. I have not always been its great friend, but I think it has a problem and we should be conscious of that.
To conclude, I advocate a rather different approach. I think we should set up accommodation centres, we should establish them and mark their boundaries, we should provide medical assistance and legal advice, but we should simply make it the case that if applicants leave that accommodation without permission, their application is refused.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
No; it is very simple —too simple for the noble Baroness—but it would mean that we do not need huge amounts of security in order to keep people where we put them. I hope that Government will take powers to do something on those lines. I do not think what they are now proposing will work, and I think it would be even worse if some of the proposals we have heard today came into effect.
Lord Dubs (Lab)
My Lords, I would not want this whole debate to turn on the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Green. All I would say is that his suggestion that people should be kept in a form of virtual detention and penalised if they happen to leave it is surely unacceptable. I am afraid that I do not accept the thrust of his arguments anyway. If he looks at the figures, he will also find that, although more people came across the Channel by boat in the last year or so, the numbers have not increased all that much, compared with those who came on the back of lorries before. The numbers have actually gone down a bit.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
That is correct. If the two are added together, it averages about 40,000 a year over the last eight or 10 years. The problem now is the publicity surrounding all this, which makes it more difficult. Also, these numbers could easily double, as the Home Office says, and then we are in a new situation, going back to the early 1960s when it ran completely out of control.
Lord Dubs (Lab)
I do not want to pursue the point, because it is diverting us from the particular amendments, which I support. I say at the outset that the Minister has the advantage that, having been able to look at the Joint Committee on Human Rights reports on this, she will know exactly the quotes and arguments that we are going to use. It will be no surprise to her at all. She knows exactly what we are on about. I am certainly speaking as a member of that committee.
Before that, perhaps I could pay tribute to the Kent Refugee Action Network. During the pandemic—at its height—when the issue of Napier barracks arose, it drew our attention to what was going on. I am sorry I could not go with the right reverend Prelate on his recent visit, but at the time of the pandemic, we were not able to go on visits and I am sure the Minister was not able to, either. She gave us a version of what was going on in the barracks which frankly was disproved by the local people on the ground, who told us that the conditions were bad, and that people with Covid were mixed up in dormitories with people who did not have Covid. I am afraid the Minister at that time appeared to be misinformed as to the situation there. All these issues were raised at the time. I cannot remember how long ago it was. We had quite a long earlier debate.
I do not want to go over the ground that other noble Lords have covered. The Joint Committee on Human Rights looked at this. We have some good quotes from Bail for Immigration Detainees and from Médecins Sans Frontières. I will not quote those, but I do want to quote paragraph 91 of the JCHR report:
“It is imperative that the Government learns from the poor treatment of asylum seekers housed in former military barracks. If accommodation centres are to be used to house those awaiting asylum decisions and appeals or awaiting removal from the UK the conditions must ensure that residents are free to come and go, treated with respect, provided with adequate access to healthcare and legal advice and not prevented from mixing with the rest of society”.
I will say one other thing. At the time this issue arose, the Home Secretary said that the barracks were used by the British Army and asked why we were complaining. That was wrong in a number of respects. First, it was years previously that the Army had used the barracks. Secondly, they were not mixing up people with Covid with other people. If the conditions were not adequate now, they were not adequate for the Army then—but to use that as an excuse, and say, “It’s good enough for refugees because the Army used it 10 or 15 years earlier” seems an unacceptable argument.
I am sorry the Home Office has been put in this position. I welcome what the Kent Refugee Action Network has been doing to support refugees in Kent generally, to support refugees in the barracks and to campaign on the same arguments that are characterised by these amendments.
Lord Marlesford (Con)
My Lords, it seems to me that this debate reflects what we said yesterday in our debate and what some of us tried to say on Second Reading. There is an irreconcilable conflict and quandary between our desire to receive people in the way in which we would wish them to be received and treated and the number of people who have been coming—and are likely to continue to come—and our capacity to handle them. The Home Office’s proposals attempt to increase the capacity and the quality. I totally understand the criticism of the proposals, but it seems to me that we are in no way in sight of a practical solution to this problem.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, I start by thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, for so comprehensively and clearly setting out the issues addressed in this group. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, for her detailed exposition of the negative impact that accommodation has on the health and well-being of asylum seekers.
We have Amendments 58, 62 and 63 in this group, which are about accommodation centres, which are—if the Government were honest about this—immigration detention centres, as the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, said. I say that because Section 30 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 allows the Secretary of State to make regulations about conditions to be observed by residents of an accommodation centre—including, in subsection (3)(a), the power to
“require a person not to be absent from the centre during specified hours without the permission of the Secretary of State or the manager”.
Hence my noble friend Lady Hamwee’s Amendment 62, which we strongly support, to remove such a condition.
If these are not intended to be detention centres, the Government will have no objection to this amendment—but I am not optimistic. The noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, will be heartened by the news in the Telegraph today that the Secretary of State
“is in talks with the Attorney-General about potential restrictions that could be placed on their movements”—
that is, the movements of asylum seekers housed in accommodation centres. The noble Lord will be heartened; we will be horrified.
We have already seen from the Government’s attempts to warehouse large numbers of asylum seekers in former military camps how such an approach is not “conducive to the public good”, to adopt a phrase from another part of the Bill. Noble Lords have talked about Napier barracks. In the same article in the Telegraph today, apparently the Home Office confirmed that it has acquired military barracks at Manston, in order to accommodate further asylum seekers.
The noble Lord, Lord Horam, suggested that there was no objection in practice to accommodation centres. To some extent, that is true, but having large numbers of asylum seekers in one place creates tensions with local communities and hampers asylum seekers’ attempts to integrate into their adopted country. While I am on the subject of the noble Lord, Lord Horam, can we nail the illegal immigrant issue? The noble Lord said that a lot of these asylum seekers had yet to have their claim determined. We have a principle in British law called being innocent until you are proved guilty. These people are not illegal immigrants unless and until their claim for asylum has been rejected.
So many objections to immigration generally are on the basis that immigrants do not integrate into society; that they do not attempt to learn the language, for example, or mix with those already established in the UK. Accommodation centres would prevent asylum seekers integrating and force them to isolate themselves from local communities. It is the very opposite of what we should be doing to ensure the integration that is so important to foster good community and race relations.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, said, we have seen the appalling conditions that asylum seekers have been forced to live in at Napier barracks, which drew universal condemnation. Amendments 56, 57 and 61 seek to provide some safeguards and protections for the most vulnerable asylum seekers. Amendment 60 would enable children housed in accommodation centres to attend local state schools, and Amendments 58 and 59 try to restrict the length of time that asylum seekers can be held in accommodation centres.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
The noble Lord mentioned that most applicants will become refugees. I have the Home Office figures here: 49% of the 450,000 asylum applications between 2004 and 2020 were withdrawn or rejected, including those that went to appeal. Those are the basic stats from the Home Office; they should surely underline the whole debate.
Lord Paddick (LD)
I am very grateful for the historic information that the noble Lord has provided. My understanding is that, as the years have gone on, the number of successful appeals has increased and the number of first-time decisions to reject application from refugees has gone down. While I do not deny that those might be the overall numbers going back to 2004, in saying that most applicants for refugee status are successful, we are basing it on the last few years—the current trend rather than the historic numbers the noble Lord refers to.
I am reminded of heavy-handed policing of football supporters in the 1980s. I remember a football fan saying to me, “If you treat us like animals, we’ll behave like animals”. Warehousing asylum seekers may be a short-term gain, but it is likely to create long-term problems.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
I too express my appreciation to my noble friend Lady Lister of Burtersett for the determination and commitment she has shown in pursuing not only this but so many other key issues about which she rightly feels very strongly. I repeat what the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, said: this clause and these amendments are about asylum seekers. In the Bill—a government document—Clause 12 is titled “Accommodation for asylum-seekers etc”. We are talking about asylum seekers, not illegal immigration, although I accept that there are those who make no distinction between the two. The other point I make at this stage is about the quite interesting exchange between my noble friend Lord Dubs and the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington. I think there was rough agreement—if not I am sure I will stand corrected—that the kind of numbers coming over in the back of a lorry are very similar to those coming over in small boats across the channel.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
To get the timescale on this, I say that 10 years ago it was 40,000 asylum seekers a year. That is roughly the number now—30,000 on the channel and 10,000 by other means. The difference, as I mentioned, is the potential in the channel for the numbers to go up very fast and make it even more difficult for the Home Office and local government.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
The potential is, of course, a matter of speculation. I note the point the noble Lord makes, but up to now there is agreement between him and my noble friend Lord Dubs that the numbers have been roughly the same.
Lord Paddick (LD)
I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord, but my understanding is that the number of asylum claims a decade or more ago was something like double what it is now. We are talking not about similar numbers crossing the channel in boats compared to those in the past, but about half as many.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
The point I wanted to make was that, when people were coming over in the back of lorries—not all that long ago—they were largely unseen and the Government were not proposing the measures in the Bill. However, when similar numbers started to come over in small boats across the channel, with pictures of them landing on our shores regularly appearing on TV, it became a big political issue for the Home Secretary and the Government, following some rather rash promises they made to their supporters. Consequently, we now see the Bill, which frankly is an attempt to save the political skins of the Home Secretary and the Government. It really has nothing to do with properly trying to solve a problem. We ought to remember what is driving it—the political future of a Home Secretary and Government who made rash promises. Because people are coming over no longer in the backs of lorries, where you do not see them regularly on television every night, but in small boats across the channel, with pictures of them on television, it has become politically very awkward.
The amendments in this group are driven, as has been said, by serious concern over the Government’s track record on accommodation for asylum seekers, not least in connection with Napier barracks, and the provision in Clause 12 for creating asylum accommodation centres. It is worth repeating that last June a court judgment ruled that the accommodation at Napier barracks was inadequate, in that it did not meet the minimum standards required by the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999. Both the process for selecting people to be sent to Napier barracks and the process for monitoring its ongoing suitability while they were there were flawed and unlawful. From January 2021 the residents were given an order not to leave the site until they were permitted to do so. The claimants were unlawfully detained, under both common law and the European Convention on Human Rights.
The report on Napier of the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration and Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons raised a number of serious concerns, including that the screening of potential residents for physical and mental health problems was “wholly inadequate”, with all of those interviewed reporting feeling depressed and one-third feeling suicidal, and that there was extremely poor communication with those accommodated at Napier. We have heard today from the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham that Napier has improved, but it is fair to say that he also said that it is far from being as it should be. It is a legitimate question to ask why the Home Office allowed Napier barracks to get into the position where it required a court judgement, and why we should now accept that the same thing will not happen again.
Clause 12 gives the Government powers to house different groups of asylum seekers in undefined accommodation centres. It appears that these centres would involve congregated living in hostel-type accommodation—the type of accommodation which has been shown to be unsuitable to house people, many of them traumatised, in the asylum system for long periods. As others have said, this move away from housing in the community is likely to impede integration prospects and will surely make access to needed support and services more difficult. I simply ask the Government, and I hope that we get an answer in their response: is it now their policy to move away from housing in the community for asylum seekers?
The Explanatory Notes to the Bill say that the accommodation centres for those at different stages of their asylum claim, including those with “inadmissible” asylum claims, will
“increase efficiencies within the system and increase compliance”,
but no evidence is given to support that assertion. It would be helpful if the Government could provide that evidence in their response to this debate.
While the term accommodation centre is not defined—again, perhaps the Government will do so in their response —there is an implication that the Government are seeking to replicate the kind of inferior accommodation that we have seen at Napier. This more prison-like and isolated accommodation provides a very poor environment for engaging with asylum claims and is more likely to retraumatise extremely vulnerable people and hinder future integration.
As I understand it, last summer the Home Secretary visited the notorious reception centre on the Greek island of Samos, which campaigners have described as “prison-like” and “inhumane”. Is that what the Home Secretary seeks to emulate in her accommodation centres? The Government must know the answer, since I believe I am right in saying that initial submissions for the procurement of these accommodation centres were invited by the end of September last year. The contract is to be delivered in accordance with Part 2 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002, and it stated, as I understand it, that it is for housing up to 8,000 people for periods of up to six months. Could the Government say in their response how accountability and standards will be maintained in such asylum accommodation when there is no public access to the contracts? How did the Government decide that commercial confidentiality should take priority over the public interest in knowing about the contracts and transparency?
Since April 2020, the Home Office has been using two large-scale accommodation centres for asylum-seeking men who have arrived in the UK by boat: Napier barracks in Kent and the Penally camp in Wales, which is now closed. A report by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Immigration Detention noted that, although legally speaking these are not detention centres, they none the less replicate
“many of the features found in detained settings—including visible security measures, shared living quarters, reduced levels of privacy, and isolation from the wider community”.
Frankly, that seems wholly inappropriate. No doubt the Government in their response will wish to provide some reassurance on this point.
It would be helpful too if the Government could spell out what freedoms and rights will be restricted or diminished for the occupants in these accommodation centres, and what independent access will be allowed, and to whom, to these centres to ensure there is some regular accountability for conditions and standards.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford)
My Lords, I thank all the noble Lords for their contributions to this debate. I will clear up two things before we start.
Noble Lords will recall that, yesterday, at Questions, I made an apology—the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, was not actually in his place—having been quite insistent that I had sent a letter to the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, and that everyone had received a copy of that letter. I had cleared the letter, but it had not gone out. I apologised to the whole House, in the noble Lord’s absence, and thanked him for bringing it to my attention. I understand—I will not assert it—that the letter has now gone out, so everyone in the Committee and the House will get a copy of the safe and legal routes. I am sure the noble Lord will intervene on me if it has not arrived in noble Lords’ inboxes.
The second point to clear up was on something mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, before he sat down, in the Times article. I had not seen it at the time, but I have looked at it now. It is speculation, but I will confirm two things: we detain only for the purposes of removal and to examine claims.
I want also to clarify a third thing: Manston is not going to be an accommodation centre. The plans are for it to be a short-term holding facility for a maximum of five days’ stay.
Noble Lords have pointed out that the asylum accommodation state is under huge strain—there is no doubt about that. We are currently relying heavily on the procurement of hotel rooms, which is not sustainable. Noble Lords have alluded to that in previous questions and debates. The use of accommodation centres will provide additional capacity and ensure that adequate housing is available to everyone in the asylum system who needs it. The noble Lords, Lord Alton and Lord Green, are right, although they come from different sides of the argument: the numbers are large, with 125,360 in the system to June last year. There is no doubt that processing claims more quickly will free up the system.
The noble Lord, Lord Alton, asked about the average time to process. We prioritise claims involving individuals who are either high-harm, vulnerable, unaccompanied asylum-seeking children or in receipt of asylum support, and we are working on implementing an improved service standard.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
Before the noble Baroness leaves that point, is she able to give an average time to process these claims? I recognise some will be in different categories.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I think I said right at the outset that I do not have a figure at this point in time. In terms of speeding up claims and decision-making, we are dealing with a sustained high level of new asylum claims, including from those who arrive in small boats who noble Lords have been talking about. That is creating an additional pressure on the asylum system, but we are committed to ensuring that asylum claims are considered without unnecessary delay and that those who need protection are granted it as soon as possible. We have in place a transformation programme. We are developing existing and new technology. We are digitising casework. We are building a high-performing team, and we are investing in training and supporting staff in professional development to aid staff retention, which we so desperately need.
A key objective of setting up accommodation centres is to resolve asylum cases faster by putting casework and other services on-site. As my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbots said, there is no rationale per se for restricting the number of people in each site to 100, as Amendment 56 seeks to do. It is only likely to make it much more difficult and expensive to set up the centres, meaning that fewer asylum seekers will benefit from the efficiencies that we are trying to achieve. There is also no reason that unrelated residents of accommodation centres cannot share sleeping quarters provided they are the same sex, as this is already allowed in the asylum accommodation system. I take the point made by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham about the noise and probable brightness within the facilities, and I will most certainly take that comment back.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
I am sorry to interrupt, but I was so struck when we took evidence about sleep deprivation from people who had been in Napier. It really got me, as someone who hates being deprived of sleep, because it clearly is such a fundamental issue for their mental health. It is not just noisy. They cannot sleep because of the noise.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
The noble Baroness and I share more in common than I thought, because sleep deprivation, which I have been a bit subject to recently, is not something I find very easy at all. I am going to take those comments back and provide more commentary, on the back of the right reverend Prelate’s questions, on what we were doing and what we are doing now, if the noble Baroness will bear with me.
As I said, there is no reason that unrelated residents of accommodation centres cannot share sleeping quarters. In fact, the right reverend Prelate conceded that some people like sharing sleeping quarters with others. It is the peripheral issues that he has brought to my attention that I will take back.
The Lord Bishop of Durham
It was simply in pairs. That was quite clearly stated to us. Two in a room was quite welcome, but more than that was objected to.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
Okay, I thank the right reverend Prelate for being so specific. However, I do not think that, fundamentally, there is a reason that unrelated residents cannot share. This amendment clearly provides effective action to alleviate this burden and seeks to restrict the introduction of efficiencies, already mentioned, to the system.
Amendment 57 is unnecessary because there are no current plans to place those with children in accommodation centres, and all other individuals will be placed in an accommodation centre only following an individual assessment that it will be suitable for them and they will be safe.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
Will the Minister at this point make a firm, absolute assurance not only that there are no current plans—I get very suspicious when I hear that, because a plan can be thought up in a few weeks’ time—but that no children will be placed in such centres?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I do not think I can go further than saying that there are no current plans because if a child was destitute and there was a place for the night, I could not say we would not put the child in an accommodation centre.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett
Could the Minister at least give an assurance that, except in the most exceptional circumstances, no child will be put in such a centre? I hope she can understand why saying that there are no current plans is not sufficient to satisfy us.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I understand the noble Baroness’s point. I cannot go beyond saying there are no current plans, but I can think further about the point she is making and perhaps give her more detail on it, if she will allow me to do so, but that is as far as I can go. She might be further comforted by some of the things I am going to say about vulnerability, et cetera.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, if the Minister is coming on to that, perhaps I should sit down, because I was going to stress welfare as distinct from safety.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
That is what I am going to come on to, if noble Lords will accommodate me—no pun intended—for a short period of time.
Whether an accommodation centre is suitable for individuals who share the characteristics listed in the amendment will depend on a number of factors, including their personal circumstances and vulnerabilities and the facilities available at the particular site or area. This goes to the points made by both noble Baronesses.
I now turn to Amendments 58 and 59, which seek to limit stays in accommodation centres to 90 days. The amendments attempt to disapply a key part of Clause 12. One of the aims of Clause 12 is to enable wider flexibility to ensure that individuals are supported in accommodation centres for as long as that form of housing, and the other support and arrangements on-site, is appropriate for their individual circumstances. We intend to provide vital services and support co-located within accommodation centres. Reducing individuals’ access to these vital services by restricting them to a 90-day stay would not be acting in their best interests.
We do not think Amendment 60 is necessary because we are not proposing to use the power in Section 36 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002, so there is no need to amend it.
Moving to Amendment 61, I would like to thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, for his contribution to this debate. The Home Office is already required to provide accommodation to destitute asylum seekers and failed asylum seekers in a way that is consistent with the European Convention on Human Rights and the requirements in the Equality Act 2010. Our policies also recognise that we need to take account of the individual’s safety and welfare—to take the point from the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee—in considering the type of accommodation that is suitable for them.
There are no plans to use accommodation centres to house all asylum seekers. I slightly wondered whether there might have been some conflation with that in today’s debate. Some will be identified at the outset as unsuitable for that type of accommodation, and some will need to be moved out of the centres as new issues emerge. All individuals in the asylum support system have access to an advice service from Migrant Help, a voluntary sector organisation that we fund for this purpose, and are able to put forward reasons and evidence why they need a particular sort of accommodation.
Moving to Amendment 62, I need to be clear on this. As my noble friend Lord Horam said and my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts asked, accommodation centres are being set up to provide housing and other support for those who require it because they would otherwise be destitute. The judges mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws, may not in certain circumstances need this type of accommodation; I am not making a presumption, but they may not. These are not detention centres, of course. Individuals are free to move out of the centres if they can obtain their own accommodation, for example through friends or family.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
The point was made very clearly that these centres should not be places of detention. I was waiting for some assurance that the ability to come and go would be recognised. The Minister has just said that people will be free to leave if, for instance, they need to go and do something specific. To me, that sounds very different—it may just be a trick of the language—from an assurance that these will not be places of detention subject to specific allowances to leave for specific purposes.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I repeat that these are not detention centres. There may be specific conditions—for example, if an asylum seeker needs to attend an interview about their claim, they will be required to be there—but they are not detention centres.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
I am sorry to interrupt—I know that there is a lot to cover—but I want to follow on from that important point. Again, we were given an example of a specific reason. The person may just want to go for a walk. They may want to go into the local town, if they can get there. Will they be free simply to go out when they want to?
The Lord Bishop of Durham
We saw and talked to people who were going out into Folkestone for a walk and coming back. So if the system is modelled on Napier as it is now, they were absolutely free to come and go. I think the Minister is saying that, if a specific appointment is made, they will be required to attend it.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I know that the Committee will believe a holy man over me—so, yes, God’s representative on earth is absolutely correct.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
One of many. The right reverend Prelate is absolutely correct and put it perfectly.
Where was I? I will talk about standards and all the stuff around Napier in more detail in a second but, for now, I will move on to Amendment 63. This would effectively give local authorities a veto over any proposals to set up accommodation centres in their areas. We do not think that is appropriate. We fully accept that local authorities should be consulted on such proposals and on their views about any impacts on local services. This is already provided for in the way that the Home Office arranges accommodation for destitute asylum seekers who need it. Accommodation providers are contractually required to consult local authorities on any proposals to use accommodation that has not previously been used to house supported asylum seekers. We hope that this consultation leads to agreement, but it is not realistic to assume that this will always happen. It is, however, vital that we provide housing and support to those who would otherwise be destitute. Local authorities cannot be given the option to turn these people away as an inconvenience. I am sure that the Committee would not want that.
I want to address directly the questions asked by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham. He asked, first, whether there would be added recreational activities and appropriate medical expertise on site. The simple answer is yes. I know that he saw such an example when he was at Napier the other day. As I have said, accommodation centres will meet all statutory and legal requirements. We expect services in and around the centres to include spaces for exercise, religious activities and appropriate healthcare provision.
The right reverend Prelate asked about community cohesion—a very appropriate question. We will work with local authorities to ensure that community cohesion aspects are addressed; I am sure that the Church will engage on that as well. He also asked whether there would be effective processes to ensure that the most vulnerable are not housed on site. Again, the answer is yes. People will be able to disclose reasons and evidence for why they should not be accommodated in a centre. I was also asked to confirm that no children would be accommodated in these centres. I refer back to my answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister.
The right reverend Prelate asked whether specific learnings from Napier would be applied in future. That is a totally reasonable question. Offering residents Covid vaccinations and personal cleaning kits is one of the things that we will do. The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, talked about the Covid outbreak. Lateral flow tests are available on arrival and twice a week thereafter for people at the accommodation centres. There are communications on Covid in 10 different languages, and there are people and messages encouraging Covid compliance.
NGOs have also been introduced on site to provide assistance and support. There is free travel to medical appointments and a visiting dentistry service. There are weekly meetings with residents to identify and act on concerns. Sport and recreational activities have also been introduced. I took the noble Lord’s point about the hard football pitch, but then I thought that, in some parts of the country—such as where I live—having a grass pitch might preclude them from playing football for six months of the year, so it is probably appropriate, depending on the area.
The right reverend Prelate also asked whether sleeping areas would be limited to two people. I think I have covered that. There is no reason why unrelated residents of accommodation centres cannot share sleeping quarters, provided that they are of the same sex. This is already allowed for in the asylum accommodation system.
The Lord Bishop of Durham
I thank the Minister for her comprehensive answers. Report after report has highlighted the importance of ESOL.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I was going to come on to that, and I shall do so now. The right reverend Prelate has mentioned ESOL, which of course is used in either a work context or a life context. He mentioned that there were NGOs providing language assistance for people in accommodation centres. I am not aware of plans to introduce ESOL, but I would say that that is maybe further along the chain of the claim and therefore the granting of asylum.
I hugely support learning the English language for all aspects of these people’s lives, not least in order to integrate, for their children to get educated and for them to be able to access basic things such as healthcare if and when they are granted asylum. So I will think about that—actually, I will not just think about it but take it up with the department.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, the Minister may recall that some years ago I came to see her, with the then Minister Brandon Lewis, specifically about the teaching of English. I declare an interest in that my wife is a volunteer, working in the north-west of England on the very kinds of projects that the right reverend Prelate mentioned, teaching English. She and I agree with the Minister that having a command of the English language gives access to everything, while not having that command is a major disadvantage. So, whether or not it is ESOL, resources are required, certainly for volunteers, to ensure that they have available to them all the necessities required if you are a teacher.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I do not think there is any disagreement here. I have seen some great examples—particularly in the north-west of England, and I think the noble Lord and I talked about them at the time—of English language learning for people new to this country. I am not in disagreement in that area.
The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, who also mentioned the Shaw review, talked about children, those with vulnerabilities and, of course, our LGBT community. I stress that we will accommodate people in a centre only after an individual assessment that it will be suitable for them and that they will be safe. There are no plans currently to use the centres to house families. Beyond that, the centres will be used to accommodate only those who require support because they would otherwise be destitute. Those who obtain accommodation with friends or family will not be affected by the measures.
With regard to unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, the provision has nothing to do with unaccompanied minors. The provision is about adults in the asylum system and their dependants who are accommodated by the Home Office under powers in the Immigration Acts. Unaccompanied minors are not accommodated under those powers.
On the question about accommodation centres generally not being suitable for certain individuals, I repeat again that there are no plans to accommodate asylum seekers and failed asylum seekers who are not destitute in this kind of accommodation. Those who can obtain accommodation with friends or family will remain unaffected; that goes to the question from the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws. Individuals will have the opportunity to disclose information and supporting evidence for why they should not be housed in accommodation centres, and I say again that we have no current plans to accommodate those with dependent children. However, it is not possible to completely rule out placing those with children in accommodation centres in future if, for example—this is a point that I made earlier—there are no available flats or houses to house them. In certain situations, this might be a better option than using hotels. In terms of educational opportunities, all children who are resident in the UK in whatever circumstances can access the state education system in the same way as British children.
I think we have gone over the question of why these are not detention centres.
On the mental health point that the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, mentioned, we have later amendments on that issue. Individuals will have access to health services, but we will discuss the issue of mental health in later groups. However, I agree with his point.
Lord Cashman (Lab)
It was also particularly in relation to LGBTQI people placed in those situations.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
Yes, I totally concur with the noble Lord’s point.
I turn to the judgment on Napier, mentioned by the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister and Lady Neuberger, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham and the noble Lord, Lord Dubs. The judgment on Napier was reached on the basis of the conditions on site prior to the significant improvement works we carried out and the measures we put in place as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. The court did not make any findings that the accommodation centres were unsuitable for providing support to asylum seekers who would otherwise be destitute. Indeed, the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 specifically provides for this type of accommodation. The Napier site provides full-board facilities with meals and other essential items provided, as well as access to essential local services such as healthcare. I have been through the improvements that have been put in place. I am most grateful to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham for reporting back on his visit there last week. He did not have me wandering around after him showing him the best bits; he was free to go in, report and make suggestions to me on the back of that visit.
I hope I have given a fulsome response to the Committee, for the reasons that I have outlined, about the need to ensure that we can support asylum seekers appropriately but also encourage—
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
The Minister is valiantly dealing seriatim with the qualms that so many of us have about accommodation centres, but I have not yet heard an answer to the fundamental question: why accommodation centres? What is the purpose of this? Why would it improve the asylum system? Is it cost savings? I hope it is not deterrence. Is it the advantages for the Executive of the concentration of cases in one particular place? If we are going to deal fairly with asylum seekers, surely the best thing to do is to speed up the process of hearing their cases and get more of the initial decisions right so that fewer go to appeal.
Surely the accommodation should be empty local authority housing. Why are 12,000 of the 16,000 August Afghans still in hotels? Is there some hold-up in the system which means that local authorities, some of which are quite keen to get some revenue from the presently empty accommodation, cannot deal with them? Is that not the answer, rather than building these concentration centres—or is there some reason that I have just completely missed that would make an accommodation centre the answer? What is the underlying rationale of the proposal?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I am very grateful to the noble Lord for asking that question. When someone arrives in this country, they go first into initial accommodation and then into dispersed accommodation. Depending on whether their claim is allowed or denied, either they are welcomed here as an asylum seeker with their claim accepted or, if their claim is rejected, they might ultimately be asked to leave. These are initial accommodation centres; this is not move-on or follow-on accommodation. I hope that helps to explain the difference.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
As long as the queue is three, four or five years long, it is not really just a question of initial accommodation. This is pretty long term.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
The noble Lord is absolutely right, and this goes right back to the beginning of this discussion. We need to process claims quickly, grant asylum if the claims are valid, and ask people to leave if they are not. He is absolutely right and we agree with each other on this point: people’s claims need to be done expeditiously. Without making excuses, I say that the pandemic really held back the smooth running of our asylum system, as I am sure it did in other countries. I hope the noble Lord is satisfied. For the reasons I have outlined—so that we can both support asylum seekers appropriately and encourage that throughput that he was just talking about, by freeing up spaces in the asylum spaces— I hope noble Lords do not press their amendments.
Lord Marlesford (Con)
Does my noble friend agree that there must be a limit to the resources available to deal with the increasing potential scale of this problem?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
There is a limit to both the resources and the geography of this country. That is why the system needs to run in a way that accommodates the most vulnerable people. People whose claims are not upheld need to leave.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I thank Committee Members for their kind words and, more importantly, those who made strong contributions in support of these amendments. It is not appropriate to cover them all in detail, but what is important is that the case was made for decent accommodation for asylum seekers that promotes their welfare and is based on a recognition of their common humanity.
While to an extent it is true that, as the noble Lord, Lord Horam, said, I am not opposed to accommodation centres in principle, I am opposed to what I think is envisaged. I am sorry if I did not make that clear. It is one thing to have small, homely centres; it is another to have things based on military barracks or their equivalent.
I will refer to what two noble Lords said before turning to the Minister. First, the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, asked me a specific question about why 100 residents. To be honest, I do not know the answer. The British Red Cross suggested 100 and I have great respect for its work in this area, but the specific number is not important. What is important is that people at such a centre can feel that it is their home for a while. That point was made powerfully by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham. There is a real danger that big centres—this is what HOPE not hate is afraid of—will attract the kind of hostility that residents of Napier have faced. The noble Lord made the point that it would be easier to accommodate families, but the Minister herself said that this is not the intention; these are not appropriate for families. I have not come up with an actual answer, but the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, also had the grace to acknowledge that his argument was based on anecdote that people might prefer to be in larger groups. But I have been using the evidence from both research and organisations working on the ground.
I also want to pick out what the right reverend Prelate said, partly because he made an important point at the outset about how, not in all but in many cases, we are talking about future citizens. He made a wonderful remark: he said that we should treat them as
“a gift to us rather than a problem”.
Too much of this debate has been based on the assumption that these people are problems. Please bear in mind what the right reverend Prelate said.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
Does the noble Baroness agree that there should be a distinction between those who have had their cases examined and are refugees and those whose cases have not yet been examined? That is all I am asking for.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
No, I am sorry; I do not, because they are all people. We should start by accepting their common humanity, and then we can see how people fare in the system. That is my working assumption and I think it is the right reverend Prelate’s too.
It was helpful that this debate was postponed, because it was originally supposed to have been while the right reverend Prelate was at Napier. In fact, I am supposed to be at Napier today with the APPG. I was struck by what he said and that there have been improvements. That is welcome and we should acknowledge it. However, he said that—I am paraphrasing—despite the improvements, he could not help getting the impression of a prison camp rather than a place of safety. We should be creating places of safety, not prison camps. That is my other working assumption.
I am very grateful to the Minister. She was on her feet responding for nearly an hour and I appreciate how she has really tried to address many of the points made. All noble Lords appreciate that. It is very difficult with so many amendments and so many questions. I am still very worried about children because, despite being pressed, the Minister said that there could be circumstances when children would be accommodated. My fear is that this would open the door, but she said that she would take this away and look at it. We will have to come back to lots of these aspects on Report, that one in particular. If the amendment about children’s education is unnecessary and there is no intention for these centres to provide education, I do not understand why the prior information notice included how they should be able to provide education facilities. I am not asking the Minister to respond now, but perhaps she could look at that.
Despite the Minister’s valiant attempts to answer them, a number of questions went unanswered. I will not push them now, but perhaps she could write one of her famous letters—and make sure that it actually gets sent. I have been asking the Library about one of them and it knew nothing about it, but I am glad it has been sent now. I am also worried about the emphasis on individual assessment, because that is supposed to happen now yet we find that many people in vulnerable circumstances end up in places like Napier. She might want to look at that and we might want to come back to it.
I am conscious that we have spent a lot of time on this and rightly so, because it is such an important issue. I am very grateful to every noble Lord who contributed and to the Minister for her engagement on the issues, even if I am left dissatisfied, because I am not sure we have moved on much further than the Commons in answering the questions asked—even though she tried very hard to do so. I suspect we will come back to at least some aspects of the accommodation centres on Report. Having said that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Paddick
“Asylum seekers’ right to work
The Secretary of State must make regulations providing that adults applying for asylum in the United Kingdom may apply to the Secretary of State for permission to take up employment if a decision at first instance has not been taken on the applicant’s asylum application within 3 months of the date on which it was recorded.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause would require the Secretary of State to make regulations enabling asylum seekers to work once they have been waiting for a decision on their claim for 3 months or more.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, this is a rare treat: a group with only two amendments. I will speak both to Amendment 64 in my name and to Amendment 65. I am reminded of the phrase “lies, damned lies, and statistics”, but apparently, according to the figures that I have—perhaps we need a Hansard fact-checker, like the BBC has—every year from 2012 to 2019 the majority of asylum seekers in the UK were successful.
Lord Paddick (LD)
There is agreement. In 2019, it was 65%. To prevent such a large proportion of asylum seekers working while their claim is resolved is demoralising, debilitating and expensive—increasingly so as the time taken to process applications continues to increase. The latest Home Office data shows 76% of applications taking more than six months to resolve. The Minister did not have the average figures, but I appear to have them. Figures published by the Independent suggest that more than 1,200 asylum seekers currently in the system have waited more than five years for a decision and 399 have waited more than a decade. That can result in asylum seekers becoming deskilled, leaving gaps in their work experience and long-lasting demotivation. To be willing and able to work but not be allowed to, for months or even years, must be devastating.
Our amendment, supported by the noble Baronesses, Lady Chakrabarti, Lady Meacher and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, simply allows an asylum seeker to ask the Home Office for permission to work if their application has not been resolved after three months, instead of the current 12 months. It is intended to establish the principle that it is better for asylum seekers and for society if they are allowed to work. Amendment 65, in the name of noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, goes into more detail, requiring the Home Office to allow an asylum seeker to work without restriction after six months, rather than the current situation where asylum seekers can apply to work. Currently, however, they will only be given permission to work in the types of employment on the shortage occupation list maintained by the Home Secretary. These jobs are very limited and asylum seekers are unlikely to be qualified for them or have recent experience of them. Moreover, asylum seekers are unlikely to be attractive to potential employers while their claim for asylum is being considered. We are currently facing worker shortages in some sectors. Providing asylum seekers with work means they can start to pay their own way in society through tax and national insurance rather than relying on handouts. They are less likely to disappear if they have a job and a steady income.
In November, a cross-party group of MPs and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham wrote an open letter to the Home Secretary saying it was “nonsensical” that there were people in the UK who wanted to work but were not permitted to do so. They described allowing asylum seekers to work as common sense, fiscally responsible, and enabling those living here to pull themselves and their families out of poverty. The Lift the Ban coalition, which includes businesses, recruitment firms, trade unions and refugee organisations, estimates that removing the ban would save the economy £181 million a year. As I said in the previous group, the key to any successful immigration policy is integration, and allowing people to work is key to their integration into society. It also makes them less likely to be exploited, for example by becoming victims of modern slavery. We support Amendment 65—
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, I was trying to intervene on the noble Lord’s speech, and I apologise to him for doing that. As I am also going to be involved in the other business going on in Grand Committee a little later on, I might not be able to be here to hear the Minister’s reply, so I am going to have to forego the opportunity of speaking on this group of amendments. However, I wanted to register my strong support for them, not least because, in 2016, I moved an amendment on the six-month issue and this House passed it by 218 in favour to 195 against. One point that the noble Lord might also like to register is that Article 23 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights specifically sets out the right to work. That is something that this House has an obligation to consider, but I thoroughly endorse everything that the noble Lord has said. I should mention that I am patron of Asylum Link Merseyside, which has made representations on this subject.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 65, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud. She is very sorry that she is unable to be here today, not least because she feels so strongly about this issue. I hope that the three of us who are supporting signatories will act as effective understudies.
The general case has already been made very persuasively by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. The main difference, as he explained, between his amendment and this one is that our amendment proposes the right to work after six months, which is the usual time period proposed and is probably more realistic. It also ensures that that right allows an asylum seeker to take up employment on grounds no less favourable than those of a person with recognised refugee status. This means they would not be confined to the highly restrictive shortage occupation list, as they now are when they are finally allowed to work.
It has already been said that there is great support for asylum seekers’ right to work, including from business and the general public. Even the Deputy Prime Minister has said that he is open-minded on the subject. Home Office Ministers repeatedly claim to be committed to refugee integration, a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. As the Migration Advisory Committee made clear, the right to work after a reasonable period—and I think six months is one—in a job not limited to the shortage occupation list, represents one of the key foundation stones of integration. The committee also challenged the pull-factor argument put forward by Ministers, an issue that we debated at some length on Tuesday, and noted that the recent
“parliamentary statement regarding analysis of the employment ban … contained no evidence on the ‘pull-factor’.
It suggested that,
“To the extent that the Home Office has robust evidence to support a link between the employment ban and a pull factor, they should of course make this evidence publicly available for scrutiny and review. That is how good policy is made.”
In the interests of good policy-making, then, will the Minister now undertake to publish that evidence, because all the evidence that I have seen, including academic studies, does not support the pull-factor argument?
As well as its implications for integration, the denial of the right to work can take a toll on mental health and feelings of self-worth. I recently attended a Zoom meeting at which members of MIN Voices, part of the Maryhill Integration Network, talked about what it meant for them. One talked about his life being frozen; another about being made to feel helpless and useless. The Government should recognise such sentiment, given the weight that they attach to paid work, especially in their social security policy.
I would like to finish by reading a statement from MIN Voices that makes the case much more powerfully than I am able to. It says:
“Remember, we are Human Beings first, and we have dignity. Asylum Seekers who came here had to leave everything behind. Security for asylum seekers is not only shelter and health but also work, the ability to contribute to their own life and other people’s. Who will give back the five years of my life I lost in the asylum claims process? Who will give me back my skills and my health? Not being able to work makes us feel less human. We are living in constant worry, feeling worthless, frustrated, in pain and fearful. Not knowing the future. Not being able to plan for the future. If we can work, it will help with integration and allow us to live in a dignified and a healthy life. If we can work, we will feel less stressed, have a sense of control over our life, have better mental and physical health, and feel at home … Being able to work is important for self-respect and dignity. If we can work, we belong to something and do not live in complete limbo. If we are not allowed to work, if we cannot even study, then what are we allowed to do? When we can work, we could pay tax, look after our families and children. Many of the problems will disappear. See us as human beings not a number.”
That is very relevant to the last debate we had, when we were constantly talking about numbers and forgetting we are talking about fellow human beings.
“See us as human beings not a number. Let us build our life and future and not waste our time and skills.”
So I hope that, like the Deputy Prime Minister, the Minister will be open-minded to the growing calls for this very basic right: the right to work.
Baroness Prashar (CB)
My Lords, I rise to support the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, and supported by the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister and Lady Ludford, and myself. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, in her usual manner introduced it fully and spoke movingly, as did the noble Lord, Lord Paddick.
As we heard, asylum seekers wait months or even years for a decision on asylum claims, and sometimes decades. This condemns them to poverty, uncertainty and fear. It leaves them in a limbo, experiencing poverty and destitution. If they are allowed to work, this would improve family life, give them better prospects for their lives in the UK, and they would be able to rebuild their lives in the UK and eventually integrate better. It also, of course, as we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, makes economic sense. As we have already heard, the Migration Advisory Committee, which advises the Government on migration policy, in December 2021 recommended that the Government should look again at this policy. It also recommended giving asylum seekers the right to work after six months and not restricting them to the jobs on the shortage occupation list. Perhaps the Minister can explain why they are not paying heed to the advice of their own advisory committee?
The committee also states that the argument that this right would be a pull factor, as we have heard already, is not supported by evidence. The benefits of allowing asylum seekers to work outweigh the unfounded fears expressed by the Government. Therefore, I urge the Minister to accept this amendment, which has very wide support.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
My Lords, it is an absolute pleasure to follow both my noble friend Lady Lister of Burtersett—who is hard working to the point perhaps of being a Stakhanovite—and also the noble Baroness, Lady Prashar. I have added my name to Amendment 64 from the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, but I support the thrust of both of these amendments. I think this is a total no-brainer—forgive me, I really do. I have always thought this. I have been working around this area all my adult life and I have never understood the logic of Governments of both persuasions, over the years, prohibiting this category of humanity from working, at the same time as trying to get other categories to “jolly well get on and work”, not be dependent on the state and not be dependent on benefits: “Don’t be scroungers—just get out and work”. It seems so illogical to have this strange bifurcation.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, except that she dropped me into a group that I have never considered myself to be part of: that of post retirement. As to whether or not it is a pleasure to be working here, obviously it is an honour, and clearly it is better to be able to shout across the Chamber than at the television or radio. Is it good for my blood pressure? Probably not.
However, it is a pleasure to have signed the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and other eminent noble Lords in this Chamber. For me, banning people from working is just one of the many ways that the Government dehumanise and punish asylum seekers. I honestly cannot see the logic behind it. Why would we not want them to work? Why would we not want them to play a role in society? Why would we not want to engage them and get them out of the probably dreadful accommodation that they are living in? Where is the logic in not letting them work? It will leave them destitute, which is not healthy for them or for us—though I suppose it is slightly better than sending them back to face persecution in their home country.
This Government are not brave enough. They pander to the right-wing parts of their own party and the country, and constantly use nationalist rhetoric to divide and rule. The Conservative Members of the House of Lords are better than that—and some of them do argue against what the Government say. On this occasion, this side of the Chamber is absolutely right: asylum seekers should be allowed to work.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, the case for asylum seekers being able to work after a few months is compelling. I am sorry that we have not heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, but I perfectly understand why she is not able to be here. Amendment 65 was admirably moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister.
In the debate on Clause 11, several noble Lords invoked public opinion, saying that it was wary of immigration. I suggest that obliging asylum seekers to be idle, existing in some cases on taxpayer support, is a surefire way to prejudice public opinion against them, especially those apparently fit young men who have been demonised recently. The noble Lord, Lord Alton, reminded us that the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights has a provision of the right to work, and I thank him for reminding us of that.
Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)
The noble Baroness made a very important point about public opinion. I draw her attention to a study by British Future which found that 71% of the public support the right to work after six months.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
The noble Lord has taken the wind out of my sails; I was going to quote that statistic, though I must admit I did not know it came from there. I got it from the splendid Lift the Ban organisation.
If the majority of people who seek asylum are ultimately found to be entitled to stay here as refugees, after either an initial decision or an appeal, how demoralising and frustrating for them to then be excluded from employment, and be unable to help support their families or to deploy and develop their skills, possibly for several years, or even a decade, as we have heard, while knowing that the host society may regard them as freeloading layabouts. It is of course a waste of a resource.
This is not just a leftie, Liberal cause. Not only was Amendment 65 led by the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, from the Benches opposite, but everyone has already spoken about the Migration Advisory Committee report, and I assume it is not going to be accused of being some leftie, Liberal outfit. As has been said, the MAC has told the Home Secretary that there is clear evidence of harm being caused by the job ban, particularly in the context of a rising number of claimants waiting for more than six months for determination of their claim. The Government argue that the ability to work would be a pull factor, but the MAC says that Ministers have failed to provide clear evidence to support this contention, and that it would instead be good policy to assist asylum seekers to “integrate well into society” by letting them work while their cases are decided. I will not delay: I was going to give the same quote that the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, did—I jumped the gun and cited it the other day—about the Home Office needing to provide robust evidence because that is how good policy is made.
Amendment 65 has the advantage of requiring permission to work to be granted after a wait of six months. That is stronger than the drafting of Amendment 64, which empowers someone to apply. Ideally, I would like an Amendment 64.5, allowing someone to work after three months but with the drafting of Amendment 65 on requiring permission to be given. The second element in Amendment 65 is that it would not limit the type of work that asylum seekers could undertake, unlike the current policy of restricting them and then, after 12 months—which is too long—using the shortage occupation list. That list is narrow, and many asylum seekers would not have relevant experience or qualifications.
As other noble Lords have said, it is extremely odd—indeed illogical—that the Government want to keep asylum seekers in enforced welfare dependency while, as shown by this morning’s Answer from the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott, to the Oral Question from the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, defending imposing benefits sanctions after four weeks on unemployed jobseekers who failed to take a job. Why then not allow asylum seekers to work? Most of us would support people trying to get a job, although there can be argument about the policy of the Government.
On Tuesday, the noble Lord, Lord Horam, and others impressed on us the need to take account of public opinion. To repeat, the ban on work makes asylum seekers the potential butt of ignorant jibes that they are lazy scroungers. Some 71% of the public support the right to work after six months. The right to work is a win-win policy. It would save the taxpayer £200 million a year. It would help remedy a labour shortage. I had in my notes that it is a no-brainer, so I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti. I very much hope that the Government will respond positively.
Baroness Meacher (CB)
My Lords, I support Amendment 64, to which I have added my name. I also strongly support Amendment 65.
The right to work—and the lack of it—for asylum seekers has concerned me for a very long time. I am rather relieved finally to be able to say so. I strongly support the comments already made in excellent speeches by other noble Lords. I shall try to avoid duplication.
First, the current law forces people to try to live on £39.62 a week. We all know that this is completely impossible. Utility bills, council tax, food, transport—you name it—cannot be paid for on this sort of money. These people are forced into something that they would never dream of doing in any other circumstances. It also prevents them from earning and paying taxes. Why would the Government force able-bodied workers to be unemployed and draw benefits at a vast cost to the taxpayer? Actually, the cost is not vast; these are trifling amounts of money, but it is a cost to the taxpayer. The cost to the community is considerable. As others have said, in many cases, these effects last for a very long time.
The Government say that they have undertaken a review of the policy. I believe they have not published the results, nor given any estimate of cost. Can the Minister inform the House whether their review considered the number of normally law-abiding asylum seekers who have been driven to crime by this policy? This is the worst possible thing a Government can do. All the asylum seekers want to do is to earn, pay taxes and lead a good life. Instead, they feel that they have to do something they have never done in their lives before and never dreamed that they would do: commit crimes. Perhaps the Minister can tell us the estimated cost in the review, and whether that includes the cost of courts, prisons and police in dealing with the crimes that these people absolutely do not want to commit.
Believe it or not, 40 years ago I wrote a book about the consequences of a similar sort of policy—a rule which deprived single people of benefits after four weeks. My research showed that the rule caused a dramatic increase in crime among that population. Government officials asked for a copy of my manuscript before I published the book. The policy was immediately scrapped. It did not help the sales of my book but, nevertheless, it was worth doing. I feel that this policy has to be scrapped for exactly the same reason. Noble Lords have pointed out all sorts of other reasons, but there cannot be a government policy which drives people into crime. Continuing it cannot be justified.
My second question concerns the basic cost to the Exchequer. The voluntary sector has come up with a figure of £194 million a year. I believe this is a massive underestimate. I am quite sure the cost is far more than that when all the unintended consequences are considered—if you want to put it that way.
The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and others have already dealt with the pull factor. We have the evidence. Asylum seekers who are desperate to get away from persecution, rape and other ghastly things—you name it—do not even think about the detail of what there will be when they arrive at the other end. It is just a European country. If I may say so, the pull factor is rubbish, rubbish, rubbish. If it made any sense, it would be the only possible justification for this policy. I implore the Minister to go back to colleagues and see what she can do.
Lord Bethell (Con)
My Lords, it is quite daunting to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher. I very much hope that she will not be driven to writing a book about this, although if she did, maybe we would see some change.
I shall speak to Amendment 65 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, with the support of the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister, Lady Ludford and Lady Prashar. As has been discussed, this aims, quite rightly, to introduce the right to work for asylum seekers who have been in the UK for more than six months.
My noble friend the Minister will know the gist of my argument from my comments on Tuesday. I am grateful for her forbearance then. Suffice it to say, I believe that this amendment is a matter of complete common sense. It is exactly the sort of policy that should underpin global Britain’s new immigration system.
This is a moment when we have to decide who we are as a nation. We want an immigration system that takes back control—one where the British people can see that we are trying to manage our borders and are actually doing so. They can also see that we have compassion for those in need when we, as a nation, have so much already.
This is not a niche opinion. I note that all wings of the Conservative and Labour Parties, the Liberal Democrats, other Cross-Benchers and the Deputy Prime Minister support the extension of the right to work for asylum seekers.
The arguments for this right to work are overwhelming. I will restate a couple of them. I hope that it will be helpful to hear them from these Benches. First, as the noble Lord, Lord Alton, said, the latest figures show that 125,000 people are waiting for asylum decisions. Every study shows that the net benefit to the state would be in the tens or even hundreds of millions of pounds a year in increased tax take if this measure were enacted.
The UK economy is recovering after Covid. A lot of jobs have been created but this has, in turn, created labour shortages. It makes no sense whatever for asylum seekers who can drive HGVs or serve in the NHS to be forced to sit around doing nothing for over a year while they await a decision from the Home Office. The noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, made that point very powerfully.
Secondly, there is very persuasive evidence that the right to work has a large, positive impact on the integration of asylum seekers who successfully settle. As other noble Lords have already mentioned, the Government’s Migration Advisory Committee recently underlined that shorter waiting times have a large, positive impact on long-term employment outcomes for asylum seekers.
As noble Lords have noted, these measures have overwhelming public support. I will mention one niche statistic. According to recent polling, 73% of red wall voters questioned support a right to work. As others have mentioned, business leaders back the easing of the ban on the right to work.
There is a basic human dignity argument for this policy. I believe that every individual should be able to support themselves and their family. I would go further and say that, as Conservatives, we believe that every family has a personal responsibility to do so where they can. I have often made the argument that work is the best route out of poverty. The aim and intention of this amendment are to do precisely that: let people support themselves and create their own pathway from poverty to prosperity while they wait for the decision.
The lack of the right to work leaves people vulnerable to exploitation, declining mental health, poverty and modern slavery. If the human dignity arguments do not seal the deal, the amendment could also be viewed as purely pragmatic. Reforms to the asylum system proposed through the Nationality and Borders Bill will take time to come into full effect. In the interim, while asylum cases are being processed, the asylum system continues to be under considerable strain. By offering asylum seekers the right to work, the Government would take pressure off themselves.
I anticipate that the Minister and other colleagues might be inclined to respond to this amendment using the pull factors argument, and I know others have addressed it. However, let me address those points from these Benches. First, it is push factors such as war and famine which drive refugees to these shores, not pull factors. If there are any pull factors, they are those which encourage people to come to the UK: our language, culture, rule of law, democracy, historic ties through the Commonwealth, family connections, and liberty, not the welfare payments.
It is worth noting that the UK is currently an outlier in enforcing a 12-month wait period for work and then placing long restrictions on which employment can be taken up. No other nation across Europe, USA, Australia or Canada has such stringent requirements. It is worth asking why they have not considered the right to work to be a pull factor. This view is totally backed by the experts. The Migration Advisory Committee underlined that there is no evidence in academic research that people decide to claim asylum based on these kinds of factors. The Home Office commissioned a study, which others have mentioned, that also shows that there is little evidence of this.
All of this is to say that I believe the Government could quite legitimately, without nervousness and in line with their poverty strategy for families working their way out of poverty, adopt this amendment that allows asylum seekers to work after six months of being in the UK.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
My Lords, we have heard eight speakers on one side of this debate, and I think a word is in order from the other side. We are back to the same point: should we or should we not assume that all those who come here to seek asylum are genuine? It is, to me, no answer to reply that we are all human. Of course we are, but so are the population of this country and the constituents of those who were MPs.
In the medium and longer term, any asylum system has to have the support of the public. That could be brought into doubt if they saw increasing numbers of mainly young men arriving in this country, as others have mentioned, in a very visible fashion. As for public opinion, that will depend very much on the outcome of the next months and years. If that is a bad outcome from the point of view of numbers—numbers who are not perhaps genuine—that will decide itself.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
I am sorry to interrupt the noble Lord, and it may be that he was going on to acknowledge this, but the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and I think the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, quoted actual public opinion surveys which showed big majorities in favour of the right to work for asylum seekers.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
Yes, I heard that opinion poll mentioned a couple of times. I would actually like to see the question and the context in what it was put. Any opinion poll needs to be looked at very carefully, but it may well be the case—I do not know, I have not looked at this particular one—if you ask the public that question today, they will say “Okay, sounds sensible”. What I am saying is that, if we set the asylum system in such a manner that the numbers will increase significantly month after month and year after year, that will change. So we need to be careful about what we do with this amendment at this point.
We know that the system is already under considerable pressure; we have talked about that. We know that the present conditions on work are very tight, as other noble Lords have mentioned. They are deliberately tight. The case must have been undecided for 12 months —there are far too many of those now—and the job must be on the official shortage occupation list, which is barely relevant to the qualifications of most asylum seekers.
My argument is that it would be a serious mistake to abolish both these requirements as the amendment proposes. It would make for a very clear incentive to spin out the claims process—not that they need to at the moment, but in the longer term—to get permission to work in any capacity. With the current delays in the system, additional numbers would get permission, thus adding to the pull factors at the channel.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
I know that the noble Lord is concerned about asylum seekers who turn out not to be recognised. No doubt he is even more concerned about the smaller proportion of them who may be wicked people in some way. Does he acknowledge that wicked people who are convicted of crimes in this country, even those who go to prison, are allowed to work? Does he consider that a pull factor or an incentive to commit serious crime?
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
I do not see the relevance of that question.
Let me conclude, if I may. As we discussed earlier in this debate, the Government’s asylum workload has tripled from 40,000 cases in 2012 to 120,000 cases in 2021. Furthermore, nearly half of all cases awaiting an initial decision have been waiting for 12 months or more. In the present situation, they would in any case get permission to work. However, it is vital for these delays to be tackled. On that point, the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I are agreed. It makes no sense to me to adjust the immigration system to encourage delay. This Bill contains some useful measures designed to speed up the asylum process, and they should be supported.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
My Lords, I rise to support Amendment 64 and 65. Before I specifically speak to them, I say to the noble Lord, Lord Green, that at some point in this Bill we are going to have to have a debate in this Chamber about the idea that this is a debate between those on the side of the public and those of us who are some kind of middle-class liberal elite who do not care about the opinions of the public—who believe that we need a draconian system to try to deal with this—because that is not what this debate is about. It is a caricature of the Government’s position and of those of us who oppose what the Government are doing.
We are saying that many of the policies being put forward by this Government to deal with the problem as they see it simply will not work. They go too far sometimes and compromise some of the principles every Member of this House would agree on. That is the clash. At some point we will have a debate about this, although perhaps there are other groups of amendments where it is more appropriate. I say again, there will have to be debate between those who—to be fair to the noble Lord, Lord Green—think they represent public opinion on this, and people like me who think he has got it wrong.
As part of the middle-class liberal intelligentsia—maybe not the intelligentsia, but the elite—let me say that I very much support that. Let me say why. As we stand here now, debating this, there are tens of thousands of asylum seekers who have applied for asylum in this country who have been waiting for a decision for more than a year. There are so many statistics sometimes you drown in them and are not sure which are actually right, so I will quote the Joint Committee on Human Rights, as it is slightly different to my own statistics. It says:
“approximately 65% of asylum applicants awaiting initial decisions had been waiting more than six months and that the average time to make an initial decision is now more than a year”.
That means tens of thousands of asylum seekers are waiting to have their application determined.
It would be interesting to hear from the Minister about the Home Office’s assessment of how long this is. Are there thousands of people waiting two years? When I was a Member of Parliament, people would sometimes come to me whose asylum claim had been neither agreed nor disagreed. They had actually disappeared and were there, and had been there for years and years. Now nobody wants that system. It’s ridiculous; of course nobody wants a situation that works like that. The reason I labour this point is that it goes back to the debates on the last group. The key to this issue is speeding up the process. We cannot have a situation where people are languishing for months and years before a decision is made. To be fair, the Minister believes that what the Government are proposing will speed up the process. I hope that they are right, but I do not think that they are. This is what bedevils the asylum system; it is not fair to the country, the public or the asylum applicants themselves. That is the basis of it.
Then you are left with the question of how you deal with this problem and what you do about it. At the moment, the Government’s position is that you have to wait a year before you can apply to work and then, if you do, you can work in specific occupations and jobs. I go back to the point made by my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti—supported I think by the noble Lord, Lord Bethell. The problem then becomes the denial of the opportunity for asylum seekers to work unless they have been here for a year. The community cohesion impact of that is enormous. What happens is that people then look at it and say, “What are they doing?” Noble Lords know the things that people say. “They’re not working. They’re not doing anything. They’re living on benefits. It’s about time they got out and did something”. Yet that is exactly what they want to do. Then some of them go out and work illegally, and they undercut the wages of legal workers or are employed in various occupations that we know about. So the whole system is undermined. To be fair, the last Labour Government did it. We introduced it, actually. I say to the Minister that, working in the Home Office, if she ever comes to this side, she will find quoted back to her things that she agreed to. So I accept that, right at the beginning of 2002, I think, we introduced this legislation for the same reason: we were worried about it being a pull factor.
But, if you look at it, where is the evidence? It clearly has not been, because it has not stopped asylum taking place—in fact, it has gone up. I will be fair and honest about it. My noble friend Lord Blunkett has done it once or twice in here, to his credit. Sometimes you introduce a policy with the best intentions—but what do you do if it does not work? Carry on? Do you just blindly say, “Well, it hasn’t worked but we’re going to carry on with it”? In supporting these amendments, we are saying to the Government that we have a policy that undermines community cohesion and does not work.
We then have the ludicrous situation where we have a Statement made by the Minister in the other place where he will not even publish the evidence for why the Government will continue with the current policy. He just refuses to publish it. So the Home Office has a review and does not publish the evidence. Then its own advisory committee says, “You’re wrong—you should do, and the policy is wrong anyway”. So the Government then turn around and say, “That’s ridiculous. We don’t agree with you”. They do not say why—other than that it is the pull factor. But then they do not publish the evidence that says that it is the pull factor.
It is not only that. I looked to see whether there was anybody else and found out that the Independent Anti-slavery Commissioner said:
“As the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, I am aware of the harm caused to survivors of modern slavery and human trafficking unable to access training and work opportunities while they face delays in asylum status decisions.”
So the Independent Anti-slavery Commissioner is wrong as well.
So, to answer this, I say that the Minister does not want to penalise asylum seekers, but this is ridiculous. We have public policy that is not working and is undermining community cohesion and a government response that simply says, “We don’t agree with all the people who disagree with us but we’re not going to tell you what the evidence is to support that, because it’s the pull factor”—
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
I am a bit puzzled. Although the precise numbers vary from year to year, it is quite clear that substantial numbers—30%, 40% or 50%, depending on which year you take—turn out not to have a case for asylum in this country. Surely that should be a factor. Surely the way forward is, as the noble Lord proposed when he first spoke, to speed this situation up so that we can get the answers within the six months, which would be much better for everybody. Surely that should be the centre of their policy.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
Can I intervene on an intervention? What is wrong if those people are allowed to work? If it is then determined that they have no right to stay, they would then have to leave—but, in the meantime, they are supporting themselves, perhaps using their skills and contributing tax. If they are then found not to have a legal claim to stay, so be it. I cannot see what the harm is in the meantime.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Green, that, at the end of the day, of course you want to speed the system up. No one does not want to speed up the asylum application process—to say that would be ridiculous, because of course everyone does. What I am saying is that, as the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, has just said, at the same time, for the purposes of community cohesion and all the other things that we have heard, allowing asylum seekers to work while their application is being processed is actually a sensible thing to do. But the Government will not publish the evidence for why that is a pull factor, when the policy has been in place since 2001 or 2002 or whatever and has not made any significant difference at all. So all sorts of people and organisations support the right to work, which seems a sensible and reasonable thing to do.
I will finish by saying one simple policy to the Minister. I like to see people off benefits; I do not want to see people languishing on benefits. I thought that was a Conservative Government policy. One of the ways of doing that is allowing people to work: it aids community cohesion and is good for the individuals concerned. I simply do not understand why the Government are turning their face against what is a sensible policy initiative that would do a lot for community cohesion.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, I again thank noble Lords who have spoken on these two amendments. The fact that there were only two amendments in this group did not make the debate any less fulsome.
I will say at the outset that the conclusion on right to work was made primarily on the grounds not of the pull factor but of the integrity of the labour market, and an impact assessment will be published on this in due course. But the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, is absolutely right that the policy has been in place since 2002. He says that things have not changed in that time in terms of people still wanting to come to this country, but I think that the global situation to draw people to this country probably has changed since 2002. I do not say that in a mischievous way at all—the world has changed and, therefore, people are more likely to want to come to this country, particularly when the economy is so good.
The noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, and the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, talked about polls, but I will not go into the merits and demerits of them: they are what they are and, as the noble Lord, Lord Green, said, it depends on the question that you ask. But the biggest poll that we have had in recent years was of course the 2019 general election, and that point about taking back control of our borders was at the heart of it.
Our current policy allows asylum seekers to work in the UK if their claim has been outstanding for 12 months, through no fault of their own. However, as the noble Lords, Lord Green and Lord Alton, were absolutely right to say, the best way to deal with people’s claims being outstanding for 12 months is to speed the process up in its entirety.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
I support these amendments, because they are good economics and good social policy, but if the Government resist them and insist that those people may not work, we are under a duty to make sure that sufficient subsistence money is paid to them to keep them alive. We pay them about £40 a week. Could the Minister get by on £40 a week? I know that I could not. It is £39.63 today; it is going to go up to the princely sum of £40.85 a week, an increase of 17p a day. My elementary maths makes that an increase of just about 3%; inflation is running at about 5.5% to 6%. Why have we increased it by such a small sum?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, it is based on a calculation. I shall not try to bluster my way through what that calculation is, but I shall get the details to the noble Lord. As I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, people who are destitute will have things like council tax and utility bills paid for them by the Home Office.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
I hate to say it, but I have just checked my phone and there is no evidence there of that letter having arrived.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, we often say that we will not provide a running commentary, but I will provide a running commentary on said letter. When we break for the Statement at 3.30 pm, I shall look to the Box as to the whereabouts of the letter —which I did clear some time ago.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, we have the famous Dubs letter; I do not know why others have not—maybe it was sent to selected recipients.
I thank all noble Lords from all sides of the Committee for their support for these amendments—with the exception of the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, whose case seemed to be that public opinion polls in the future might turn on their head from where they are now, with 70% of the public supporting asylum seekers being able to work, and that might be a minority rather than a majority.
I am losing patience with the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington. When he intervened on my opening remarks he accepted that, from 2012 to 2019, the majority of asylum seekers were successful in their applications and that, in 2019, 65% were successful. But in his speech, he maintained that the majority of asylum seekers’ claims were not accepted. It is getting difficult.
The Minister talked about an impact assessment in due course on the effects on the labour market of this change. What is the Migration Advisory Committee for if it is not to advise the Government on the likely impact of changes in migration policy? The MAC recommends that asylum seekers are allowed to work. The Minister claimed that if the amendments were accepted, it would go against what people voted for in 2019. Is she really saying that in 2019 people voted not to allow asylum seekers to work, particularly in the light of the evidence of opinion polls showing 70% support for the contrary?
The Minister seemed to claim that allowing asylum seekers to work was a pull factor, but then said it was complicated and more research was needed. If there is evidence that allowing asylum seekers to work is a pull factor, what is it? She talked about other countries making the UK appear more attractive to asylum seekers, yet we have already heard that the UK is an outlier in terms of most other European countries allowing asylum seekers to work. How does that happen? She also said that European countries that allow asylum seekers to work still provide them with accommodation. Asylum seekers could pay for the accommodation that they are provided with if they were allowed to work.
The Minister’s explanations are not acceptable and we will return to this issue on Report. At this stage, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“Prescribed period under section 94(3) of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999
(1) The Asylum Support Regulations 2000 (S.I. 2000/704) are amended as follows.(2) In regulation 2(2) (interpretation) for “28” substitute “56”.(3) Subject to subsection (4), this section does not prevent the Secretary of State from exercising the powers conferred by the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999 to prescribe by regulations a different period for the purposes of section 94(3) (day on which a claim for asylum is determined) of that Act.(4) The Secretary of State may not prescribe a period less than 56 days where regulation 2(2A) of the Asylum Support Regulations 2000 (S.I. 2000/704) applies.”Member’s explanatory statement
When an individual is granted refugee status, their eligibility for Home Office financial support and accommodation currently ends after a further 28 days. This amendment would extend that period to 56 days or allow the Secretary of State to set a longer period.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, Amendment 66 is also in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Hamwee and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, whom I thank. I speak at the risk of being called a Stakhanovite by my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti.
The aim of the amendment is to extend from 28 to 56 days what is called the moving-on period, which sets a deadline by which those recognised as refugees are required to move on from asylum support to mainstream social security support and housing. As I said the other day, it feels like Groundhog Day, because I think it was six years ago that the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, and I first raised the difficulties created by the moving-on period during the passage of what became the Immigration Act 2016. I have lost count of how many times I have raised it since but have certainly had at least one meeting with the Minister about it. I pay tribute to the British Red Cross for continuing to press the issue with us.
The case for the change rests on the fact that it is extremely difficult for newly recognised refugees to make the transition to mainstream support in 28 days. Not only do they have to sort out all sorts of complex administrative issues that would try any of us at the best of times, and not only does research by the BRC and others show that it is virtually impossible to achieve within 28 days, but there is also a basic incompatibility between a moving-on period of 28 days and the 56 days that local authorities usually have to support those at risk of homelessness and the 35 days it takes from application to receipt of a first universal credit payment. In case the Minister has been briefed to respond to this issue, I point out that an advance payment that has to be repaid out of basic benefit is not an inviting prospect for someone already on the breadline.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, I am glad to have my name to this amendment. I am aware—to use the rather odd language of this House—that lunch-hour business is to come, although neither “lunch” nor “hour” is accurate. I could just use the first line of my notes, which reads “Lister—double tick.” I will say only a very little more. Joining up 28 days, 35 days and 56 days does not take a genius—and even if it did, it has been proven by experience that it does not actually work.
I am looking to see whether there is anything the noble Baroness has not said. In terms of integration for the individual, the family and the community, underlying this amendment is not just support for the individual but the importance of self-sufficiency—this is quite similar to the previous debate—as a component of integration, and not being dependent on the state. Integration and contribution to community and society go hand in hand.
I have one further point. The Minister mentioned the charity Migrant Help in a previous group. As I understand it, it can give advice; that is not the same as providing dosh—the funds that are needed. That seemed to be the implication in that debate. However, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, on her persistence. I am glad to continue to be one of her terriers.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
Am I a terrier as well? I think of myself as a larger animal, but a terrier will do. There is almost nothing left to be said. I am delighted to have my name on this amendment. The noble Baronesses, Lady Lister and Lady Hamwee, have said virtually everything, but I would like to say a couple of things.
In spite of our rather uncertain economic situation—if anyone from the opposing side wants to say that it is all terribly healthy, a Radio 4 programme more or less corrected that conceit yesterday; we have a slightly unhealthy economic situation, and it is not as good as people in the Government claim—we are still a rich country. We ought to show a little more generosity to people who have lost virtually everything, not to mention the fact that we have often caused the instability that forced them to leave their homes. Whether it is Afghanistan, Syria or other countries, when we have sold weapons, invaded or, as I have said before, used fossil fuels to the extent that we continue to do, we have destabilised many countries throughout the world. We have a moral obligation to behave better and take in refugees. This amendment is worthy of acceptance.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, however undesirable accommodation centres may be, being thrown out on to the street as the first acknowledgement by the state that it has accepted your claim to be a refugee is not acceptable. The current limit of a 28-day transition has proved in practice not long enough for all refugees to avoid homelessness and destitution. Amnesty and Migrant Voice point to the fact that it takes time to find alternative accommodation, open a bank account and find a job, particularly if refugees have been prevented from working while their applications are considered, which in itself makes it more difficult for them to find work.
The limit is therefore more likely to result in refugees having to rely, at least initially, on benefits, which take time to apply for and to come on stream. It also takes time to readjust from the trauma and anxiety caused by the war or persecution from which they have fled or by the often hazardous journey to the UK and the uncertainty of whether they will be granted asylum.
Twenty-eight days is simply not long enough. This amendment extends that transitional period to 56 days, with the Secretary of State being given discretion to extend it further. We strongly support it. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston, who looked aghast when I said I was losing patience with the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, that the noble Lord and I have had words offstage and we are all good.
Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)
As the noble Lord has mentioned me by name, I feel duty-bound to respond. It is far from my responsibility to feel in any way concerned for the noble Lord, Lord Green, but I am pleased that he and the noble Lord have been able to come to some kind of resolution.
The reason I looked aghast was because I feel—I have listened to a lot of these debates over the last few days—that whenever anybody raises any opinion which is not widely held by those moving amendments or supporting them, there is a tone and reaction which I do not think becoming of your Lordships’ House. We have to be as courteous and considerate to those with whom we disagree on this topic as to those with whom we agree.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
The noble Baroness is absolutely right, except that those who interject constantly with tiny, mean little points also ought to respect the House and perhaps be courteous to everybody else. It goes both ways.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
Coming from where I have, it seems incredibly courteous to me. We have Ministers who try to answer questions, which is refreshing. However, I take the point—the noble Baroness is absolutely right in what she said.
This is an important little amendment, which I support, in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister, Lady Hamwee and Lady Jones. It is not a party-political or ideological issue but a question of administration and removing a totally avoidable obstacle for people granted asylum in the UK. The British Red Cross is campaigning for it. The 28-day move-on period is simply not long enough to put basic arrangements in place. It leaves people facing avoidable poverty, and we should be able to do better. I remind the Committee that we are talking about people who have been granted asylum, not those waiting for their decision.
I believe we can go on a couple of minutes past 3.30 pm, but I will not detain the Committee for very long. The Minister, Tom Pursglove MP, gave a couple of answers in the other place that I did not quite understand. He did not disagree that there was a problem, saying:
“We are aware of reports that some refugees do not access universal credit or other benefits, or adequate housing, within 28 days.”
He went on to say that extending the period to 56 days, as the amendment suggests, would not fix the problem but he did not say why. He said there was a problem, but that extending the period would not do anything about it. Can the Minister elaborate on why the Government believe there is a problem but that extending the time limit would not make any difference? He also gave no response to the points raised on cost savings to local authorities and the benefits to the public purse of extending the time limit, lessening homelessness and the use of temporary accommodation. He gave no answer to any of those questions.
Finally, Mr Pursglove said that
“we must also consider the strong countervailing factors that make increasing that period difficult”—[Official Report, Commons, Nationality and Borders Bill Committee, 4/11/21; cols. 666-67.]
but he did not say what they were. He just stated it. Knowing our Minister as I do, and knowing that she does try to answer questions, I say that it is not really acceptable to make a statement as a point of fact without some evidence to support it. The Minister in the other place accepted that there was a problem with 28 days but did not say why extending it would not solve this. He just said, “Yes, there is a problem”, almost as a shrug of the shoulders. This important little amendment seeks to help those who have been granted asylum deal with their transition into the life we all want them to have.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, again, I thank noble Lords who have made points. I will attempt to assist the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, on the extension. First, I will say that I am glad the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, is in his place—I hope noble Lords will indulge me; because different amendments are bleeding into different groups, I know noble Lords will not mind. The basic approach to the asylum support calculation is based on the essential needs of the claimant—but I will get him more detail and perhaps more of a breakdown if that is what he would like.
I also say before we start that I agree with my noble friend Lady Stowell: I disagree with many points that people make, but I hope I always approach the House with courtesy. I know the Committee generally does not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, but I must admire his tenacity in coming to this place, week in and week out, and making points that a lot of people do not agree with—I feel like that sometimes. That is a light-hearted point, rather than a point for debate.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, perhaps I could just explain to both noble Baronesses that it was facts that were in dispute, not opinions. I actually agree with a lot of what the Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, says about immigration as a whole, and I would not want that misconstrued.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
That is not in dispute; I was just echoing the point made by my noble friend Lady Stowell about respect, because I think it is always a good thing to be promoting.
I too listened to “More or Less” yesterday—the programme that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, referred to—and I think the conclusion was that it depended on how you looked at it. So everyone was right and everyone was wrong, all at the same time; I think that was the conclusion. But I very much enjoyed listening to that calculation.
Anyway, before I cause any more controversy, I will start by saying that it is very clear that individuals leaving asylum support following a positive immigration decision receive the assistance that they need to obtain other housing and apply for other benefits, such as universal credit, that they are entitled to. We do not think it is sensible to increase the length of time they remain eligible for asylum support from 28 to 56 days, and I will explain why.
The asylum accommodation estate is under huge strain and demand for normal asylum dispersal accommodation —that is to say, flats and houses obtained from the private rental market—is exceeding supply. The only way to meet this demand has been to use hotels, and there are currently around 26,000 people accommodated in them. A programme of work is under way to drive down the use of hotels by obtaining more dispersal accommodation and introducing accommodation centres. This clause would impede this work—I hope that answers the question put by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, about “Why not 56 days?” In simple terms, the longer that successful asylum seekers remain in asylum accommodation, the fewer beds will be available for those entering the asylum system, including those temporarily accommodated in hotels at great expense to the taxpayer.
We are aware of reports that some refugees do not access UC, as it is called, or other benefits or adequate housing within 28 days. The reasons for this are complex, but the problem is not solved by increasing the 28-day move-on period, for reasons I have explained, and that is why our focus has been on implementing practical changes with the aim of securing better outcomes for refugees within the 28-day move-on period. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, talked about some of the things that have been done during the pandemic that have actually improved the situation. These include ensuring that the 28-day period does not start until refugees have been issued with a biometric residence permit, the document that they need to prove that they can take employment and apply for universal credit, and that the national insurance number is printed on the permit, which speeds up the process of deciding a UC application.
We also fund Migrant Help which, as noble Lords will know, is a voluntary sector organisation that contacts refugees at the start of the 28-day period and offers that practical, move-on assistance, including advice on how to claim UC. I think this is a big change from the last time the noble Baroness and I spoke on the subject. We offer advice on the importance of an early claim; on other types of support that might be available; on booking an early appointment at their nearest DWP jobcentre, if needed; and on how to contact their local authority for assistance in funding alternative housing. We did evaluate the success of the pilot scheme that booked an early appointment with the local jobcentre for those who wanted one. The evaluation showed that all applicants for UC in the survey received their first payment on time—that is, 35 days from the date of their application—and that those who asked for an earlier advance payment received one, although I take her point about the advance payment. This assistance is now offered to all refugees leaving asylum support and is provided by Migrant Help, which again, as the noble Baroness knows, is a voluntary organisation funded by the Home Office.
Asylum accommodation providers are under a contractual duty to notify the local authority of the potential need to provide housing where a person in their accommodation is granted refugee status. Refugees can also apply for integration loans which can be used, for example, to pay a rent deposit or for an essential domestic item or work equipment, or for training.
We have a proud history of providing protection to those who need it, and I can reassure the Committee that this Government are committed to ensuring that all refugees are able to take positive steps towards integrating and realising their potential. We keep the move-on period under review, but we must consider the strong countervailing factors that make increasing it very difficult at this stage. For the reasons that I have outlined, I hope that the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I thank everyone who spoke in support of the amendment, and I thank the Minister. I did ask some questions that she did not answer. I will not push them now, but I would be grateful if she could write to me, particularly about the potential implications of the Bill for the numbers affected—but I am conscious that we all want our lunch so I will not press her to reply now.
I said that hope springs eternal, but hope constantly gets dashed, does it not? It is the same old arguments. I was aware that there had been improvements since I last raised this with the Minister, so I asked the British Red Cross to brief me on what those improvements were and what the effects had been—and, yes, they have had some effect. But there are still problems, otherwise the British Red Cross would not be asking us to put this amendment. So why does the Home Office think that everything is hunky-dory? I take the point about accommodation, although, as I pointed out, if you leave newly recognised refugees without accommodation there are knock-on costs for other statutory services. But that point is not valid for UC. So even if one accepted the point about accommodation —which I do not—why cannot newly recognised asylum seekers receive asylum support for longer before they get UC?
It is not complex; it is quite simple. As the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, said, just do the maths. It is simple arithmetic: there is not enough time. I actually think it is a territorial issue about who is paying. I ask the noble Baroness—I am sorry, I need my lunch and I am sure the Minister does too—the Minister to take this back to her department and the DWP and look again at the basic incompatibility with universal credit. If nothing else, I think there is a strong case for continuing financial support for longer than 28 days to ensure that people can claim UC. I will leave it at that, and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Finance (No. 2) Bill
Thursday 3rd February 2022
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Finance Act 2022 View all Finance Act 2022 Debates Read Hansard Text Amendment Paper: Consideration of Bill Amendments as at 2 February 2022 - large print - (2 Feb 2022)
Vaccination: Condition of Deployment
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Wheeler (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for the Statement and welcome the Secretary of State’s decision to end the requirement for vaccination as a condition of deployment. Vaccines are safe, effective and the best defence that we have against the virus, and, whether compulsory or not, it remains the professional duty of all NHS and care workers to get vaccinated, as it is the duty of us all in order to protect ourselves, our loved ones and our society from the greater spread of infections and hospitalisations.
The debate over this policy has always been about whether the state should mandate the vaccine for health and care staff or whether it should take a voluntary approach. It is not a discussion over the need to get vaccinated, the arguments for which are overwhelming and one-sided. Since our support for mandatory vaccination in December, we have seen a significant increase in vaccinations among NHS and social care staff, with tens of thousands more staff now protected. I thank NHS and social care managers who have worked tirelessly to persuade hesitant staff of the need to get vaccinated. I also thank the royal colleges and the health unions for all the work they have done to encourage vaccine take-up by their members, despite their misgivings about the mandate policy.
Clearly, things have now moved on in terms of both our overall levels of infections and our understanding of this latest omicron variant. It has also become clear that to follow through with this policy could see tens of thousands of staff being forced to leave their roles at a time when our health service is already desperately understaffed and overstretched. However, with 5 million people in the UK still to have their first jab, we cannot take our foot off the pedal in getting the message out. Strenuous efforts must now also continue to persuade those staff who are still hesitant. What plans do the Government have to achieve that?
In the light of Monday’s decision, I ask again: when will the Government take action to make all workers eligible for sick pay to enable them to do the right thing and isolate when they need to without the fear of being unable to feed their families? One in five care homes still do not pay their staff full wages to isolate. Why have the Government still not sorted this? Is it not an essential requirement for being able to learn to live well with Covid?
Technically, the next stage is the Government’s consultation on ending vaccination as a condition of deployment in health and social care settings—that is now under way—and then bringing forward the necessary statutory instruments to revoke the regulation for Parliament’s approval. Can the Minister explain the process and timescales for this? I understand that the Secretary of State has also promised to strengthen the guidance on staff’s duty to be vaccinated. Can the Minister say more about that?
We know that NHS Providers and the NHS Confederation have expressed their concern and frustration at managers having to have such a significant 11th-hour policy change, just three days before the deadline for first jabs, after all the hard and complex work that had gone into meeting the deadline. Can the Minister explain why the decision was not made earlier given, in particular, the growing concern in the NHS and social care about escalating job losses and staff vacancies? These organisations and the many staff who have strongly advocated the mandatory policy fear that the change may have a serious impact on the wider message for staff, and the population as a whole, on the importance of being vaccinated. Can the Minister say how this is to be combated?
Finally, I want to ask some practical questions about next steps. Have the Government instructed employers not to proceed with plans to implement mandatory vaccines from today, including the issue of pre-dismissal notices? What advice has been given to employers on how to approach all this? What will happen to the thousands of staff dismissed from their roles in social care settings last autumn? How will the Government’s decision impact on their approach to other vaccination programmes for health and social care staff, such as in relation to flu jabs?
The Deputy Speaker (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, is taking part remotely. I invite her to make her comments.
Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]
My Lords, from our Benches, I thank all the staff and volunteers in the entire health and social care sector, as well as the scientists and other experts, who are still working to keep us all safe as this pandemic continues, because it is clear, especially with omicron BA.2, that it is not over yet.
We are warned that there may yet be more surprises down the line, which is why it is somewhat bemusing that the Statement begins with this phrase:
“Last Thursday, we woke up to a new phase of this pandemic as we returned to plan A.”
That is extraordinary, because the Prime Minister made his Statement with neither the Chief Medical Officer nor the Chief Scientific Adviser by his side. His press conference and this Statement feel like the Government trying to create good news against the constant bad news battle, not least over partygate.
Last summer, and again before Christmas, we warned that the insistence on compulsory vaccination for front-line staff in the social care sector and the NHS would cause severe problems, specifically in terms of staff shortages as staff either left or were sacked. That problem is already evident in social care; a number of care homes have already been taken to court by staff they have had to let go.
The Statement on Monday also talked about cases falling but, frankly, the opposite is happening at the moment, with cases plateauing in some areas and rising in others. Tim Spector of the ZOE Covid study is warning that the numbers are consistently increasing despite many people no longer recording their results. The high level of cases in schools and in the younger adult age groups shows that Covid is still prevalent. Even if omicron BA.1 and BA.2 are less severe than delta—which is, by the way, good news—the number of cases has two consequences. First, there is increased pressure on primary care, especially GPs and hospitals, even if there is less pressure on ICUs. Secondly—the Minister will not be surprised to hear me say this—there are the problems faced by the clinically extremely vulnerable. I will return to this point later.
Yesterday afternoon, the director-general for adult social care wrote to providers of CQC-regulated adult social care activities about the removal of vaccination as a condition of deployment, or VCOD. Extraordinarily, this letter was written as late as on the eve of the date when notices would have to be served to staff in the NHS. Further, the letter refers to a Written Statement being laid before Parliament today but, as at 3.30 pm, it still has not been laid.
The first and second paragraphs of the letter refer to the regulations on VCOD, which relate to care homes and the wider social care sector, but the heading of the letter reads:
“Vaccination as a condition of deployment … in wider social care (social care settings other than care homes)”.
For anyone reading this letter at face value, it clearly excludes care homes from the U-turn on compulsory vaccination. There is no mention of a separate letter for them and the sector is extremely concerned. I know that the department has been dealing with calls on this matter today, but those I have talked to say that they cannot get a straight answer from the department. Can I try to distil this to get a clear answer from the Minister, who I wrote to about this earlier today?
Is the reason that the letter to the social care sector specifically excludes care homes from the compulsory vaccination rule changes because they are covered by regulations that are being revoked and it is not necessary and, if so, why were they not told that in the letter? Or is it because of an error, and they will receive a separate letter that has not gone out yet, despite today being the day that any final employment notices must be served? Or is it because compulsory vaccination rules remain in care homes? Another matter that I have picked up today is that this letter was not sent to hospices. Why was that? I hope the Minister can give your Lordships’ House a precise answer, but there is a wider interest in this so, if he cannot give me that now, I would welcome a written response.
Secondly, can the Minister say whether UKHSA gave formal advice to the Department for Education, in advance of Nadhim Zahawi’s guidance to schools on 20 January, specifically the strong guidance on no face coverings in schools, other than temporarily and only on the advice of their director of public health? Further on in the guidance, on page 12, it says that
“Children and young people previously considered CEV should attend school and should follow the same … guidance as the rest of the population. In some circumstances, a child or young person may have received personal advice from their specialist or clinician on additional precautions to take and they should continue to follow that advice.”
What would the Minister say to the head who, earlier this week, asked all pupils—not just the CEV pupil—to wear masks until further notice, as one pupil has leukaemia and is severely immunocompromised? The family and the school want that pupil in school, if possible. Why have the Government, the Department for Education or the Department of Health—I do not mind which—not given advice to these pupils, their families and their schools?
Finally, the briefing to journalists earlier this week that the Secretary of State for Health wants to stop publishing Covid data in mid-April has rung alarm bells across the medical and scientific community, as well as for those who are CEV and are still following the guidance in place for them. Scientists say it will reduce their ability to look at data to understand the progress locally, regionally and nationally, and doctors need that information too. I hope the Minister can confirm that any such decision is in the hands of the Chief Medical Officer and the Chief Scientific Adviser, as these are scientific, not political, decisions.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord Kamall) (Con)
I start by thanking both the noble Baronesses for their questions and the Benches opposite for their support during this difficult time. There was not really much political difference between us. We all recognised that vaccination remained the best defence against the virus and the variants. I also thank them for their support on VCOD.
One of the things we have constantly been doing—for example, over the Christmas break, I was on almost daily calls with other Ministers, the UKHSA and others—is to look at the evidence and the data, as it came in. We were always led by data when it came to making decisions. At the time, we felt that it was right to bring VCOD in for care homes and then to extend it across wider health and social care. You only have to look back to the beginning of Covid when we saw the disproportionate number of deaths in care homes.
Given that Delta has now been replaced, it is not only right but responsible to revisit the balance of risks and opportunities that guided our decision last year. In weighing them up, this was the balance we struck. First, our population as a whole is now better protected against hospitalisation from Covid-19. Secondly, the dominant variant, Omicron, is intrinsically less severe. Taken together, the evidence shows that the risk of presentation to emergency care or hospital with Omicron is approximately half that with Delta. Given these changes, and in conjunction with scientific advice, we have reviewed the policy and decided it is no longer proportionate to require VCOD.
We continue to encourage staff to take up vaccines. It is really important. I know most noble Lords have supported this. The NHS has focused on a targeted approach, particularly among hesitant groups within the health service, but in some ways, those hesitant groups reflect hesitant groups in the wider population. When speaking to my colleague, the Minister Maggie Throup, I have been very impressed by the number of different targeted interventions and consultations there has been, sometimes targeted right at the level of local communities. When I chaired a round table for black and ethnic minority organisations this week, one of the things we looked at was how to roll out antivirals. The question there was do we need to do still more work to convince those who are hesitant in certain communities, sometimes based on ethnicity, sometimes based on geography, sometimes based on income levels. How do we make sure they are vaccinated?
The NHS has continued and will continue with its one-to-one conversations with all unvaccinated staff. This has been associated with an early increase in vaccine uptake by 10%. Even though VCOD, we hope, will be dropped subject to the consultation, we will continue, and I know the NHS will continue, to consult all staff.
On the written advice to those who are about to issue letters today—I have to take responsibility for this—it was waiting for sign-off from me because I was doing lots of meetings for the Bill. I am very sorry; I was juggling two things at once. However, literally just before I came into this Chamber, I gave my sign-off for that letter to go out to give advice that those letters of dismissal should no longer go out.
We know it does not happen immediately, but we want to finish the consultation quickly. We hope to finish the consultation by April, and then we can drop VCOD.
As I said, we are continuing with the wider vaccination programme, and our intention is to be able to revoke it well ahead of 1 April, which is our target date. We want to move as quickly as possible, but as noble Lords will acknowledge, we also have to do a consultation process.
In the care home sector, employees have already been dismissed since 11 November. We know it has been difficult. Care homes were following the laws at the time. There have been conversations about whether some care homes will have those conversations with staff who have left. Will those staff want to go back, or have they got new jobs? This is part of our wider recruitment process to make social care a more attractive vocation and a more attractive career. Some care homes have told us individually that they will probably keep VCOD because it gives more assurance to the relatives of patients in those care homes. So, it is very much not one size fits all.
Some have asked why we are doing this now and whether it is still too dangerous. Others have asked why we have not done this sooner. We have always followed the evidence. We have always balanced the risks, and we now recognise, clearly, that given the rates of transmission, the lower severity of Omicron and the higher percentage of staff that are vaccinated in both the health and social care systems, this was the right time.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, for giving me advanced notice of some of her questions. Unfortunately, I do not have good enough answers at this stage, so I am going to go back to my department and ask for clearer answers, and I will write to her.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, as my noble friend knows, I have advocated compulsory vaccination since the beginning of last year. I am very disappointed that this decision has been made. Can my noble friend assure me that there will not be another variant breaking out in a few weeks’ time that will be much more dangerous? Of course, he cannot. If he can, we will all be delighted. Would we think of suspending the requirement for a motorist to pass a test and have a licence before driving? A car is a lethal machine. Well, a worker who has this virus can be a lethal instrument within a hospital or care home. Can my noble friend at least give me an absolute assurance that this policy will be under constant review?
Lord Kamall (Con)
I thank my noble friend for his question and for his longer-term engagement with me on this issue. I assure him that we are keeping this under constant review. The evidence changes. We are aware that new variants will arise, as is natural with any virus. Given the replication factor, when the virus replicates, there will be some imperfect replications and so there will be variants. That is just part of the virus spreading. As my noble friend acknowledges, we cannot give an absolute guarantee that there will be no new variants, but we are keeping an eye on all the variants and their continued transmission, along with the tools that we are using to protect workers, staff and everyone, to make sure that we are continuing to protect people as best as possible.
Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)
My Lords, I was pleased to hear the Minister say just now that some care homes will choose to keep this as a condition of employment because of the reassurance that it gives to both the relatives and the residents. In this increasingly fractious debate on mandatory vaccinations, one voice entirely missing has been that of patients, social-care users and care home residents on what they want. Could the Minister tell me, first, what consideration in the decision to change the policy was given to the wishes of patients and residents? Secondly, will patient-voice groups or relatives’ groups be included in the consultation referred to by the Minister? Thirdly, what will be the position of patients who, due to their own vulnerabilities, actually do not want to be treated by staff who, despite being given every opportunity, have chosen not to get vaccinated?
Lord Kamall (Con)
I thank the noble Baroness for raising that point. It is really important to note that, when engaging in debates such as this, it is sometimes easy to forget patients, and we should not do that. The health service should be all about patients; it should be patient-centred. I understand the concerns. One of the reasons that we originally introduced VCOD, particularly for care homes and then more widely, was that patients were very concerned and relatives of patients were concerned about their loved ones—they were terrified, given the early outbreaks that we saw in care homes. On the particular consultation, I am afraid that I do not have the information with me, but I will commit to write to the noble Baroness.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
I thank my noble friend for answering questions on the Statement here this afternoon. One thing that struck me when I read through it was that
“Incredibly, over a third of the UK’s total number of covid-19 cases have happened in just the last eight weeks.”—[Official Report, Commons, 31/1/22; col. 71.]
Taken together with the point raised by one of the noble Baronesses on the Front Benches—that the Government are planning to stop publishing the level of Covid infections and deaths, and to stop testing from the end of March—what reassurance can he give us this afternoon that the Government will know where the infection is and what the level of infection is? Against that background, how does my noble friend expect to protect the NHS and care homes at that time?
Lord Kamall (Con)
I thank my noble friend for her question. I will be frank with her: I was not aware that the Government intend to stop publication, so I will have to go back to the department and double-check whether that is indeed true or whether it is a qualified statement. I commit to write to all noble Lords, given that it seems to be what we have heard. Clearly, as we are told, we follow the evidence, and the scientists continue to follow the evidence, so I would expect that data to continue to be collected. The best answer I can give at this stage is that I will go back to the department and investigate, and will write to noble Lords.
Viscount Waverley (CB)
This might be another point that the Minister will wish to write to us about. Beforehand, the selfless manner by which the British people have risen to the challenge represents nothing short of the finest traits of Britishness. Would the Minister care to say a word about the benefits, advisability and practicality of receiving a fourth jab?
Lord Kamall (Con)
I agree with the sentiments expressed by the noble Viscount. Sometimes it takes the worst of times to bring out the best in people. It was an incredible response. It was also a very sad, emotional response. People lost loved ones, friends and relatives, and we were unable to contact people. I still have not seen my mother since January 2019 and my father died in September 2020, and I have not seen his grave. We have all been through incredibly emotional times and lost loved ones. On the fourth jab, we are continuing to review this—for example, we know that Israel has gone for a fourth jab. The briefings I get say that it is too early to tell whether there will be a fourth jab. It depends on whether immunity wanes, and whether the immunity that people now have responds to new variants, for example. In the longer term, if we have to live with this virus, will it almost be like the flu, with people having to take annual jabs? It is too early to give a definitive answer on that, but as soon as the evidence suggests one way or the other, we will notify noble Lords.
Lord Farmer (Con)
My Lords, may I come at this matter from another angle? Dr Steve James, the King’s College Hospital intensive care doctor who defended the principle of bodily autonomy to the Health Secretary, said natural immunity should be taken into account. Healthcare workers like him, especially those who have had Covid, keep topping up their natural immunity with micro exposures. In the omicron rethink, are the Government considering allowing vaccine-hesitant people to use readily available antibody test kit results instead of vaccine status?
Lord Kamall (Con)
First, I thank my noble friend for giving advance notice of the question, enabling me to try to get an answer. While we do intend to revoke the VCOD, subject to consultation in these sectors, we believe that staff still have an important professional responsibility to be vaccinated. The Secretary of State has written to regulators to review their guidance on vaccination for social care providers and the importance of vaccination in supporting the provision of safe care. We believe that vaccination remains important. In conversations I have had—on the daily calls with the UKHSA, for example—I have been told that even if people believe they have natural immunity, vaccination increases immunity by a further percentage. We believe it is worthwhile encouraging people to take vaccines.
Baroness Walmsley (LD)
My Lords, I associate myself with the Minister’s remarks and the Front-Bench contributions about the importance of the professional duty of health and care staff to take the vaccination. However, given the Statement today, it seems we will continue to have unvaccinated staff working in patient-facing roles in hospitals. We do not know about care homes yet, but I look forward to the Minister’s urgent response to my noble friend Lady Brinton’s question about that. What is going to be put in place so that unvaccinated staff and their patients continue to be protected? Will unvaccinated staff be asked to have a negative lateral flow test every day when they are on duty? Can the Minister assure us that they will continue to have appropriate PPE provided for them, for every day that they are working, in every corner of the hospital or care home, and whichever patients they are dealing with?
Lord Kamall (Con)
The noble Baroness raises an important point. I am afraid I do not have detailed answers on patients’ concerns about unvaccinated staff. The main reason for revoking VCOD is that the levels of transmissibility are much lower, with a higher number of people being vaccinated, and cases are less severe. I will have to go back to the department and write to the noble Baroness.
Lord Framlingham (Con)
My Lords, given all the scientific information now available, will the Minister accept that there is absolutely no justification whatever for the wholesale vaccination of children?
Lord Kamall (Con)
The Government continue to review the data, as other countries do. Clearly, we have vaccinated vulnerable children, and there have been moves, particularly with omicron, to look at vaccinating children. We have reduced the age, but we still need more data. Once we have that data, if it is more appropriate, we will vaccinate children, but we have to make sure we have the data because children respond differently.
Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I have always been opposed to this discriminatory policy on principle, so I welcome the Statement, even if it rather defensive. Will the Minister commit to dumping jabs for jobs and not sacking front-line workers? Will the Opposition roll back on the divisive rhetoric, categorising workers under moralistic labels of vaccinated equals virtuous, and traducing the unvaccinated as selfish or neglecting their professional duty? This seems unhelpful, especially as many of the NHS100k campaign are fully vaccinated, vaccine enthusiasts working in the health service, but who believe in choice and freedom of conscience. Is there any likelihood of the estimated 40,000 care workers who have been driven out of their jobs being compensated for the income lost, never mind being reinstated?
Lord Kamall (Con)
I begin by agreeing with the sentiments expressed by the noble Baroness that we should not necessarily be labelling people who decide not to take the vaccine. We should understand individual choice, but with freedom comes responsibility, and we always have to get that balance right. At the same time, I do not think that some of the characterisations that have been given are helpful. Having said that, if people have stopped other people being vaccinated, they should be dealt with by the law. The noble Baroness and I agree on individual choice, but, clearly, this was an emergency and people were dying and it was important that patients going into hospitals and care homes felt confident that they were being treated by staff who would not pass the virus on to them. There is always a difficult balance between liberty and responsibility.
Lord Scriven (LD)
My Lords, I come back to the really important issue raised by my noble friend Lady Brinton about the letter that went out last night to providers of CQC-regulated adult social care activities, except for care homes. My noble friend gave the Minister three hours’ notice of this question because, if care homes do not receive a letter by midnight tonight, under the law they will have to send out notices of termination to staff. Can the Minister give an absolute guarantee that, by midnight, or as early as possible, a letter will go out to stop the confusion whereby many care home providers do not know whether to keep their staff or send out a letter of termination? This is critical.
Lord Kamall (Con)
I hope that the noble Lord will forgive me, but I had a lot of meetings on the Bill today. When the questions came in and I saw the original answer, to be perfectly frank, I was not content with it and I pushed back, which is why I need more time to answer the question.
We are completely clear. We intend to revoke the requirement in its entirety for both care homes and the health and wider care sectors. The care home requirement has been in force since 11 November, but the requirement for health and wider social care was not due to come into force until 1 April. This means that first doses would have been needed by today in order for people to be fully vaccinated by 1 April. We wrote to the sector to clarify how the 3 February deadline would be impacted by the Government’s intention to revoke the regulations. While this particular question was specific to wider social care settings, not care homes, the letter was clear that we intended to revoke them for both care homes and wider social care.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)
My Lords, I am most grateful to the Minister for the way in which he has answered these questions, because he has done so in a very nuanced way and this is a difficult topic to deal with. Can he reassure me that there will be no let-up in the effort to understand the fears behind why people are vaccine hesitant, particularly when they are working in these settings, so that they can change their mind without any sense of losing face? Will the general infection control measures that have been put in place, such as handwashing, social distancing and ventilation, be maintained? It is not only Covid that is transmitted from one person to another; there have been thousands and thousands of cases where patients have acquired a nosocomial infection in hospital. One of the most important measures—particularly for something like MRSA—has been handwashing in between treating every patient. Any let-up in these procedures could well mean that we would slip back to the bad old days of multiple wound infections on surgical wards.
Lord Kamall (Con)
As ever, the noble Baroness is absolutely right. Once again, I thank her personally for her frequent advice and questions, based on her years of experience. This gives me the opportunity to be quite clear: just because we are intending to revoke VCOD does not mean that we should let up in the fight against this virus. We need to continue to be vigilant, to wash hands, to respect space, and we hope that many people will continue, as in this Chamber, to wear face masks in crowded places and to ventilate areas, particularly when you are with people that you do not know and do not normally associate with. We should not give up on those; in fact, some of those measures, especially handwashing and others, are good common sense anyway, whether we have a virus or not. We hope that one of the lessons from this whole Covid experience has been the need for better hygiene and for us to be more aware. We cannot yet let up. We may have revoked VCOD, but it is really important that we continue to battle against this virus.
On the first question, about understanding the very real concerns, as the noble Baroness said earlier, I do not think we should simply categorise people as anti-vaxxers or pro-vaccine and virtuous; I think we need to understand their reasons. I had conversations this week when I was chairing the round table with local community organisations and I made the point to them that we want to learn from them. It is all very well for me, as a Lords Minister, to say this, but they understand much better in the community. Sometimes, it is a lack of trust. Sometimes, there are historical trust reasons. Sometimes, it is people’s personal experience. Noble Lords will have heard the recent story about the police, for example: it does not exactly engender trust in figures of authority within certain communities. It just shows the spillover effect of all these issues—discrimination, racism, but also lack of trust—and we have to be quite clear that we understand individual communities. Sometimes, even though they are in the same ethnic community, they may live in different parts of the country and respond in quite different ways. It is very easy to group people and say, “Oh, all BME, all Asians or all disabled people feel this way.” These people are individuals, and we need to understand their concerns.
Baroness Wheatcroft (CB)
My Lords, whatever the reasons people refuse to be vaccinated, the Statement says more than once that it is a professional duty of those working in the health service or in care homes to have the vaccination. Therefore, I rather agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, that it is an unusual situation in which those who breach their professional duty will be allowed to continue in the role. Can the Minister tell us whether what appeared to be a decision taken through thorough research and as a matter of principle has now been changed, not because of principle but because of practicality—we need these people in the health service because of the terrible shortage of staff?
Lord Kamall (Con)
One of the things we have constantly done has been to listen—I had daily calls over the Christmas period, for example—and follow the evidence. Clearly, one of the issues may well have been staffing and warnings of potential shortages, and we had to balance all that up. As the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, said, these things are nuanced; there are number of different factors we have to consider.
As for professional responsibility, on more than one call I have been on with senior NHS staff, clinicians and senior practitioners, they have told me that in their codes—for example, the GMC code and the nursing code—there is a professional duty to be vaccinated against transmissible diseases. Clearly, that is an issue. The NHS has had to speak to individual clinicians, those who have been reluctant, to try to press that issue, but clearly it came up against freedom of choice. It is difficult and I may not understand it, but we all think differently, which is why we have such great diverse thoughts and debates. It is really important that we understand individuals’ concerns and we can address them, but we are not going to be able to persuade everyone.
Lord Scriven (LD)
My Lords, the Minister is an honourable man and tries his best. The letter that went out yesterday evening has literally caused confusion. People in care homes will be sending letters of resignation. Can he give a guarantee from that Dispatch Box that something is going to go out before midnight tonight, before notices go? It is really important.
Lord Kamall (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for raising this issue and emphasising its importance. As soon as I leave this Chamber, I will go back to the department and ask what is being done and notify him. I thank him for raising it.
Nationality and Borders Bill
Thursday 3rd February 2022
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Nationality and Borders Act 2022 View all Nationality and Borders Act 2022 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 82-III(a) Amendments for Committee (Supplementary to the Third Marshalled List) - (3 Feb 2022)
Lord Ashton of Hyde (Con)
My Lords, during the hybrid House my children thought that all I ever said in this place was “Please could the noble Lord unmute?” Now they think that all I ever say is, “Please could noble Lords be brief?” Contrary to what some noble Lords think, I am not against scrutiny and improvement of legislation, but this afternoon we have six groups of amendments left to the target on this important Bill, and significant issues to debate on the two remaining days in Committee. I am very grateful to those on the Front Benches for agreeing to sit beyond 7 pm today but, to make the best use of this time and to give all the issues raised by this Bill the attention that they deserve, and to allow Peers who are involved in the later groups to have their say, I ask all noble Lords from all Benches to ensure that their contributions are as brief and to the point as possible, and strictly related to the amendments. That way we will get the business done properly and get home at a reasonable time.
Clause 13: Requirement to make asylum claim at “designated place”
Amendment 67
Lord Paddick
Member’s explanatory statement
Clause 13(1) requires an asylum claim to be made at a designated place. However, the UK territorial sea is excluded from being a place where a Home Office Immigration Officer is authorised to accept an asylum claim. This amendment would remove that provision.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, the Committee will be pleased to hear that I am not hangry any more. I would not like the Chief Whip to think that this speech is so short because of what he just said; it was going to be short anyway.
Amendment 67 in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Hamwee seeks to take out an apparently innocuous part of the Bill that intends to put into primary legislation that the feet of the asylum seeker need to be on dry land in the UK before they can claim asylum. At present, this requirement, “UK terra firma” as I might call it, is contained in the Immigration Rules rather than in primary legislation. The concern of organisations such as the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association is that this strengthens the Government’s hand in any court case where Home Office actions are challenged as being contrary to the refugee convention, where the Government can now point to primary legislation as in some way overriding their international obligations.
Section 2 of the Asylum and Immigration Appeals Act 1993 provides that nothing in the Immigration Rules may lay down any practice that would be contrary to the refugee convention. Moving the UK terra firma condition from the Immigration Rules to primary legislation may be seen as an attempt to get around this requirement. The change is seen as integral to other quite abhorrent and questionably legal measures that we will come to later, giving Border Force and others the authority to board, intercept and drive away vessels containing asylum seekers crossing the channel.
Presumably this change that we are challenging is to stop asylum seekers being pushed back towards France from trying to claim asylum in the channel. Clause 13(7) may seem innocuous, but it is part of a greater evil and should be removed from the Bill. I beg to move.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
My Lords, I have a couple of questions for the Minister on Amendment 67. I will be interested to hear the debate on this amendment because the change in Clause 13(7) appears to be fairly innocuous, although quite significant. As the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, has said, the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association has raised concerns about it so we will all listen carefully to what the practical impacts of this charge are.
Can the Minister explain what “territorial sea” of the United Kingdom means? I take the Chief Whip’s point—this may seem a very detailed point, but that is the point of Committee. What does “territorial sea” mean with respect to the beach? My understanding is that territorial water is low tide to 12 nautical miles out. The target then becomes the low beach mark. How is that measured? This is pedantic, but important: how is that measured around the coast?
I looked up the Explanatory Notes for Maritime and Coastal Access Act 2009 and I do not understand what they mean:
“For the most part the territorial sea of the UK does not adjoin that of any other state. Where it does do so in the English Channel, the Territorial Sea (Limits) Order 1989 … sets out the limits of the territorial sea in the Straits of Dover in accordance with an agreement between the UK and France.”
Is that still in existence? The notes continue:
“In relation to the delineation of the territorial sea between the UK and the Republic of Ireland, the situation is more complex, with no boundary having been agreed between the two states. Instead arrangements have been put in place under the Belfast Agreement for joint management of the Loughs that form the border (the Foyle, Carlingford and Irish Lights Commission’s Loughs Agency).”
I do not expect the Minister to answer now—this is not a trick question—but will she write a letter to explain what the legislation means for someone who may or may not be claiming asylum? The Explanatory Notes continue:
“Within the territorial sea, the UK has jurisdiction for the sea itself, the seabed subjacent and the air above.”
I do not know what the “air above” means. Will the Minister clarify that point?
I am confused—and the Government are confused—on another point. A row is clearly going on in government between the Ministry of Defence and the Home Office on pushback and this House is confused by the Government’s response.
Yesterday at the Home Affairs Select Committee, the Home Secretary was asked whether James Heappey, a Ministry of Defence Minister, was right to rule out pushback by the Navy. To be fair, the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, ruled this out in this Chamber in answer to a question from me and other noble Lords. We were told by the Home Secretary, and this is really important, that the Minister
“gave a view … They are not facts. They cannot be facts, because the work—that operational work—is still under way. While I appreciate that he was responding to questions in Parliament, whether that was in Committee or in response to an urgent question, this is work in progress. It is wrong to say anything specific with regards to work operationally that is still being planned. That work has not completed yet.”
They cannot both be right, can they? If the Government have a pushback policy, they have a pushback policy and, as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, mentioned, presumably including the seas helps with that. I do not know. What is the Government’s policy on pushback? We are debating the Nationality and Borders Bill and an aspect of it to do with territorial seas and I have no clue what the Government’s policy is.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)
I thank noble Lords for speaking to these amendments. In terms of territorial waters, yes, I understand it to be 12 nautical miles at low tide. In terms of pushbacks, of course I agree with my right honourable friend the Home Secretary and we are developing a range of tools to tackle the illegal and very dangerous crossings in the channel.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
I absolutely understand why the Minister has said what she has with respect to the Home Secretary. Nobody, including me, expects the Minister to get up and say that she disagrees with the Home Secretary—for obvious reasons. But that is not the point. The point is: what is the Government’s policy? The Ministry of Defence is saying one thing—including the Minister who speaks for defence matters from the Dispatch Box—and the Home Secretary is saying something completely different. It is not good enough.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I agree with the noble Lord and I will clarify the point on this issue. He knows that I will clarify that for him.
Amendment 67, if we can get on to that, seeks to weaken the message that this Bill strives to send. People should not risk their lives using unseaworthy vessels—I do not think anyone would think that they should—to reach our shores when they have already reached safety in a country such as France. It puts their lives at risk, and those of Border Force and rescue services. Events in recent months have all too starkly demonstrated the devastating human cost of undertaking these journeys. This provision is just one of a host of measures which aim to deter illegal entry to the UK. It is right that we prioritise protection for the most vulnerable people rather than for those who could have claimed asylum elsewhere.
Parliament has already had an opportunity to scrutinise these measures when they were placed in the Immigration Rules in December 2020. It has been a long-standing practice in place for many years to only accept claims for asylum in person at the individual’s first available opportunity on arrival in the UK. These provisions simply seek to place these long-standing requirements on a stronger statuary footing.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, for his intervention. From memory—and I have to say, no pun intended, that I am finding it difficult to keep my head above water with this Bill—we come on to pushback in a later group. Maybe the Minister might be able to say more when we get to the appropriate group on that issue.
But on this issue, there are lots of things in Immigration Rules that are not in primary legislation, and I do not understand why this particular issue is different. If it is simply to put something that has been for a long time been in Immigration Rules on a more secure statutory footing, why are we not seeing many more Immigration Rules being put on a firmer statutory footing by putting them into primary legislation? This leads me to believe ILPA—that there is some other motivation behind it related to pushbacks, as the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, has said.
But there will be an opportunity to revisit this when we come to the groups debating pushbacks, so at this stage I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Etherton
“(c) fails to protect its nationals, including in particular those who have a protected characteristic within the meaning of Chapter 1 of Part 2 of the Equality Act 2010 which is innate or immutable, from persecution by third parties who are not agents of the member State.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment provides that there are exceptional circumstances where, even though there is no overt persecution by the State or state agents, the conduct of others towards a person which the State has failed to prevent can amount to persecution within the Refugee Convention.
Lord Etherton (CB)
In moving the amendment in my name, I should say that I have also put my name to the proposal from the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, to exclude Clause 15 from the Bill—but I will wait to hear him and support him when he proceeds with that.
I will make a relatively short point in relation to Amendment 68. The provision relates to Clause 14 and the section of the Bill that deals with inadmissibility. Clause 14 is concerned with amending the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 and the exclusion in that Act, by way of amendment, of asylum claims by EU nationals. I am not certain why they have been selected for exclusion, but I assume it is because EU member states are bound by the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights, the provisions of which, for the most part, mirror the European Convention on Human Rights and, in some respects, go beyond it. In Article 1A(2) of the refugee convention, persecution is obviously tied to the question of human rights.
The point I wish to make is simply that, under the new clause proposed by Clause 14—headed “Asylum claims by EU nationals”—to amend the 2002 Act, the Secretary of State
“must declare an asylum claim made by a person who is a national of a member State inadmissible.”
Proposed new Clause 80A(4) states:
“Subsection (1) does not apply if there are exceptional circumstances as a result of which the Secretary of State considers that the claim ought to be considered.”
Proposed new subsection (5) states:
“For the purposes of subsection (4) exceptional circumstances include”—
and then it lists a series of matters under proposed new paragraphs (a) and (b), with three proposed sub-paragraphs under (b).
Basically, short the point is that there can be persecution for the purposes of entitlement to refugee status under the convention even where the state itself is not the protagonist of the persecutory conduct but allows citizens, residents or others present within its territory to persecute particular groups or persons who otherwise fulfil the requirements of the convention’s definition of “refugee”. My amendment proposes adding to the exceptional circumstances in proposed new Clause 80A(5) the circumstance when the EU member state
“fails to protect its nationals, including in particular those who have a protected characteristic within the … Equality Act 2010 which is innate or immutable, from persecution by third parties who are not agents of the member State.”
This is not a fanciful matter. If we take the case of Hungary, which has been moving more and more to the right in political terms, we see a campaign that is based on undisguised anti-Semitism against George Soros’s support for universities there, and a constant encouragement by the Government there of homophobia and attacks on LGBTQI+ people. So it is not a fanciful point, and I suggest that it should plainly be added as one of the exceptional circumstances. That is the point. On that basis, I beg to move.
Lord Dubs (Lab)
My Lords, notwithstanding the fact that we have touched on some of these issues before, we have to face them head-on in this group of amendments. The issue is whether an asylum seeker has to claim asylum in the first safe country that they reach, and we might as well deal with that head-on because it is fundamental to many of our criticisms of the Bill. Bearing in mind the Chief Whip’s request that we keep our speeches short, I shall endeavour to do that, but this issue is so important.
First, there is a practical issue in all this. If we had demanded that asylum seekers should claim asylum in the first safe country that they reach, the result would have been that every Syrian who reached Europe would have had to have stayed in Greece, Italy or Malta. That is clearly not a practical way for the world to function. If we make demands on where asylum seekers should claim asylum, so of course can other countries. It is quite wrong in practice.
The principle is perhaps more important; that principle being the Geneva convention of 1951. I would have thought it would be widely acceptable to say that the UNHCR was the guardian of the 1951 convention, and if the UNHCR has a view on that convention then that should surely have some influence on the Government—after all, the convention has been fundamental to human rights for asylum seekers over the last 70 years or so. The UNHCR has made it very clear that it disagrees with the argument that refugees should claim asylum in the first safe country that they reach, saying that:
“Requiring refugees to seek protection in the first safe country to which they flee would undermine the global humanitarian and cooperative principles on which the refugee system is founded”.
No country close to the main countries of origin of refugees would ever have considered signing a convention if it meant that they would assume total and entire responsibility for all refugees. These are responsibilities that the international community has to share, and that is implicit in the 1951 convention. Therefore, some of the amendments, although they are in my name, probably seem to be compromising a fundamental objection in principle to what the Government are seeking to do. For example, my explanatory statement on Amendment 70 says that
“asylum seekers should not be removed to a safe third State other than the one with which they are considered to have a connection.”
One can argue about that. The Bill says clearly what it means to have a connection, and some of its definitions are okay but some are not.
Amendment 71 says that there must be a return arrangement in place. Clearly, unless we have a return arrangement in place with other countries, we cannot even begin to consider returning people. I say to the Minister: do we have a return arrangement with any country? If people come from France, across the channel—we all deplore the people traffickers and how they endanger lives, and the tragic loss of life that we have seen in the channel—unless there is an agreement with France, what do we do? If they have come from France, can we send them back to France or not? The French will not accept that. Incidentally, judging from this morning’s papers, our relationship with France is getting worse and worse; that is something that should be put right anyway, regardless of other considerations. Surely there must be a return arrangement in place, otherwise we cannot even consider this.
Lord Horam (Con)
My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, that there has to be some shared responsibility in Europe. In particular, his point about Greece, Italy and Spain was well made. They have had to bear the brunt of the inflow of asylum seekers to a very difficult extent, and I understand their problems. The noble Lord was also right that, whatever other solutions may be forthcoming on this very difficult issue, we will eventually have to have some agreement with the French. I am rather hopeful that, with the departure of the noble Lord, Lord Frost, we may have a better chance of reaching agreement—I say that with no malice to the noble Lord, Lord Frost, who I am sure did a very difficult job his way, but none the less, the fact that he has gone seems to me to be rather good news from the point of view of having a rather more diplomatic approach to France. I am glad that the Foreign Office in particular may now be in charge of that. I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Kerr, will agree that it is probably better for the Foreign Office to have more say in this matter than under the previous arrangements.
What I am concerned about reflects what the Chief Whip said earlier on. Clauses 14 and 15 seem to do no more than bring into British law what we already had when we were in the European Union—that is all they do—using the Dublin regulations and the Spanish protocol. This is nothing more than a transfer. We have all the rights that we enjoyed when we were members of the European Union to take account of particular circumstances and difficulties which people may have in getting evidence and so forth. All these fairly extensive amendments are already taken account of by our existing rights, so I do not see how we can spend very long on these clauses, given that they really do no more than a transfer job.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, I do not think that the noble Lord is right about EU arrangements. I remember as an MEP fighting hard on the inadmissibility provisions in EU directives. On the Dublin arrangements, my understanding is that the UNHCR is satisfied that those arrangements were compliant with the refugee convention. I contend that Clause 15 is not, hence I have put my name to some of the amendments in this group. My noble friend will propose that Clause 15 be removed altogether, as it fails to recognise the need to share asylum responsibilities with other countries in order for the international system to work effectively, but at least some changes to the clause are necessary, and so I have co-signed the amendments suggested by the JCHR, tabled in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs.
Amendments 69, 70, 71 and 75 all seek to restrict and improve the operation of the scheme proposed in Clause 15. I also support Amendment 68, and convey the apologies of my noble friend Lord Oates, who has a conflict with other business. Clause 15 is about proposals whereby the UK would attempt to persuade some other country to take responsibility for the asylum applicant if it considered that there was a connection to that state, broadly defined, or even if there was no connection at all.
Amendment 69 seeks to ensure that the definition of “safe third State” means it affords the protection and rights to which the person is entitled, so there is no real risk of them experiencing persecution, a violation of their human rights or refoulement, and that there is access to fair and efficient asylum procedures and refugee convention rights. Amendment 70 seeks to ensure that any removal should be only to a state with which the person has a connection. Amendment 71 requires that, unless formal and legal binding return arrangements are in place with the state in question—such as was the case with Dublin, which is why the UNHCR gave it its blessing—and removal takes place within a reasonable period. Absent those conditions, there must be no declaration of inadmissibility and the claim must be considered in the UK. Amendment 75 removes and rejects the suggestion that the UK can remove a claimant to a country in which the UK Government think it would have been reasonable for them to have made a claim, even if they had never visited that country.
As I said, even if these four amendments were adopted, Clause 15 would still be flawed. It would create yet greater delays, backlogs and costs in the asylum system. As we keep saying, the Home Office says the system is broken yet it wants to shoot itself in the foot by having ever-more complicated and long-winded procedures. It would also create greater anxieties for claimants and disruption to the international system. Therefore, Clause 15 must be at least amended, if not removed.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
My Lords, unsurprisingly, I agree with everyone who has spoken so far except, I am afraid, for the noble Lord, Lord Horam. This is why: we are out of the EU now and have taken back control of our borders and laws. This is the Government’s policy. We are no longer in this family of nations, this bloc called the EU. Therefore, on what logical basis should we be saying that, by definition, we will never consider a claim made by an asylum seeker from that group?
It is one thing when you are in the EU to say that we do not need to be taking refugees from the EU because there is free movement in the EU and we are part of that bloc. You might well say that it will be inadmissible and that we do not consider refugee claims from within that family of nations of which we are a part, but we are not in it anymore. We have taken back control. Therefore, we are no longer able to assert pressure on others in that group to buck up their ideas about human rights or to threaten the Hungarians with being ejected from the EU if they do not sort out their human rights record. We do not have that leverage anymore. Therefore, it is our obligation as global Britain, as great believers in human rights and a signatory to the refugee convention, that if Hungarians are being persecuted we will consider their claims for asylum because we are better than them and we have taken back control in a lovely global Britain sort of way. It is totally illogical for Clause 14 to be part of the Bill.
More generally, the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, made an important point about complexity and efficiency. In an earlier group, everyone in the Committee agreed that decision-making needs to be faster and better. That is in everybody’s interest, whichever side of the argument we are on. Creating lots of convoluted provisions about what is inadmissible, before you even consider whether someone is being persecuted, will only make life harder for caseworkers in the home department. I have seen Governments of both persuasions do this over the years. They think they are making it easier, but they actually make it harder by creating more convoluted hoops for people to jump through before their claim is even considered. It is better to have a clean slate and to consider somebody’s circumstances: do they qualify for asylum or not? It would be much easier without all these hoops, so Clauses 14 and 15 should go.
Just consider the claims: if countries are safe, they are safe. If people are not telling the truth, test their credibility and make that decision. Of course, I agree with everything my noble friend Lord Dubs said about safe countries, who has or does not have an association with one and the Government making the decision for them on a spurious basis.
Finally, I agree with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, it is a well-established principle of refugee convention jurisprudence the world over that you do not have to be persecuted just by agents of the state. States have a duty to protect all the people in their state. If they do not do it, there can be behaviour and persecution by non-state agents within that territory. If the state is not offering protection, if there is no effective rule of law, it is not enforcing the criminal law and is allowing Roma or gay people or whoever to be persecuted by fascist skinheads in Hungary or whatever it is, that is persecution for the purposes of the refugee convention.
Lord Cashman (Lab)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti. I will be brief. I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, for moving Amendment 68 and associate my name with this amendment. It deals with a glaring omission. I hope the Government will accept the amendment because, as has been rightly said, the Bill states:
“The Secretary of State must declare an asylum claim made by a person who is a national of a member State inadmissible … For the purposes of subsection (4) exceptional circumstances”.
This is where Amendment 68 beautifully sits and deals with that omission because intolerance is on the rise on the grounds of many protected characteristics listed within the Equality Act not only in Hungary, but in Poland and other parts of the EU. Indeed, the EU is somewhat restricted in what it can do with independent member states on some of these issues. I hope that the Minister will indicate that the Government will move on this, and the other positive amendments within this group, because in the end we are dealing with issues of human rights.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I am going to make a short speech about how the Government want to have their cake and eat it. One minute the EU is a place where there are lots of freedoms and protections for its citizens, and the next minute it is terribly repressive and we want to get out. Essentially, I support the noble Lord, Lord Dubs.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
My Lords, I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, but my feeling about these amendments is that that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, is right and that the best answer is to strike out the clause.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
I am so sorry but would the noble Lord remove his mask for a moment so we could better hear his wisdom?
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
Was everything I said even more incomprehensible than usual? Basically, I am saying that we can amend and improve this a bit, but it would be much better to get rid of it.
I also have one point of detail. I am struck by the double reference to the definition of a safe third country, which I believe is irrelevant because the refugee convention says what it says. The definition is that a safe third country
“is one from which a person will not be sent to another State … otherwise than in accordance with the Refugee Convention”
and that is repeated later. Of course, there is absolutely nothing in the refugee convention about sending somebody to a safe third country, or sending somebody to any country, except there is the firm ban on refoulement, that is, sending somebody back to the country where he had the justified fear of persecution. I understand why the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, has that phrase in his amendment. He is thinking about refoulement, but the Government, when they put it in the Bill, are not thinking just about refoulement. They are thinking about their doctrine of having to seek asylum in the first safe country. They are thinking about their strange reading of Article 31 of the refugee convention. They are not letting Article 1 speak for itself, and their reading of the convention is a quite different one, as was explained by the noble and learned Lords, Lord Etherton, Lord Brown and Lord Clarke, with a different definition from the one that has become the jurisprudence of this country.
The Lord Bishop of Durham
My Lords, very briefly, my deep concern is that the Government’s proposal virtually rules out us ever being the first safe country in which to arrive, simply because of our geography. That is the fundamental problem I have with the whole proposal, because it feels like we are removing ourselves from being a front-line nation in receiving people. I believe the Minister does not actually think that, but this would be the impact. We need to strike these clauses out.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, my name is to a number of amendments in this group—including Amendments 69A, 71A, 71B, 73A and 73B—and they all come from the UNHCR. I had written down not “guardian” but “steward”, but it comes to the same thing—that is, stewardship of the convention. I am not suggesting for a moment that I would be happy—or that it would be happy—to see these clauses remain in the Bill, and I hope I am not too much in “lipstick on pigs” territory, but given that the UNHCR of all bodies has proposed these, I think it right that I speak to them, and I will do so reasonably quickly.
The UNHCR has reiterated that the Bill is fundamentally at odds with the Government’s avowed commitment to uphold the UK’s international obligations under the convention, and its long-standing role as a global champion of supporting and protecting refugees. It has reminded us that three safeguards are essential to any inadmissibility rules. First, they must not operate in a way that denies the fundamental right to seek and enjoy asylum, which is another way of saying a good deal of what has already been said. Secondly, they must protect rights under international law during the refugee process and once a refugee has been recognised. Thirdly, the aim should be to increase access to asylum globally. Clause 15 does not meet those tests; in the interests of time, I will not go through why.
The amendments in my name are to prevent the UK breaching international standards. They would mean that a safe third state must be safe in law—I should put that first—but safe in practice, and that a claim must be considered under the Immigration Rules, not as an optional matter; they broaden the circumstances in which the Secretary of State must consider the application and reduce the risk of an asylum seeker being sent to a country which is not a signatory to the convention and does not respect the rights of refugees under international law. The “connection” would be what most people would regard as a connection in ordinary language, and they define a “relevant claim” as a claim for protective status consistent with the convention. On Tuesday there was a lot of discussion about the importance of the convention as a matter of morality and, very importantly, as law. These amendments relate to both.
On the issue of formal returns agreements, to which the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, referred, Amendment 195 would require a returns agreement before regulations were brought into force. I agree with that but with the condition that the agreements were acceptable. The amendment perhaps begs the question: I would like to think that it would be possible—it would be proper—for Parliament to have a role, which it will in an international agreement, and that amendments that are thought by Parliament to be required are made, so that the agreement is not just imposed.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, there are lots of issues here, but I start by making an overarching comment. A decade or more ago, the Home Office was dealing with many more applications for asylum than now. I am talking about initial decisions, not appeals. It was dealing with them more quickly and more effectively; the backlog was lower; and the successful appeal rate was lower. I try to be a “glass half full” person and usually fail miserably—but enough of my problems. Let me put it this way: the Home Office has proved in the past that it can deal efficiently and effectively with many more asylum applications than it is facing today. The fix for the current problems lies in the staffing systems and processes of our Home Office, not in the legislation or the number of asylum applications.
I have said it before, and I will say it again: the Government are focusing on the wrong things in the Bill and doing nothing to address the things that need to be addressed. This group of amendments is about unfairly and unreasonably reducing the number of asylum applications rather than increasing the capacity of the Home Office to handle them effectively, as it has proved it is capable of doing in the past.
Clause 14 proposes that all claims for asylum from EU nationals must be ruled inadmissible and that, as it is not a decision to refuse a claim but a decision to refuse to consider a claim, there be no right of appeal. A claim can be considered in exceptional circumstances, but the examples given are where the EU state is at war and has suspended the European Convention on Human Rights, or is going off the rails to such an extent that the EU itself is taking action against it for not complying with the standards of human rights expected of a member state.
These exceptional circumstances do not go far enough, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, said. We have seen EU states fail to act or take sufficient action to protect minorities. He mentioned Hungary. In 2020, six Polish cities announced LGBT-free zones. It may not necessarily be the case that an EU state, or even a municipality within an EU state, is overtly persecuting minorities, but failing to protect some minorities may make it unsafe for them to be in a particular state and as such may amount to grounds for asylum in the UK. Surely Home Office officials can determine whether any application for asylum has merit, whoever it is made by and whatever part of the world the applicant is from, without blanket bans of this kind in primary legislation. Amendment 68 from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, would be useful if the clause survives, but Clause 14 should not stand part of the Bill.
Another category of claim the Government want to rule as inadmissible is where the claimant has a connection, however spurious, with a safe third state. It just smacks of: “Let’s invent lots of excuses for rejecting someone’s asylum claim, however far-fetched they may be.”
In relation to the other amendments, if the clause remains part of the Bill, of course a safe third state must be safe—and that means safe for everyone, including minorities. It means that their rights will be protected and that the asylum system is compliant with the refugee convention. Of course the Home Secretary should not be able to remove a genuine refugee to any safe third state—to dump them anywhere in the world, whether they have any connection with that state or not.
On what planet does the following make sense? You establish some kind of connection between an asylum seeker and a safe third state, but you cannot send them there because you do not have a return agreement with that state. However, you still refuse to consider their application for asylum. So what are they supposed to do now?
Another amendment seeks to prevent the following scenario: even if the refugee has family in the UK, they could still be deported to a safe third state—“Sorry, lad, I know your parents are here but you’ve got a connection with Turkey because your grandparents are old and frail and could only make it that far, so off you go”.
The conditions for establishing a connection with a safe third state—we have seen this sort of thing before—look like an awayday board blast, where there are no wrong answers and anything you can think of is uncritically written on a flipchart. Can “Well, we think you should have made a claim elsewhere” seriously be a reason an official can give to rule a claim inadmissible, with no right of appeal?
Clauses 14 and 15 should not be part of the Bill, and we will support the other amendments only if those clauses remain.
I was going to speak to Amendment 76, which seeks to override
“all prior national and international law”,
but there is no one here to speak to it, so I shall decline.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
I have the Clause 15 stand part debate and Amendment 195 in my name. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, for their support in opposing this clause, and my noble friend Lord Blunkett for his support on Amendment 195.
Clause 15 puts in the Bill an existing immigration law on inadmissibility that makes any asylum claim inadmissible in a number of circumstances, including if the claimant has passed through a safe country or if they have a connection to a safe third country. The result of a finding of inadmissibility is that, unless the Secretary of State decides that there are exceptional circumstances, the claimant will be denied access to the UK’s asylum system for a “reasonable period”, currently defined as six months in Home Office policy, while the UK seeks to transfer them to “any other safe country”. With the huge backlog and delay currently in the system, it is impossible to understand how adding another six months to the asylum process will help an already dysfunctional system.
We believe that, as drafted, Clause 15 should not stand part of the Bill. It is just not acceptable or deliverable in practice. We have concerns on the definitions of “safe third state” and “connection” and the lack of relevant international agreements. Serious concerns have been raised by the UNHCR and the cross-party Joint Committee on Human Rights, among others. There is an absence of adequate safeguards against returning individuals to countries in which they will be denied rights owed to them under the refugee convention.
Safe returns, as part of an international asylum system, are not new and are accepted under agreed conditions. However, this clause does not provide for safe reciprocal return agreements. Even as it stands, the UK Government do not have return agreements with EU member states—namely the “safe third countries” that refugees are most likely to have passed through.
Lord Etherton (CB)
My Lords, I support the proposal from the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, to exclude Clause 15 from the Bill, for a wide variety of reasons.
First, if a claim is deemed to be inadmissible but to satisfy the convention, that seems effectively to be saying that the person is not a refugee within the convention. That does not make sense. If they satisfy the definition of refugee within the convention, they have a claim. It can be dismissed, and then there will be a right of appeal. What cannot be said—which is effectively what is being said here—is “We’re not going to hear you at all, even though you are a refugee within the strict terms of the convention”. So I take issue with the very idea of inadmissibility with no right of recourse at all by way of an appeal.
Secondly, the terms of Section 80C to be inserted into the 2002 Act in relation to four and five seem completely contrary to both the wording and principle of the convention. My understanding of Clause 4 is that it is, in some way or other, intended to be made analogous to the Dublin III regulation.
There are a number of points to be made about that. First, we are no longer part of the EU or of the Dublin regulation. Perhaps more importantly, EU member states themselves have recognised that the Dublin regulation has failed. On 23 September 2020, the European Commission adopted what they called the New Pact on Migration and Asylum, following consultations with the European Parliament, member states and various stakeholders. The PR notice from the European Commission, which is available on the internet, states:
“The new pact recognises that no member state should shoulder a disproportionate responsibility and that all member states should contribute to solidarity on a constant basis.”
It has failed because the effect of the Dublin regulation, when strictly applied, means that certain states are overwhelmed with refugees because they are inevitably the first state on the way through to somewhere else. What is happening at the moment is that the Commission is proposing to replace the Dublin III regulation with a new regulation on asylum and migration management. So, frankly, there is no point in referring to the Dublin III regulation. It has failed in practice, and we should not be emulating it.
Furthermore, proposed Section 80C(4) is inconsistent with the terms of the convention itself. There is nothing in the convention, in Article 31 or anywhere else that makes this “connection” mean that a refugee claim would fail.
I have another point about condition 4, and I would welcome clarification from the Minister on it. The description that would render a connection with the state, and therefore the claim, inadmissible is exactly the same as the definition of arriving “directly” for the purposes of Clause 11. Clause 36 effectively amplifies Clause 11 and paragraph 1 of Article 31 of the convention. It says:
“A refugee is not to be taken to have come to the United Kingdom directly from a country where their life or freedom was threatened if, in coming from that country, they stopped in another country outside the United Kingdom, unless they can show that they could not reasonably be expected to have sought protection under the Refugee Convention in that country.”
On this particular approach, you are never going to get anywhere near Clause 11 because you will be knocked out under Clause 15—so I do not understand that contradiction. Once you fall within condition 3, which is the same as condition 4—which is the same as not arriving directly under the definition in Clause 36 —you are knocked out. So which is it—are you knocked out or do you still have some right under Clause 11, admittedly, to show that you could with good cause fall within either group 1 or even group 2? I am left confused by that.
Condition 5, on which the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, and others have eloquently spoken, provides
“that, in the claimant’s particular circumstances, it would have been reasonable to expect them to have made a relevant claim to the safe third State (instead of making a claim in the United Kingdom).”
Nothing in the Dublin regulations says that, even if they were to apply—and there is certainly nothing in the convention that would make such a condition apply to exclude a claim.
So I support the suggestion that Clause 15 should be excluded because, with respect, it seems to be a muddle in a whole series of different respects—legally, practically and in principle.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, I thank noble Lords again for speaking to this group of amendments. I appreciate the thoughtful and well-meaning intent of Amendment 68, but we cannot accept it. The definition of “persecution” is well established and must be on the basis of a refugee convention reason—namely, race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion. It is reiterated in Clause 30(1)(c) that persecution can be committed by
“any non-State actor”
where the state is
“unable or unwilling to provide reasonable protection”.
Given the level of protection afforded to EU nationals, through fundamental rights and freedoms, EU countries are inherently safe, and individuals are exceptionally unlikely to be at risk of persecution. If individuals experience discrimination, they can seek protection from within their country of nationality.
That said, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, might be comforted to have it confirmed that our processes already acknowledge that it may not be appropriate to apply inadmissibility to EU national claimants in exceptional circumstances. The list of exceptional circumstances included in the provisions is not exhaustive; it looks to protect individuals in the very rare circumstances that a member state is at risk of a serious breach or where there exists a serious and persistent breach of the values under the Treaty on European Union, including equality.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
Briefly, on the Minister’s previous point in response to the right reverend Prelate about refugees being able to fly here instead of making perilous crossings, will she make a commitment that the Government will not slap transit visa restrictions on jurisdictions that produce a lot of genuine refugees because of what is happening over there, and that they will not use carriers’ liability as a deterrent for people trying to escape through that safer method?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
Can I write to the noble Baroness on that? I suspect that I will misspeak if I try to answer because there are several things in that question that I am thinking about. I hope that she is okay for me to write to her.
The definition of a safe third state is already set out in the clause. It ensures that, even if a country is not a signatory to the refugee convention, the principles of the convention should be met if we are to remove an individual to that country. It defines safe third countries as states where an individual will not be sent to another state where they would be at risk of persecution or a breach of their Article 3 ECHR rights. This is consistent with our obligation under the refugee convention to ensure that individuals are not subject to refoulement; I keep pronouncing it as “refowlment”, which is completely wrong. This definition has been part of our previous legislation on safe countries and is a widely recognised definition of a safe third state; it is used in EU law under the procedures directive.
I want to come to point made by the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, that the UNHCR says that we are breaking the refugee convention. There are three groups of amendments on this in Committee—not today, but shortly, so I will not go too much into the convention. We have already touched on it. We think that everything we are doing complies with our international obligations, including the convention. The first safe country principle is the fastest route to safety and widely recognised internationally. It is a fundamental feature of the Common European Asylum System. It is self-evident that those in need of protection should claim in the first safe country and that is the fastest route to safety.
There are different ways in which an individual may be protected and not all of them require entitlements that fall under the refugee convention. To define a safe third state in the way that is suggested by these amendments ignores the fact that other forms of protection are available to individuals which ensure that these countries are safe for them to be removed to. We will only ever remove inadmissible claimants to countries that are safe. Using this definition is not a new approach. It has been part of our previous legislation on safe countries. I do not think these amendments are necessary.
On Amendment 70, the ability to remove an individual declared inadmissible to any safe country has formed a part of our inadmissibility process since the changes to the Immigration Rules in December 2020. This amendment would remove a provision that Parliament has already had the opportunity to scrutinise. The aim of these provisions is to disincentivise people from seeking to enter the UK by dangerous means facilitated by criminals. They send a clear message that those arriving via an irregular route may be eligible to be transferred to another safe country, not of their choosing, to be processed.
I do not agree with the premise of Amendments 71 to 73A and 195. Agreements by a safe third country to accept an asylum seeker may not always be via a reciprocal or formal arrangement. It is right to seek removals on a case-by-case basis where appropriate. Doing so has formed a part of our inadmissibility process since the changes to the Immigration Rules in December 2020. I do not think that these provisions are unworkable without formal agreements in place. That said, I do not disagree with the need to get formal agreements in place. Without providing that running commentary, that is what we are working on doing.
Lord Dubs (Lab)
Will the Minister confirm that to date we do not have an agreement with any country for the return of the people she is talking about?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
There are countries that we can return people to but, as I said, I will not provide a running commentary on ongoing discussions. Of course, there are countries that we return people to, or else we would never have returned anybody in the last two years, and we have.
The Lord Bishop of Durham
If I remember rightly, we returned only five last year. It is partly to do with Covid, I fully accept that, but it is also because there simply are not the agreements in place with the countries that we want to return those people to.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I am not disagreeing with the need to have formal arrangements in place to return people. On that we are at one.
We also acknowledge that it might not always be appropriate to apply inadmissibility to all claimants who have travelled via or have a connection to a safe country. The provisions as drafted already have flexibility that allows us to consider if an individual has exceptional circumstances to warrant consideration of their asylum claim through the UK asylum system. That includes consideration of the best interests of any children affected.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
How does case-by-case work? If we are not going to have agreements and the Minister says it is much better to do it case by case, how does that work? The diplomatic post in the capital in question goes in and says, “We have Mr X in an accommodation centre in Kent. We’d like to send him to you because we think he has a connection to you and we don’t want to let him have asylum here.” What happens if the country in question says, “Well, if he’s with you, he’s your problem”? Do we just put him on a plane and tell him to take his chances at the other end, or are we negotiating his terms of entry into the third country?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I think it is both. We need to assess people on a case-by-case basis and we need to have return agreements in place. It is not an either/or. I fully acknowledge the need to have return agreements in place. We could not return someone to a country that said it would not accept them; that simply would not be on. That underlines the need to have formal return agreements in place.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
Does that mean that the Government accept that Clause 15 is pretty meaningless without such agreements in place? There is no argument about that, then.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
No, I do not accept that Clause 15 is meaningless. I am agreeing that we need to have return agreements in place. I do not think anyone would disagree with that point.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
If we do not have return agreements in place by the time this clause comes in, we will end up with a lot of people being here for six months while the Government try to find out if they can send them back to another country. If you have no agreements with any other countries, you know before you start that that is a further six months wasted before the Government seek to do anything meaningful. Clearly the clause is meaningless without those agreements in place.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I was going to go on to say that if no agreement is possible within a reasonable period, the individual’s asylum claim will be considered in the UK, but I am not disagreeing with the point that return agreements need to be in place. I think I have made that quite clear. Similarly, this is a global challenge, so every nation in the world has to be mindful of the fact that they will be in similar positions as the months and years go on.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
No other country is in this position because other countries believe that the refugee convention means what it says. I am uneasy, and I think the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, must be right, but what makes this particularly peculiar is that we are considering inadmissibility here. Suppose there were an agreement in place. Suppose we were handling a case—the Minister says that it is best done case by case—but we have not done anything except say, “This is inadmissible.” We do not know anything about this chap. He has not had an appeal turned down and has not been categorised in group 1 or group 2; he has simply been declared inadmissible. What does the diplomatic post in the intended recipient country have to go on?
Baroness Ludford (LD)
Surely the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, is right: there is no realistic possibility. The Minister keeps “not confirming” that there are no return arrangements in place yet; she lives in hope, but the reality is that there are none and it seems unlikely that there will be any in the near future. I know there are hopes for one with France after the presidential election; well, good luck with that.
The Government wanted Brexit, they got Brexit done and Brexit meant that we no longer enjoy the Dublin regulation. Realistically, the countries that she is talking about sending people back to are mainly EU countries. Frankly, the chances of having a readmission agreement with the EU are for the birds, so we are going to be seeking bilateral agreements—and none is in prospect. So Clause 15 is indeed basically window-dressing.
The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, mentioned that apparently 6,500 cases have been declared inadmissible. All we do by kicking the can down the road is create more people waiting, more people demoralised and more work for the Home Office. It is all completely unrealistic.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
My Lords, I am not sure whether this is helpful to the Minister or not, but the Dublin agreement was just quoted. Over the last five years, we asked France and Germany whether they would take back 2,480 cases. They took 234, which is just under 10%. Let us not imagine either that the Dublin agreement was useful or that something similar will be in future.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
That is a very good point. I think we talked about this the other day, in terms of returns. We actually took far more than we returned under Dublin. At this juncture, I would say that we do not need formal agreements in place.
Lord Kerr of Kinlochard (CB)
The noble Baroness should be careful. I quite agree that it was an interesting point, but it is a point that works for the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, not for the Minister. While there was a Dublin agreement and only 10%—I do not vouch for the figure, but the noble Lord, Lord Green, may be right—what do we expect to happen when there is no agreement? Do the Government expect a higher acceptance rate from the French and Germans when there is no agreement, when they are declaring the guy inadmissible?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
I do not know if the noble Lord heard my last point, but we do not necessarily need formal return agreements in place. We can do returns without formal agreements. The point about Dublin is that the formal arrangements that were in place did not necessarily work. It is important to try both—formal and informal, diplomatic and otherwise. It works both ways and, as I said, this is a global challenge. It is not that it is not an EU problem either.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
Can I just be clear? Will this then work on the basis of some ad hoc arrangements that will be determined through diplomatic channels, in which other countries take people whom we have declared inadmissible? As I understand it, the number of people we are likely to declare inadmissible will be high. Will all that be done by ad hoc arrangements? Will there not be any agreements and will these countries come forward and say, “Yes, that’s fair enough. You declared the claim inadmissible; of course we will take them back”. Is that how it is going to work?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, I am saying that there are a number of ways in which we can seek to secure this—formal, informal, diplomatic and otherwise. I am not saying there is a single solution to returns. Therefore, Clause 15 still needs to be in place.
It might not always be appropriate to apply inadmissibility to all claimants who have travelled via or have a connection to a safe country. The provisions that we have drafted already have flexibility that allows us to consider whether an individual has exceptional circumstances to warrant consideration of their asylum claim through the UK asylum system. As I said, this includes best interests. We also have the family reunion provisions that I mentioned earlier so, if individuals have family members in the UK, they should apply under those provisions. The inadmissibility provisions should not be used to circumnavigate those provisions and create a back door to enter the UK by dangerous means.
Furthermore, if an individual has not been recognised as a refugee, but has been provided with a different form of protection from refoulement, that country is safe for them to be removed to. To define a “safe third State” in the way suggested by the amendments ignores the other forms of protection available to individuals, which ensure that these countries are safe for them to be removed to.
Regarding Amendments 74, 73B, 74A and 75B, the UK should not be obliged to assess the substance of an asylum application where the applicant, due to a connection to a safe third country, can reasonably be expected to seek protection in that third country, or where they have already sought protection in a safe country and have moved on before the outcome of that claim, or where a claim has already been granted or considered and refused. This is a necessary part of achieving the policy aim of deterring those unnecessary and dangerous secondary movements. We are not alone in operating this practice. These amendments ignore the other forms of protection available to individuals that ensure that these countries are safe for them to be removed to. Amendments 75, 75A, and 76 would significantly undermine the aim of these provisions. The provisions as drafted send that clear message for those who could and should have claimed asylum in another safe country to do so.
I commend the spirit of Amendment 76, which would introduce a new clause to strengthen our inadmissibility provisions and deter irregular entry to the UK, particularly where that means of entry indicates that individuals have travelled to the UK via a safe country. I agree with the premise of this amendment—that access to the UK’s asylum system should be based on need and not driven by criminal enterprise. The provisions in the Bill send that clear message. However, this proposed new clause probably goes too far, and would breach our international obligations. It could place individuals in indefinite limbo, which would be against the object and purpose of the refugee convention. The provisions as drafted ensure that individuals are not left in limbo, with their asylum claim neither considered in the UK nor another safe third country. If after a reasonable period it has not been possible to agree removal of the individual to a safe third country, as I said earlier, their asylum claim will be considered in the UK. The introduction of Clauses 14 and 15 as they stand aims to strengthen our position on inadmissibility, further disincentivise people from making dangerous journeys, and encourage them to claim asylum in the first safe country.
I will leave it at that. I hope that noble Lords will be happy not to press their amendments.
Lord Paddick (LD)
The Minister said that two issues were widely recognised internationally. One was the definition of a safe third country and the other was on the first safe country principle—that refugees should claim asylum in the first safe country. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees asked for the definition, in the amendments, of a third safe country, so it does not agree that it is a widely recognised international definition. The UNHCR also says that it does not recognise the first safe country principle and that there is nothing in international law about it. Does the Minister accept that, even if she says that these things are widely recognised internationally, they are not recognised by the UNHCR?
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
We have had wide discussions about the UNHCR’s opinion on this and think that we are complying with international law. It is up to each state to interpret the refugee convention. I know that the noble Lord and most of this House do not agree but it will ultimately be for Parliament, through the passage of the Bill, to interpret what Parliament thinks of the refugee convention.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
My Lords, I will not move Amendment 76 and will consider the Minister’s comments on it.
Lord Etherton (CB)
My Lords, I am extremely grateful to the Minister for battling so valiantly in relation to all the points that have been raised, and am extremely grateful for all the amendments that have been spoken to. What has become clear from this discussion is that there are, on any footing, immense practical difficulties in relation to Clauses 14 and 15. In effect, I think the Minister accepted that it is not going to be straightforward to repatriate people with inadmissible claims to other EU countries without any agreement. The expression “window dressing” has been used. It is going to be very difficult.
I hope I correctly interpreted the Minister in getting my crumb of comfort from Clause 14. I think she reassured me that the exceptional circumstances specified were not closed. As a statement from the Dispatch Box in Parliament, recorded in Hansard, that is quite an important point. If Clause 14 remains, it will give at least some people some succour at any event, particularly in the circumstances I mentioned: an EU country which does not prevent those who are citizens, resident or present within the country, from persecuting others belonging to a social group, or for some other reason.
I am afraid that the overwhelming sentiment—and certainly my view—was that whatever may be said by the Government about adopting existing expressions which are generally used or have been previously used, in vital respects Clause 15 is inconsistent with the convention. This is not in a complex way, but in an obvious way. I am sorry to say this, but to my mind as a lawyer it is an egregious contravention of the convention. I ask the Minister about, for example, condition 5 in new Section 80C. Not only is that not in the convention, but I do not know where it comes from. I can see it is there as a matter of policy but it is not in the Dublin regulations, so far as I can recall. As I pointed out, in any event the Dublin regulations are being revised, so there is no point in going back to them.
There are a number of difficulties. There is one point I was hoping the Minister might be able to reply to that she has not. I would be grateful if she could explain perhaps in communication with me. How does one reconcile condition 4, which is failing to make a claim in the first country—thereby rendering you having a connection and the possibility of inadmissibility—with one of the requirements under Clause 11 to satisfy Article 31, which is arriving directly, because you never get there if you are rendered inadmissible? At the moment I do not see how the two fit together. I am not suggesting it is a straightforward and easy point; it is a lawyer’s point, but an important one. It shows a muddle somewhere along the line. But, on the basis of everything that has been said, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Haskel) (Lab)
If Amendment 69 is agreed I cannot call Amendment 69A because of pre-emption.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Haskel) (Lab)
If Amendment 71B is agreed I cannot call Amendment 72 because of pre-emption.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Haskel) (Lab)
If Amendment 74 is agreed I cannot call Amendment 74A because of pre-emption.
Lord Coaker
“(1A) The Secretary of State may not serve an evidence notice on a person who—(a) has made a protection claim or a human rights claim on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity;(b) was under 18 years of age at the time of their arrival in the United Kingdom;(c) has made a protection or human rights claim involving sexual or gender-based violence;(d) is a victim of modern slavery or trafficking; oron other categories of person on whom the Secretary of State considers it would be inappropriate to serve an evidence notice.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment probes the serving of an evidence notice on vulnerable groups.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
My Lords, my noble friend Lord Rosser tabled Amendments 77 and 89. In this group we also very much support the important amendments in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton; those of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, to remove the deadline; the crucial amendments of my noble friend Lord Dubs on the weight given to evidence; and indeed the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. This is another important group of amendments.
The Government are aware that there are extreme and widespread concerns over the impact of the late evidence provisions in this part of the Bill, particularly the impact on vulnerable groups of people. I am pleased that the Government agree, because in their equality impact assessment which goes with the Bill there are hundreds of quotes that could be used to support the amendments that have been put down by various noble Lords. I have picked just a couple out. For example:
“We will continue to consider ways in which to mitigate adverse impacts on vulnerable people.”
Astonishingly, it also admits that:
“Where we do not have data, we have made assumptions.”
One hopes that if they have made assumptions on legislation which we are going to presumably pass at some point, we will continue to look at how we mitigate these consequences.
Noble Lords will be particularly interested in a quote from the Government’s own evidence to themselves:
“There is a risk that our policies could indirectly disadvantage protected groups.”
That is the Government’s own evidence to themselves. They are worried about the impact on protected and vulnerable groups—they say so in their impact assessment. If noble Lords have not had a chance to read all if it, it is worth reading in great detail. If the Government come back and say that there is no need for some of these amendments, they are actually contradicting their own evidence. So I support the Government’s equality impact assessment of these amendments and hope that noble Lords will also support it, and that the Government will welcome the amendments for further clarifying their own impact assessment.
Crucially, the amendments seek to provide more clarity on how vulnerable groups will be considered and what will be accepted as, for example, a good reason for late compliance. It is well understood, but not particularly reflected in these provisions, that those who have experienced trauma may find it intensely difficult, if not impossible, to disclose their experiences on demand.
Amendment 77, in the name of my noble friend Lord Rosser, would prevent evidence notices and the strict cut-off date for evidence being served on children, people seeking asylum based on their sexual orientation or gender identity, or survivors of sexual violence, gender-based violence or modern slavery and trafficking. I should declare again my interest as a research fellow at Rights Lab, at the University of Nottingham, in respect of modern slavery and trafficking. This amendment seeks to probe what the approach will be to these and other vulnerable groups.
I was struck by my noble friend Lord Cashman’s speech, on Tuesday, about somebody fleeing persecution because of their sexual orientation. He said that when you arrive at a place of safety, your first thought is that you are safe, not whether you are complying with a notice of what you will be required to do by a certain date or else be in trouble; indeed, when you are fleeing from whatever it is you are fleeing from, you first thought is not whether you have picked up all the relevant papers. These are the sorts of things that we need to consider.
Crucially, the amendment is not limiting, as it allows the Secretary of State to recognise further vulnerable groups who should also be exempt from these provisions. There is always a problem when you generate a list that there is someone you do not include.
An LGBTQ+ asylum seeker may face obvious problems providing evidence of sexuality, given that they will have been forced to hide in their home country through fear of persecution or death. They have fled to seek safety. They may not be being interviewed through a translator, the fear has not left them, they may not have the language with which to express what they have been through, and they may be fearful for the loved ones they have left behind. I know many noble Lords will have met many victims and survivors. Part of the problem is the concern they have for people at home, back in the country they have fled. I use myself as an example, as I know other noble Lords might: I would not comply with an authority, even if I felt safe, if I thought that my sister, brother, uncle, husband, wife or whoever was going to be put in danger—I just would not. I sometimes wonder whether what the Government are suggesting complies with the real world in which we all live.
Women for Refugee Women, which supports women fleeing gender-based violence, has said that
“because there are so many legitimate reasons for why a woman who has survived gender-based violence may submit evidence late, we do not think there is a way in which these evidence notices can be implemented fairly in respect to these highly vulnerable individuals.”
The Government themselves recognise that these specific difficulties exist, yet now, if a vulnerable person cannot produce that relevant evidence by a fixed date, it will be considered to have less weight than it is actually worth. That is included in the legislation, as laid out in the clauses we are considering at the moment.
Particularly concerning is that victims of modern slavery and trafficking are included in these provisions. The Government’s own statutory modern slavery guidance says that victims may be
“reluctant or unable to self-identify … Victims may experience post-traumatic stress disorder and anyone interviewing a potential victim should be aware of the impact of trauma on the interviewee, for example difficulty recalling facts.”
Why then, on the one hand, does guidance recognise the impact of trauma in disclosing experiences, yet, on the other, the Bill includes provisions that penalise people for not being able to hand over a neat life story on a deadline? That is contradictory.
Can the Minister clarify—because it is not clear to me—whether these provisions will be applied to children? The number of children waiting for more than a year for their initial decision increased from 563 in 2010 to 6,887 in 2020. That is not because of a surge in applications; it is because of a breakdown in the asylum system. We need to be extremely careful that the Government’s answer to that huge increase is not to penalise children for a failure of the system.
The Bill provides for exemptions where a person has good reason for not complying on time, but we need more information, as we have heard in respect of other parts of the Bill, about what is meant in practice by “good reasons”. Is that a subjective judgment? Is it just left hanging? What does “good reasons” mean? Our Amendment 89 probes examples of what would be considered a good reason for providing evidence late for a PRN. The amendment includes examples of where there is evidence of post-traumatic stress and where it would potentially endanger a person to gather the needed evidence before the cut-off date. It would also require the Secretary of State to publish a non-exhaustive list of what would be accepted as a good reason. The Minister will understand that we are trying to understand what the Government mean by “good reasons”.
It is particularly interesting that the only answer to these queries that we had in the Commons was:
“Guidance … will be published and made available when these measures come into force.”—[Official Report, Commons, Nationality and Borders Bill Committee, Commons, 26/10/21; col. 357.]
We know how difficult it is for us to consider whether that is the appropriate way forward and or whether it satisfies this Chamber given that it is, “We’ll pass it, but don’t worry, the guidance is on its way, and we’ll deal with it”. I say with all respect to the Minister that that is not good enough. Parliament is being asked to pass this Bill now, and we need greater clarity and understanding about how it will function in practice.
Clause 25, on which there is the stand part debate, states that “minimal weight” should be given to late evidence. It is extremely problematic to give important evidence minimal weight based on a deadline rather than judging it on its merits. That is prioritising process over truth and factual evidence, and it will lead to bad decisions. It completely flies in the face of the established practices and procedures of this Parliament and our judicial system. I say again that the Government are prioritising process over truth and factual evidence and it will lead to bad decisions.
The system is currently not operating as it should. The proportion of asylum appeals that were successful in 2020-21 was 47%, so evidence is already not being given the weight it should be given because almost half the decisions are overturned on appeal, and it is leading to decisions that are incorrect. Why in this situation would we build in a mechanism to take evidence less seriously? It flies in the face of the reality that we are confronted with. We must ask how this measure complies with the legal requirement on the Government and all of us to act in the best interests of the child. Can it ever be the case that giving evidence of their need for asylum “minimal weight” is in their best interest?
We therefore strongly support my noble friend Lord Dubs’s Amendments 83 and 88 to remove, as recommended by the JCHR, the provision in Clause 25 that the deciding authority must have regard to the principle that minimal weight should be given to the evidence. It is quite an astonishing principle to establish in law that evidence should be given minimal weight rather than whether it is good evidence or bad evidence or whether it is truthful evidence or untruthful evidence. The noble Lord has been in court. I am sure that if he was giving evidence and somebody said, “Well, that’s minimal”, he would say, “Well, actually, it’s true.” I am not a lawyer, but I would hope that anybody representing me would put good evidence forward and the court would say whether it was good or bad, and you would hope to establish the facts.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, we have Amendments 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 82A, 82B, 86A, 86B, 90 and 90A in this group. I have also put my name to Amendment 95A along with that of the noble Baroness, Lady Lister. I do not know whether she is planning to speak to it—it is the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins—but its thrust certainly falls within this group. Noble Lords will be pleased to know I am not going to speak precisely to each amendment.
I am slightly hesitant to raise this point, given the expertise of the noble Lord on the Front Bench and the noble and learned Lord sitting opposite, although it feels as if I have been sitting next to him through most of the passage of this Bill. Listening to the last exchange, is it something to do with the whole of our legal system that we place asylum seeker on one side opposite the state as the other party? The whole way this is designed is to have parties to proceedings fighting one another. I am glad to see the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, nodding at that. It has only just occurred to me.
This clutch of amendments addresses the period within which the claimant is to provide evidence. I hoped that the noble and learned Lord might be speaking ahead of me because I am sure I would be saying I agree with him. Why is the specific date a matter for the Secretary of State or the immigration officer? Different people will need different periods of time. That might be an argument for variability, but it should not mean that it can be an arbitrary date without there being a reasoned basis. The lawyers in the Chamber will tell me if I get this wrong, but I think one would usually expect to see time periods within tribunal rules with a possibility of applying for an extension, but the procedure rules are the subject of the next clause. I am concerned about whether this is a proper way to go about giving notice. It should be neutral and objectively appropriate, and Clause 17 gives the Secretary of State considerable power.
Under the new subsections introduced by Clause 18, the tribunal is required to make a statement as to whether the claimant has behaved in a way designed or “likely” to go to his credibility. When we tabled Amendments 82A and 82B, I was thinking about points noble Lords made and will make again and again about the impact of trauma on a claimant, and the difficulties someone may have—even someone who is not affected—in dealing with authority figures, accessing documents and so on. This point was very clearly made by the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, a couple of days ago. That is why I stress the word “likely”.
This gives me the opportunity to ask the Government why Clause 18 is included. It would be good to have that on the record. Others may have a different take on the reasons for some claims having taken the course they have.
In my Amendment 86A, I am not really seeking to amend the noble and learned Lord’s Amendment 86, just to add to it by requiring adequate time before a cut-off date in a priority removal notice. Amendment 86A would add more of the people about whom we have been concerned to the list; the same point is made on Amendments 90 and 90A.
I also have Amendment 86B in this group. I got into quite a circular argument with myself last weekend about this. I am not sure I resolved it, but I will not trouble the Committee with it this evening, given the time.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I support Amendment 95 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, who apologises for having had to leave early. This speech will be in two halves—although one will be rather bigger than the other. The first half is roughly what the noble Baroness would have said.
At Second Reading she spoke about the ways in which she believes this Bill places additional unacceptable barriers in the way of women refugees seeking asylum who are fleeing sexual violence and exploitation. The amendment seeks to remove one of those obstacles and to extend the benefit to other groups of asylum seekers who may be similarly disadvantaged, so that it is accepted that they have a good reason for a late claim.
As we understand it, the issue is that in the proposed legislation the authorities deciding an asylum claim or appeal are instructed to attach, as we have heard, only minimal weight to any evidence provided late by the applicant, unless there is a good reason for it being late. However, there is robust evidence to show that the trauma suffered by the victims of sexual violence or trafficking can impact on memory and the ability to recall information. The Home Office guidance itself makes this clear. The other categories she included in Amendment 95, such as victims of torture, modern slavery and trafficking, are just as likely to suffer the same effects on memory and should be protected in the same way. I strongly support what she would have said.
However, as the arguments from this perspective are very similar to those I made in support of Amendment 40 on Tuesday, I will focus on children, a group we have not talked much about so far, although I was very pleased that my noble friend Lord Coaker did so in introducing this group. It is the strong view of children’s organisations such as the Children’s Society—I am grateful for its help—that the Bill completely fails to protect children, a group in particular need of it. Despite recognition of this added need for protection, this Bill’s harsh reforms apply to children just as they do to adults, unless the Minister can tell me that I am wrong—I hope he can. This is not right; it is a serious failure of the Government’s duty to protect children.
We need only look at Clauses 25 and 17 to see the disproportionate impact many of these provisions will have on children and young people. Amendment 95 seeks to ensure that children are recognised as having a good reason for not providing evidence by the deadline and that any evidence they provide late is given due weight. We know from organisations on the ground that asylum-seeking children who have been forced to flee, who may have witnessed violence and the destruction of their homes or schools, or even death, and who may have endured traumatic journeys, might not be able to share all the details of their ordeal in the first instance to provide evidence to support their case. The particular difficulties children might face in providing prompt evidence are recognised by the JCHR.
The Government know this. Their only quality impact assessment, to which my noble friend referred, sets out how these clauses will have a disproportionate impact on vulnerable persons, including children. The Home Office’s Children’s Asylum Claims Casework Guidance makes it clear:
“Decision makers must take account of what it is reasonable to expect a child to know”—
or relay—
“in their given set of circumstances”.
It is inappropriate for authorities to question the credibility of a child’s claim if they omit information, bearing in mind the child’s age, maturity and other reasons that may have led to those omissions. Requiring time-limited evidence and penalising children when they are unable to meet the deadlines goes against the Government’s own assessments and guidance and does nothing to protect children or, as we have heard, their best interests.
As one young person supported by the Children’s Society, which has long supported asylum-seeking children and young people, reminds us:
“This is not a joyful moment in our lives. We have to talk through the worst parts of our past. It is very traumatic.”
Children and young people need time and a sense of safety before they can begin to disclose their experience. They also need good, child-appropriate legal representation, which we know they often do not get, unfortunately. All too often, asylum-seeking children receive poor initial legal advice, which can lead to ill-prepared claims and to them not feeling comfortable about setting out their information. Due to legal aid funding cuts, quality legal advice is not readily available.
Another young asylum seeker supported by the Children’s Society described his experience:
“My solicitor did nothing, it was horrible. They didn’t even prepare a witness statement for my interview. I had to do everything myself. I had my social worker but she didn’t know how to help me with my asylum case. The interviewer told me she had no information and I had to tell her everything.”
The Children’s Society sees many asylum-seeking children who have to provide evidence at later stages of their claim, not because of any weakness in the claim but because of the trauma they have endured or the consequences of non-existent or poor legal representation. No doubt the Minister will assure us that these concerns will be addressed in guidance and on a case-by-case basis, yet, as was highlighted in the recent report, An Inspection of Asylum Casework, guidance is often neither followed nor implemented by Home Office caseworkers. Home Office staff themselves stressed that they
“did not have time to consider each case on its own merits, contrary to the guidance they receive.”
So the aim of Amendment 95 is not to tie the hands of decision-makers or legislate for every situation in which a person might provide late evidence. Rather, it is to ensure that the most vulnerable are protected in the Bill, because we cannot leave their safety and well-being to chance. That is consistent with this highlighted observation from the JCHR:
“It is crucial that decision-makers recognise the many legitimate reasons why asylum seekers may struggle to provide evidence in support of their claims within tight deadlines.”
If Clause 25 stands part—I have to say that I will support the proposal that will be put by my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti that it should not—this amendment represents the minimum necessary to protect children, women, women fleeing gender-based violence and others in the most vulnerable circumstances.
I want to return briefly to what the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, said. Given the Home Office guidance, we cannot see any logical or humane reason why the Government would not accept this amendment and establish on the face of the Bill that, in these circumstances, for these victims, any late evidence should always be accepted as being late for a good reason, and their application or appeal should not in any way be disadvantaged because of it.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 85 on the destruction of documents. I am a sponsor of this amendment, together with the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, who is unfortunately unwell and in isolation.
The purpose of these subsections is to indicate matters that might damage a claimant’s credibility in respect of an asylum or human rights claim. The destruction of documents is clearly one of these. Why else would this be done, except to make it much more difficult to identify the claimant and therefore much more difficult to assess their claims? Noble Lords will remember that claimants arriving by air used to cut up their passports and dispose of them in the aircraft’s toilet. That was dealt with by photocopying their documents before they boarded the aircraft. This time round, it is rather more difficult to counter, but it should certainly be regarded as relevant to an assessment of the validity of their claim.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, I will speak to the five amendments in this group—Amendments 83, 88, 90B, 95A and 137, and the question of whether Clause 25 should stand part—all of which I have co-signed or are in my name. The four I have co-signed are inspired by the Joint Committee on Human Rights and are in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs. He has had to leave and has asked me to give his apologies.
The provisions whereby the presentation of evidence, after a date specified by the Home Office or in a priority removal notice, is required to be treated as damaging to credibility or to be given minimal weight are unfair, unjustifiable and should be removed. I agree with everything the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, said.
I have also tabled Amendments 90B and 95A in the alternative, as it were. Under Clauses 21 and 25, the decision maker on priority removal notices or in an asylum or human rights claim would at least be obliged to consider whether the presumption of damage to credibility was fair, rather than looking solely at whether there were good reasons for the delay. Taking lateness into account should be rejected if it would be unfair.
The motivation for all these amendments is fair access to justice—both to comply with the European Convention on Human Rights and, as set out in Amendment 137 about removal notices, to uphold a common-law right to access justice. Yesterday, I had the pleasure of being at the Joint Committee on Human Rights session at which the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, gave evidence. We discussed having the common law as an inspiration, as well as the ECHR, in the application of human rights. I am sure the noble Lord will be able to tell me that the Government at least accept Amendment 137.
I do not need to say more because the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, put it very well. To say that evidence is not convincing is one thing; to say that, because it has not been submitted by date X it is incredible or has no weight, is putting process over substance.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
My Lords, I shall speak against Clause 25 standing part. I agree with so much of what has already been said. This is a particularly tawdry little clause in an outrageous Bill, which, as we have heard, has been slammed by UNHCR, the custodian of the refugee convention, by the JHCR, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and everybody, it seems, except noble Lords opposite.
My noble friend Lord Coaker need not apologise for not being a lawyer. It is not necessary to be a lawyer to see how tawdry Clause 25 is and how it absolutely puts process over substance.
This area of the law is not about parking regulations, or the tax owed to the Revenue or even major civil or commercial litigation between powerful opposing forces. This is the David and Goliath situation referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. When an asylum seeker presents themselves to whoever—the Border Force or the Home Office—they are putting themselves in the trust of Her Majesty’s Government in the hope that this is the right place to be.
Noble Lords have been making arguments in Committee, and those opposite have been making arguments about forum shopping, wanting better lives and all those things as if they are terrible but, in essence, the refugee convention is about desperate people escaping and having a fair crack at being believed. They may not all be telling the truth. Whether they are or not, they may not all qualify for convention protection, but there should at least be a kind and fair reception and a fair crack of the whip. That means not taking tawdry little process points such as this.
I have been a refugee lawyer, in and outside the Home Office. When I worked as a lawyer in the Home Office—I am going back now to before the new Labour Government, when my first boss was the noble Lord, Lord Howard—we did not take tawdry process points like this. That was in 1996.
In a moment, the ever-avuncular and brilliant advocate, the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson of Tredegar, will get up and tell us not to worry, because this will come into play only when there are no good reasons. So, fear not, Women for Refugee Women, UNHCR, Amnesty International, ILPA and every other bleeding heart. The Home Secretary would call them activist human rights lawyers and they are perhaps almost as contemptible as refugees in her eyes. The noble Lord will say not to worry because, where there are good reasons, this does not come into play and there will not be an issue about evidence.
But why put this in the statute book? Immigration officers, the Secretary of State, the First-tier Tribunal, the Upper Tribunal and SIAC—these bodies are well capable of looking at evidence and credibility. It is an insult to their intelligence for them to look at whether there were or were not good reasons for late evidence. Sometimes late evidence is incredible and sometimes it is perfectly valid, because there are very good reasons—a host of good reasons, more good reasons than not—in relation to trauma.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
Would the noble Baroness like to say whether evidence is ever deliberately produced late in order that it is impossible to remove people for whom such a decision has been made?
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
I have no doubt that that is sometimes the case, but my point is that you do not need Clause 25 to deal with that case, because the decision-makers listed here are well capable of looking at evidence whenever it is served. If the idea is that this is late, incredible or mischievous evidence, or the other concerns of the noble Lord, these decision-makers are capable of getting there by themselves. They do not need this insult to their intelligence that they must give it minimal weight. I never knew about this principle of minimal weight. It has been invented. Sometimes late evidence is good and sometimes it is bad, but this is asylum; refugees are at stake.
The noble Lord opposite always wants to talk about the numbers. He is very concerned about the numbers and I appreciate that, but this is not about numbers. It is about getting decisions right and protecting even the one claimant in a thousand who is the torture victim, who has been persecuted, who may be a child and who may have been trafficked. To turn this into a matter of a parking fine or commercial litigation, in which your case is prejudiced because you were only just advised that being gay is relevant and that you do not have to be afraid to say so, because this is Britain and Hungary, is tawdry. To make that process point, when we are talking about life or death—not big bucks or small bucks but life and death—is totally tawdry.
Clause 25 does not help. If anything, it will make life more difficult for the Home Office because, I promise you, there will be endless litigation about what good reasons are. That is why the amendments are helpful, because they are beginning to tease out what will eventually be the subjects of litigation. We do not need it. We all know that late evidence is sometimes an abuse and is sometimes incredible, but sometimes it emerges because people have only just got decent translators or lawyers, or country or other vital information, which is sometimes hard to get.
I am sorry to hear that the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, is unwell. I am sure that the Committee will join me in wishing her a swift and full recovery.
On the point about identifying documents, let us go back to the history of the refugee convention. Some of the most genuine refugees have to escape without identifying documents, and some of the least oppressed people are the ones who have fantastic documents. That is why Amendment 85 has to go. This is not the biggest problem in a terrible Bill, but Clause 25 is a tawdry little clause, unworthy of Her Majesty’s Government; let us strike it from the Bill.
Lord Cashman (Lab)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti. I have deep concerns about Clauses 17, 19 and 25. Others have already expressed why, so I will not overly repeat myself. I congratulate my noble friend Lord Coaker on brilliantly moving the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lord Rosser. Equally, I associate myself with the amendments in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, my noble friend Lord Dubs and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton.
The reality of what is sometimes the last line of defence, not only in LGBTQ issues but in other vulnerable situations, is that it is the last thing you want to have to deal with yourself. Sometimes the very notion of coming out to yourself is deeply painful, because the recognition in certain cultures, countries and religions means to shut yourself off, not only from a body of support, your religion or community, but from your family. Initially, to come out to yourself is a huge step. Then you have to make the decision, day in and day out, whether to come out in other, very ordinary situations. You are here and you have put in your claim, and someone might say, “How was your weekend? Did you spend it with your girlfriend?” You have to decide whether to lie or tell the truth. If you tell the truth, you may become isolated in the asylum community, and perhaps from your country or religion. This is the community that you associated yourself with, to give yourself support and belonging, in a country where you seek to belong. Then you come out in late evidence, with that last line of defence. If your claim is rejected, you are possibly putting yourself in danger at home, in that you could be returned to one of the seven countries where you are criminalised simply for the reason of being LGBTQI+, or to one of the 11 countries where you could face the death penalty.
I remember in the 1990s working on the case of an 18 year-old Iranian who came out in this country. His asylum application was going to be rejected. A group of us were privileged to intervene on his behalf. What that teenager had said publicly would have been recorded and noted back home. We were successful—I do not say this boastfully, but it is one of the few things I am proud of in my life—in preventing that young man being returned to Iran, where, like three other young men in the weeks before, he could have been hung by his neck on the gallows until he was dead. How will the Government deal with exceptional cases where people bring in late evidence in order to substantiate their claim?
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 83 and 88, which I have co-signed, and Amendment 96, but there are some other superb amendments. I am not a lawyer—I am not going to apologise for that because I have had an interesting life— but I did get a lawyer to look at this for me; not yet a QC, but obviously it is a possibility. Their thoughts were that these evidence notices treat asylum seekers like criminals—in fact, worse than criminals; they treat asylum seekers as if they were dreadful criminals.
In a criminal case, late evidence might be treated as less compelling than if it had been raised earlier on, but evidence is evidence, and if evidence demonstrates a fact, then that is a fact. Facts do not care about your timescales. Rather than allowing a tribunal to determine how much weight to give the evidence, Clause 25 forces them to give minimal weight if the evidence is supposedly late. Even if it were the most compelling evidence, a tribunal would be forced to give it minimal weight. That really cannot be right; it is not justice. I cannot believe the Minister will stand up—in a few moments, we hope—and say that this is justice. This is an artificial exercise. It is not founded in justice. It is a purely political venture to make it harder and harder for people to claim asylum, and to make it easier for them to be deported. It must be stopped.
Lord Etherton (CB)
My Lords, I will speak to my Amendments 82, 84, 86, 90, 91 and 96. I would like to start by taking up the point about the so-called principle specified in Clause 25(2) of the Bill
“that minimal weight should be given to the evidence.”
I am not aware of such a principle. Of course, there can be times when time limits are imposed in a court—and perhaps it can be done by statute—for evidence to be delivered, and if it is not delivered by that time it is excluded. But once evidence is before the court, as the Minister will appreciate, it has to be taken into account even if the relevant evidence—it may be documentary evidence—has been obtained improperly, when it should not have been disclosed or it has been disclosed inadvertently. Once the evidence is there, it is taken into account and given such weight as it is due. We do not have a principle in this country, so far as I am aware, of simply saying that if evidence is late we are not going to have regard to it. That seems to be a denial of justice. I certainly support all those who have spoken against that so-called principle.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, for his introduction to the difficulties faced by minority groups, particularly LGBTQI groups, in relation to the giving of evidence. In deciding whether there is good cause for late evidence, or for failure to comply in a timely manner with a priority removal notice and so on, all my amendments—apart from one—put forward that there be, on the face of the Bill, a provision so that the difficulties and particular situations of people who have a protected innate or immutable characteristic must be taken into account. I went into this, your Lordships will remember, on Tuesday in relation to Clause 11, and there is no need for me to repeat it. It has been put very well by the noble Lords, Lord Coaker and Lord Cashman.
Apart from all the difficulties of having discreet, secret lives—particularly in the case of the LGBTQI community—and therefore perhaps not having any evidence as such, seeking information when it is required, and corroboration, from people back in the country from which asylum seekers come poses great difficulties. An asylum seeker will not want to implicate his or her family or friends, because they could suffer as a result. There are all sorts of adverse consequences as a result of conduct that is disapproved of in the many countries that proscribe sex between same-sex couples. There is a combination of a whole variety of things, in addition to all those other points made by people about the difficulty of coming to terms with one’s sexuality.
The same applies for single women. They have many similar problems: the shame of having left an abusive relationship, the shame on the family, the consequences for the family, the clandestine nature necessarily required for those women to come here—and then they may face a male authoritative figure. All these grave difficulties have to be taken into account.
I explained why this ought to be on the face of the Bill, despite the fact that the noble Baroness the Minister said it would all be dealt with in guidance, because, as the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, said, the record of the Home Office in relation to this is not good. I gave the statistics on Clause 11 earlier this week. In 2018, 29% of LGBTQI applicants were permitted asylum, but on appeal, taking the average from 2015 to 2018, nearly 40% of the appeals succeeded. That reality reflects the grave difficulties and the disbelief faced by these desperate people. That is why noble Lords will see in those amendments—apart from one; I will come to Amendment 91—that they are all to do with putting on the face of the Bill the need to take into account, wherever there is a reference to reasonable cause or what is practicable, the particular protected characteristic of the asylum seeker.
The one that is different is Amendment 91, which is one of the two amendments I have to Clause 22. Clause 22 provides for a new Section 82A to be inserted into the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 and provides for “Expedited appeal to Upper Tribunal in certain cases”. For there to be an expedited appeal, the Secretary of State has to
“certify P’s right of appeal”—
that is, the person served with the priority removal notice—as being appropriate
“unless satisfied that there were good reasons for P making the claim on or after the PRN cut-off date (and P’s right of appeal may not be certified if the Secretary of State is satisfied that there were good reasons)”.
What is important is that, whatever the Secretary of State has to be satisfied about, they should be reasonably satisfied. My amendment is to impose a requirement that the Secretary of State can certify the right of appeal under this clause only if satisfied on reasonable grounds, so that there is some principle that can be examined in the light of the particular facts of the case.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, as my noble friend Lady Hamwee explained, Clause 17 has the potential for time limits to be placed on the submission of evidence in support of an asylum claim. I am immediately reminded of the criminal caution in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, which says:
“You do not have to say anything. But, it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court.”
There is no time limit, you notice. I accept it is not a perfect analogy, because we have already established that asylum seekers are not illegal immigrants and, as my noble friend Lady Hamwee said, this should be an inquisitorial process not an adversarial one.
In this context, a notice served on a claimant saying something along the lines of “It may harm your claim if you do not provide evidence in support of your claim as soon as it is becomes available” seems reasonable. As in criminal cases, it should be left to the court, or in this case the tribunal, to place whatever weight it thinks appropriate on the evidence based on when it was submitted, and if it considers that the timing of submissions reflects on the credibility of the claimant or not. Placing a deadline for the submission of evidence seems completely arbitrary and unreasonable, hence Amendments 78 to 81. How long it takes to secure, collate, and submit evidence will be different in every case, and may be especially delayed in the case of vulnerable claimants for the reasons we discussed on Tuesday, and the reasons noble Lords have explained this afternoon, hence Amendments 78 and 82. Even if the Government want to instruct officials, why not do this through the Immigration Rules, as has always been done?
The rest of Clauses 17 and 18 seem superfluous. To instruct a judicial body by primary legislation what conclusions it must come to when it is presented with evidence appears unnecessary, unreasonable and unconstitutional. I say that not knowing anything about the constitution, but thinking in terms of separation of powers between Executive and judiciary.
Clauses 19, 20 and 21 relate to priority removal notices. These too set an arbitrary deadline that must be complied with—in this case, after which a person is liable to be removed and deported. I say that, but Clause 20(4) says:
“A priority removal notice remains in force … even if the PRN recipient ceases to be liable to … deportation”.
Amendment 87 asks why that is. I am guessing that it is to avoid having to serve a separate evidence notice.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Wolfson of Tredegar) (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate, which has ranged fairly widely. I will try to cover everything in my response. I start with Amendments 77, 89, 90B and 95A, which were spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, on behalf of Lord Rosser.
We acknowledge that there may be many good reasons why an individual is not able to comply with either the requirements of an evidence notice or the requirements of a priority removal notice. We also accept that those good reasons may often be linked to the trauma that they have suffered. Where such reasons exist, they will be fully considered by decision-makers on a case-by-case basis and thereafter by the judicial system, should a claimant appeal the refusal of a human rights or protection claim.
The key point here is that every claim is unique; that is trite to say but none the less true. I therefore suggest it is correct that case-by-case scrutiny is given to all individuals. The good reasons test therefore takes into account objective factors, such as difficulties in obtaining evidence, but it would also include subjective factors, such as an individual’s particular vulnerabilities—related perhaps to their sexual orientation, as the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, mentioned; gender identity; or, indeed, mental and physical health. I suggest that the good reasons test, which I think is appropriate, means that Amendment 77 is unnecessary.
To respond specifically to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Cashman, who invited me to parse or gloss what good reasons are and are not, I respectfully say that the test is deliberately open, not circumscribed, to ensure that all relevant factors in the individual case can be considered. Specifically, I can confirm that LGBTQ+ protections will be dealt with in guidance that specifically addresses good reasons and how they may relate to LGBTQ persons and issues, because of course you can have an LGBTQ issue even if you yourself are not LGBTQ.
Further, under Amendment 77, a vulnerable individual who did not fall within the specified groups listed in the amendment may nevertheless be served with an evidence notice. If they provided late evidence, a decision would be needed on whether or not they had good reasons for that lateness; whereas at the same time an individual who happened to fall within the categories set out in the amendment would be free to raise evidence at any time. For reasons that may be entirely unconnected with the reason for their exemption, they would none the less be automatically free from any disadvantage under the system or the consequences in the legislation, based on what is essentially something of a tick-box exercise. I suggest that that would be unfair.
The noble Lord, Lord Coaker, asked how the test would apply to children. This was taken up by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, speaking also on behalf of the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins. Guidance will be published setting out how decision-makers should consider the age of the child in the exercise of their discretion. This should be obvious but let me state it from the Dispatch Box anyway: evidence provided by a child will be considered in the light of their age, degree of mental development, and maturity, currently and at all material times previously. As part of our obligations under the public sector equality duty, as the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, said, equality impact assessments have been completed in respect of these clauses. Those assessments incorporate a consideration of the impacts on children.
We are concerned that Amendment 77 could also lead to perverse outcomes, whereby individuals who do not fall into one of the categories identified by the amendment could abuse the process by falsely claiming that they did. That would perpetuate the issues that these clauses are designed to address, to the detriment of genuine claimants, undermining their usefulness.
For similar reasons, Amendments 90B and 95A are unnecessary and would confuse the test to determine the acceptable reasons for something being raised late in response to an evidence notice or a priority removal notice. Unlike the good reasons test, which is fair and is an established principle in the assessment of credibility of an asylum or human rights claim, an unclear and, at least in practice, a rather subjective test of “fairness” risks inconsistent decision-making, which could lead to an increase in uncertainty for both decision-makers and claimants. For those reasons, I invite the noble Baroness to not move her amendments.
Amendment 89 introduces a requirement to publish guidance on good reasons within 30 days of the Bill receiving Royal Assent. This is an arbitrary deadline which is not necessary to include in the Bill. I have already said that good reasons will be set out in published guidance for decision-makers. This will be made available when the measures come into force. The amendment does not assist those in genuine need of protection and would in fact limit the discretion of decision-makers and undermine the effectiveness of the priority removal notices. For those reasons, I invite the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, to not move those various amendments.
I turn to Amendments 84, 90 and 96. In accordance with the public sector equality duty, protected characteristics must be considered by decision-makers when they are considering good reasons for lateness following service of an evidence notice or a priority removal notice. However, it is not intended that the good reasons are limited to the characteristics listed in Chapter 1 of the Equality Act 2010. For example, mental health issues or past trauma do not amount to a disability under the Act, but they will also be considered. These may be as important, perhaps even more important, than a protected characteristic in determining whether or not someone has a good reason for lateness. Therefore, the amendment is not only unnecessary but could have the unwanted effect of leading decision-makers to believe that they should be prioritising a narrower range of factors than those already intended within the Bill itself. I invite that amendment to be not moved.
I turn to Amendment 85, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Green of Deddington, and my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe. Again, I associate myself with the remarks of other noble Lords: we wish her well. Clause 18 adds two new behaviours to the existing credibility provisions in Section 8 of the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Act 2004. It introduces the principles that providing late evidence without good reason or not acting in good faith should be damaging to the claimant’s credibility. Where there are good reasons for providing late evidence, that will not impact on their credibility.
The concept that certain conduct should be damaging to credibility is not new. Decision-makers must consider egregious conduct by the claimant, and it is then open to the Home Office decision-maker or the court to decide the extent to which credibility should subsequently be damaged. The good-faith requirement is intended to address behaviours such as those mentioned in the amendment, as well as any other behaviours that a deciding authority thinks are not in good faith. Therefore, there is no need, I would suggest, to single out, as this amendment does, particular behaviours to highlight them specifically.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
My Lords, is the Minister saying that in practice—I hope he is—if someone has quite clearly destroyed their documents, that will be taken into account when considering their claim?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
I really do not want —as I said earlier—to get into a position of glossing the wording of the Bill. It is very important that decision-makers and the courts are able to look at the Act—I hope that it will become an Act—and not my gloss on it. What they will have to do is to ask themselves whether there are good reasons or other circumstances, and whether the claimant acted in good faith. Those are the tests which they will have to apply. Although it is tempting to do so, I am going to resist the temptation to say that this would be included and that would not be included, because my underlying point is that this has to be assessed on a proper case-by-case basis and the statutory tests applied. I am going to leave it there, because I think I have said it clearly enough.
Let me now turn to Amendment 86A in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. For the priority removal notice to achieve its objective and operate efficiently, it is essential that those who receive the notice should raise any relevant claims and provide information and evidence before the date specified in the notice. That is to ensure that all claims can be considered sufficiently in advance of the person’s removal, reducing the extent to which removal can be frustrated, and to allow those, on the other hand, in need of international protection to be identified and supported as early as possible. For individuals who have received a priority removal notice, there will be standard timescales for recipients to respond, which will be set out in guidance. Guidance for decision-makers will also set out the circumstances where it would be appropriate for these timescales to be adjusted or extended.
When considering whether to extend the standard timescale, decision-makers will be required to take into account a wide range of factors and will not just be limited to the recipient’s experience of, or alleged experience of, sexual or gender-based violence or torture, or modern slavery or trafficking. The approach is certainly not arbitrary, to use the noble Baroness’s word. The guidance will, therefore, actually go further than these amendments and will require decision-makers to consider a wider range of issues when determining what is a reasonable and fair timescale for an individual to be able properly to respond to a PRN. For those reasons, I invite the noble Baroness not to press her amendment.
It should also be noted, while I am on this point, that all recipients of a PRN will receive a legal aid advice offer to support them in responding to the notice. Having experience of sexual or gender-based violence or torture, or modern slavery or trafficking, does not necessarily mean—I underline the word “necessarily”; I do not want to be taken out of context here—that an individual will acquire additional time or a longer period to respond. There are many factors and reasons why an individual may require additional time to respond. Again, each case has to be looked at on its own circumstances. Therefore, we need to adopt a case-by-case approach, and not the approach set out in this amendment.
Turning now to Amendment 87, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, a person who has been issued with a priority removal notice can be subject to the conditions of the notice while it remains in force. That is a 12-month period after the cut-off date or, where a claim is received prior to the cut-off, the 12-month period after they have exhausted their appeal rights. We suggest that that is a reasonable period, which recognises that personal circumstances can change over time.
Lord Etherton (CB)
Is the Minister able to give an assurance that this guidance, which has been referred to a great deal, rather than putting what I would describe as cautionary provisions in the Act itself, will be ready before the Act comes into force and will be made sufficiently public so that there can be discussion and consideration of it by the general public?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I think I was asked a similar question, in a different context, on the police Bill. I will give the same answer, not least because I am conscious that a lot of these provisions are actually Home Office provisions. I can assure the noble and learned Lord that I will write to him with the answer to that question, so that when this matter comes back he will be in possession of the answer—rather than make an educated guess, which might turn out to be slightly inaccurate, from the Dispatch Box. I hope that is sufficient.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, on that very important point, perhaps the Minister will take back to the Home Office that this Committee would very much like the guidance to be published in draft form in good time so that Members of the House and others can look at it.
Lord Paddick (LD)
I am sorry for interrupting, but I am becoming a little confused again, I am afraid, probably because we have been at this for a very long time and it is very late and so forth. Is the Minister saying that the deadline that is set for the submission of evidence will be set on a case-by-case basis, for example, if the applicant is particularly vulnerable? If vulnerabilities come to notice that were not initially brought to the notice of the decision-maker, will the deadline then be adjusted and perhaps extended as a consequence of that? Although there might be general guidance about what the deadline might be in every case, is it movable and adjustable in every case and might it be adjusted further as the case progresses? In which case, why on earth is this part of the Bill?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
Let me come to that point in a second. First, let me say that I almost took it as implicit in the request from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, that the Committee would like to have the guidance, but I have heard the point made, and I will certainly pass it on. I do not want to go over points I have already made, and I think when the noble Lord looks in Hansard, he will see that I have set out quite clearly why, first, we need to have a system whereby, in particular cases, the date can be extended or adjusted, but also, secondly, why that does not undercut the principle of actually having a date and having this structure. However, I am very happy to look again at what the noble Lord has just said. If, having read it, it seems to me that I can add to what I have already said, I will; otherwise, I respectfully direct him to what I said earlier.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
It may be that, because it has been a long day, I have missed something, or it may be that I have jumped the gun and the Minister was about to come to this point, but I have not yet heard the justification for having Clause 25 at all.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
There are a number of ways of skinning this particular cat because there are separate amendments but common themes. If when I am about to sit down, I have not dealt with it fully, I am sure the noble Baroness will intervene, but I will try to come to Clause 25 head on.
However, I was going to go next to Amendments 82A and 82B, both in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. Different elements of Section 8 of the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Act 2004 have different thresholds in how they are applied to the facts of a case and how credibility is consequently damaged. Clause 18 is drafted to take this into account, so that decision-makers will take into account the relevant thresholds on a case-by-case basis. Clause 18 will encourage claimants to engage with the process in good faith and, along with the measures relating to late evidence in Clauses 17 and 25, to provide evidence in support of their claim at the earliest opportunity. As I said earlier, we think that by encouraging people to bring all their evidence upfront in protection or human rights claims, we can protect those who need protection and identify any unmeritorious claims as early as possible.
Turning to Amendment 82B, the good faith requirement is intended, as I think is obvious, to address behaviours that a deciding authority thinks are not in good faith. Where an individual who makes a protection or human rights claim exhibits a pattern of non-compliant behaviour during their dealings with immigration authorities, their credibility should be damaged to reflect that behaviour. It is also designed to stop claimants deliberately obstructing the one-stop and expedited judicial process—for example, by not taking up our enhanced legal aid offer and then making a last-minute claim based on lack of access to legal advice. The good faith requirement therefore goes further than the behaviours currently described in Section 8 of the 2004 Act. It puts beyond doubt that past behaviour that is deliberately designed to frustrate or delay proceedings should be damaging to the claimant’s credibility. We think that is right, for the reasons I have outlined.
I turn to Amendments 83 and 88, which would remove the credibility provisions in Clauses 18 and 21. For the reasons that I set out earlier, we think that it is entirely reasonable to require evidence in support of a protection of human rights claim, or a claim of being a victim of modern slavery, to be provided in a timely manner, unless there are good reasons why that is not possible.
However, I underline that a person’s credibility is not necessarily determinative of their claim under the current rules and procedures, and the Bill does not change that. Decision-makers will still be required to consider credibility in the round, as they currently do, and, where a person has raised evidence late, which causes delay and wasted resource, it is right that decision-makers consider whether there is any merit in the reasons for that lateness.
I turn now to Amendment 90A, again in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. We recognise that, due to an person’s individual circumstances, it may be harder for them to provide material in a timely manner. Since this is essentially an amendment to Amendment 90 in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, I respectfully direct the noble Baroness to the response that I gave to the noble and learned Lord.
As I am on the noble and learned Lord’s amendments, I will now deal with Amendment 91 on reasonable grounds. It is right that, where an individual has been assessed as a priority for removal or deportation, they should avail themselves of the associated legal aid advice offer and provide any matters listed within Clause 19(3)(a) before the cut-off date and they should provide reasons for lateness where a late claim is raised, under subsection (7).
Decision-makers cannot reasonably be expected to speculate on or investigate why an individual who has received a removal notice and associated legal aid advice offer would raise a late protection or human rights claim. If no reasons for lateness are provided, or if the reasons provided are not considered to be good reasons, it would be clear to the decision-maker that any appeal must be subject to the expedited appeals process. In answer to the noble and learned Lord, I say that the good reasons test is adequate and sufficient.
The clause already provides significant safeguards for recipients of a PRN in the form of the legal aid advice provision and the good reasons test for individuals who raise late claims. I set out earlier what those good reasons can amount to. It is a very open-ended test. Therefore, I respectfully suggest to the noble and learned Lord that the amendment is unnecessary and, indeed, would risk complicating an otherwise straightforward and, I suggest, suitable test.
I turn now to Amendment 95 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Coussins, but spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister. By introducing a statutory requirement to provide evidence before a specified date, the Bill redresses the current balance. It is right that decision-makers should have regard to the principle —I underline “principle”—that minimal weight is given to evidence that is late, following receipt of either an evidence notice or a priority removal notice, without good reason.
I will come to the thrust of Clause 25 in a second, but I will first say that this amendment would place an obligation on decision-makers, not only in the Home Office but also the judiciary, to accept that there were good reasons for late evidence in all asylum and human rights cases where either the claimant or the claim type fell into one of the listed categories. That would remove the requirement that decision-makers should have regard to the principle that minimal weight should be given to the evidence. That would be the case even if the reason for lateness was wholly unconnected to the category of claim or the personal factors. No causal link between the two is set out in the amendment. I respectfully suggest that that is overly prescriptive and would tie the hands of the decision-maker. Of course, in all cases, the decision-maker can take these matters into account—
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
It is not my amendment so maybe it could be worded better. The noble Lord gave great emphasis to the case-by-case basis earlier, which sounds very reasonable, and he talked about subjective factors. Has he read the recent research from the British Red Cross about women seeking asylum? It found that frequently their claims are met with disbelief and they are not treated very well at all. There is a lack of recognition of gender-based violence that they may be fleeing from, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, talked about earlier. I suggest that the noble Lord and those responsible for this clause look at this research, because I worry about putting so much emphasis on subjective factors and the case-by-case basis.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
I think I have received the email from the Red Cross, as I think it emailed everyone. I have set up a folder for all these briefings, so I do not want to say that I have read it, but if I have been sent it I certainly have it and will read it. However, due to pressures of other business, I cannot say that I have read all the material yet.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
I absolutely understand—I do not think it was in its general briefing, but it produced a separate report last week or the week before, and it is worth looking at.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
In that case, I will certainly read it over the weekend. I know that those in the Home Office responsible for this area are obviously looking at the debate and will have picked up what the noble Baroness has said.
I was just dealing with Amendment 95, after which I will come to Clause 25 itself. I lost count of how many times the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, used the word “tawdry”. It really is not, if I may say so. We obviously disagree, and I will make no comparisons either to parking fines or international commercial litigation. At one point it seemed to me that the noble Baroness was saying that, on the one hand, this clause was terrible and, on the other, that this is what tribunals do in any event and we can trust them to do the right thing.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
I am saying that, if we trust—as I am sure the Government do—immigration officers, the Secretary of State, the First-tier Tribunal, et cetera, to be intelligent, effective operators in the system, they are by definition capable of looking at late evidence on a case-by-case, open-textured, well-reasoned basis and determining those occasions where there is a good reason and those where there is not. That goes without saying, so why do we have to have this diktat in the Bill, with “must” give it “minimal weight”? I suspect it is because, as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, suggested, the Government are trying to dictate to the tribunals in particular what is and is not a good reason. That is the sinister aspect of this. It is also impractical, because you then have to have arguments about what is and is not a good reason. I promise the Minister that this will be litigated ad nauseam. It would be better, as he said to other noble Lords, to leave this to open-textured judgment and decision-makers who are capable of applying it.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
As regards the in terrorem threat that things will be litigated ad nauseam, I am tempted to say that that is not really a change from the current position. More substantively, and with respect, to say that the clause sets out that the tribunal “must give … minimal weight” to the evidence, as the noble Baroness just put it, is not what it does at all.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
It does not do that either.
It does not say that the tribunal “must give the evidence minimal weight”; it says that the tribunal
“must, in considering it, have regard to the principle that minimal weight should be given to the evidence”.
The tribunal is perfectly entitled to say, “Well, we’ve looked at that principle. Actually, we’re not going to apply it here”—for reasons A, B and C. There is no requirement and no fettering of the tribunal; there is no compulsion that the evidence be given minimal weight. What the decision-maker has to do is have regard to the principle that minimal weight should be given to any late evidence unless there are good reasons why it is provided late.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
I promise that this is my final intervention on the Minister, but I do not understand why we have to have the provision at all. He is saying that it is perfectly open-textured enough, that good reasons do not have to be specified in the Bill because the Government are not going to put glosses on it or be overly prescriptive, that they can be objective good reasons or subjective good reasons, that it is only about having regard to the new principle that they are inventing et cetera. Why have this at all?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
It is because there is absolutely nothing wrong with Parliament saying to a tribunal, “We want you to have regard to this principle, but of course the final decision is yours”. We do that in other areas of the law as well. As the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, kindly said, I gave evidence yesterday to her committee in what I hope was an interesting session. One thing we talked about was Section 12 of the Human Rights Act. The layout there was not a million miles away from this. It too gives a very clear direction to the court, but ultimately it is the court’s decision. I find it slightly surprising that, on the one hand, the noble Baroness is saying that this is tawdry and dreadful but, on the other, is saying, “Actually, you don’t need it all because the same result is going to eventuate”. Both points cannot be right at the same time.
As we all know, the asylum and the legal systems in this regard are overwhelmed. We see repeated unmeritorious claims at the very last minute designed to delay removal. This clause is a proper part of an overall system to make sure that we give protection to those who need it—I always put that first; that is the most important thing—and at the same time to identify unmeritorious claims.
Finally, Amendment 137 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, and spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, seeks to implement a recommendation made by the JCHR in its ninth report. Of course, we welcome the JCHR’s positive comments on Clause 45. Migrants who are subject to removal must be given sufficient opportunity to access justice. The clause improves and enhances the status quo. It gives a statutory guarantee that migrants will receive a minimum notice period of five working days. As a result, some migrants will get more time compared to the current policy. It introduces a separate statutory requirement for a notice of departure details to be provided to the migrant before removal.
On a practical level, Clause 45 will be supplemented by policy guidance that accords further respect to the common-law right to access to justice. I say respectfully that it is not clear to me what deficiency in Clause 45 Amendment 137 tries to address. I would genuinely welcome engagement from the noble Baroness and the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, to identify what offending aspects of Clause 45 there may be and how Amendment 137 would solve them.
Therefore, having taken probably too much of the Committee’s time already, I invite the various noble Lords to consider not pressing their amendments.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this very important debate. I also thank the Minister. Yes, it was a long reply, but it was an important one and it did not take up too much time. Sometimes long replies are needed, and the Minister was right to take the time that he took to respond. There are a large number of points on which I could reply to the Minister, but it is clear that we will have to come back to some of them on Report.
If the Minister does not mind me chiding him slightly, I will say that that was a bit of a “no worries, no problem” defence: “Everything is fine. It will all be sorted in guidance, although we will not see it until some future time. Do not worry about the children problem that the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, raised, because we have all taken into account the sensitivity of children and how old they are. Do not worry about LGBTQI because they will all be very reasonable. Do not worry about the good reasons either—it will all be sorted. Good reasons mean good reasons. Nobody will do anything about it if the reasons are good.”
One example where the Minister was in trouble at the end essentially concerned Clause 25(2). When is a principle not a principle? Is it a principle when it is written down? I love the phrase “have regard to”; it is always put in. The Minister said that we do not have to take X or Y into account. In a sense, he agreed with the JCHR that a better word would be “may” instead of “must”. This is quite a significant change—something may be taken into account, or it may not be. At the moment, it says “must”. This is the problem with which he was trying to wrestle—first, whether there is a principle at all, and secondly, whether “may” or “must” should be used.
The Government are seeking to deal with the problem that the asylum system is in chaos. Half the decisions are overturned on appeal. Panic has broken out. The Government say, “We cannot have this. The public are going mad. Everybody is dissatisfied. We will get more and more of this. Everyone is making late appeals. They are not abiding by the rules. We have to do something.” A whole series of new measures is being taken to overcome a bureaucratic problem. In the end, it needs good—probably trained—decision-making, speedily done, to get a system that works. The Government will not address the very real problem in the Bill, particularly in respect of late priority notices, except on a piece of paper. In a year or two or three, there will be a Nationality and Borders Bill mark 2. If they are not careful, whoever is in government—I hope it will be a different Government—will be panicking in the face of it not working. They will bring in other measures.
Much of what has quite rightly been raised by noble Lords across the Chamber will have to be revisited on Report. I thank the Minister again for his courtesy and for the time and trouble he took to try to respond. Finally, the sooner we have a look at the guidance, the better. It is very frustrating when the Government say that they will publish the guidance and it is published after the Bill is passed. We deserve to see the guidance as soon as possible. I would be very grateful if the Minister could pass this on. I seek leave to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, I have put my name to the proposal that Clauses 22 and 23 should not stand part of the Bill. When I first saw the term “expedited appeals”, my antennae twitched. It sounds such a benign and helpful term but then so did “detained fast track”—the accelerated process for considering asylum claims introduced in 2002, involving detention immediately after the asylum screening interview, which was followed shortly by the substantive interview, with a decision the following day and two days to appeal. The High Court found that the DFT, as operated, carried
“an unacceptably high risk of unfairness”
to vulnerable or potentially vulnerable applicants, and to that extent it found it to be unlawful, and the Home Office eventually suspended it. Expedited appeals are not the same but some of the issues are really quite similar.
As we have been discussing, the Bill of course provides for priority removal notices to be served on anyone liable for removal or deportation; we have discussed the cut-off date for the provision of evidence. However, it does not set out the factors that may lead to a PRN being issued. That is left solely to Home Office guidance. I support what the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, just said about needing to see guidance—but only so far because guidance, by definition, can be changed and although we may be reassured in February 2022, come February 2025 things might look quite different, with the same Government or another Government producing rather different guidance.
Listening to the previous debate, I was concerned that for an appropriate date to be set, the Home Office needs to know whether somebody is vulnerable, but it will know that only after the event of the notice. I understand the difficulty of trying to start without a starting point, which is the point that the Minister was making. Without a date, you cannot look further, but the extension of that is important. I found it quite difficult to follow all that. I am mentioning it now because it is part and parcel of the same issue and certainly Hansard will require careful reading.
The PRN will remain in force until 12 months after the cut-off date or exhaustion of appeal rights. We have talked about whether or not there is a principle. Clause 22 provides for an expedited appeal route for appellants who have been served a PRN and have made a claim on or after the cut-off date but while the PRN is still in force. In that circumstance, the Secretary of State may “certify”—an interesting term in itself—that any right of appeal against a Home Office refusal will be to the Upper Tribunal instead of the First-tier Tribunal. The Secretary of State can also certify that she or he is satisfied that there are good reasons for making the claim on or after the date. I cannot think of an alternative to what is probably an inappropriate term about being judge and jury in your own case, but I think noble Lords will understand what I mean.
The result of an appeal being certified is that one tier of appeal—the First-tier Tribunal—is lost. Under the Bill, the rules must provide for expedited appeals in the Upper Tribunal to be determined more quickly than an ordinary appeal in the First-tier Tribunal and allow for the Upper Tribunal to make an order that the expedited appeals process may—I stress “may”—not apply
“if it is satisfied that is the only way to secure that justice is done in the case of a particular expedited appeal”.
When someone is subject to the expedited process, Clause 23 provides that any other appeals they may have, for instance
“in respect of protection and human rights claims … deprivation of citizenship … EU citizens’ rights”
and so on, are dealt with as a related expedited appeal.
Ousting the jurisdiction of the Court of Appeal, and so prohibiting an appeal from a first-instance decision, is clearly a significant matter. It would give no one the right of appeal to the Court of Appeal and, necessarily, not to the Supreme Court afterwards either. As we have discussed, the appeals concerned involve international protection rights, human rights, European Union and EEA citizens’ rights and the deprivation of citizenship, all areas where the UK has bound itself to abide by international agreements. For such a fundamental right as the right not to be sent back to a country where one is at risk of persecution to be excluded from an onward appeal to the Court of Appeal—even if the decision of the Upper Tribunal contains an error of law or a breach of natural justice—is extraordinary. This is not a criticism of the Upper Tribunal in any way; it is just not how things should be done. Removing Clauses 22 and 23 would leave the existing appeals structure in place.
How will one challenge Upper Tribunal decisions if these clauses stand? My noble friend made a caveat about the use of “constitutionality” but I think that it applies here, as well as on the impact on the rule of law. The Constitution Committee of your Lordships’ House said in its report:
“The House may wish to consider the effect of clause 23 on the functioning of the appeals process and consequently on access to justice.”
That is quite strong stuff for a Lords committee.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, I apologise but, in the war of attrition that this Bill has become, we seem to have lost any contributions other than from the Liberal Democrats and the Labour Front Bench.
Bearing that in mind, I will add to what my noble friend said rather than repeat anything she said. This clause smacks of the Home Office trying to remove or deport people before they have had a reasonable chance to appeal against a removal or deportation decision. No doubt it is embarrassing when repeated stories emerge of government charter flights taking off almost empty because the courts ruled that the majority of those with a seat on the plane should not be deported, but the answer is not to deport them before they have a reasonable chance to put their case before the courts. The answer is to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the Home Office to ensure that there is a cast-iron case for deportation that cannot be overturned in the courts at the last minute. Yet again, the Bill focuses on the wrong solution to the problem.
I am sure the Minister will agree that as the Home Office becomes better at making its decisions and more and more appeals are turned down, as opposed to the current situation where the majority are accepted by the tribunals, there will be fewer appeals as lawyers say to their clients “Look at what’s happening now. There’s absolutely no point in appealing.” That is the answer to this problem, not Clauses 22 and 23.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
My Lords, the Bill’s system of penalisation includes curtailing appeal rights, as set out in Clauses 22 and 23. These clauses create an expedited appeal route for those who have been served with a priority removal notice and who have provided evidence or a claim after the PRN cut-off date. Most importantly, the right of appeal would be limited to the Upper Tribunal. However, where a person provides a good reason for lateness, they will not be subject to this clause.
Clause 23 wraps certain other appeals a person may have into the expedited appeals process, further restricting appeal rights. The Government say the reason this clause is needed is prevent delaying tactics, remove incentives for late claims and protect the system from abuse. It is probably fair to say that in this Bill, where so much of it is driven by the party-political considerations of the Government, they will be part of the so-called lefty-lawyers amendments—we have one or two others—who seem to have become the bête noire as far as this Government are concerned.
As has been said, I have added my name to the clause stand parts to Clauses 22 and 23, to start, at least, to probe concerns that have been raised about these provisions. The Law Society, the Public Law Project and Justice have recommended that these clauses be removed from the Bill. The UNHCR has raised legal concerns. I suggest that these are not concerns the Government should take lightly.
The UNHCR has said the expedited appeals process, as designed under Clause 22, risks “miscarriages of justice”. Its legal observations agree, as do we, that accelerated processes can be appropriate for
“manifestly unfounded or repeat claims, as long as they are sufficiently flexible and contain adequate safeguards to ensure that they can be determined fairly and justly.”
The UNHCR is, though, entirely clear that appeals
“should not be accelerated … for reasons that are unrelated to their merits.”
The widespread expediting of appeals under these sections is, in the words of the UNHCR, “arbitrary” and
“unrelated to considerations of justice or efficiency.”
It risks people having their human rights violated as a result of a truncated appeals process for asylum claims. The incorrect decision can cost an individual their safety, security and livelihood.
Clause 23 is particularly troubling on the “arbitrary” point as it joins certain pre-existing appeals to the expedited process, even where they pre-date the priority removal notice and were made entirely on time. I ask the Government: what in this clause actually targets the expedited process on vexatious and unmerited claims? That is the reason Ministers give for why the clause is needed but, as far as I can see, it is not what the clause as drafted achieves.
I will make a couple of further points. First, the Public Law Project has said that making a system quicker is patently not the same as making it efficient. In order to be efficient, a system must move both more quickly and more accurately.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, in the last group I spoke at some length. This time I hope to be more brief. The principles have been discussed in some other groups and the points at issue are of relatively narrow ambit, although they are important.
Clause 22 creates a new expedited appeal that will be heard in the Upper Tribunal. Too often, those facing removal or deportation utilise delay tactics to thwart removal action, such as withholding relevant information in their initial claim, which can be used later if they are first refused, resulting in late and repeated claims and subsequent appeals. That is both costly and an unfair burden on the courts and tribunals system. With this clause, appeals in relation to late human rights or protection claims brought by recipients of a PRN are determined quickly, with decisions being final. That removes the incentive for bringing late claims.
Where a person provides good reasons for a late claim, their right of appeal will not be certified as an expedited appeal. Furthermore, the Committee will note in Clause 22(5) that the Upper Tribunal retains discretion and when it considers that the only way that justice can be done in an individual appeal is to remit to the First-tier Tribunal, that is what it will do. Therefore, while I agree with the noble Lords, Lord Paddick and Lord Rosser, that better decision-making is important and certainly part of the answer, I do not accept the implication of their contributions, that it is the only answer. This is also an important thing that we can do to improve the system.
Clause 23 works together with Clause 22 to ensure that individuals cannot utilise the appeal system as a tool for delay. Clause 22 provides expedited appeals to be determined quickly and finally by the Upper Tribunal. There may be additional rights generated by other claims that an individual may want to exercise in parallel with an expedited appeal. Those other appeals might usually be heard in the First-tier Tribunal. Therefore, without Clause 23, an expedited appeal might have concluded but there would be an outstanding appeal in the First-tier Tribunal, which would prevent removal. Clause 23 provides that the other related appeals will be heard by the Upper Tribunal at the same time, so provides a suitable one-stop shop. Again, there is a safeguard to ensure that in cases where the Upper Tribunal thinks that justice can be done only by continuing the appeal in the First-Tier Tribunal, it can do that. That is the burden of Clause 23(7).
For those reasons, which are brief but, I hope, persuasive, I beg to move that Clause 22 stand part of the Bill.
Baroness Ludford
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would give effect to the recommendation of the Joint Committee on Human Rights to amend the Bill to provide those receiving a slavery or human trafficking information notice with an equivalent amount of civil legal services support as for those receiving a priority removal notice.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, as I said in an earlier group, the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, who is the lead signatory of these amendments, could not stay so I am moving our amendments in this and the last group.
Clauses 65 and 66 amend LASPO—the Legal Aid, Sentencing and something Act—to allow for people already in receipt of legal aid for an immigration, asylum or human rights claim, under the exceptional case determination procedure, to receive legal aid advice in relation to a referral into the national referral mechanism, whereby they seek a positive reasonable grounds decision as a potential victim of slavery or human trafficking.
However, these provisions help only victims who already receive legal aid and know how to ask for it. It does not cover all victims. Exceptional case funding for legal aid is very difficult to secure in practice, so Clauses 65 and 66 will help only a small number of people, not least, as the Anti-slavery Commissioner has noted, because it requires a lot of time-consuming work up front to get that exceptional case funding and the solicitor is paid only if the application is successful.
The Joint Committee on Human Rights supports the request of the Anti-slavery Commissioner that legal aid advice of seven hours—or preferably more, as my noble friend’s Amendment 94A probes—should also be available to those in receipt of a slavery or trafficking notice in the same way as for those in receipt of a priority removal notice, to avoid victims of severe trauma remaining unidentified and unassisted. The Joint Committee on Human Rights, like others in Parliament, as I know from these Benches, has also repeatedly expressed its concern about legal aid deserts, but that is a wider debate. I beg to move.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, I have Amendment 94A in this group. I am sorry that I could not respond to the Minister on the previous group, but I am sure we will come back to that. I was going to observe that the Chamber seemed largely to have cleared, possibly because other noble Lords could not bear this Bill any longer today, but some noble Lords have rejoined us.
It is clearly better that legal aid is available than not, but I am aware, as my noble friend is, of the shortage of provision and some of the problems here. I would say that it is not a matter for today, but actually it probably is. It is very significant, because the words in the Bill will not provide the advice. The Minister has referred two or three times very confidently to the legal aid offer; we are concerned to ensure that that offer has substance.
I have heard over the years of the difficulties of solicitors—if you can find one—advising and taking instructions in immigration removal centres, with the restrictions there on time, of 30 minutes eaten into by the client having to be fetched and then returned. I do not need to say again, but I will in one sentence, that the client often needs a lot of time over a period to tell his or her story.
My amendment seeks to understand how the Government have landed on seven hours. The Minister gently chided me for the use of the term “arbitrary” before. I will acknowledge that my proposal of 20 hours is arbitrary, but it is my way of probing why the Bill provides for seven hours. I asked ILPA whether that would be sufficient, and the reply was:
“I do not think seven hours of legal aid is sufficient to advise on the notice, the person’s immigration status, the lawfulness of removal, and immigration detention. The immigration system is complex, and the Bill makes it more complex through the expedited processes, priority notices, and new definitions/standards … It is also of concern”
that the Bill
“would allow a power to alter that 7 hour time limit.”
There must have been evidence for coming to the seven hours. If that is so, what evidence would the Minister apply to reduce that figure—or indeed extend it? ILPA says it does not
“have a sense as to the specific number of hours needed for this advice, as it would be so case-specific,”
which is entirely understandable,
“including the immigration and procedural history of the case, novelty of any legal arguments, number of bases on which to raise a claim, the legality of detention”
and so on. So I hope that the Minister can flesh out this provision in the Bill so we can understand what the Government think can be achieved with the seven hours of scarce legal aid.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, we support the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, for the reasons my noble friend Lady Ludford has explained. As my noble friend Lady Hamwee has explained, Amendment 94A is not to replace one arbitrary number with another but to probe how much legal aid should be provided in such cases. The Minister described, in a previous group, how cases are of different complexity and how people will be given more time to secure and collate evidence if they are from a vulnerable background. For example, if they come from an LGBTQIA background, they are less likely to be able to acquire evidence quickly, and therefore, the date on the notice they are given would change even during the process. Surely that points to the fact that each and every case is different and will require a different amount of legal aid, depending on how much aid is needed to advise in each particular circumstance. I understand that people who are in this situation do need legal aid, but surely the number of hours should be as case-specific and flexible as the deadline date of any notice for them to submit their evidence.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
We too support the amendments we are debating. I suppose, in a sense, this clause is a rare section of the Bill, in that we welcome it but desire it to go much further, as has already been said. Amendment 94A is a probing amendment, but it is a very valid one, because, clearly, the Government have come to the view that the seven hours of support that will be available will be sufficient.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to all those who have contributed. These amendments obviously deal with matters of legal aid, and I remind the Committee that LASPO is the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act, just to put everybody out of their misery—otherwise they will not be able to sleep when they get home. I will be quick, but I will just make one point: with great respect to the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, this is not a matter of generosity. This is not about the Government being generous. I do not want to sound high-falutin’, but this is about the rule of law. Abiding by the rule of law is not a matter of generosity; it is simply non-negotiable, and this provision is in the Bill because it is a proper and necessary thing to do.
Amendment 93 and 94 seek to provide up to seven hours of free legal aid to individuals with a slavery or trafficking notice. They are unnecessary because existing legal aid rules will already ensure that individuals can receive more than seven hours of advice if they receive a slavery or trafficking notice. The key point to bear in mind—and I accept that this is complex—is that a slavery or trafficking notice can be issued only to individuals who have made a protection or human rights claim. That is relevant because it means that they are already within the immigration system and legal aid is already available in order to make that protection or human rights claim. So, in a case where an individual is in receipt of legal aid for their protection or human rights claim and they then receive a slavery or trafficking notice, they are already entitled to advice on that notice as part of their protection or human rights claim. Importantly, there is no limit on the number of hours that can be provided on someone’s protection or human rights claim. Legal advice is available until the matter is resolved, and it may well be for considerably more than the seven hours—or, indeed, 20 hours.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
I am really sorry, I know we are looking at the clock, but if I have understood it, and I am sure the Minister is briefed to the hilt, the problem is that he who has, gets more, as it were. If you are already in the asylum system and then you get the notice, you will get even more legal aid—but what if you have not already made a protection claim? What about those people?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
The noble Baroness must have had access to my notes, because that was just the point I was going to make. I have written down here that I know the Committee will ask about individuals who are not receiving legal aid for their protection or human rights claim—and sure enough, the Committee did. My answer is that there could be multiple reasons for an individual not receiving legal aid in those circumstances. The individual might not have passed the means or merits test, and those two tests, as the Committee will know, are there to ensure that legal aid is targeted at those most in need who cannot afford advice themselves. That is one possibility, and I will come back to that in a moment. Another possibility—and this does happen—is that the individual has just made an application to the Home Office by themselves and has not sorted out a lawyer. If so, I would strongly encourage them to seek out a legal aid lawyer, who would be able to provide more than the seven hours of advice that could be provided.
Turning to Amendment 94A, the short answer to why we have specified up to seven hours in Clause 24 is that a balance must be struck between giving free legal advice and using taxpayers’ money responsibly. Seven hours is intended to reflect that this is an opportunity for initial legal advice to help individuals understand what the notice is and what it is requiring them to. It is available on a non-means-tested and non-merits-tested basis. That means that anyone with a PRN is guaranteed access to legal aid for up to seven hours, but it does not mean that, after seven hours, there is no further access to legal aid. Some individuals will need further advice; it is not intended that seven hours will resolve every immigration issue. At the end of the seven hours, any individual who has an issue within the scope of the legal aid scheme and who passes the means and merits test will be eligible for ongoing legal advice funded by legal aid until the matter is resolved.
I am conscious that that gets us into the territory of means and merits tests. I answered an Oral Question in this area on Tuesday, when I said that there was a review of the means test under way at the moment, on which I have personally spent a lot of time. I hope very much that we will soon be able to go out for consultation on that. We are conducting a really thorough review of the means test.
Finally, I will address the noble Baroness’s concerns that the exceptional case funding scheme might not be up to standard. Respectfully, I disagree. That scheme is specifically designed to act as a safety net and to provide legal-aid funding to individuals who can demonstrate that, without it, their human rights might be breached. In 2019-20, of the immigration cases that applied for exceptional case funding, 80% were granted legal aid, so that shows that the system works. We are continuing to work with legal aid practitioners and the Legal Aid Agency to improve the scheme if we can.
For the reasons that I have set out, I hope that the noble Baroness, speaking also for the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, will be content to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
Before my noble friend responds, could the Minister at least acknowledge that it is not just a matter of hours? It is a matter of the difficulties of finding a legal aid lawyer and the very clear existence of legal aid deserts and so on? Even when it is not a desert, there are difficulties which are, to a very considerable extent, related to the terms for the lawyers themselves. I do not know whether it ever occurred to the noble Lord that he might pursue a career in legal aid; he probably felt as guilty as I used to, when I was in practice as a solicitor, that my firm did not do legal aid, or at least it gave up doing it. That is partly because you need to specialise in legal aid, as well as the subject that you are dealing with, and that is very difficult for a lot of lawyers. It has led to two classes of lawyers, and that is a very bad thing.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
The noble Baroness’s question is quite broad. She knows that we have had a number of discussions about legal aid, which will continue. I did not do much legal aid in my practice. I do not want to advertise from the Dispatch Box, but my brother-in-law is one of the finest criminal legal aid solicitors in London—I am sure that no one here will ever need his services, but he is absolutely brilliant, none the less.
More seriously, I am very conscious of the need to make sure that people have access to a lawyer with the relevant skill set, because a general right to legal aid is not much use if you cannot find a legal aid lawyer—I absolutely appreciate that. On Tuesday, I explained some of the efforts that we are making in this area. To say any more now might trespass on the Committee’s patience, but I am obviously well aware of this point.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
I appreciate the care with which the Minister has responded to these amendments. Although he started by saying that they were unnecessary, he conceded that there is a group of people who do not get legal aid. We might differ in our views on how meritorious they are in any claim for legal aid, but he said that they could find a solicitor and get legal aid that way—but that might not be the easiest thing in the world, for reasons that include what was just discussed. I am afraid that I am not really persuaded.
I will read the Minister’s remarks in Hansard, but I do not think that he denied that there are people who do not get legal aid. The fact that the anti-slavery commissioner was on the case with the JCHR shows that it is not just these Benches over here that think that this is an issue. For the time being, I have to accept that the Minister has given his response and I cannot get any further. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Baroness Ludford
(a) any relevant appeal brought in relation to the decision would be likely to be disposed of expeditiously; and(b) any relevant appeal brought in relation to the decision could be resolved within the time limits set out in subsection (3) without giving rise to unfairness or injustice.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would give effect to the recommendation of the Joint Committee on Human Rights to limit the cases that are brought within the accelerated detained appeals process, to prevent unfairness or injustice arising.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
This clause is about accelerated detained appeals. In moving Amendment 97 I will also cover Amendment 99, both of which I have signed. As I have said, the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, is leading on these amendments, but he has had to leave.
I support the deletion from the Bill of Clauses 26 and 27 in order that claimants should retain a meaningful right of appeal. The Government are trying to revive, though with an even wider scope, the detained fast-track system, despite the fact that their arguments were rejected by the Court of Appeal in 2015 and later by the Tribunal Procedure Committee. These provisions would deny access to justice, including for the reason that five days is far too short for a claimant to prepare an appeal, particularly if they are detained—it is even worse if they are in prison or a detention centre. Clause 26 would apply to a greater number of people even than the detained fast track, including those facing deportation.
The Home Office has been struck down and rebuffed twice but is coming back for more. Its decision-making is frequently flawed and unlawful. As we have heard this afternoon, half of all appeals against immigration decisions were successful in the year to June 2019, so people must have access to effective means of appeal.
After the Court of Appeal declared the detained fast track unlawful in 2015, the Government tried to revive it in tribunal rules. However, the Tribunal Procedure Committee said that if the rules were to operate fairly, which is vital given the high stakes for the claimant, they needed procedural safeguards—an additional case management hearing, for example—such that there was no guarantee of a fast conclusion of the appeal. By trying short cuts, the Government are yet again creating more potential delays. Justice cannot be achieved with the kind of short cuts the Government are trying in this Bill.
Lord Green of Deddington (CB)
My Lords, the noble Baroness is right to say this is the detained fast track brought back again, in effect. I simply say that this is a very good idea. Leaving aside the detail, if experienced officials can see that a case is really very unlikely to be a genuine one, there should be a fast track and the person should be detained. The details can be sorted, but it is the right way to go. It is what we need to do, given the enormous wave of applications we are now receiving.
Lord Etherton (CB)
I speak in support of the amendment in my name in relation to Clause 26, Amendment 98. It is that
“The Secretary of State may not give … certification if the appellant claims to have a protected characteristic … which is innate or immutable, and that the characteristic is relevant to the appeal.”
Cases in which the appellant is an asylum seeker who has an innate and immutable protected characteristic that is relevant to the appeal are not appropriate for the very short timescale set out in Clause 26(3). I think the noble Lord the Minister himself acknowledged, and the noble Baroness the Minister accepted earlier, that many of these cases raise difficult issues and that guidance that we wait to see will be issued to provide assistance. The paradigm case again is that of the LGBTQ+ asylum seeker. Establishing whether or not they are in fact LGBTQ, the adequacy of the evidence in support on that issue—whether or not there is a genuine fear of persecution because of that characteristic, whether what they have done in relation to pursuing their claim has been reasonable, even if it was not always in compliance with the required time limits—makes their appeal inappropriate for an accelerated appeal.
Once again I say, as others have said, that this conclusion is reinforced by the significant proportion of successful appeals that have been brought by LGB refugees. That is something we simply cannot ignore. Nearly 40% of appeals taken in the period from 2015 to 2018 succeeded.
Lord Paddick (LD)
My Lords, for the reasons I explained in a previous group, accelerating appeals processes is not the solution to the last-minute successful appeals against removal or deportation. Rather, it is improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the Home Office. Clause 26 is another clause with the wrong solution to the problem, and while Amendments 97 to 99 seek to limit the damage that accelerated appeals might cause, it is more lipstick on more pigs.
To my shame, I am struggling to keep my head above water on this Bill and asking that Clause 27 does not stand part of the Bill does not go far enough. Already the Home Secretary can certify that the decision to remove or deport can be appealed against only once the claimant has been removed or deported, which makes such an appeal more difficult. We should have tabled an amendment to remove that power, let alone Clause 27, which proposes to go one step further, allowing the Secretary of State to certify that a claim cannot be appealed against at all if she thinks it is clearly unfounded. That should be a decision for the tribunal and not the Executive.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
In this group, I have the Clause 26 stand part amendment, and Clause 26 requires the Tribunal Procedure Committee to create a fast-track route for certain appeals made from detention. The accelerated process would apply where the Secretary of State “considers” that an appeal brought in relation to the decision would
“likely be disposed of expeditiously.”
Of course, that raises the question of the basis on which the Secretary of State will decide that an appeal brought in relation to the decision is likely to be disposed of expeditiously. Will it be done on a whim? Will it be done on the basis that we need to speed things up and this may be the way to do it? Will they be getting legal advice on whether they should consider that it is likely to be disposed of expeditiously? What happens if they do decide that an appeal brought in relation to the decision is likely to be disposed of expeditiously, and they then find that it cannot be disposed of expeditiously? What is the redress in that situation?
The Explanatory Notes state:
“This clause aims to establish an accelerated route for those appeals made in detention which are considered suitable for a quick decision, to allow appellants to be released or removed more quickly.”
As far as the Explanatory Notes are concerned, it is being done for the highest of motives, and nothing to do with simply trying to speed up the process.
The Law Society, Justice, the UNHCR and the Public Law Project have recommended that the clause be removed from the Bill. They raise that the fast-track system largely replicates, as has been said, a system that was already found to be unlawful in 2015 in a Court of Appeal ruling.
We support the amendments and concerns raised in this group, but I intend to speak only to the amendment in my name, which is to oppose Clause 26 standing part of the Bill. The concerns are very clear. As I said, various organisations have recommended that the clause be removed from the Bill. Their basis for saying so is that it amounts to a new detained fast-track procedure that was found to be unlawful in 2015 due to being “structurally unfair”. The Court of Appeal described the timetable for such appeals as
“so tight that it is inevitable that a significant number of appellants will be denied a fair opportunity to present their cases”.
It held that the policy did not sufficiently appreciate
“the problems faced by legal representatives of obtaining instructions from individuals who are in detention”,
nor did it
“adequately take account of the complexity and difficulty of many asylum appeals”
and
“the gravity of the issues that are raised by them”.
Since that ruling, the Tribunal Procedure Committee has repeatedly taken the position not to introduce specific rules in relation to cases where an appellant is detained. In its report of March 2019, the TPC concluded that
“a set of specific rules would not lead to the results sought by the Government. If a set of rules were devised so as to operate fairly, they would not lead to the increased speed and certainty desired.”
Following the clear and somewhat damning court ruling and the position of the TPC, the Government’s response has been, as we now see, to legislate to reintroduce a fast-track procedure by forcing the TPC’s hand and requiring it to create one.
The questions for the Government are fairly simple. What is it about this scheme that is significantly structurally different from the scheme that was found to be legally unsound? What about this scheme will prevent it having a timetable
“so tight that it is inevitable that a significant number of appellants will be denied a fair opportunity”?
Why, and on the basis of what evidence, do the Government disagree with the TPC when it says that such rules should not be brought in since they cannot both operate fairly and achieve the desired result of speed?
One wonders whether the Government are risking further judicial proceedings in replicating a scheme that has been found to be unlawful or, indeed, whether they would care too much anyway if there were such future judicial proceedings. I await the Government’s response.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
My Lords, I will come to the amendments in a moment but, since we have had a number of references to the old detained fast-track scheme, I will start by saying a word about that.
Obviously we considered carefully the legal challenges to the detained fast-track. We are confident that the new accelerated detained appeals route will ensure fairness as well as improving speed. It is right to say that the courts have been clear, in upholding the principle, that an accelerated process for appeals made in detention, operated within certain safeguards, is entirely legal. We believe that the new accelerated detained appeals route will contribute significantly to the timeliness with which appeals can be decided. We will be able to remove swiftly people found not to be eligible to remain while those people with valid claims can be released from detention more quickly, which is also important.
So far as the Tribunal Procedure Committee is concerned, the Bill sets out a clear policy intent but, as the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, says, changes to tribunal procedure rules are for the TPC to draft and are subject to its statutory consultation requirements and procedures. We have already begun to engage with the TPC on the elements of the Bill that will require tribunal rules to be made or amended and will continue to do so as the Bill progresses and passes into law.
I turn to the amendments before the Committee. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, and, in his absence, the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, for Amendment 97. I understand the motivation behind it. It is right that appeals made from detention should be dealt with in a timely way so that, as I have said, people are not deprived of their liberty for longer than necessary, but we recognise that not all appeals made from detention will be suitable for the accelerated detained appeals route. So Clause 26 specifies that if a decision is certified as suitable for an accelerated detained appeal, in those circumstances the Secretary of State must consider that any appeal to the decision is likely to be disposed of expeditiously. Importantly, the tribunal may remove a case from the accelerated detained appeals route if that is the only way to ensure that justice can be done in a particular case.
Lord Rosser (Lab)
I may not have been listening as attentively as I should have been, but if the Minister has already said it I ask him to repeat the criteria under which the Secretary of State will make the decision that he or she considers that the appeal is likely to be disposed of quickly, which was a question I asked. Another point rises from something he said—that the clause now sets an extremely high bar for an appeal to be released from the scheme, and provides that it can be done only where
“it is the only way to secure that justice is done.”
Am I not right in saying that this has been amended by the Government during the Bill’s passage, and that the original language permitted the release of a case if the tribunal
“is satisfied that it is in the interests of justice to do so”?
Why is it no longer the case that “the interests of justice” are a good enough reason to take action?
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)
I shall reply to the second point first, if I may. The language in Clause 26(5) is essentially the same language as in Clause 23(7).
Lord Rosser (Lab)
Is it the same or essentially the same? My understanding, and I may be wrong, is that the Bill now says that
“it is the only way to secure that justice is done”,
where previously it said
“that it is in the interests of justice to do so”.
They may be similar but they are not the same words.
Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
My Lords, I think we are at cross-purposes. I was not saying that the language had not changed; I was saying that the test in Clause 26(5) is the same test as in Clause 23(7). On the question of whether the language has changed, I think the noble Lord is right. I will write to confirm the position—I do not want to get it wrong at the Dispatch Box—but I think there was a change in this clause. The test as set out is entirely proper. Is the only way that justice can be done to take the case out of this tribunal? If that is the only way justice can be done, it ought to be done. If this tribunal therefore, by obvious logic, can deal with the case justly, it should do so.
On the first question, I am not sure how much more I can say. The Secretary of State must consider, in order to certify a case as suitable for an accelerated detained appeal, that any appeal to that decision would be likely to be disposed of expeditiously and that the other conditions are met. In coming to that conclusion, the Secretary of State would obviously have to look at all relevant factors. I am not sure that I can take it much further than that, but let me look again at the noble Lord’s question in Hansard. If I can add anything more, I will do so, so he is in possession of everything I can say before we look at it again—no doubt on Report.
Baroness Ludford (LD)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord again for his detailed responses. On the first point, on Amendment 97, I just hope that we do not find ourselves back in litigation. He asserts that the Bill avoids the pitfalls that the Court of Appeal found in 2015 and that the Tribunal Procedure Committee found later. Let us hope so, because obviously, resorts to litigation will also be something that gums up the system, which the Home Office already says is broken. Time will tell if this is going to stay as it is.
On Amendment 99, I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, is right. If my memory serves, the wording has changed since the Bill was in the other place. Certainly, the JCHR would suggest that wording that says that the tribunal “must”—not just “may”—if the interests of justice and fairness require it, take an appeal out of the accelerated detained system is stronger than the wording that is there at the moment. It says that the tribunal “must” if—and it is a broader test—it is in the interests of fairness and justice. It is a better test, and a fairer and more just test, so I am disappointed that the Minister does not like that amendment—although I guess I am not terribly surprised. On that note, I can only withdraw my amendment.