House of Commons
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Mr Speaker
I understand that the hon. Member for Stafford wishes to take the oath to the King, as she was unable to do so earlier.
Theo Clarke took and subscribed the Oath.
New Member
The following Member took and subscribed the Oath required by law:
Ashley Dalton, for West Lancashire.
Oral Answers to Questions
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)
Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Michael Gove)
It is wonderful to see such a strong contingent from Lancashire in the Gallery. Skelmersdale and Ormskirk will be proud of their new MP, I am sure.
Developers are lining up to sign our contract to remediate approximately 1,500 buildings. Some 95% of those buildings with the most dangerous Grenfell-style cladding have already been remediated or have work under way. The number of buildings that are being fixed by the building safety fund has doubled in the past year. The pilot for our new mid-rise scheme is making good progress ahead of its full opening in the coming months.
Mr Dhesi
Even after the horrors of the Grenfell tragedy in 2017, the Government have failed abysmally to get to grips with the cladding scandal. While the Government dither and developers delay, the leaseholders of potentially dangerously clad apartments are stuck in limbo. Many, including people living in West Central in Slough constituency, and in other blocks, cannot sell or remortgage their apartments, and many face ever-rising service charges and other charges that they cannot now meet. Does the Secretary of State think it is fair for my Slough constituents to have to continue to suffer intolerably under such dire and demoralising conditions?
Michael Gove
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising the plight of his constituents, but the action we have already taken will ensure not only that the ultimate owners of those buildings—whether that is the developers or the freeholders—are responsible for remediation, but that those leaseholders who are currently trapped and unable to move will be able to do so and to secure a mortgage on their property if required.
Dame Meg Hillier
I declare an interest: I live in a block with cladding. There are many real concerns, and I commend the Secretary of State for some of the progress he has begun to make, but there is still a big issue with insurance premiums that are way too high for the risk involved. Will he update the House on what progress he has made with the insurance industry to get premiums down?
Michael Gove
The hon. Lady is absolutely right. Not only have insurance premiums been too high, but some of the middle people involved have been gouging at the expense of leaseholders. We have made it clear that there are responsibilities on the Association of British Insurers and others to change their ways. The Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley), is responsible for local government and engaged in work to make progress on that.
Mike Kane
My constituent Joanne Davies faces a nightmare scenario. In a few weeks’ time, she will have to fork out £5,000 because of regulatory change in the light of Grenfell. She gets no support because she lives in a low-rise block. Will the Minister meet me to discuss her case?
Michael Gove
I will absolutely make sure that I or another Minister meets the hon. Gentleman and takes up the case of his constituent, yes.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
Does the Secretary of State recognise that issues like the cladding scandal being foisted on innocent leaseholders will continue until there is fundamental reform of the leasehold system? I know he has plans to do that. When does he think they might be put into effect?
Michael Gove
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. We hope, in the forthcoming King’s Speech, to introduce legislation to fundamentally reform the system. Leaseholders, not just in this case but in so many other cases, are held to ransom by freeholders. We need to end this feudal form of tenure and ensure individuals have the right to enjoy their own property fully.
Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Dehenna Davison)
I am grateful for the question from my hon. Friend, who is a great champion for his constituency. He will know that his constituency has benefited from nearly £5 million of levelling-up funding since 2020, including £4 million from the Getting Building fund for the redevelopment of Britton Farm and the Connecting Rural Kent and Medway project, and £600,000 from the community renewal fund for the Medway Together project. His constituency will also benefit from £3.3 million that Medway Council was allocated from the UK shared prosperity fund.
Rehman Chishti
I thank the Minister for that answer, but it was for the wider Medway. I think Gillingham received £2 million with regard to the Britton Farm skills hub.
Having worked very closely with Medway Council to put forward an outstanding bid for Gillingham Open Lines, covering an area with high levels of deprivation, I was disappointed to see that application turned down. It raises real concerns about fairness and a merit-based system of government, which the Prime Minister assured me would be the case. Will the Minister visit Gillingham with me and meet stakeholders to look at—
Mr Speaker
Order. Please, there are a lot of people on the Order Paper who I want to get in. Let us help each other. If somebody does not want to get in, please tell me and then we can help each other.
Dehenna Davison
I will, of course, visit my hon. Friend’s constituency again, after a fantastic visit just a few months ago. I should really reiterate that all the funds in the Department are distributed fairly and objectively, and that different allocation methods are used for each fund to ensure that funding reaches those who most need it, but of course I will meet him to discuss his own project further.
Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
I commiserate with the hon. Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Rehman Chishti) and the people of Gillingham and Rainham for feeling let down. The Tory Mayor of the West Midlands went further. He said, after the disappointing results for his area—including Druids Heath in my constituency, one of the most deprived parts of the country—that it was time to end this “begging bowl culture”. Does the Minister agree?
Dehenna Davison
I am sure the hon. Member will be very, very pleased to read the funding simplification plan we will be publishing in due course.
Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Felicity Buchan)
The Government do not support the introduction of rent controls in the private rental sector. Evidence suggests that they discourage investment, lead to declining property standards and may encourage illegal sub-letting, which would help neither tenants nor landlords.
Nadia Whittome
In September last year, a survey by the tenants’ union ACORN found that 48% of private renters had received a rent hike from their landlord since January 2021. Some increases were as high as 67%. In a cost of living crisis, that is fuelling poverty and homelessness. Will the Government act now to freeze rents, allowing vital breathing room while more permanent solutions to tackle spiralling housing costs are devised?
Felicity Buchan
In the UK, rent increased by 4.4% in the year to January 2023. We are clearly aware that there is a lot of pressure on household budgets, which is why the Treasury put together an enormous £37 billion cost of living package in 2022-23. A further £26 billion will be available in the coming year.
Paula Barker (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab)
More than 40 households have been served with a section 21 notice every single day since the Government first announced their intention to scrap such notices. That is a total of nearly 53,000 households, and the number is rising. I must sound like a broken gramophone record, but the situation out there, in the real world, is desperate for so many people at the sharp end of the private rented sector. The Opposition are ready to support them. Enough of the talking: when can we finally expect the Government’s renters reform Bill to be put to the House?
Felicity Buchan
The Government have a manifesto commitment to abolish section 21, and we will do so as soon as parliamentary time allows. We have just finished the consultation on the decent homes standard, which concluded in mid-October. It is important that we get this legislation right, and we intend to do so.
John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Lee Rowley)
As my hon. Friend will know, local authorities are responsible for determining resourcing priorities in accordance with the needs of their local electorates, and the members of those electorates will differ according to the areas where they live. That said, the local government finance settlement for 2023-24 makes available up to £60 billion for local government in England in response to the requests of the sector, and the majority of that funding is ringfenced in recognition of the fact that local authorities are best placed to understand the priorities.
John Penrose
There is a widespread concern that some local trading standards teams are no longer capable of protecting local citizens from scams, fraud and rip-offs, or of delivering the strong and fair competition locally which will ultimately be the only route for levelling up jobs, exports and growth in left-behind communities. Will the Minister meet me to discuss the proposals for minimum standards in my Government-commissioned report “Power to the people”, so that we can level up opportunities in communities throughout the country?
Lee Rowley
I have read that report, and I should be happy to meet my hon. Friend to talk more about this important issue, in which I know he has a long-standing interest.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
The Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Rachel Maclean)
National planning policy makes it clear that local plans and decisions should help to create the conditions in which businesses can invest, expand and, most importantly, create jobs and life opportunities. We are consulting on how the national planning policy framework could better support these developments, and we welcome contributions to that consultation.
Mark Pawsey
And I welcome my hon. Friend to her new position.
The businesses and jobs of the future will need modern premises from which to operate. In my constituency, Rugby Borough Council recently agreed to review its local plan emphasising the provision of more land for employment to help levelling up and to create jobs and opportunities. What further support and incentives can the Department give local authorities such as Rugby which are seeking to do the right thing and enable our businesses to grow?
Rachel Maclean
I thank my hon. Friend for his kind words. We are delighted to see ambitious local authorities such as Rugby, which he doubtless champions on behalf of his constituents, promoting the development that will help to level up his area. We are therefore creating a new framework to make local plans easier to produce, and they will be given more weight in decision making so that we can create certainty and foster a genuinely plan-led system.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
When land is available for urban development, external partners of local authorities often determine the future economic strategy for locations such as my constituency. How is the Department ensuring that there is a focus on a levelling-up agenda that benefits local communities, as opposed to a trickle-down agenda that benefits only the investors’ interests?
Rachel Maclean
The hon. Lady will know that the Government are committed to levelling up areas throughout the country, including her constituency. Working with Homes England, we deliver significant investment funds to enable York and other partners to deliver homes and, more importantly, places that people will want to come to, in order to drive all-important economic growth and level up the country.
Gareth Bacon (Orpington) (Con)
The Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Rachel Maclean)
Meaningful engagement with local communities is essential to the improvement of public services, and our reforms in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill will strengthen community engagement in planning and increase the opportunities for engagement through the development of digital services.
Gareth Bacon
I thank my hon. Friend and welcome her back to her well-deserved place on the Treasury Bench. Would she agree that the Mayor of London’s decision to go ahead with the expansion of the ultra low emission zone despite overwhelming opposition to the scheme expressed in a public consultation shows complete contempt for the people of outer London? Would she further agree that what appears to be a clear attempt by Transport for London to interfere with the outcome of the consultation in order to predetermine the result further undermines the democratic process?
Rachel Maclean
I thank my hon. Friend for his vital question. I have seen the reports he refers to and I totally share his concerns about the consultation process led by the Mayor of London. Clearly these plans will have a significant impact on the communities that my hon. Friend represents so ably, which is why we must get to the bottom of what happened and hold the Mayor of London to account.
Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Michael Gove)
We are advancing on all fronts, rolling out deeper and broader devolution across England, allocating extra resource to the poorest regions and taking steps to enhance productivity everywhere. In Portsmouth, £20 million has already been received through the levelling-up fund to transform the visitor economy, and nearly £7 million has been allocated from the future high streets fund. Portsmouth is also receiving £48 million as part of the national bus strategy.
Stephen Morgan
The Government promised that their levelling up plans would provide much-needed funding to communities such as my own, but last month Portsmouth South was once again deprived of funding that would have revitalised our city centre. Having rejected a bid twice, can the Minister confirm what action the Government are now taking to make Portsmouth city centre a place that local people can be proud of once again?
Michael Gove
I think we can all be proud of Portsmouth city centre, the visitor attractions and the historic communities that the hon. Gentleman is so fortunate to represent. I look forward to working with Gerald Vernon-Jackson and others like him across the party divide in local government in Portsmouth to ensure that the next bid can be successful.
Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)
On the subject of the next bid, my right hon. Friend will know that we are very disappointed in Lichfield that after two bids we were not awarded any grant to help with the leisure centre, but does he agree that an application for Burntwood, an ex-mining town in the Lichfield constituency, might be more successful?
Michael Gove
My hon. Friend is a brilliant advocate for Lichfield. It may well be that his impassioned advocacy for the community that he has come to call Lich Vegas has meant that bids for the leisure centre might have been seen as de trop, but Burntwood certainly seems to be one of the communities that would be a prime candidate. I took the opportunity when I was in the west midlands recently to visit Willenhall to see how the levelling up fund was helping to transform communities there. My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes) has done an amazing job in making sure that communities that have been overlooked and undervalued for years are at last getting the investment they need. That is levelling up in action.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Dehenna Davison)
The second round of the levelling-up fund will invest up to £2.1 billion in 111 vital local infrastructure projects. We prioritised investment in high-quality bids in places that have not previously received levelling-up fund money in order to maximise the spread of overall funding from rounds 1 and 2. In this round of the fund, two thirds of the funding went to those places in the greatest need, which we designated as category 1. In Scotland, across both rounds, the amount of money awarded exceeded our public funding commitments.
Alison Thewliss
The Earl of Rosebery said at the opening of the People’s Palace and Winter Gardens 125 years ago that they would be
“open to the people for ever and ever”.
The M8 motorway driven through the centre of Glasgow was called the
“scar that will never heal”.
Can the Minister tell me why Glasgow’s bids to address both of those issues were rejected in a process that she has already admitted to Members of this House was rigged?
Dehenna Davison
I ask the hon. Lady to retract that statement, because in no way have I said that the process was rigged. It absolutely was not. The decision-making framework that we use was outlined in full, in writing, in the technical note that we published, and I would be happy to send her a link to it on gov.uk. She has raised the question of the People’s Palace, and I would be happy to sit down with her to talk about the bid once she has received the written feedback, to see if we can strengthen it for any future funding rounds, potentially including round 3 of the levelling-up fund, which will be announced in due course.
Peter Aldous
Projects to protect coastal communities against erosion and flooding bring significant economic and social benefits on their own. Can my hon. Friend therefore review the investment criteria for round 3 of the levelling-up fund to include stand-alone coastal defence schemes that are not part of a wider transport regeneration or cultural bid?
Dehenna Davison
My hon. Friend is a fantastic champion not only for the east of England but, in particular, for coastal communities. We know that coastal communities add unique value to our country and offer significant growth potential, which is why 22 coastal areas are benefiting from more than £673 million of investment via the towns fund, why eight English freeports are in coastal areas and why coastal areas such as Ramsgate continue to benefit from the levelling-up fund, but of course I will be happy to meet him to discuss this further.
Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)
It was not just councils that put time and money into these bids; local people put their heart and soul into developing their community’s submissions, only to find that their bid would never have been allowed to win, that their time had been wasted and that they had been taken for fools. The Minister does not seem troubled about wasting Members’ time, and certainly not local authorities’ time, but surely she will apologise to those volunteers.
Dehenna Davison
I have already expressed my admiration for the incredible work put in by local government officials, volunteers and Members across the House, and I have apologised—the hon. Gentleman can read the Select Committee transcript for himself.
I need to make the point that we had £8.8 billion-worth of bids for round 3 of the levelling-up fund and only £2.1 billion to allocate, which unfortunately means difficult decisions had to be made. We are not a Government who shy away from making difficult decisions, and my own county council unfortunately faced a detriment, too. Ultimately, in line with the decision-making framework outlined in the technical note, we were keen to ensure geographic spread so that the most areas possible benefited from the levelling-up fund across rounds 1 and 2.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
The Minister gave assurances in Westminster Hall less than two weeks ago that unsuccessful local authorities would receive feedback and their scorings. Local authorities are now being told that they will not receive their scorings. Why has that decision been taken?
Dehenna Davison
As I outlined in the Westminster Hall debate, local authorities will receive detailed feedback on their specific bids in due course. Some areas have already received feedback, and it will be rolled out further in the weeks to come.
Chris Stephens
Let me recap, then. As the Minister admitted in Westminster Hall, councils that received money in round 1 were told at the very end of the process that they would not receive money at the end of round 2, despite the many hours that officials had spent putting bids together. We are now being told that councils will no longer receive their scorings. What confidence can local authorities have that this process is fair and transparent? Or is it simply the case that this policy is in tatters and no faith can be placed in this process?
Dehenna Davison
I would ask the hon. Gentleman to visit some of the areas that are benefiting from the levelling-up fund. He should visit some of the incredible projects that are benefiting local communities and then look me in the eye and tell me that this policy is in tatters.
Sir James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Dehenna Davison)
Devolution gives local leaders the tools to level up. Mayors already drive economic growth, improve public services and respond to local priorities, which is why the Government are committed to deepening the devolution settlement for the most mature institutions, supported by stronger processes for accountability. The west midlands and Greater Manchester trailblazer deals will act as a blueprint for other areas.
Sir James Duddridge
Devolving powers seems like such a great idea, but is the Minister as concerned as I am that Mayors like Andy Burnham are using the role to build a personal power base and to implement policies, such as the so-called Manchester clean-air zone, that are diametrically opposed to Conservative values?
Dehenna Davison
I thank my hon. Friend for staying vigilant on the creation of socialist power bases, which those of us on the Government side of the House take incredibly seriously. I believe that levelling up this country by devolving power is the best way to champion the Conservative values and principles of entrepreneurialism, innovation and individualism. As I have already outlined, this will happen alongside a deepened accountability framework.
Mr Speaker
I call the Chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
The trailblazer deals in the West Midlands and Greater Manchester imply that everyone else will have to sit and wait, and not get extra devolution. Will the Minister disabuse me of that by setting out a timetable—nothing in her response indicates a timetable—for when the Mayors of other combined authorities will be given the same powers as Greater Manchester and the West Midlands?
Dehenna Davison
Our priority at the moment is securing these trailblazer deals—securing the devolution of vital powers on things we know really matter to communities in Greater Manchester and the West Midlands. Following that point, we will be talking to other metro areas about how we can deepen their devolution deals as well.
Chris Green (Bolton West) (Con)
Does the Minister share my concern about the Mayor of Greater Manchester’s proposals for a workplace parking levy? It is a tax on business, jobs and families, is it not?
Dehenna Davison
My hon. Friend is a great champion for his community and I would be happy to meet him to discuss this policy further.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
The Minister knows that I am very supportive of the devolution of more powers to Greater Manchester, but one area that she needs to look at carefully is the increase in scrutiny that will be necessary at a very local level. As powers shift from this place, where scrutiny is strong, to local government, where scrutiny is not as strong as it perhaps ought to be, we need to look afresh at those powers.
Dehenna Davison
I could not agree with the hon. Gentleman more on that point. If powers are being handed to local areas, which I think we all agree is right, it is important that that comes with a proper scrutiny framework. That is why we will shortly be publishing a detailed devolution accountability framework, alongside the trailblazer deals.
Helen Morgan (North Shropshire) (LD)
Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Lee Rowley)
The local government finance settlement 2023-24 recently made available nearly £60 billion of funding for local government in England in the coming financial year, responding to the requests of the sector for clarity, space and additional resources.
Helen Morgan
Shropshire Council has recently reported that it needs to find £10 million of cuts this quarter and £50 million in the coming years. Some 85% of its budget is spent on social care, so 97% of residents are going to pay more for reduced services. Will the Government consider reviewing the fair funding formula, so that councils in rural areas can continue to provide proper services to their constituents?
Lee Rowley
The main message we heard from the local government sector in the past 12 months, after covid, inflation and all the pressures it had, was that it wanted stability. What we have tried to offer as part of the financial settlement for 2023-24 is a stable platform upon which colleagues in local government can plan, reform and work through where they are going in the future.
Munira Wilson
Both adult and children’s social care are in crisis, but the social care grant, which can be used for both, excludes from its flawed funding formula the needs of tens of thousands of vulnerable children across this country. That means that in London alone councils will miss out on some £600 million by 2025, leaving boroughs such as mine in Richmond struggling to provide high-quality care for those children in need. Will the Minister look at fixing this faulty formula so that the most vulnerable children in our society can get the care they desperately need?
Lee Rowley
As I said to the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan), we are prioritising stability this year. Of course we always look at elements of the settlement and what we can or cannot do, and how we can make them better for the long term. However, substantial additional funding, support and resources are going into the local government finance settlement, which we hope will make a difference on the frontline.
Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)
Over a decade of Tory cuts are not the only thing damaging council budgets; fly-tipping is a stain on our communities and costs nearly £400 million a year. Taxpayers are left footing the bill for the 16% increase in this crime under a Tory Government. Councils should not pay the price for Conservatives being soft on crime, so does the Minister agree that it is time to get tough on people who do not respect our neighbourhoods? Will he back Labour’s plan for stronger punishment for fly-tippers and the introduction of clear-up squads?
Lee Rowley
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her comments. I absolutely agree that fly-tipping is a scourge and a crime, and that local authorities have the resources and the ability to try to do this and to crack down on it. I encourage them to do so.
Ian Levy (Blyth Valley) (Con)
Kate Kniveton (Burton) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Michael Gove)
Across Government, we are developing an action plan to tackle antisocial behaviour. We are looking at stronger enforcement and swifter justice, as well as supporting young people into sports and other activities. This action builds on our wider investment in tackling crime and antisocial behaviour, including our recruitment of an additional 20,000 police officers.
Ian Levy
Antisocial behaviour and petty crime have long been a problem in Blyth Valley, which is why I have been meeting the police, community groups and local retailers to try to resolve the issues. Will my right hon. Friend please agree to meet me to discuss the matter in greater detail, and hopefully find where the support is?
Michael Gove
I absolutely will. My hon. Friend, who is a spirited champion for the communities in Blyth Valley, recognises how important it is that we work together with other agencies to deal with antisocial behaviour, that we have swift and certain justice, and that we ensure that perpetrators clear up the mess they have created. Above all, we have activities to intervene upstream and ensure that the persistent absentees and truants of today, who could go on to become the antisocial actors of tomorrow, are helped back on to the right path.
Kate Kniveton
My constituents on Ashby Road, the A511 and the former A50 trunk road, are suffering as a result of drivers racing along the road with no consideration for residents who need to pull in and out of their driveways. Excessive speed, aggressive driving habits and numerous traffic collisions are very worrying for those who live there. What support can my right hon. Friend give local authorities to help them tackle such instances of antisocial behaviour?
Michael Gove
My hon. Friend is quite right to raise this issue. Vehicle crime—whether those driving cars or using e-scooters in an antisocial fashion, or otherwise making life difficult for their neighbours—often needs attention. That is why an additional 231 uplift officers have been added to Staffordshire police, but I will be working with Staffordshire’s police and crime commissioner to ensure that this issue is tackled appropriately.
Duncan Baker (North Norfolk) (Con)
The Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Rachel Maclean)
The Government fully understand that beautiful areas attract large numbers of holidaymakers and, therefore, large numbers of second homes. That is why we have introduced higher rates of stamp duty land tax for those purchasing additional properties, which will help to support local areas that have a large number of second homes.
Duncan Baker
The ability to double council tax on second homes is a real step in the right direction to help communities, such as mine in North Norfolk, that suffer from a high concentration of second homes. However, clause 73 of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill requires greater clarification. Currently, a district council such as North Norfolk benefits from just 8p in the pound from council tax revenue. Does the Minister agree that we ought to look at that clause and ensure that the communities affected by second homes are the ones that benefit from additional taxation raised?
Rachel Maclean
My hon. Friend does a superb job of representing communities affected by large numbers of second homes. That is why the new council tax second homes premium will enable councils, particularly in areas such as his with a strong tourism industry, to generate significant additional funding for local services. If they introduce the maximum premium, they will benefit from double the council tax revenue. I am happy to discuss that issue with him in more detail.
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
The pandemic turbocharged the housing crisis in rural areas, especially in Devon and Cornwall. Families are being turfed out of their private rented homes under section 21 notices so that they can be turned into second homes and Airbnbs. Does the Minister agree with south-west supporters of the First Homes Not Second Homes campaign, which I run with Cornwall councillor Jayne Kirkham, that it is time not only for increased council tax on second homes but for a proper licensing regime, so that communities can decide how many second homes should be in their community, to stop them being hollowed out?
Rachel Maclean
I thank the hon. Member for bringing this issue to the Floor of the House on behalf of his constituents and communities. We are looking at the issue of registration of second homes through the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill and other frameworks. We understand that, naturally, people want to go on holiday to beautiful areas, but there is an impact on communities. We need the registration scheme so that we understand and better mitigate that.
Anthony Mangnall (Totnes) (Con)
The Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Rachel Maclean)
We want to ensure that affordable homes are available to anyone who needs them, including in rural locations where stock is limited and often difficult to replace. Our £11.5 billion affordable homes programme is one of the vehicles through which rural housing is delivered. It will provide thousands of affordable homes in rural communities such as his across the country.
Anthony Mangnall
I wholeheartedly agree with the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Member for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker): we need to build more houses and put them in the right places and spaces, in the right style and at genuinely local affordable levels. One of the ways to do that is through community land trusts. Could the Minister outline how we can do better to support community land trusts in south Devon to build the houses that local people need, on a primary residency basis?
Rachel Maclean
The Government completely agree with those comments. We are clear that the community-led housing sector offers significant untapped potential for helping to meet housing need. It is the support and close involvement of the local community that helps secure that planning permission, so that we can build the homes that local people support and can afford to buy.
Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)
May I once again welcome the new Minister to her place?
Over a quarter of a million people in rural England are on a housing waiting list, yet the Government are on course to miss even the paltry target of 13,000 new rural affordable homes set out in the current five-year affordable homes programme. At the same time, the steady erosion of our country’s social housing stock continues apace, with data released by the Department only last month making it clear that the Government presided over the net loss of 14,110 social homes last year. Is it simply not the case that, when it comes to providing rural and urban communities with the genuinely affordable rented homes they need, Ministers are failing woefully?
Rachel Maclean
No, that is not the case. It is a pleasure to respond to the hon. Gentleman. This Government are taking the delivery of affordable housing across the whole country incredibly seriously. That is why more than 243,000 affordable homes have been provided in rural local authorities in England, such as those represented by Members across this House, between April 2010 and March 2022. We must get the planning system right. We have a mission to level up the country, which includes building affordable homes in rural areas, as well as in urban areas.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
The Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Rachel Maclean)
New housing needs to be supported by the right infrastructure, including primary care services. The new infrastructure levy that we are introducing through the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill will be able to provide funding for local infrastructure and so contribute towards addressing that vital issue.
Andrew Selous
I am running out of ways to describe how unbelievably awful the current system is, which is failing to allocate sufficient increased general practice capacity when we build tens of thousands of new homes. Do the Government recognise the urgency of this matter? If we are going to build housing, people must be able to see a doctor when they move into their new homes.
Rachel Maclean
Yes, the Government do recognise the urgency of this issue, and I thank my hon. Friend for raising it. He is right to be consistent about it, because, as we recognise, access to healthcare is one of the most important concerns—if not the most important concern —of local communities when new housing is planned. Our community infrastructure levy places much firmer requirements on local planning to engage with healthcare provision in the local community, and I would be happy to meet him to discuss this matter further.
David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Dehenna Davison)
In 2022 we signed six new devolution deals—with York and North Yorkshire, the east midlands, Norfolk, Suffolk, Cornwall, and the north-east—with £4 billion of long-term investment funding and key powers devolved to local leaders. When these deals are implemented, more than half of the English population will benefit from devolution.
David Simmonds
My constituents benefit from access to places such as Ruislip woods and the Pinner Memorial Park as a means of getting to green spaces in the local area. What measures does my hon. Friend have in mind to ensure that, through the access to nature target, more local authorities can use these devolution powers to create good-quality green spaces?
Dehenna Davison
I completely agree with my hon. Friend about the importance of access to green space. My Department has made significant funds available to local areas, including through the UK shared prosperity fund and the levelling-up parks fund, which can be used to regenerate green spaces, but I would be happy to sit down with him to discuss the matter further.
Stephanie Peacock (Barnsley East) (Lab)
Can the Minister confirm whether there is levelling-up funding within the Department that has not been spent or allocated?
Dehenna Davison
I am not quite sure whether I understand the hon. Lady’s question. If she would like to write to me, I will certainly follow up in writing.
Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Lee Rowley)
The part L uplift, which came into force in June 2022, delivered a significant improvement in energy efficiency. New homes now produce 30% fewer CO2 emissions, and new non-domestic buildings produce 27% fewer. The uplift will act as a stepping stone to the 2025 standards, which we will consult on in due course.
Eddie Hughes
Is the Minister aware of a simple additive called EndoTherm, which can be added to both domestic and non-domestic wet heating systems for condensing boilers? Tests have proved that it reduces energy use and hopefully it will soon be standard assessment procedure-approved for testing. If he is not aware of it, will he meet me and Andrew Bean to discuss its properties?
Lee Rowley
I was not aware of it until now, but I thank my hon. Friend for highlighting it. As he knows from his time in the Department, our approach is agnostic on technology and materials, but where there are opportunities to find out more about how things are working and how we can improve things, I am happy to do so.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Michael Gove)
I was honoured 10 days ago to have the chance to meet the family of Awaab Ishak, the child who died so tragically in horrendous circumstances in Rochdale. I was able to thank them for their campaigning work and, as a result, with co-operation from bodies across this House, we are taking forward legislation in his name and in his honour to ensure that the scourge of damp and mould is at last effectively dealt with.
Dan Jarvis
In the levelling up White Paper the Government rightly confirmed that they would match European Union structural fund receipts for Cornwall. They could do the same for South Yorkshire, Tees Valley, County Durham and Lincolnshire, but so far have not. Will they?
Michael Gove
I think we may be arguing from slightly different premises, because it depends how one defines the replacement for EU structural funds. I am more than happy to take the hon. Gentleman through the figures and point out the ways in which the funding we have supplied through the funds at our disposal match European commitments.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
Michael Gove
Stoke-on-Trent and all the six towns are enjoying a renaissance under this Government in a way that they did not under the last Labour Government. We are ensuring that investment is going into Burslem, Tunstall, Stoke and Hanley in a way that did not occur under that Labour Government. Homes England is at the heart of that investment, providing new homes and cultural investment and ensuring that people who voted Conservative at the last general election recognise that they made the right decision.
Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)
I wish the Secretary of State good luck with that. Last week, he told ITV News that,
“nobody will get in the way of making sure we get money to those who are vulnerable and who deserve it”.
Was he referring to the Chancellor or the Chief Secretary to the Treasury?
Lisa Nandy
Seriously, the Secretary of State no longer has the power to sign off on a park bench. There are now reports of significant underspends in his Department that are about to be clawed back by the Treasury. Can he guarantee to the towns crying out for investment in town centres, high streets and affordable housing that the full allocation of the towns fund, the future high streets fund and the affordable homes programme will be spent? If he cannot, will he tell us who is to blame—him, or the Chancellor?
Mr Speaker
Just before the Secretary of State replies, I remind him that we should not use the name of the Member but their constituency, and also that he is certainly a right hon. Member.
Michael Gove
My apologies to you, Mr Speaker, and to the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer)—the “human roadblock”, as he was once memorably described by my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson). Returning to the issue, it is absolutely the case that this Department is responsible for the disbursement, successfully, of funds to the frontline, helping to transform communities that were overlooked and undervalued by the last Government. No one is going to get in the way of this Department spending the money we need on the communities that need it. The only thing I would say is that there is not a single spending commitment that the hon. Lady has been able to make because of the shadow Chancellor. Labour—
Mr Speaker
Secretary of State, I do not want to do this every time we have questions. We get to topicals, and because the question is asked you feel it is a free-for-all. It is not your questions; it is Back-Benchers’ questions. Please, let us get everybody in, and let us start with Greg Smith, who wants to ask a good question.
Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)
Thank you, Mr Speaker. Whole communities have been up in arms after perverse decisions by the Planning Inspectorate, most recently on a site between Askett and Meadle and another between Twyford and Poundon. What steps is my right hon. Friend taking to reform the Planning Inspectorate to stop it walking all over local wishes?
Michael Gove
The new national planning policy framework ensures that the Planning Inspectorate will work with, not against, local communities. The Planning Inspectorate also has a wonderful new chief executive officer—an official from my Department who helped to deliver the homes for Ukraine programme and understands what communities need and want.
Stephen Farry (North Down) (Alliance)
Michael Gove
We will do everything we can to expedite that funding to Northern Ireland.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)
Solar is an important part of the UK’s energy mix, and, as the Secretary of State will know, the sun always shines in Shropshire. Does he agree that solar farms, which are often of huge scale, need to be in the right place, not the wrong place? So often, a lot of good agricultural land is lost.
Michael Gove
Shropshire, home to the “blue remembered hills” of A. E. Housman, is one of our most beautiful counties. It is vital, even as we pursue renewable energy across the United Kingdom, that we recognise that our environment is just as much about natural beauty as it is about striving towards net zero.
Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)
Michael Gove
That money went towards ensuring that service families get the accommodation and support they deserve. If Labour wants to be taken seriously as a patriotic party, it should stop talking down our armed forces and ensure that they receive the money they deserve.
Simon Jupp (East Devon) (Con)
Devon, Cornwall, Dorset and Somerset secured £152 million from the levelling-up fund last month. The four counties make up the region’s new powerhouse, the great south west, of which I chair the all-party parliamentary group. Will my right hon. Friend meet me to discuss the fantastic opportunities that lie ahead for the great south west?
Michael Gove
I absolutely will, and I will make sure that the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Dehenna Davison), is with me as well. There is nothing that the two of us enjoy more than hearing good news from fantastic constituency MPs such as my hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Simon Jupp).
Mrs Emma Lewell-Buck (South Shields) (Lab)
Michael Gove
Actually, the way that this Government have handled Ofwat has ensured that we have done more to improve water quality—[Interruption.] If the hon. Lady were to ask the chief executive of any water company about the toughest Environment Secretary that they have had to deal with, they would know. But anyway, on the key question of South Shields, I agree that it is beautiful, and I will have the chance to visit soon. The additional money that we are making available for the devolution deal for the north-east should help, but I would be delighted to visit and find out more.
Mr Gagan Mohindra (South West Hertfordshire) (Con)
There have been multiple frivolous applications in my beautiful South West Hertfordshire constituency, including in my hometown of Tring, where such applications would increase the population by 30%. What advice can the Secretary of State give me on how best to engage with his Department on these issues so that my constituents’ voices are heard clearly?
Michael Gove
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I know that the new Minister of State for housing and planning, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), will be meeting him shortly. It is absolutely vital that communities in the suburban green belt such as his have the opportunity to ensure that people have the new homes that they need and that we preserve the communities that make his constituency so attractive to so many.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Ind)
Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con)
Fisherman’s Green has been identified by the local council as a potential housing development site in Eastbourne. Local people do not support that, and I support them. Can my right hon. Friend confirm that the council, which owns the land and has put the site into the strategy, can take Fisherman’s Green out of the strategy without sanction?
Michael Gove
My hon. Friend is absolutely spot on. I have been taking a close interest in the activities of Eastbourne Borough Council. The decision to develop Fisherman’s Green is the council’s alone, so the council could easily take it out—the changes that we have made in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill would allow it to do that. I am afraid that there has been a campaign of dissimulation on the part of her local council; it is a case of Lib Dems spinning here.
Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
Michael Gove
I could not agree more that the north-east is on the up. Newcastle and Sunderland are doing well in footballing terms, but even better in political terms, thanks to the leadership of local figures, who are uniting with central Government to deliver devolution.
Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con)
Antisocial behaviour is causing misery for my constituents, as I can tell from responses to my survey. Does the Secretary of State therefore welcome the stronger action that we have seen from Staffordshire police since its new local policing model was introduced last June? In the last month, that action has included a closure notice in Knutton, working with Asda to stop boy racers in the Wolstanton car park, and a section 34 order in Chesterton. It is a big issue, but we are moving in the right direction.
Michael Gove
Staffordshire’s police and crime commissioner is certainly moving in the right direction, as is Staffordshire police, supported ably by my hon. Friend and others such as my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Kate Kniveton). Boy racers and others who cause misery for their neighbours need to be dealt with effectively. That is happening in Staffordshire and should be happening more broadly as well.
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)
Many constituents are contacting me about the rental market; I am sure it is the same across the country. The shortage of available properties is making it hard for private renters who are seeking accommodation. One constituent emailed to say that she had been told to keep requests to a minimum if she wanted to have a chance of getting a property. What will the Secretary of State do about the frankly disgraceful emails that tenants are receiving from letting agents?
Michael Gove
There are challenges in the private rented sector and with housing supply everywhere. I would say two things: first, we need to work together to unlock additional supply, which is why it is important for the Mayor of London—I am not criticising him—to play his part; secondly, we need to ensure that renters have the protections that they deserve. That is why we are bringing forward legislation, which I know the hon. Lady supports.
Mark Fletcher (Bolsover) (Con)
The Help to Buy scheme has helped hundreds of my young constituents to get on to the housing ladder, yet it is due to end shortly. Can the Secretary of State assure me that he is badgering the Chancellor to ensure that that vital scheme continues?
Michael Gove
I do not need to badger the Chancellor; we are not just constituency neighbours, but brothers from different mothers. More than that, the newly appointed Minister of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), was immediately on the case. We will secure an extension to make sure that my hon. Friend’s constituents get the benefits from the scheme that they deserve, and I look forward to meeting him next month.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
Does the Government’s commitment to look at helping blocks below 11 metres with cladding apply not only where that cladding is found to be dangerous and needs to be removed, but where lenders are still demanding EWS1 certificates, which cannot currently be provided?
Michael Gove
Let me look into the specifics of any individual case. It should be the case, however—as the conversations that the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley), has had with lenders show—that there has been a significant diminution in the demand for EWS1 forms. Where they are still being demanded, however, I would like to know more, so I look forward to working with the right hon. Gentleman to find out more about any kinks in the system.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
On-street parking is a policy of Warwickshire County Council. Does the Secretary of State agree that the council has got it wrong in allowing people who drive internal combustion engines to park all day directly in front of the electric vehicle chargers that it has provided?
Michael Gove
I will have to look closely at that. It is rare that Warwickshire gets things wrong, in my experience, but my hon. Friend seems to have identified an anomaly that stands in the way of the effective transition to electric vehicles, so I look forward to considering more closely the issue that he raises.
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
How can taking away £25 million from Halton Borough Council over the next three years be classed as levelling up? For Cheshire West and Chester Council, it is nearly half a billion pounds since 2010. That is not levelling up. When can we expect a genuine, fair funding review?
Michael Gove
It is the case that at the last spending review, we secured a significant increase in local government spending, and as my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire pointed out when we had the debate on the local government finance settlement, authorities such as that of the hon. Member for Weaver Vale (Mike Amesbury) have received the funding they need in order to deliver the services on which constituents rely.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
Does the Secretary of State agree that when we build thousands of new homes, we need to do as well at providing extra general practice capacity as we do at providing extra primary school places? If he does, what will he do about it?
Michael Gove
I do, and our new infrastructure levy in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill is designed to do just that. I look forward to working with my hon. Friend and with the new Minister of State for Housing and Planning, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch, in order to make sure that the infrastructure levy delivers as we both would want.
Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)
While people in Levenmouth certainly welcome the fact that the levelling-up process gave us some of our own money back again, can the Secretary of State identify a single measure of need or deprivation by which the Prime Minister’s constituency is as needy and as deprived as the Levenmouth area in my constituency, and more deprived than the entire city of Glasgow?
Michael Gove
First, as I mentioned earlier, the reason that money has gone to the Prime Minister’s constituency is that it is going to help service families who do so much in order to make sure that we are all kept safe and protected. Secondly, I am grateful that the hon. Gentleman acknowledges that it is a good thing that the UK Government are distributing this money in this way. It is the case that his party used to oppose that, but we are now delivering that money; for two successive years, cash has been delivered to Glenrothes, to Glasgow, and to other communities.
The third thing I would say is that I hope the hon. Gentleman is not the SNP MP quoted in The Times at the weekend as saying that the thing about the Scottish Government is that they cannot even—
Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)
The latest round of levelling-up funding has once again failed to provide much-needed investment in my part of Devon. The proposals put forward by East Devon District Council would have funded vital investment in Seaton and Axminster. What does the Secretary of State say to people in towns that are attractive to tourists, who feel taken for granted and feel that this Government are not serious about levelling up for them?
Michael Gove
I say, “Vote Conservative,” because with a Conservative MP such as my hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Simon Jupp), you have an effective advocate who can work with central Government in order to deliver.
Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
More people rent privately in my constituency than own their own homes, and more people rent socially than both of those groups combined. When I visit those people, week in and week out, they are massively overcrowded with no prospect of renting in the private sector or buying. What is the Secretary of State doing to deliver properly affordable social rented housing?
Michael Gove
The hon. Lady’s point is very similar to that made earlier by the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi), and my answer is also very similar: we need to work with the Mayor of London, who has clear responsibilities in this area. Once again, I am not criticising him, but I am stressing that the delivery of so much of the funding required to improve housing in the capital depends on effective action by the Mayor.
Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)
Some of the Homes for Ukraine six-month placements are now starting to come to an end, and some Ukrainian nationals in my constituency cannot get into private rented accommodation because they have no credit history. The local council is ready to look at rematching families, but if that does not work out, some of those Ukrainian refugees will have no choice but to present as homeless. Will the Secretary of State look at this issue, and look at the suggestion of a guarantor system backed by the Government?
Michael Gove
That is actually a very fair and constructive point. Making sure that there are not just banking facilities, but the kinds of guarantees that the hon. Lady asks for, is something we have been looking at in the past. I will ask the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Felicity Buchan), to talk to the hon. Lady and to St Albans council in order to make sure that the generosity of her constituents is not undermined by the activity of the financial sector.
Mr Speaker
That completes questions. Will those who wish to leave before we start the urgent question please do so?
Knowsley Incident
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Speaker
Before we come to the urgent question, I wish to make a short statement. I understand that at least one individual has been charged following the incident at Knowsley. Once charges are brought, the case in question is covered by the House’s sub judice resolution and should not be referred to. However, I accept that there are important wider implications raised by the events in Knowsley, and I am prepared for the House to discuss them, but I request that Members do not refer to any specific cases where charges have been brought.
Sir George Howarth (Knowsley) (Lab) (Urgent Question)
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if she will make a statement on the wider implications of the violent incident in Knowsley on Friday 10 February 2023.
The Minister for Immigration (Robert Jenrick)
The incident at the asylum accommodation centre in Knowsley on 10 February was totally unacceptable. As the Home Secretary and I have repeatedly made clear, there is never any excuse for violence. A substantial police response was deployed to the incident, and I offer my thanks to the officers involved on the night and subsequently for their service. A number of arrests were made, and the police investigation is ongoing. The Home Office remains in close contact with Merseyside police.
The Home Office takes its responsibilities to those in temporary asylum accommodation and to local communities extremely seriously. Alongside the police and Home Office accommodation providers, we are closely monitoring the situation around the country and the activities of relevant groups. Security at our accommodation sites has been enhanced and is kept under constant review.
We will always defend the right to peaceful protest and freedom of speech, but we will not tolerate violence, intimidation or attacks on the police. The police have a range of powers to deal with unlawful behaviour, and anyone taking part in criminal activity can and should expect the full force of the law. I have met senior Home Office officials and the police to discuss the lessons to be learned from this and other incidents and to ensure that appropriate steps are being taken.
The unprecedented number of illegal, unnecessary and dangerous small boat crossings has pushed our asylum system to breaking point. We share the frustrations of the British public about the abuse of our generosity by human traffickers and illegal migrants, who are leaving the evidently safe France and entering our country in flagrant breach of our laws. Just as everyone has the duty to obey the law, they have the right to expect that the law, including our immigration laws, will be enforced.
The enduring solution is to break the business model of the evil people smugglers and to stop the boats. The system we will build is one where if someone comes here illegally via a safe country, they will not have a route to life in the UK, and we will bring forward legislation to that effect in due course. That does not mean we are abandoning our country’s instinct and history of generosity and compassion. We will continue to assist those in genuine need of our protection. To do that, we must address illegal migration, and that is what this Government’s reforms will do.
Sir George Howarth
May I begin by thanking the right hon. Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick) for contacting me following the appalling incident that occurred on 10 February at a demonstration outside a hotel in Knowsley? A further smaller scale demonstration took place on Friday evening. The scenes that unfolded were truly shocking, with three people, one of whom was a police officer, receiving minor injuries and a police vehicle being vandalised and set on fire. I should point out that the demonstration was attended by a substantial number of residents, many of whom conducted themselves peacefully and lawfully. Unfortunately, some did not, as the number of arrests regrettably illustrates. This is not, however, typical of the people of Knowsley or Kirkby, who are not bigoted, racist or unwelcoming.
I do have concerns, as the Minister is aware, about the involvement of far-right groups from outside of Knowsley, such as Patriotic Alternative, Yorkshire Rose and Britain First, in promoting that event and seeking to stir up racial hatred in our community and others.
Before concluding I would like to put some questions to the Minister. First, does he share my concern about the involvement of those far-right groups in such incidents, and will he consider proscribing them? Secondly, will the Minster undertake an urgent review of the use of hotels to house refugees and report back to the House? Thirdly, as part of such a review, will the Minister look at alternatives to hotels, taking into account the housing needs of local residents, and work with local councils to arrive at more suitable options? Will the Minister agree to meet me and officials from Knowsley to discuss what can be done to address the local situation?
Fourthly, can the Minister at some point make a further statement to the House about how the Government propose to fix the asylum system? Finally, does the Minister agree with me that in these circumstances, some social media sites are used as platforms for poison and misinformation? Will he urge the companies that own them to ensure that the platforms are used more responsibly?
Robert Jenrick
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for the experienced and measured manner in which he has led his community in recent days. I associate myself with his remarks regarding the people of Knowsley.
The right hon. Gentleman is right to say that a number of groups have been involved in the protest in his constituency, as well as those elsewhere in the country, and that the behaviour of those groups is at times disgraceful and vile, and should be stamped out. We have been monitoring those groups closely, and I have asked my officials at the Home Office and police colleagues, including the National Police Co-ordination Centre, to continue doing so and to step up that activity. If we need to take further action against those groups, we will. We will be monitoring them very closely, including the social media content that they and their supporters are perpetuating.
The right hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to the social media companies and their involvement in such activities. There have been some vile posts in recent days, including some about Members of this House, for no good reason. Again, we are monitoring that social media content; we raise it with the police and they raise it with social media companies through the appropriate channels.
With regard to accommodation more broadly, none of us wants to see hotels being used in this manner on an ongoing basis. They are an emergency, temporary solution to a serious national emergency. The number of individuals crossing the channel illegally in recent years has been on such a scale that the Home Office had to resort to options that are clearly undesirable.
The Prime Minister set out at the end of last year our intention to end the use of hotels as swiftly as possible. Better forms of accommodation will include dispersal accommodation, where we work closely and constructively with local authorities—including that of the right hon. Member for Knowsley—to find suitable properties, consult the local community and then house asylum seekers for as long as is necessary. That plan is now moving forward, and we have reached regional agreements with local authorities. It is for the Home Office and those local authorities to ensure that it is implemented as swiftly as possible.
More broadly, as I said in my opening remarks, hotels are a symptom of the problem. The cause is the number of people crossing the channel. That will be resolved only by breaking the business model of the people smugglers and deterring those people from crossing the channel. It is for that reason that we will bring forward further legislation very soon.
Sir Bill Wiggin (North Herefordshire) (Con)
The Minister, the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister are all doing everything they can to stop this sort of incident from happening elsewhere. It must not happen in places such as Herefordshire. Can the Minister explain why the permanent secretary is still in post, and why no small boats Bill has appeared before the House?
Robert Jenrick
On the legislation that I have mentioned, the Home Secretary, the Prime Minister and I are working closely as we finalise those plans. It is absolutely right that we take time to ensure that this legislation is as effective as possible. As my hon. Friend knows, this is one of the most litigious areas of public life. It is an area where, I am afraid, human rights lawyers abuse and exploit our laws at times, and where the courts have taken an expansive approach in the past. That is why we must get this right, but we will be bringing forward that legislation very soon.
Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)
The scenes outside the Suites Hotel in Knowsley 10 days ago—violence, intimidation and a police van smashed up and set on fire—were appalling and shameful, and all of us should support Merseyside police in its response to keep people safe. It comes just a few months after the appalling terrorist attack at Dover, when someone who had been engaging with far-right and extremist groups online attempted to use a petrol bomb on a centre. In the last year, the number of so-called migrant hunts organised by far-right groups has doubled, and there has been an increase in far-right groups organising protests and intimidation and attempting to increase and inflame community tensions.
All of us have a responsibility to take this issue seriously, and there is an important debate about asylum accommodation and asylum policy. We have disagreements, and we have criticised the Home Office for the collapse in decision making on asylum, which has led to an increase in delays and in the backlog. People should not be spending a long time in hotels—they should not be put in hotels in the first place—and we should be targeting the criminal gangs, seeking new agreements with France to prevent dangerous boat crossings, and ensuring that the UK does its bit to help those who have fled persecution. We can have that debate, but we all—Government and Opposition—have a responsibility to do so calmly, with common sense, and in a way that does not inflame tensions or divide communities. The Minister will regret the fact that some of the Home Secretary’s language has appeared on some of the placards. On all sides, we need to have a calm debate.
Let me ask the Minister some specific questions. What is being done to co-ordinate the monitoring of far-right activity around asylum accommodation? What is being done about the hateful extremism that has grown and that can radicalise people into violence? The former commissioner for countering extremism has said that the Government have actually reversed some of their action on this. Will he now revisit the downgrading of the response to far-right extremism as part of the Prevent strategy? Serious concerns have been raised about the links between some far-right extremist groups and people who have been exploiting these issues, as well as some links between them and National Action, which has been proscribed because it was so serious.
Does the Minister agree that, nationally, the responsibility is on all of us to be calm and to promote community cohesion and a sensible response to all the challenges we face, rather than divide and inflame tensions that the police and local communities then have to deal with?
Robert Jenrick
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for her closing remarks. It is absolutely incumbent on all of us to treat this in a respectful and serious manner, and ensure that we do nothing to inflame tensions within our communities. I hope she will appreciate that that is the way in which I have always conducted myself in this role.
The Home Secretary has condemned unequivocally the violence we saw in Knowsley, and that is absolutely right, because there is never any excuse for violence, intimidation or attacks on the police. That does not mean that we should not seek to understand the level of public frustration that lies behind wider concerns about our asylum and immigration system. To understand is not to condone, and there are those who treat those frustrations as a phenomenon to be managed, rather than as a warning to be heeded. We in Government take the approach that this is a serious concern for the British public, and that is why we need to take all appropriate steps to stop the illegal channel crossings as quickly as possible.
On the right hon. Lady’s specific questions, we are co-ordinating with police colleagues to ensure that all police forces have the correct and up-to-date advice on how they can support asylum accommodation and manage protests should they happen in the future. The National Police Co-ordination Centre is assisting us in monitoring the activities of relevant groups, including on social media, and we will take such steps as are required if there is content that constitutes a criminal offence. We have also worked with our asylum accommodation providers to ensure that they put in place enhanced security where appropriate, and have the best possible advice from the police as to how they can protect the people working in the hotels and other centres, and, of course, the residents.
With respect to the right hon. Lady’s question about the review of Prevent conducted by William Shawcross, the findings of that report were not that there were no far-right activities in this country, but that we must follow the facts and take a balanced view as to where to deploy our resources. That is exactly what we will do: we will tackle Islamist extremism with all the robustness it deserves, but we will also address far-right activity, including by the groups concerned in this protest.
Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for his engagement with me on issues connected with far-right politics. Given his response to my representations, I can tell the House that his concern about these matters is genuine.
Will my right hon. Friend deconstruct the point he is making about the fact that we must tackle the organised criminal activity that sits behind all this, as that should redouble the effort to tackle detention in hotels? I have been advised by police representatives that some slave masters are targeting some of these hotels, where they try to entice young men to work on their various businesses. The suggestion that arriving here from a safe country is made illegal would drive people who arrive by small boats back into the hands of the slave masters because there would simply be no incentive for them to give themselves up to the authorities. What representations has my right hon. Friend had on those matters? Does the situation not underline the fact that we need to get the hotels emptied and the Home Office working properly?
Robert Jenrick
I agree that we need to ensure that the operational side of the Home Office performs, but there is no easy way to build our way out of this problem; we have to stop people crossing the channel illegally in the first place, because the numbers crossing the channel today are of an order that will always place our asylum and immigration system under enormous strain.
We are working very closely with the police and the National Crime Agency to bear down on organised immigration crime. We have doubled the budget of the NCA in that regard, and are working with it across Europe and beyond to tackle the gangs upstream in every respect. Here in the UK, we are increasing the number of immigration enforcement visits, including raids on illegal employers, by 50%. That activity started at the beginning of the year.
I do not agree with my hon. Friend’s premise that if we pursue a policy like Rwanda, we will see people escaping into the broader community, although I understand where she is coming from. In fact, almost 99% of people crossing the channel in small boats are apprehended by British law enforcement authorities—mostly when we save them at sea and bring them to Western Jet Foil and Manston—so we do meet people who arrive on our shores. The key thing is to stop them arriving in the first place.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
It is clear that putting people in hotels in this large-scale way has allowed right-wing extremist groups to target groups of vulnerable people. It is Home Office policy, therefore, that is putting people at risk—not just vulnerable asylum seekers, but our police, who have to protect everybody in such situations. Does the Minister agree that a lot more needs to be done with social media companies? He said that there is some kind of monitoring and conversations with the police regarding social media companies, but what meetings has he had directly with social media companies? It is very clear that these right-wing extremist groups are organising on social media platforms. I saw some of it myself—was offered it by an algorithm—at the weekend; I do not want to see that kind of hatred on any social media site.
Will any asylum seekers who have been badly impacted by the attack on the hotel, or who still feel at risk, have the option to be moved somewhere else where they feel safer, and will they get additional support if that is required? Will the Minister tell me what additional security measures have been put in place at all sites where asylum seekers are being held in such accommodation, and does he agree with the statement from Merseyside police that,
“Social media speculation, misinformation and rumour can actually damage the outcome of investigations and cause unnecessary fear and consequent behaviour”?
Robert Jenrick
We are working closely with the social media companies, and in fact are stepping up that activity. We supported a recent proposal to amend the Online Safety Bill by putting extra duties on the social media companies in respect of tackling organised immigration crime and abuse of this kind. We monitor social media content closely and the police will raise that with the social media companies through the appropriate channels.
I am afraid that the hon. Lady’s accusation that the Home Office has stoked far right activities is both wrong and deeply offensive; the issue here is the number of people crossing the channel illegally.
Robert Jenrick
It is not the backlog; that is a fantasy. The way to tackle this issue is not by making the UK a more attractive destination, but by tackling the illegal gangs and changing the incentives. We will only do that through having the most robust approach to illegal migration, including by ensuring those who come here in this manner are removed to a safe third country.
Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)
Like me, the Minister, the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister believe that hotels are the wrong place to put people seeking asylum, but on Saturday in Skegness another protest is planned against the use of these hotels and, while there are legitimate concerns, I hope the Minister will agree that the shameless use of people’s concerns by far-right groups is to be deplored and stands in the way of our having a sensible conversation that will in the long term allow us to move beyond the use of these hotels. Will he join me in appealing to the people of Skegness to focus, rightly, on those issues but not to join hands with far-right groups?
Robert Jenrick
I know my hon. Friend’s constituents are frustrated by the use of hotels in Skegness—as are we in Government—and want to see action to tackle the small boats issue. They want to see our laws enforced and those coming here illegally apprehended and removed to other safe countries, but I know also that they will not want to join with more pernicious elements such as far-right groups and to stoke disorder or community tensions in his town. I applaud him for the work he is doing with his community; he held an important public meeting recently to listen to community concerns and raise them with me and the Home Secretary as we formulate policy.
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)
The Minister knows that there is a backlog and that hotels are having to be used because of it. He might not want to admit it from the Dispatch Box, but that is the reality.
My constituency is about 10 minutes away from where this incident in Merseyside happened and the Minister mentioned the asylum accommodation providers; may I urge him to work closely with them to ensure that wherever they are placing asylum seekers, they are working closely with the communities, the local authorities and the police there now, and they are ensuring that the accommodation that people are being placed in is able to handle and support them?
Robert Jenrick
The backlog is a contributing factor; it was a contributing factor when we came to power in 2010 and found a backlog of 500,000 cases, three times more than the level today. Simply processing those claims faster and making claiming asylum swifter and easier will not solve the problem, however; the problem will be solved by preventing people from reaching our shores in the first place.
On the situation in Merseyside, we are working closely with Merseyside police; we are in regular contact with them and with local authorities. We hold multi-agency meetings, which include the police, prior to standing up any new forms of accommodation so that these issues can be discussed. Where protests are planned, and we have extensive intelligence about that, we work closely with police forces so that they can make sensible preparations to keep the local community safe.
Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)
I join my right hon. Friend in condemning the use of violence and in thanking the police for their response, and I categorically agree with him that we must stop the people smugglers, stop the small boats and end illegal immigration into our country. I hear him on the need for further legislation down the line, but in the meantime can he assure me that every single one of the huge suites of powers that this Parliament granted to the Home Office in the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 is being used to solve the problem quicker?
Robert Jenrick
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We passed that Act, which was opposed by the Labour party, and we are implementing every measure in it as swiftly as possible. Many of those measures are already making a difference, as seen in the number of arrests now being made of those people with their hand on the tiller of small boats when apprehended by Border Force and our partners in the English channel. That is important, but we will follow that up in due course with further, even more robust legislation, which I am sure my hon. Friend will support and hope the Labour party will too.
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
What specific liaison occurred between the Home Office and Knowsley Council prior to the block booking of the hotel for the accommodation of asylum seekers? Did the Minister’s Department anticipate problems such as the ones that occurred? What steps will he take to prevent a recurrence of such problems at other similar sites?
Robert Jenrick
Shortly after taking up this role, I changed the Home Office’s engagement procedures to ensure that when accommodation is stood up, unless it is a grave emergency or we are ordered to stand it up by a court, we will provide at least 24 hours’ notice to a local authority, and that there will be extensive consultation with such a local authority. I am pleased to say that today that level of consultation happens around three to four weeks in advance of standing up a site. There are usually multi-agency meetings prior to doing so and opportunities for Members of Parliament to meet either me or senior officials, but of course if any right hon. or hon. Member feels we are falling short of those standards, I encourage them to bring that to my attention.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
I absolutely support my right hon. Friend the Minister and Members throughout the House in calling out and condemning the violence that took place and any far-right activists and groups operating in that area. They have no place in our society, as far as I am concerned.
But I am also clear that I totally agree with the Minister that we have to stop the small boats and stop the illegal immigration coming to our country. On 7 November last year, the Minister said to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton) that he accepted that the significant number of people taken into our local area is disproportionate. On 13 December last year, the Prime Minister made the point that the use of hotel had to end soon. It is 20 February 2023 and the hotels of Stoke-on-Trent have yet to be emptied. When will this happen? Will the Minister commit to Stoke-on-Trent being the first place in the country to have its hotels emptied?
Robert Jenrick
My hon. Friend has been an assiduous champion of his community and he wants his hotels back and to be put to good use, for the benefit of the local economy, for tourists and for visitors to Stoke-on-Trent. We agree, which is why we have set out our plans, including mandatory dispersal, working with local authorities throughout the country in a constructive and productive manner to find suitable accommodation that is not hotels. That is why we are also exploring a small number of larger sites that will provide decent but not luxurious accommodation at good value for money for the taxpayer. I reiterate that this challenge will be resolved only by reducing the flow of individuals coming across unnecessarily on those dangerous boats. Without that happening, we will be living with issues such as hotels for some time. That is why we are going to bring forward further legislation.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)
The Minister told us a few minutes ago that part of the problem here is human rights lawyers who abuse and exploit our laws. That is obviously very serious, Mr Speaker. Any lawyer doing that needs to be stopped, so could the Minister tell the House how many solicitors, advocates and barristers have been reported by the Home Office in the last 12 months to the regulatory authorities?
Robert Jenrick
We are monitoring the activities, as it so happens, of a small number of legal practitioners, but it is not appropriate for me to discuss that here. The wider point I was making stands, which is that the British public are looking on askance at the fact that individuals, mostly young males, are setting off from a demonstrably safe country, France, and soliciting human traffickers to ferry them across the channel, and they are invariably throwing their documents into the sea, so that they can exploit our human rights laws. That needs to change. The British public are angry and frustrated at that situation. We understand that and that is why we are taking action.
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)
The best solution to an end to the use of hotels and to protect our communities is to stop the boats, stamp out the human exploiters and people smugglers, and increase deportations. What steps are the Government taking to increase and speed up deportations, and to get the Rwanda scheme going? May I make a suggestion to the Minister? Doncaster Sheffield airport recently closed down. Will he consider using it to fly out illegal immigrants and deport them quickly?
Robert Jenrick
It is absolutely right that, as a deterrent, we increase the number of illegal migrants removed from this country, so that it is clear that anyone who comes here in breach of our laws in this manner will not get to stay in the UK. We have taken a number of steps recently. One has been our communiqué with Albania, a safe European country from which it should be extremely unusual for anyone to come here and successfully gain asylum. That communiqué is now in force, with updated country guidance, and individuals are now being removed from the United Kingdom on weekly flights to Albania. We are working very well with the Albanian Government. That is one example of how we can tackle this issue.
Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)
Just months apart, our country has seen two attacks on innocent people from right-wing extremists. First, a terrorist firebombed an immigration processing centre, and now we have seen an angry right-wing mob attack police outside a hotel housing asylum seekers. We are seeing more and more vile incidents that are fuelled by a far-right ideology. Does the Minister agree that it was a mistake for William Shawcross to say Prevent places too much emphasis on far-right extremism?
Robert Jenrick
No, I do not. William Shawcross conducted a very rigorous review over a long period of time which looked at the facts, and the facts are that there is extremism and violence in this country from both the far right and the far left, or Islamist extremists. We need to take action against both, but we need to apportion our resources in a manner that is proportionate to the challenge. That is the point that William Shawcross was making. I fully support what he suggested. The Home Secretary, in her statement to the House, made clear that we will be implementing that as soon as possible.
Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab)
Liverpool has a very proud history of chasing fascists off our streets or locking them into left luggage cupboards at Lime Street station. Does the Minister agree that the so-called independent review of Prevent failed to recognise the threat levels of far-right groups? What action is being taken to prevent serious incidents, such as that which took place in Knowsley?
Robert Jenrick
It is disappointing that the hon. Lady attempts to draw conclusions from these events with respect to Prevent. The Government have been very clear: extremism of any kind, whether from the far right or from Islamist extremism, is unacceptable and we will bear down on it with the full force of the law. With respect to the groups that were involved in Knowsley, as I said in answer to previous questions, we are monitoring them closely and we will take action, with the police, wherever we need to do so.
Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)
Earlier, the Minister mentioned the importance of observing the law. The European convention on human rights is, of course, still part of our domestic legal system, and human rights are not a dirty word; they are, in fact, universal.
The Joint Committee on Human Rights, which I chair, is currently conducting an inquiry into the human rights of asylum seekers. We have heard evidence that a number of rights under the convention are engaged: the right to life, the right to be free from inhuman and degrading treatment, the right to liberty and security, the right to dignity and respect for private and family life, and the right to be free from discrimination in the enjoyment of convention rights. Can the Minister tell me what steps the Home Secretary is taking to ensure that the human rights of asylum seekers are respected in the United Kingdom?
Robert Jenrick
We take our responsibilities to those in our care extremely seriously. While there will of course be occasions when we fall below the standards that we would expect, and we should learn from and correct those errors as quickly as possible, in general we care for asylum seekers well in this country, and we should be proud of that.
I have had the opportunity in this role to visit a range of facilities—difficult places such as Western Jet Foil, where we meet those people whom we have saved at sea; Manston, where we house them while we conduct security and health checks; and the child hotels where we house unaccompanied minors while we find local authority care for them. In general, the standards of these places are high, and the staff who are working in them are doing a good job on behalf of all of us, but if there are ways in which we can improve those services and ensure that we continue to meet our legal obligations, we can and should do so.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
The right hon. Gentleman will be well aware that there are people going around claiming to be journalists who are actually stirring up hatred and fear of asylum seekers. I watched one of their reports recently. It was directed at a building in my constituency which, it turns out, is not being used and will not be used to house asylum seekers. That broadcast was designed to create fear, and for the life of me I do not understand why it is still available on YouTube.
Let me ask the Minister this question. Does he think it is better for the Government, or the police or the Home Office, to ask the social media companies to take such videos down, or does he think—given that there is a law against inciting racial hatred in the Public Order Act 1986—that the prosecuting authorities should look at the videos and decide whether the threshold for prosecution has been met?
Robert Jenrick
I think the right hon. Gentleman has answered his own question, in that some of this content is vile and quite probably criminal, and in those instances the police should take action using the laws that are available to them. When we at the Home Office find such content we raise it with the police, and the police then raise it with the social media companies; but if the police feel that it meets the threshold for prosecution, they can and should be prosecuting.
The right hon. Gentleman is also right in saying that there are a small number of cases of so-called citizen journalists visiting hotels. Of course we all respect the right to protest and the right to free speech, but these individuals need to be careful to ensure that their actions do not stir up community tensions or spread disinformation, as is often the case.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
Like many others, I am heartbroken following the incidents in Knowsley. I stand in this Chamber as a proud product of immigration: my ancestors fled the great hunger in Ireland, as did those of so many of my fellow Scousers, which is why these events have caused such shock in Liverpool.
This is a wake-up call for those of us who want a society in which all are welcome. The words and the tone of hon. Members in this place and the media matter hugely, so will the Government commit themselves to ensuring that there is an end to the hateful rhetoric that demonises and dehumanises people? Will they put resources into communities to foster hope and understanding, and, crucially, will they provide resources for safe, welcoming and suitable community-based accommodation for all people seeking asylum?
Robert Jenrick
I am proud that the United Kingdom is one of the most generous and welcoming countries in the world. Since 2015, 440,000 people have come to our country on humanitarian grounds, and last year more humanitarian visas were issued than at any time since the end of the second world war. That is exactly the right approach, and we see it with great schemes such as Homes for Ukraine and the schemes applying to Afghanistan and Syria. It is true that the British public can see the difference between that and those people who are coming here illegally, abusing our generosity and our laws, and it is for that reason that we must take action to ensure that the illegal channel crossings end as swiftly as possible.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
The Government’s politicised language on asylum seekers inevitably stokes division between communities and people in hostels, but Wales has shown that things can be different. Last year, the national youth organisation, Urdd, provided welcome centres with dedicated support services for refugees from Afghanistan and Ukraine, and everybody benefited. Does the Minister agree that when the history books are written about his Government’s sorry record on asylum, it will be recorded that people in Wales strove to act with humanity and for community harmony?
Robert Jenrick
I hope that when the history books are written about this Government, people will point to some of the fantastic schemes that we have created and that have commanded such broad support, including Homes for Ukraine and the Syria and Afghan schemes, all of which collectively have brought hundreds of thousands of people to our shores, where they have been welcomed into the homes of British citizens. But it is right that we make the distinction between those people—many of whom we have geographical, moral and historical obligations to—and the young men in safe countries such as France soliciting human traffickers to ferry them across the channel and to exploit our laws. This is an important distinction that we can see and that I think the British public more broadly can see, and the British public want us to address it.
Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)
The Home Secretary was warned by Government lawyers last November that inflammatory immigration rhetoric risked inspiring far-right terror attacks. What discussions has the Home Secretary had with her Ministers about what is appropriate language?
Robert Jenrick
The Home Secretary was very clear that the violence we saw in Knowsley on 10 February was completely unacceptable, and she stands squarely with the brave officers from Merseyside police who responded to that incident. I pay tribute to them again today and to all those who work in our asylum system more broadly who do such a good job, often in very difficult circumstances.
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)
Earlier, the Minister mentioned that there was a level of frustration and concern among the British public. The people who are fleeing such horrors and trying to seek asylum are frustrated by the fact that they have been living in hotels, in some cases for coming up to two years. They are concerned about the backlog in Home Office applications, and they are concerned and frustrated when they are contacting MPs across the House to try to get their cases resolved. Does the Minister understand that accommodating people in hotels will not work? Can he guarantee that there will be a safety review assessment before people are put into those hotels, to protect them and the staff in the hotels?
Robert Jenrick
We have safeguarding procedures in place to support people going into the hotels and the staff who work in them. The hon. Lady’s broader point was about the backlog. As I said earlier, the backlog was three times higher when we came to power in 2010, but that does not mean that we should not take action to get it down and return to a position where we are processing claims in a sensible and swift manner. I have put in place, with the Home Secretary, new measures, and we are in the process of recruiting a significant number of further decision makers. We are already seeing significant progress in bringing down the legacy backlog, and the hon. Lady will start to see that flowing through in the numbers that are publicly reported and in the cases that come to her surgery. I am confident that we will meet our objective of eliminating the legacy backlog of initial decisions over the course of this year.
Mick Whitley (Birkenhead) (Lab)
The vast majority of those who turned out on the night of 10 February were not hardened veterans of the organised far right; they were ordinary people whose frustrations had been fostered by this Government’s decade-long neglect of their communities and whose fear had been stoked into hatred by the kind of inflammatory rhetoric that we hear all too often on the Government side of the House. Does the Minister accept that stranding refugees in hotels in left-behind communities such as Knowsley risks leaving these vulnerable people divorced from vital community support networks and means that they become a target for hatred? Will he explain what steps the Home Office is taking to find community-based alternatives to the use of hotels as contingency accommodation?
Robert Jenrick
As I have said, we are pursuing a strategy of replacing hotels with dispersal accommodation, which is agreed constructively between the Home Office, providers and local authorities and provides better value for taxpayers’ money. That is the way to avoid this situation, other than addressing the root cause by preventing people from coming across the channel in the first place.
I encourage the hon. Gentleman to support our further steps over the coming months to bear down on individuals crossing the channel and to create a system whereby people who come here illegally will not find a route to remain in the UK, because that is the enduring solution to this problem.
Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)
The truth is that this is not the first time we have seen violence and intimidation directed towards refugees in these hotels. Indeed, the hon. Member for Boston and Skegness (Matt Warman) outlined his fear of a further protest coming this weekend.
Hope not Hate has documented hundreds of incidents involving Patriotic Alternative, Britain First and so-called migrant hunters. The Minister says the Home Office reports to the police incidents that it feels may breach the Public Order Act 1986, perhaps in the same way it is monitoring these lawyers, yet nothing is happening. He says these groups are being monitored closely. For the avoidance of doubt, will he set out the threshold for prosecution? This will keep happening until we are clear that free speech does not involve 50% of participants in the conversation being in fear of their life. This is harassment and terrorism on our doorstep, and it needs to be dealt with properly. What on earth is he doing to prosecute these people?
Robert Jenrick
I have spoken on a number of occasions in recent days to Home Office officials, the national police co-ordination centre and operational policing colleagues. They are monitoring this activity very closely, and they are keeping a close eye on these groups. Where they believe content requires further action, they will take it, but it is for the police to take that action rather than the Home Office.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
The anti-Muslim group Britain First has activists in my constituency. The group is known to have carried out more than 80 visits to asylum accommodation sites and to have distributed leaflets containing Islamophobic narratives in those areas. The language of Britain First is only a few steps of escalation from the anti-migrant sentiments expressed by the Home Secretary when she claimed there was an “invasion” by migrants on the south coast. Does the Minister regret the Home Secretary’s use of such inflammatory language, which feeds into and enables far-right groups? Will he explain what proactive work the Home Office is leading to get a grip on far-right extremism?
Robert Jenrick
I usually have great respect for the hon. Lady, but it is wrong to equate the actions of far-right groups with the comments of the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary has condemned the violence we saw in Knowsley, and she is working with the police to ensure it is properly investigated and that the police have the resources and the support they need for that investigation. We will bear down on far-right extremism, just as we care about Islamist extremism. There is no place in this country for any form of extremism, and we will ensure the police have the resources they need.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
When the Government use language closely associated with the far right, it only provides encouragement. We know these far-right groups are trying to stoke local problems around the hotels in which asylum seekers are being housed. Has the incident in Knowsley inspired the Government to review how they assess the safety of these locations and the powers that the police and those investigating online activity need to deter the people who are trying to exploit this situation?
Robert Jenrick
We have reviewed the security at these hotels and other asylum accommodation centres. The national police co-ordination centre will be issuing updated guidance to our providers and local partners on how they should ensure correct levels of security at each site. Security is based on risk, so procedures will vary depending on intelligence. I assure the hon. Gentleman that we take this issue very seriously.
Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)
The disorder at Rotherham and Knowsley was instigated by fascist goons such as Patriotic Alternative, and the Home Secretary must take a share of the blame for using rhetoric that helped to create the environment that normalised these racist thugs. The Erskine Bridge hotel in my constituency is planned to be the largest of these hotels in the UK, and we have seen this group incite and inflame local sensitivities for its own racist and divisive ends. I have made urgent suggestions to the Home Office to address legitimate concerns. Will the Minister chase a response, so that we can drive the far right out of Erskine?
Robert Jenrick
I am aware of the site in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and the protests around it. I spoke to officials earlier today regarding it and they gave me an update. I would be happy to connect him with those officials so that he can raise his concerns and they can support him in any way.
Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister speaks as though all of the issues were someone else’s problem. He has acknowledged some changes he is bringing into the asylum system. I am one of the top six customers of the Home Office for my constituents and it is the worst it has been in 18 years, but in truth what we are seeing here is the chickens coming home to roost in the impact on communities, the appalling situation that many asylum seekers are living in and the danger around these sites. When we will see a real change, a step change, as a result of the changes he is introducing? I cannot see it happening any time soon.
Robert Jenrick
The Prime Minister set out a plan at the end of last year and I am working every day to implement it. We are already seeing significant progress on the asylum backlog, with cases falling significantly with every passing week, and we are recruiting more decision makers into the Home Office to do this. We are working intensively with local authorities to find better and greater value for money accommodation through the national dispersal scheme, rather than hotels. If the hon. Lady, as a valued Member of this House, has suggestions as to ways in which we can improve the quality of service, I would be happy to meet her to discuss them.
Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)
The Minister must be well aware that what happened in Knowsley is not an isolated incident; the far right is attacking hotels in other places and attacking asylum seekers regularly. We have a system that spends a great deal of public money to keep desperate people in absolute poverty and degradation in these terrible hotels—their use obviously needs to end. Will he say a word of humanity about the fear that many of these people must be facing? They are refugees from wars, famine and human rights abuses who are looking for a place of safety in this world. They are human beings just like the rest of us. Surely they deserve to be able to exercise their legal rights to seek asylum and not be constantly accused of being illegal when this is a legal right.
Robert Jenrick
It is, just as a matter of fact, a criminal offence to cross the channel in a small boat, so those who enter the UK in that manner are in breach of our laws. The broader point that the right hon. Gentleman makes is, of course, absolutely right: irrespective of that, those people who come here should be treated compassionately and we should abide by our broader legal obligations. The hotels and accommodation we provide are of a good quality. They will vary and if there are poor instances, I will take action against the providers. However, generally speaking, they are of a good quality and they are significantly better than what we find in comparable European countries. Many of the people who arrive on our shores in small boats have spent a sustained period in camps such as those in Calais; the way in which we treat people in this country is far superior.
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
Two weeks ago, at departmental questions, I requested a meeting with a Minister about the continued use of hotels in my constituency and the broader Liverpool city region. In the meantime, a group called the Patriotic Alternative has started distributing leaflets in one part of my constituency. Again, I request that meeting.
Robert Jenrick
I would be happy to meet the hon. Gentleman, and I apologise if there has been any delay. He raises a broader point of concern to us, which is the leafleting by far-right groups of the communities surrounding hotels. There have been examples of leaflets with faces of Members of Parliament and local councillors on them. Whenever I have seen those, I have raised them with local police and the Home Office’s dedicated counter-terrorism support. That kind of intimidatory leaflet is completely unacceptable on the streets of our country.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
I do not doubt the Minister’s sincerity when he rightly condemns right-wing extremism—indeed, all extremism—but it is now three years since the former commissioner for counter-extremism warned that the Government’s counter-extremism strategy was out of date because it did not have key measures to tackle online radicalisation. When can we expect to see those measures before the House?
Robert Jenrick
I will take the hon. Gentleman’s question away and ask the Security Minister to write to him with a fuller reply. I have always taken extremism seriously. For example, I worked with Sara Khan in her work on tackling the victims of extremism. Extremism, whether from the far right or Islamism, is pernicious and needs to be tackled. We will do everything we can to address it.
Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)
The Minister will be aware that there are asylum seekers who have complex physical and mental health needs, and placing them in hotels can exacerbate those needs. Can he assure us that he will speak to the refugee charities, particularly the Scottish Refugee Council and the Refugee Council, about both the far-right activity and their concerns about placing asylum seekers in hotel accommodation?
Robert Jenrick
The Home Office works very closely with non-governmental organisations, including the Refugee Council, and takes their views into consideration. I have been clear that no one in Government wants to see the hotel accommodation continue for one day more than is absolutely necessary. There are only two ways in which we will resolve this: first, and most importantly, by stopping the boats coming in the first place; and secondly, for as long as we have illegal migration, by working with local authorities, such as those in Scotland, to find better dispersal accommodation. If the hon. Gentleman can support us in that effort with respect to the Scottish Government and local authorities, I would be grateful.
Fan-led Review and Football White Paper
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if she will make a statement on the fan-led review of football governance and the publication of a football White Paper.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Stuart Andrew)
Our national game has become a worldwide sport, loved and followed by millions. The growth of the premier league, English football’s top division, is an achievement to be celebrated. Our grassroots game is a force for good to bring people and communities together across the country. However, the findings of the fan-led review made it clear that the underlying financial and governance structures that support English football are unstable and fragile. The review highlighted the perverse financial incentives that encourage clubs to overspend on chasing success. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) for her considerable work in this area.
The issue is exacerbated by poor corporate governance. Some clubs lack scrutiny of decision making, are poor at communicating with fans and lack transparency in decision making. Defective industry self-regulation throughout football has led to a high and growing risk of financial failure among clubs. Indeed, one of my first meetings as the Minister for Sport was with fans groups. I heard at first hand how poor ownership and governance can leave clubs at the mercy of careless owners.
The structural weakness, along with the risk of breakaway competitions such as the European super league, threatens the stability of the football pyramid as a whole and risks leaving fans powerless and our national game in peril. The unique importance of football clubs to their fans and local communities means that the social cost of financial failures and the loss of clubs would be significant. That includes the risk of irreversibly damaging our valued cultural heritage.
Reform is needed to avoid those failures and prevent those impacts from arising. It is clear that the game is in need of significant reform. As I have stressed to the football authorities on several occasions, there is much that football could already be doing to protect the game. This includes reaching a much-needed agreement on a new package of financial redistribution for the football pyramid, and, again, I urge them to solve this issue.
The Government responded to the fan-led review in April 2022, and we will publish a football governance White Paper this week. This will set out a clear and well thought-through package of reforms that will ensure that the foundations of the game are strong and that the game can continue to thrive.
I make a commitment that Ministers will come before the House to make a statement with a full announcement on how we intend to reform our national game for the future and for fans, and we look forward to ensuring that hon. Members have the opportunity to fully scrutinise those proposals.
Lucy Powell
I thank the Minister for his response, but it is just not good enough. Three weeks ago, the entire White Paper was conveniently “leaked” to the press. He and I both know that it was ready to be given to the House before recess, yet he has still not published it today, and the Secretary of State has not even turned up. The very well-received fan-led review, conducted by the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch), was published more than a year ago. It was welcomed by both sides of the House, and the Government committed to implementing it in full. However, five months later, they dropped the ball and would commit only to a White Paper, which we have been waiting for ever since. Fans, football clubs and their communities deserve better and this Government are letting them down. Can the Minister tell the House why he has not published it today, or before today, given that it was clearly expected before recess?
There is widespread support for an independent football regulator, and for the recommendations of the review. The arguments for that grow stronger every day: Bury FC has collapsed; and Derby County nearly went under. From Southend to Scunthorpe, other clubs stand on the brink. A European Super League is back on the table. Manchester City and the Premier League face years in the courts. Negotiations over the sale of Manchester United, Liverpool and Everton are going on as we speak, and we are still nowhere on those financial settlements for the pyramid.
Fans are desperate for a proper say and for assurances about ownership and sustainability of these global and local assets, yet without a regulator these assurances cannot be made. Will the Government take responsibility for clubs that go bust, that spiral into decline or that are bought by unsuitable new owners, in the years they have wasted bringing in the regulator? As we will see again today, Parliament fully supports these proposals. Labour is fully committed to them. The Minister is facing an open goal, so instead of constantly passing it back, can he just put the ball into the back of the net?
Mr Speaker
Just before the Minister responds, let me add that the Secretary of State did tell me that this was a serious leak. In which case, I would like to know whether there has been a full investigation, and at what point the House will be updated on that investigation, which I presume has started.
Stuart Andrew
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
I make no apology for taking time to ensure that the White Paper, which we will publish this week, actually addresses what are essentially quite complex and sometimes difficult issues. It is important that we think about all aspects of the game. We do not want to do something that might damage the commercial success of the premier league. The Opposition may think that they can just publish a report in a week, but I have taken a considerable amount of time—and I am glad that I have done so—to meet all the stakeholders involved in this and to listen to their varying views. If the shadow Secretary of State had had the same conversations, she will have seen that there are competing views. It is important, therefore, that we take those carefully on board, listen to them and ensure that we come up with the best advice possible. We have also ensured that we have sought the best external advice from those who have been involved in the establishment of other regulators. That is the right thing to do.
I must point out that it was this Government who commissioned the review in the first place and, as I have mentioned a number of times, that football need not have waited; it could have got on with this, but it has not. We will publish our intention with the White Paper this week so that we can celebrate what is good about football and reform it where it is needed.
Damian Green (Ashford) (Con)
I will take a self-denying ordinance and avoid bad football puns in asking my question—
Damian Green
Thank you; I will.
My right hon. Friend the Minister is aware of the huge degree of unanimity across the House on the need for urgent reform, given the many crises that we know have affected and continue to affect clubs at the top of the game and further down the pyramid. On that basis, I am pleased to hear that we will see the White Paper later this week, but he will be aware that that is only one step in the process. The White Paper will need to be followed by legislation before we see a regulator or any of the other reforms we want. Can he tell me whether it is the Government’s intention to legislate in this Session, and if not, is it their intention to legislate in this Parliament to introduce these much-needed reforms?
Stuart Andrew
My right hon. Friend is right to highlight the importance of the issue. We will set out our plans for reform of the game in the forthcoming White Paper. As with all Government policy, when the Government commit to reform, legislation only follows when parliamentary time allows, and we will be working on that at pace.
Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)
Will the Minister just stop trying to deflect attention by saying that football will sort itself out? The mess that the game is in is because football has not sorted itself out. That is why we need the Government to come in with a clear statement, a White Paper and a commitment to legislate speedily. The message is simple—he must have talked to the English Football League, which says there is no chance of an agreement on funding with the Premier League, because the Premier League holds all the money and all the cards and it will never give to the rest of football that which is enough to make the rest of the game sustainable.
Stuart Andrew
The hon. Gentleman likes to tease me regularly on this issue. I agree with him; that is precisely why we will publish the White Paper on Thursday, and I am sure he will be pleased with its contents.
Nicola Richards (West Bromwich East) (Con)
Supporters groups are doing hugely important work. It has taken groups such as Action for Albion and Shareholders for Albion to highlight the genuine concerns about owners’ financial mismanagement of West Bromwich Albion. Will the Minister ensure that supporters groups have an enhanced role in football governance when the White Paper is published later this week?
Stuart Andrew
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who has been an active campaigner on this issue and has worked incredibly hard with the fans groups in her area. She is right, and that is why the first meeting I had was with fans groups. I want to ensure that they are the ones we consider most when we publish the White Paper.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
I am concerned that the Minister, in his response, has pointed the finger at least to some extent at the EFL and implied that he has listened to owners as much as he has to fans. That deeply concerns me. Two great challenges that football faces are: bad and dodgy governance, and institutionalised unfairness of income. Some 93% of football television income goes to the premier league clubs, despite the fact that a majority of fans going to watch games each weekend are going to EFL and non-league games, not premier league games. Only 35% of transfer revenue from premier league clubs goes to the EFL, even though the majority of British premier league players have played in those lower divisions. Does the Minister understand why many of us are concerned about the tardiness of this process and the fact that Ministers seem to be listening to the owners more than to the fans?
Stuart Andrew
I totally reject that accusation; if anything, I have spent more time with EFL, the Premier League, the Football Association, and fans groups and supporters groups than with any of the owners, because I recognise that the changes we need to see arise from the evidence that the fan-led review highlighted, much of which came from hundreds of hours of work listening mainly to fans. The hon. Gentleman’s interpretation of what I have said, as meaning that I am spending more time with owners, is factually incorrect.
Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con)
The Minister is a diligent man, and I am pleased that he has taken the time to look into the system and is coming forward with a White Paper next week. He cannot comment specifically on the Manchester City issue, but the fact that there are more than 100 charges—particularly about not co-operating —does raise questions. Will he confirm that the independent regulator will have the power to compel clubs to co-operate with the Premier League and the authorities when they are dealing with such important issues?
Stuart Andrew
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that I cannot comment on a live investigation. However, the case that he highlights does not affect the reforms that we will introduce, which we know are needed in football. We want football authorities to take action where they can, and they have in this instance. I am sure that he will be reassured by the contents of the football governance White Paper that we will publish shortly.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
The Government commissioned the fan-led review of football governance, and it was the Government who published it. They did not make it clear at the time that they intended to prevaricate and then announce further consultation through a White Paper. One wonders what it is the Government think they will find out from the White Paper that they have not already found out from the fan-led review. Will the Minister commit to implementing all 10 recommendations of the fan-led review, or is the White Paper going to unpick them?
Stuart Andrew
The hon. Gentleman will have to see what is in the White Paper when we publish it this week.
Anna Firth (Southend West) (Con)
I absolutely welcome the Minister’s statement and the Government’s commitment to implementing the fan-led review, because although next month marks the first anniversary of Southend becoming a city, our treasured football club, Southend United, faces severe financial difficulties. Supporters’ clubs have done a huge amount, but will the Minister meet me to discuss what the Government can do, if anything, to help? Will he also confirm that the upcoming White Paper will address the hugely unfair redistribution of Premier League solidarity payments, which is one of the reasons why Southend United is in the position that it is?
Stuart Andrew
I commend my hon. Friend for her work, particularly in support of her local football club. I would be more than happy to meet her. I can assure her that we are taking action exactly because of examples such as the one she raises, as she will see in the White Paper when we publish it.
John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)
I noticed that the Minister did not answer the right hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green) on when we will see the implementation of the White Paper in primary legislation. Given the way things are going, the danger is that it will be delayed until next year. That is too late. A number of clubs are already in serious financial straits, and a number of them could go under within the next few months. As we have seen over the past few years, that situation will get graver and graver, not better.
Stuart Andrew
I absolutely recognise that the issue needs addressing. That is why we have taken a considerable amount of time to get this right, and I believe that we have. I think that the White Paper will help us to secure our national game, but—as I said to my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Damian Green)—when parliamentary time allows.
Sir James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)
I refer hon. Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
As has already been mentioned by a number of Members, Southend United is in financial crisis. As well as involving fans, can we involve the broader community? In the case of the Southend United development, there will be an extra 2,400 social houses as a result of the development if the club goes forward beyond the insolvency in two weeks’ time.
Stuart Andrew
I know that my hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Anna Firth) have worked incredibly closely together in support of the local football club. He is right to highlight the significant role that all football clubs play in our communities. Addressing many of those issues is precisely what we sought to do in developing the White Paper, and I hope that he will be satisfied when he sees it published this week.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
Football without fans is nothing. The delay in the publication of the White Paper should worry every supporter. What we need now is protection for the future of the game: we need a regulator with teeth and a fit and proper owners test that is fit for purpose. As a Liverpool fan, I am worried about what we might face in future—I am sure that every other supporter of a club is the same. The delay in legislation harms the future of the game.
Events this week, with the publication of the independent review of the events in Paris, which exonerated Liverpool supporters, show that governing bodies such as UEFA and Governments have a long way to go with regard to the treatment of supporters. We must never forget that they are the lifeblood of the game, which is why this is important—this is a crucial point in football history. Will the Minister assure me that the White Paper places supporters at the heart of decision making to ensure that their voices are heard and that they can play a major role in shaping the future of football in this country?
Stuart Andrew
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. We were all glad to see that the Liverpool fans were exonerated. The fact that they faced such disgraceful action was appalling. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will shortly meet her French counterpart to understand what lessons are being learned from that awful incident. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that the fans need to be at the heart of this, which is why they were the first group that I met when I was appointed, as I said at the beginning. They have been foremost in my thoughts when I have been working on the White Paper.
Mr Simon Clarke (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Con)
I welcome the Government’s commitment to bring forward the White Paper this week. I want to press the Minister on three points. First, it is important to ensure that we have a robust test for the ownership, particularly foreign ownership, of our clubs. Secondly, it is critical to ensure that the parachute payments for relegation do not make it almost impossible, frankly, for clubs to break into what risks becoming the closed shop of the premier league. Thirdly, as several hon. Members have said, it is central to ensure that we legislate in a timely fashion. I gently point out to the Government that we are not overburdened with legislation on Thursdays, for example, so there is scope within the next year to bring forward legislation to deliver a great outcome for the game that we all love.
Stuart Andrew
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight that the ownership of our clubs is an important area of work. We know that there are some very good owners and some very bad owners; that will be addressed in the White Paper. It will also address the fact that we want to see payments go down the pyramid, so that there is more financial sustainability. On committing to legislative time in Parliament, as a former Whip, I know how much trouble I would be in if I were to step on the Whips’ plans, but I will certainly emphasise his point.
Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)
The Prime Minister promised to implement all 10 of the fan-led review’s recommendations before the World cup, including having an independent regulator and giving fans a key role in decisions about selling stadiums or changing a team’s name, colours or crest, yet he failed to even publish a White Paper in time. Can the Minister commit that all those measures will be covered in the White Paper that is now coming out this week, and can he commit to making them law this year?
Stuart Andrew
I am in terrible danger of repeating myself, but I assure the hon. Lady that many of the issues that she has raised are included in the White Paper. We have taken careful consideration of all the points raised, not just in the review, of course, but by other stakeholders, as she will see in just a few days.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Minister for his response. Obviously, I understand the caution that he is referring to, but as an avid football fan, I know first hand the disconnect between fans and club owners. Does he agree that the owners and directors test, as proposed in the fan-led review, is a workable solution to ensure that the sophisticated business regulations required are produced as a result of the review?
Stuart Andrew
Of course, the owners and directors test is an important element of the White Paper. We want to ensure that the people who own the clubs are not reckless with that ownership—they are custodians of important community assets. We want to ensure that that happens and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will enjoy reading that section of the White Paper.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)
Over the years, we have seen some owners treat football clubs more like cash cows than the community assets we all want them to be. Pending the publication of the White Paper later this week, will the Minister say whether he thinks there is merit in ensuring that any new owner seeking to take control of an English club is subject to a more stringent fit and proper persons test?
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
We are on our way to Wembley, and I am sure the Minister will join me in wishing every success to Newcastle United in the league cup final on Sunday. However, he must know that even that success will not erase the years of anger and frustration at unsuitable, unaccountable, and sometimes downright dodgy ownership within a Premier League that is out of touch and does not seem to care about fans. Fans should be at the heart of football, but this Government are messing with the heart and soul of fans. Will the Minister commit now that the White Paper will institute an independent regulator and that fans will have real power in the beautiful game, and that those measures will be in place by the start of the next season?
Stuart Andrew
I am looking forward to attending that match at the weekend, and I already have a list as long as my arm of people who want to join me. The hon. Lady is right; she is an advocate, and other advocates such as my hon. Friend the Member for Hyndburn (Sara Britcliffe) have talked about the club Accrington Stanley and all the work it does and how important the fans are. The hon. Lady is right to raise that issue, and I can assure her that throughout this process, I have tried my best to ensure that the voices of fans are heard in the White Paper that will be published this week.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)
Order. Would Members wishing to leave please now do so, quickly and quietly.
Security Threat to UK-Based Journalists
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Minister for Security (Tom Tugendhat)
I want to update the House on steps that the Home Secretary and I have been taking to address the concerning activities of the Iranian regime and its operatives in the United Kingdom.
The United Kingdom is committed to defending our freedoms—values that define us and make us who we are—and none is more fundamental than freedom of the press. The Iranian regime’s violent oppression of its own citizens and repeated violations of human rights have shown us who the supreme leader and his enforcers really are. It has murdered its own people and made hostages of others, and the protests that began in September 2022 show that it does not have the support of the Iranian people.
In recent months, the Iranian regime has publicly called for the capture or killing of those holding it to account. That includes very real and specific threats towards UK-based journalists working for Iran International, a prominent Persian-language news channel, and their families. The Home Secretary and I absolutely condemn this outrageous violation of our sovereignty and the attempted violation of the human rights of those journalists. In response, we have put in place an extremely robust range of security measures, including armed policing. However, because of the severity of the threat and the particularities of the site, counter-terrorism policing have advised Iran International to move to a more secure location in the United Kingdom. Until its studio is ready, it has chosen to continue its broadcasting from existing studios in the United States—I assure the House that this measure will be temporary. Until then, I have asked officials to help find a temporary location for Iran International’s UK operations, and we will make sure that its permanent new studio in the United Kingdom is secure. I spoke to counter-terrorism policing this morning to confirm that.
Let me be clear: freedom of the press is at the heart of our freedoms. Tehran’s efforts to silence Iran International are a direct attack on our freedoms, and an attempt to undermine our sovereignty. They will fail. Democracy is as much about journalists and civic activists as it is about politicians. The media must be free to work without fear, which is why this Government have already set up the Defending Democracy Taskforce, and why we will be taking further action in response to these threats. I am not alone in saying this: earlier this afternoon, I spoke to my counterparts in France, Germany and the United States. They all agreed, and spoke of incidents that have targeted individuals in their own countries. When I spoke to Iran International over the weekend, it praised our police; it is right to do so, because only last week, the vigilance of our officers resulted in an individual being charged with a terrorism offence after being arrested near the broadcaster’s office.
None the less, this is clearly an appalling situation. The Government, police, agencies and our allies are working together to ensure that Iran International’s operations will resume, and these threats will not silence us, nor them. I know that this House will wish to express its support for that principle too.
As of last week, we had responded to 15 credible threats to kill or kidnap British or UK-based individuals by the Iranian regime since the start of 2022. Between 2020 and 2022, Iran tried to collect intelligence on UK-based Israeli and Jewish individuals. We believe this information was a preparation for future lethal operations. In 2021, UK police asked partners to share information on Iran-based Mohammed Mehdi Mozayyani, a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps who worked to conduct a lethal operation against Iranian dissidents here in the United Kingdom. We know that the Iranian intelligence services work with organised criminal gangs, and I can assure the House and the public that we will go after anyone working with them.
Our partners in Europe and the United States face similar threats, and we are working together to keep our people safe. My call this afternoon with other allies was about co-ordinating action that we will take to protect ourselves and ensure a unified response to these threats. We are strongest when we work with our allies around the world, and the Iranian regime should be in no doubt that we are absolutely united.
Let me be clear that this is a persistent threat. It is not carried out by rogue elements, but is a conscious strategy of the Iranian regime. Our Government will act. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has already summoned the Iranian chargé d’affaires, and we will be looking at further sanctions on those linked to the Iranian regime. We already have around 300 sanctions in place against Iran, including of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in its entirety.
Today, alongside international partners, eight further individuals were sanctioned, but our response will not end there. Today I have instructed the Home Office to lead work on countering Iranian state threats, making use of the full breadth and expertise of the Government and our extraordinary and courageous police, security and intelligence agencies. We will target the full spectrum of threats we see coming from Tehran. I will be asking our security agencies to explore what more we can do with our allies to tackle threats of violence, but we will also address the wider threat to economic security from illicit finance and the threat from malign interference in our democratic society.
At home, the Charity Commission will soon report on its statutory inquiry into the Islamic Centre of England, which is accused of having links to the Iranian regime. We must ensure that our police and intelligence agencies have the power to crack down on state threats such as those from Iran, which is why urge the House to back the National Security Bill, which is going through Parliament at the moment.
The relationship we have with Iran is not the one we want; it is not the one we chose. We have a deep respect for Iran’s rich history and for the Iranian people. From the “Shahnameh” to the works of Saadi, the wealth of the nation has been in the words of her people. They taught ethics and governance and the importance of law, but today the tyrants in Tehran have betrayed those great pillars of Persian civilisation and are trying to silence those words and their own people, but they will not be silenced. To the brave Iranian journalists and community here in the United Kingdom, I say that this country, this Government and this whole House stands in solidarity with you against the oppression that you face. Mr Deputy Speaker, let me directly address the Iranian regime, which is responsible for these heinous crimes. We will hold you to account for your blatant violation of our laws and values. We will expose your crimes against the British people and against the Iranian people. We will expose your actions around the world. We will work with our allies to hold you to account, personally. We will act to keep our country safe. I commend this statement to the House.
Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)
I am grateful to the Minister for advance sight of his statement. As he has already said, press freedom is fundamental to any liberal democracy, and it is a right that we are all committed to defending across this House. We should all be appalled that Iran International has felt the need to close its office here in the UK following police advice after a series of threats made against its brave journalists.
The UK has a proud history of supporting those who speak truth to power. Since 2017, Iran International has operated successfully here in the UK. In recent weeks, it has shone a spotlight on the Iranian regime’s violent repression of those protesting the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini and of those taking to the streets calling for civil liberties to be upheld. For that, they have been targeted by the regime, and, unbelievably, deemed to be a threat to Iran’s national security, with threats that agents of the organisation would be pursued.
As the Minister knows, in November’s annual threat assessment, the director general of MI5, Ken McCallum, stated that Iran had sought to murder or kidnap individuals in the UK on at least 10 occasions. Just this week, the head of Counter Terrorism Policing in the UK stated that there had been five more plots since then, saying that they had disrupted
“15 plots since the start of 2022 to either kidnap or even kill British or UK-based individuals perceived as enemies of the regime.”
I know that across this House we are united in our outrage that any foreign Government would think that they could conduct activity in this way within the borders of another country. As a democracy, we have to send the strongest possible message that we, our policing and security services, and the British public, will not tolerate it. I have met with representatives from Iran International. As the Minister said, they have spoken highly of UK counter-terrorism policing and our security services. I want to put my thanks to them on the record for the work that they undertake every day.
However, I have asked the Government five times in this Chamber since October why we are not going further to deploy sanctions and proscription powers against those acting on behalf of Iran. In response to my question at the last Home Office questions earlier this month, the Minister spoke of his desire to see the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps proscribed, so why are they not, either through the use of existing terrorism powers or new state threats equivalent powers? He has not mentioned it at all in his statement today. That means the IRGC are still free to organise and establish support here in the UK. We have to put a stop to that.
There are people appointed to posts here in the UK who are representatives of the supreme leader himself. Why are they still here? The Minister talked of instructing his Department today to lead work. Although the threat from Iran has escalated, it has not come from out of the blue. Why have we found ourselves ill-prepared to respond to the threat? The United States proscribed the IRGC as a terrorist organisation in 2019. Activity from Iran has been a feature of the annual threat assessment for some years. There were warnings in the 2021 integrated review, as well as in the Intelligence and Security Committee report of March 2022, which said:
“There also exists a continuing threat of state-sponsored assassination, attacks and abductions of those perceived as dissidents.”
Again, in November of last year, we had the starkest warnings from the director general of MI5. The ISC’s annual report published last year said:
“In November 2021, the Committee announced that it will be undertaking an Inquiry into national security issues relating to Iran.”
I understand that the ISC still has not been able to progress that report, and so I would welcome an explanation from the Minister as to why requested information has not been forthcoming to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee, with an assurance that it is being addressed as a priority.
The UK must always be a safe place for journalists to speak truth to power. The rest of the world is watching. We cannot ever allow authoritarian tyranny to be exported to the UK and conducted on behalf of other hostile states within our borders. I ask the Minister: when will we see the sanctions? Can he provide us with a timeline? He has talked about co-ordinated responses, but those can be slow. When will we see proscription? We have to get this done. We are looking to table amendments to the National Security Bill; will the Minister support them? We very much stand ready to work with the Government in making this happen.
Tom Tugendhat
I thank the hon. Lady for her comments. She is absolutely right to press me on those issues, because it is absolutely true that this has been ongoing. She is also aware that proscription is a legal instrument, and that therefore there is a natural element of discussion. We do not comment on whether we are going to proscribe; we wait until we have the actions ready to do it. She will understand that we will wait until we have full advice.
What we need to be doing is exactly what we are doing, which is sanctioning individuals. I announced eight further sanctions today. We have spoken about various different actions we have taken, and I am grateful that the hon. Member has quite rightly praised the work of the police and the intelligence services, which have done a phenomenal job in keeping us safe. I am afraid that it is not true to say that nothing has happened since the IR. Since then, MI5, Counter Terrorism Policing and many other agencies of the state have been working tirelessly to keep this country safe, and to defend our values and freedoms.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)
I call the chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
I can confirm what is in the public domain, which is that the committee is undertaking a study of Iran and its security implications, and I will just say that I am cautiously optimistic that various causes of delay in the supply of evidence and the progress of that work are within sight of being overcome.
I would like to add my congratulations to the police and security authorities on the announced foiling of 15 credible threats. What I would like to know, without any prejudice to our future inquiries, is whether the Minister is in a position to tell us anything about the origins of the people making those 15 threats. Were they home-grown, or were they people who had come here from Iran? He does hint at the involvement of criminal gangs, which suggests a franchise. How are people able, in this country, to pose such threats? They know who they are, so it should not be difficult for him, either now or in a subsequent announcement, to give an analysis to this House.
Tom Tugendhat
I hope my right hon. Friend will invite me to his committee, where I will be able to answer these questions more fully. He will understand that I cannot address them on the Floor of the House. His reading of the question, however, is interesting and, as usual, very well informed.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
I thank the Minister for his statement and for advance sight of it, as well as for the way in which he has approached this very serious issue this afternoon.
We in the SNP are alarmed and deeply disturbed by the serious threats to UK-based journalists by the Iranian regime, and we condemn in the strongest possible terms the horrifying threats to journalists, their family members and all others involved. We owe a great debt of gratitude to the brave independent Iranian journalists, particularly those from Iran International, who have shone a light on the recent protest movements and shown the world the continuous and shocking human rights abuses by the Iranian security forces and the Iranian regime. We commend their courage in continuing to do so in the face of threats that have come in a place where they should expect to feel safe.
It is very welcome that the Minister is talking about more sanctions today, and I appreciate what he said about not announcing the proscription of organisations such as the IRGC on the Floor of the House, but I would strongly urge him to consider doing so and to consider doing so quickly. This is the source of great uncertainty and great fear for many Iranians who are living in the UK, including those who have come to visit my surgeries, and he may remember that I raised the case of a constituent a few weeks ago. Those Iranians I have spoken to in Glasgow are scared. They do not know where they are safe, and that should not be the situation for anybody who has come to live in these islands. They should be able to go about their lives in Glasgow or anywhere else without fearing who might be coming to get them, and without having to look over their shoulder whether out in the streets or even in universities, where they do not feel as though they can be quite as safe as they should be.
Could I also ask the Minister what approach he is taking with colleagues in the Home Office to the issuing of visas for those who fear that if they return to Iran they will be persecuted, for those—perhaps if they are on a student visa that may run out—who are in limbo at the moment and are not certain as to what their future will be, and for visitors? What is the further approach to those who may actually pose a risk to people in the UK in getting visas for here?
Tom Tugendhat
I thank the hon. Member for the tone in which she has approached this. She is absolutely right, of course, that anybody in the United Kingdom—whether they are in Gloucester or in Glasgow—should be absolutely as safe as any UK citizen. She is right that, sadly, some are being targeted. While I hear her words on proscription, it is worth noting that the National Security Bill we have brought in does allow us to exercise almost all the powers of proscription against state threats, which will be enormously helpful. I know that she has in the past been very supportive of various elements of that, so I hope we will be able to continue enjoying the support of her and her party.
The hon. Member raises the question of visas, and she is absolutely right to do so. I will not comment on individual cases for obvious reasons, but as she knows, the UK Government and the British people have been exceptionally generous to those in need of sanctuary in the United Kingdom, and I am absolutely certain that that policy will continue.
Sir John Whittingdale
My right hon. Friend will be aware that Iran has one of the worst media freedom records in the world. When the Government press the Government of Iran over the outrageous threats made against Iran International, will they also raise the question of the continuing persecution of family members of BBC Persian service staff who are still living in Iran? Does my right hon. Friend also agree that the threats against Iran International in this country are a further demonstration of the need for the cross-Government National Committee for the Safety of Journalists, and will he continue to give that committee every support to ensure that media freedom in the UK is fully protected?
Tom Tugendhat
I thank my right hon. Friend for his comments. When he was Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, he was exemplary in supporting media freedom around the world. I completely agree with his comments on BBC Persian, which offers an extraordinary window—not just for the Persian but for the Iranian people—into the truth that is quite rightly highlighted by their broadcasts, and allows those of us who are lucky enough to watch BBC Persian here in the UK to understand what is going on in Tehran and across Iran. I absolutely agree with my right hon. Friend and I give that same commitment.
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for his statement and for his work to ensure that Iran International returns to the UK before too long. Until a few days ago, it was broadcasting from Chiswick business park in my constituency, and I visited last year. It is beyond contemptible that the Iranian Government have attempted to export their crackdown on free speech and the freedom of the press, and to endanger not only the journalists but the other workers in the business park and local people. Iran International and I are hugely grateful for the steps the Metropolitan police have taken to ensure the safety of journalists and the wider public, but what are the Government doing to ensure that journalists in my constituency and across the country are never again forced to leave their workplace to protect the rest of the public?
Tom Tugendhat
May I first pay tribute to the hon. Lady and her constituents for their work supporting Iran International? She will be aware of the site and its peculiarities, and therefore the nature of finding an alternative venue. That is exactly what we and the Metropolitan police are doing to ensure that the interregnum is as short as possible.
It is absolutely clear that we have more to do to protect journalists in this country, which is why the Prime Minister asked me to set up the defending democracy taskforce. The hon. Lady will understand that there has been only a slight moment between the taskforce being established and today, so we will be coming up with further options shortly.
Mrs Flick Drummond (Meon Valley) (Con)
I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement. In a recent Inter-Parliamentary Union meeting, I heard from journalists working with the BBC Persian service that they have also been threatened, as have their families in Iran. This is totally unacceptable, as the freedom of the press is fundamental in this country. Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that he is working closely with our security services to counter the threats and protect these brave journalists and their families in Iran?
Tom Tugendhat
My hon. Friend is absolutely right that those in Iran deserve the same protection. It is absolutely wrong to target the families of journalists who happen to be still in that country, and for people to be punished for merely speaking the truth; it is quite a tragic violation not just of international norms, but of the culture that Iran gave us over many thousands of years. The words of Saadi that we are all banī ādam—all sons of Adam—and therefore all have the same rights, are in stark opposition to the actions of the vile regime in Tehran.
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)
The UK must always act to ensure press freedom and the safety of journalists, who have played a pivotal role in publicising human rights abuses in Iran and across the globe. Our intelligence services do an extraordinary job, but in the light of the Intelligence and Security Committee’s recent complaints about the agencies not meeting their own deadlines, which has delayed the Committee’s inquiry into the security threats posed by Iran, what discussions has the Security Minister had with the heads of MI5, MI6 and GCHQ to ensure that there are no further delays to the Committee’s work?
Tom Tugendhat
I spoke to the head of MI5 only this afternoon; I will leave it to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs to answer for the other two agencies. It is incredibly important to make sure appropriate information is available quickly and in a timely fashion for the Intelligence and Security Committee, and I know it is conducting a very important inquiry—indeed I believe witnesses will be appearing before it in a week or two.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
My right hon. Friend said: “We know that the Iranian intelligence services work with organised criminal gangs.” Mindful of the fact that Colonel Gaddafi’s terrorists used to work quite closely with the Provisional IRA, is my right hon. Friend able to say whether there are indications that such links are happening between Iranian terrorists and home-grown terrorists?
Tom Tugendhat
My right hon. Friend will understand that I would rather answer that question before the Committee on which he sits than comment on the Floor of the House, but he will be aware that there are, very sadly, many different connections between criminal enterprises and terrorist groups and indeed hostile states. That is why countering state threats is about not just defending ourselves against hostile adversaries but ensuring that we are free from fraud and the abuse of crime in our communities.
Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for his statement and completely agree with the sentiments expressed by him and the shadow Minister with regard to the violation of our sovereignty: these are very serious matters indeed. I want to ask about a slightly wider but connected point: I understand that he will be limited in what he can say, but may I seek his assurance that his Department remains hypervigilant with respect to the activities of other states who may also seek to conduct operations against UK-based personnel?
Tom Tugendhat
Yes, is the answer. The reality is that state-based threats have increased in the last few years, and we know the obvious sources of such aggression—sadly, they have been written all too large on the global map. However, other states that are not so well-advertised have also been exploiting our freedoms and liberties to further their ends, and we will stop them.
Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)
Earlier this month I met with BBC Persian journalists to hear about the challenges they face in reporting on the Iranian regime’s horrific human rights abuses, and around the world journalists are increasingly under threat for seeking to tell the truth and it is shocking that this is now the case in the UK. Is the Minister satisfied that the steps he has outlined today will protect press freedoms so that this situation is not repeated and UK-based journalists such as Iran International are able to operate safely and freely? When does he expect his taskforce to report back on extra security measures to be put in place?
Tom Tugendhat
I welcome that question. No, I am not satisfied; the reality is that there is more to do. That is exactly why the Prime Minister asked me to set up the taskforce; the Prime Minister himself is not satisfied. We will be coming forward with a series of options in respect of the integrated review, and from there a decision will have to be taken by the Government, and it will be a wider call. But the hon. Gentleman can be assured that the entire Government—including the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary—are absolutely committed.
Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab)
I send my solidarity and support to all BBC Persian journalists, who continue to speak truth to power in the face of adversity. The UK must act to ensure the safety of journalists, who have played a vital role in publicising human rights offences in Iran. The National Union of Journalists has called on police and Government to act swiftly and robustly, with assassination attempts and threats against UK-based journalists. What are the Government doing to protect press freedoms?
Tom Tugendhat
The hon. Lady is absolutely right that there is more we can do, and I am very glad the NUJ is supporting this. The NUJ has formerly worked extremely closely with groups like Reporters Without Borders, which has done enormously important work in defending journalism around the world. This Government are absolutely committed not just to supporting journalists here at home, but to making sure journalists can be free around the world, which is why the Government, and in former years the Foreign Office, have supported various different projects for journalistic freedom around the world.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Minister for his statement and, as always, for his and our Government’s determination to maintain freedom and protect safety. I would be grateful if he assured us of the Government’s commitment, which I am sure they hold, to supporting a free press in countries where freedom of religion or belief is regularly and violently violated. We are seeing serious repercussions for those who speak out about injustice in countries where freedom of religion or belief is a concern, with Iran being a priority concern. The regime in Iran is violent, brutal, bloodthirsty and guilty of some of the worst crimes in the world. What assessment has the Minister made of the crackdown on media reporting and freedom of religion and belief?
Tom Tugendhat
The hon. Gentleman will understand that I answer for the Home Office, not the Foreign Office, so I will not give an assessment of Iran other than to say that that brutal regime has murdered LGBTQ communities. It has murdered Jews. It has murdered Muslims. It has murdered Christians. It has murdered Baha’is. It has murdered, frankly, pretty much anybody it can get its hands on. Tragically, it has conducted a regime of terror against women who refuse to be told what to wear. It is a regime that has violated so many principles not just of international law, as I said, but of Persian culture. It is an absolute abomination and this Government stand in full solidarity with those who are defending their human rights and we absolutely stand for freedom of religion and belief.
Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)
The Minister referred to the Charity Commission’s inquiry into the Islamic Centre of England and its links with the Iranian regime, but he will also be aware of wider concerns about other cultural centres across the UK, including in Manchester, allegedly having links to the regime and allegedly controlled by Khamenei. Would the Government consider a wider investigation of those outposts—those cultural centres—so that we can get to the bottom of this and get to the truth?
Tom Tugendhat
The hon. Member will understand that I am not going to list all those that are linked to the Khamenei authority, but he can be assured that the Islamic Centre of England is not the only one that I am aware of.
Ukraine
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs (James Cleverly)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the situation in Ukraine.
This week, the war that President Putin expected to last just three days reaches a year in duration. Russian forces have killed thousands of Ukrainians. Eighteen million Ukrainians have left their homes. Thousands have been forcibly deported to Russia. Historic cities now lie in ruins. Russia has targeted hospitals, schools and energy supplies, and because of Russia’s blockade of the Black sea ports and its economic blackmail, some of the world’s poorest people are now paying higher prices for food, energy and the means of survival.
In the areas liberated from Russian forces, the Ukrainians have uncovered mass graves, as well as evidence of rape and torture on an unimaginable scale. Putin is responsible for this. His invasion was unprovoked and it was illegal. He could stop it at once by withdrawing his forces from Ukrainian land, but he is making the lives of millions of people hell for the sake of his imperial delusions. He blundered into a war that he cannot and will not win. Ukrainians were always going to resist a hostile attack aimed at wiping out their country.
Early last year, in New York, I predicted that if Putin were foolish enough to invade Ukraine, Ukrainians would defend their homeland ferociously, and I have been vindicated in that prediction. Today, they are more unified, more proud and more determined than ever. As President Zelensky said when he addressed my right hon. and hon. Friends and Members from across the House in Westminster Hall on 8 February, “freedom will win”. We and the whole world remain united and resolute in our support for Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity and for the defence of the UN charter.
Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)
How resolute are we? Are we going to give them aeroplanes?
James Cleverly
I assure my right hon. Friend—I will make reference to this later on in my remarks—that the determination of the Ukrainian people is unbounded. I will talk about what further support we might give them later on in my speech.
The UK and Ukraine stand side by side in the face of this aggression. We have become the closest of friends and the most committed of partners. We are inspired by its heroism and by the resilience of the Ukrainian people. We come together as never before; we share a common purpose.
Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con)
When I go out in my constituency, I am struck, a year on, by the support of the British people. Despite the adversity they face with cost of living pressures, they still think this is the right thing to do. Does the Secretary of State agree?
James Cleverly
The British people, in every corner of the United Kingdom, have demonstrated a generosity of spirit that is admirable. That should make every single Member of this House proud.
Ukraine’s heroic armed forces have already recaptured thousands of square miles from the Russians, driving them out of more than half of all the territory it grabbed last year. But Putin shows no sign of withdrawing his forces. If we are to change his mind, Ukraine will need to take back more land. Today, the Russian army is on the defensive, morale is pitiful, casualties are immense, and its troops are running out of key weapons and ammunition. This is exactly the right moment for Ukraine to seize the advantage. That is why we and our allies must step up our effort to ensure that Ukraine wins this war and secures a lasting peace. Justice must be served on those responsible for war crimes and atrocities, in accordance with international law.
Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)
The Foreign Secretary has made an outstanding start to the debate. Last week, the Vice-President of the United States said that the US has formally determined that Russia has committed crimes against humanity. Has His Majesty’s Government now come formally to the same conclusion?
James Cleverly
We are looking very closely at the evidence that is being compiled. While we have not made a formal designation, I can assure the right hon. Gentleman, and other right hon. and hon. Members across the House, that we will ensure that those who are responsible for atrocities, whether in the field or right up to the desk of Vladimir Putin himself, will be held accountable.
Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)
I thank the Foreign Secretary and welcome the Government’s move to freeze the assets of Russians engaged in supporting the Putin regime. The EU has already set out a plan for how it will move frozen assets into a rebuilding programme for Ukraine. Our good friends and allies, the Canadians, have also set out in legislation how they will be doing that. What is causing the delay with respect to the UK? Why have we dithered while others have acted?
James Cleverly
The hon. Gentleman is mistaken in his assessment of how far forward other countries are in this situation. We are all looking at how we can ensure—I will make reference to this later in my speech—that the people responsible for the damage will ultimately pay for the damage. The facts are that he is wrong about how far forward other nations are. On Canada, I discussed the issue with Foreign Minister Joly on my recent visit. We have a similar legal system and it is testing the legal parameters. We will, of course, learn from its experience.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the Foreign Secretary very much for his positive response—we expect that and thank him for it. Reports are filtering through about systematic rape, abuse and sexual attacks on women of all ages, from as young as four to as old as 83. They are systematic and approved at the top of the Russian Government and their troops. On taking action and collating all the evidence to ensure that those perpetrating these depraved and evil acts are held accountable, I am sure the Foreign Secretary will give the House the assurance it needs, but we need it as a nation as well.
James Cleverly
That is an extremely important point, and one that, again, I will refer to later in my speech. I will say now, however, that when I visited Kyiv and Irpin and spoke with Ukrainians, and when I also spoke with Ukrainians during our Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict conference here in London, the testimonies that I heard were genuinely heartbreaking, and I assure the hon. Gentleman and the House that the perpetrators will not go unpunished.
Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)
As other Members have said, we are seeing terrible atrocities in Ukraine, and in retrospect this awful situation may be classified as a genocide. This is not the first time that Russia has undertaken a genocide; it did so in 1932-33 with the Holodomor, but we as a country do not recognise that as a genocide. I hope that when this is over—as soon as possible—we can look again at the Holodomor, in which millions of people were murdered, as they are being murdered now, and reclassify and recognise it formally as a genocide, as many other countries already do.
James Cleverly
That is another extremely important point, to which I referred when I made some brief comments to the press after my meeting with Foreign Minister Kuleba in Kyiv. It would obviously be wrong to prejudge how this is defined in the future, but we know, because we have heard Vladimir Putin say it himself, that his intention is to eradicate the whole concept of Ukraine.
James Cleverly
I will make some more progress, because a number of the interventions made so far have touched on points that I was planning to make in my speech, but I assure my right hon. Friend that I will give him an opportunity to intervene later.
Increased military support for Ukraine is the quickest and therefore the most humane way to end this war. I witnessed the extraordinary courage and resolve of the Ukrainian people when I travelled to Kyiv and Irpin three months ago: I saw for myself, and I understand fully, that they will defend themselves and their land whatever the cost may be. They will never give in. They will never surrender. Russia’s untrained conscripts, sent to the frontline of a war that makes no sense to them, will never be able to match Ukraine’s martial spirit. That is why Ukraine is going to win, and that is why we must ensure that it wins as quickly as possible.
The UK’s military, humanitarian and economic support for Ukraine since the invasion started has reached nearly £4 billion. I pay tribute to, and commend, my right hon. Friends the Members for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) and for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss) for the decisiveness and resolve, in the early stage of this conflict, which gave the Ukrainians a fighting chance, enabled them to defend their capital city, and bought them the time they needed to push back the Russian forces. I am very glad that both my right hon. Friends are present.
We are proud to be the largest supplier of military aid to Ukraine, after the United States of America. We were the first country to provide the weapons that Ukraine needed to defend itself. In 2023 we shall at the very least match the £2.3 billion of military aid that we gave last year, and we shall add more advanced capabilities across land, sea and air.
Sir John Whittingdale
My right hon. Friend referred to the importance of holding Russia to account for its crimes. He will be aware of the action that is already under way in both the International Criminal Court and in the Ukrainian judicial system, but can he confirm that the Government now support the establishment of a special international tribunal to pursue Russia for the crime of aggression?
James Cleverly
My right hon. Friend makes an important point. We have joined a working group to look at a special vehicle for full accountability, because, as I said in response to an earlier intervention, it is not enough just to hold to account the people committing the rapes, murders and brutality; we must ensure that those who are ordering them to do so and facilitating that brutality are also held to account.
Mr Simon Clarke (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Con)
My right hon. Friend is right to commend the heroism of the Ukrainian armed forces, which has been second to none. Our military aid is therefore absolutely paramount and we are right to give it. There is clearly a continent-wide challenge that embraces all of NATO around our ammunition supplies and our ability to sustain the war effort in Ukraine in the way that is going to be required. Can he commit that we are reassessing as a matter of urgency our defence stocks, which must be severely depleted at this juncture, to make sure that we can sustain the effort, however long it takes?
James Cleverly
My right hon. Friend is right to say that we need to support the Ukrainians until they are victorious. I have made the point on the international stage, including at the Munich security conference at the tail end of last week and over the weekend, that this equipment and this ammunition is to be used to fight in that theatre against that enemy. We are lucky that the young men and women who are conducting that fight are Ukrainians rather than British. We therefore have an enhanced duty to ensure that they are successful. I say to anyone in the international community or among our allies who is thinking of holding back their stocks for a rainy day: this is the rainy day.
Dr Luke Evans
Leading on from that, Biden has pledged a further $500 million for weapons, and we have given £2.3 billion from here. What message do we have for our European colleagues and those across the world on supporting us to come forward and make sure that Ukraine is successful?
James Cleverly
I have had this conversation with NATO allies and others. This is not just about ensuring that Ukraine can defend its sovereignty, territory and people; as I will come on to later in my remarks, this is about defending the UN charter and the international order that has kept us safe since the end of the last war. All countries that believe in defending those principles should make every effort to assist Ukraine at this time.
We will give the Ukrainian forces the upper hand on the battlefield so that they can reverse Russia’s gains and limit Putin’s ability to target civilian infrastructure. We must also develop their force structures and capability so that they can build a deterrence force for the future. Over the last six months we have trained 10,000 Ukrainian troops to bring them up to battle readiness, and we will upskill a further 20,000 this year. As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced last week, we will train Ukrainian fast jet pilots and marines as part of a long-term investment in their military capabilities.
When the Prime Minister and President Zelensky met earlier this month, they underscored our joint determination to achieve a just and sustainable peace. We shall work together in international organisations to achieve that, and to defend the principles of the UN charter. I am travelling to New York this week to speak on Ukraine in the UN Security Council. I will tell the truth about Putin’s brutality and Ukraine’s heroism, but we must always increase our efforts, with partners, to tackle the steady drip of poisonous Russian propaganda and lies. We will work together to help Ukrainian grain to reach world markets. The Black sea grain initiative and the Grain from Ukraine initiative boost food security for the world’s most vulnerable people.
Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for allowing me to intervene. On the subject of training pilots, the aircraft that we have—the Lightning and the Typhoon—are totally incompatible with fighting in Ukraine. They require large sustainment and they operate from bases well away from in theatre. The aircraft that could be ideal is the Gripen, which the Swedes have. We do not have the people to train the pilots and we do not have the aircraft or the simulators on which to do it, so I am slightly concerned when the Foreign Secretary says that we are going to train pilots. I wonder how we will do it.
James Cleverly
As my right hon. and gallant Friend knows, I am a good, old-fashioned team gunner, so I understand ballistic artillery and very little else, but I am assured by my right hon. Friend the Defence Secretary, in close co-ordination with our Ukrainian friends, that the training contribution we are making is genuinely valuable and very much valued.
Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Alba)
It is said that war is easy but peace is hard, which ignores the fact that war is never easy and that peace is a light we must all attempt to pursue to avoid an escalation of hostilities. The Secretary of State will be aware that the devastation caused by the earthquake in Turkey and Syria will have an impact on our ability to maintain the Black sea grain deal. What support is being offered to Turkey, and what is the UN doing to secure the position of food supplies to the rest of the world?
James Cleverly
The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. It is not directly linked to the subject of this debate, but I can reassure him that I have been in regular contact with the Turkish Foreign Minister with regard to our ongoing support to Turkey and north-west Syria as they attempt to deal with the terrible consequences of the earthquake. I committed to keeping the House informed in my urgent statement, and I will make sure I do.
James Cleverly
Given the number of people in the Chamber, I will try to make progress before taking another intervention.
In addition to our £2.3 billion of military support, we are providing more than £1.6 billion of non-military assistance, some £1.35 billion in lending guarantees through the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, £100 million in direct budgetary assistance and £220 million in humanitarian support.
Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con)
Talking about gunnery, the Ukrainians are managing to maintain barrages of between 5,000 and 6,000 shells and rockets a day—they are probably receiving barrages of 20,000 a day from the Russians—which is equivalent to a small NATO country’s annual procurement before the war. Is my right hon. Friend confident that we and the Americans have the industrial capacity not only to maintain our current level of support to the Ukrainians but to increase it without diminishing our own stocks, which are getting fiendishly low?
James Cleverly
The simple truth is that we have to make sure we provide the Ukrainians with the ammunition they need to get the job done. Our industrial base will have to step up a gear, I have no doubt, but we should be confident that our NATO allies, including the industrial might of the United States of America, will considerably outmatch the capability of the Russian Federation to produce ammunition.
I give the House notice that I now intend to make progress. Our vital humanitarian assistance, delivered through the United Nations, the Red Cross and non-governmental organisations, is saving lives and helping to protect the most vulnerable in Ukraine and those forced to flee Russian attacks. The ongoing attacks on civilian infrastructure underscore Putin’s increasing desperation, and we have provided £22 million in direct support to Ukraine’s energy sector. This includes £7 million for more than 850 generators to ensure vital facilities such as hospitals have power.
James Cleverly
I will make progress.
And we are providing £5 million for safety and security equipment for the civil nuclear sector.
We are working closely with international partners to reduce their energy dependence on Russia. The UK phased out Russian coal from August 2022 and banned imports of Russian liquefied natural gas from the start of this year. In December, alongside the G7 and Australia, we set a price cap on seaborne Russian crude oil to restrict Putin’s primary source of revenue for his illegal war. Despite elevated oil prices, Russia’s Finance Ministry has reported a $47 billion deficit in 2022, because of the decisive action we have taken. We will continue to work with partners to cut off Russia’s hydrocarbon revenues and accelerate the global transition to clean, reliable sources of power.
We have also imposed our largest and most severe package of sanctions ever against Russia. With our allies, we have frozen more than £275 billion-worth of Russian assets; in addition to the 1,200 individuals already sanctioned, we will introduce new measures against those in Russia and outside it who are supporting or profiteering from this war. We will crack down ruthlessly on those who seek to evade sanctions.
Abuses and violations of human rights have been committed by Russian forces on a systematic scale: torture and killing of civilians; rape and sexual violence as a weapon of war; and forced deportations. We will not allow these crimes to go unpunished. We will support the war crimes investigations, those of both the Ukrainian authorities and the International Criminal Court. In March, the UK will host a major international meeting to support the ICC in investigating alleged war crimes in Ukraine.
When this war is over, Ukraine can never again be left vulnerable to attack. A strong Ukraine must be safe, flourishing and prosperous. With our Ukrainian friends, we will co-host the 2023 Ukraine recovery conference on 21 and 22 June, here in London. Together, we plan to mobilise the combined might of public and private finance to ensure that Ukraine gets the vital reconstruction investment that it needs. I know that this House will join me in calling on Putin to withdraw Russian forces from Ukrainian territory and immediately bring an end to the barbaric attacks against civilians. The Ukrainians have endured months of relentless attacks and bombardment, but their spirit is unbroken. We share their determination that Putin’s illegal attempted invasion will fail and this House demands that justice be done.
Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)
One year ago, we gathered in this Chamber fearing the worst. Alongside the shadow Defence Secretary, I had just returned from Kyiv. Russian forces were massed on Ukraine’s border, the intelligence picture was bleak, and the spectre of tanks rolling across the borders of 21st century Europe seemed both inconceivable and yet imminent. 24 February 2022 was a dark day for Europe. That morning, President Putin launched the largest conflict on our continent since the second world war. This illegal, unprovoked and unjustifiable war of choice has left tens of thousands dead; millions displaced from their homes; billions-worth of damage inflicted on Ukraine’s infrastructure; families torn apart; landmines strewn across once golden fields; and the dark trail of atrocities pockmarking the Ukrainian countryside.
Putin believed this would be a short war. He thought it would be an easy war. He thought that Ukraine would fold without a fight, perhaps because, in his warped world view, he thought these Russian invaders would be welcomed as liberators. He thought the west was weak and divided, but he was wrong on every count. Instead, Putin’s folly has been met with unity and strength. Ukrainians have paid a bitter price for this war, but they have defended their land with courage, ingenuity and that relentless commitment that comes from a righteous cause. Russia stands isolated and condemned on the international stage, its economy hamstrung by severe sanctions. NATO, rather than weakened, has been strengthened and invigorated, with new members poised to join. The transatlantic alliance has stayed united and this House, too, has stood united.
That was the message that President Zelensky received when he visited Westminster. It was a message that my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) took to Kyiv personally last week: Britain stands united behind Ukraine. In that spirit, I want to pay tribute to the Foreign Secretary and the Defence Secretary and our two former Prime Ministers, who deserve credit for the roles they have played. On Britain’s military help to Ukraine and on reinforcing NATO allies, the Government have had and will continue to have Labour’s fullest support.
Duncan Baker
This is pertinent because the Leader of the Opposition was not the only Member of Parliament in Ukraine last week, as I was there. Along with six constituents, I took 112 generators to the people of Ukraine. We have worked tirelessly since December to raise nearly £40,000 to take aid there. There was a bomb the night we were in Lviv, but luckily we were all safe. On our return journey, we took a little girl, her mother and their pet back to the UK, to a host family in Guildford, because they had had their home destroyed. I say to the right hon. Gentleman that this Government have done an awful lot of work to help the people of Ukraine, but will he also pay tribute to everyday men and women, throughout the entire UK, including my constituents, who have literally given up their day jobs to raise money and take humanitarian aid to the people of Ukraine, with whom they stand shoulder to shoulder? I can say now that the resolve and bravery of the people we met and the aid agency is unshakeable.
Mr Lammy
The hon. Gentleman is right: in sometimes fractious times in our country, the spirit of the British people and their generosity has known no bounds. Their compassion is humbling and their desire to continue to stand steadfast alongside the Ukrainian people is a tribute to our nation. We can also all be proud of the role our armed forces are playing in training Ukrainian forces. We can be proud of the contribution of our diplomats and our brilliant ambassador, Melinda Simmons, on the ground in Kyiv. As has been said, we can be proud of the way British families have opened their homes to Ukrainians fleeing war and supported their cause from home.
Putin’s war in Ukraine marks the end of the post-cold war era and we need a new mindset for these challenging times. The past year has illustrated some hard lessons. First, it has laid bare how naive and complacent we have been about Russian malign intent in this country and others. The invasion exposed a decade of chronic inaction against dirty money from Russia and other authoritarian states, which saw Kremlin-linked oligarchs and kleptocrats use London as both the hiding place and service industry for their ill-gotten gains. It should never have taken the invasion of Ukraine for us to act and although some progress has been made, the job is far from done. Labour will continue to hold the Government to account until Britain is no longer a soft touch for illicit finance.
Secondly, as the Defence Secretary himself conceded, for a decade we have hollowed out and underfunded our armed forces. Many in Europe believed that the era of wars between states was over. We reshaped our security, defence, intelligence and diplomacy to tackle different threats, allowing core capabilities to dwindle. Even when Putin broke international law and invaded his neighbours, our responses were weak. That must change, beginning with the immediate need for a stockpiles strategy to sustain support for Ukraine and rearm Britain.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
As someone, not alone, who has called on both Front Benches for a very long time to commit to spend 3% of GDP on defence—a figure that we were still spending in the mid-1990s after the end of the cold war—I am used to hearing people say that we need to spend more when they are not in a position to do so. Could the right hon. Gentleman assure the House that if he were in a position of power, we would reach 3% of GDP as a minimum on defence?
Mr Lammy
I am grateful to the Chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee for all that he has said on this issue over many years. We in my party have committed to a defence review on day one if we were to come to office. I gently remind him that throughout our previous period in office, spending on defence per capita was higher than today, standing at 2.5% when we left office. We are seeing what is happening across the European continent—so many European countries are committed to spending more, including the 3% that he indicates. We must play our part alongside France, as 50% of Europe’s defence capability.
Mr Dhesi
My right hon. Friend the shadow Foreign Secretary will be aware of reports of Russian attempts to subvert Moldovan democracy and interfere in its political institutions. That could have far-reaching consequences for the war in Ukraine and for broader European security. Does he agree that the UK Government must act urgently to support Moldova and its democracy before the situation worsens?
Mr Lammy
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise the issue of Moldova and its vulnerability at this time. I fully suspect that other Members will return to this issue in the course of the debate. Moldova is feeling very worried one year on from the start of the war. We must stand with them. My hon. Friend is right to refer to the cyber-terrorism alongside it that has become a benchmark of Putin’s aggression.
Thirdly, we must never again allow ourselves to become dependent on autocrats and their fossil fuels for our energy. Decarbonisation is now a vital national security imperative. The faster we can transition to clean power, the quicker we can undermine Putin’s war effort. Every solar panel is a shield to Putin’s aggression; every wind farm a defence against dependency. In developing our home-grown energy systems we can build the green jobs and the transformational industry of the future.
Fourthly, we are reminded of the essential relationship with our European allies. We have shared interests, shared geography and common values with our neighbours in Europe. NATO will always be the anchor of our defence and the cornerstone of European security, but it is more important than ever that we have strong diplomatic partnerships with our European allies and a close, co-operative relationship with the EU itself. This is too serious a time to be starting unnecessary fights or engaging in petty diplomatic squabbles.
As we approach the one-year anniversary of the war, it is obvious that we are entering a new and dangerous phase. Last week, NATO and western intelligence agencies warned that Putin had started amassing fighter jets and helicopters near the Ukrainian border—a sign that as we enter spring, Putin is adopting a new approach to the war that could see greater use of Russian air power to support its faltering land offensive. In recent days, both Ukrainian and NATO officials have warned of ammunition shortages, dwindling domestic stockpiles and supply chains under increased pressure. If Ukraine is to prevail over what Putin will throw at it, the UK and our allies should set aside individual announcements and instead lay out a long-term strategy to provide the support that Ukraine needs, whether it be ammunition, additional air defence capabilities or NATO-standard weaponry.
We need to ensure that Ukraine has our total support to tackle the Russian threat from air and land. Alongside that military assistance, we need a new diplomatic drive to sustain and broaden the diplomatic coalition against this war. Russia’s invasion was an attack not just on Ukraine but on the international order itself. It is perhaps the most egregious violation of the UN charter since it was written: a sovereign UN member invaded by a permanent member of the Security Council.
We need to work with Ukraine and partners around the world to make clear the truth of this war and counter Putin’s propaganda; to make it clear that it is Russia that has chosen this war; it is Russia that is the aggressor; it is Russia that is willing to use global hunger as a bargaining chip; it is Russia that is trying to change international borders through force. We will be less secure if that aggression is allowed to succeed.
Our support for Ukraine must entail action at home as well as abroad. At home here in the UK, we must complete the job and get our own house in order. That means tackling Putin’s kleptocracy, closing the loopholes that continue to exist in our sanctions regime and properly enforcing our own laws on illicit finance. We will go still further. Russian rockets and Iranian drones have destroyed Ukraine’s hospitals, energy plants and homes. Whole villages, towns and cities have been reduced to dust, rubble and ruin. By some estimates, the damage to infrastructure is more than $100 billion. Without proper funding, the essential task of rebuilding Ukraine will take decades to complete.
As long ago as July 2022, the then Foreign Secretary, the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), said that the Government supported using frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine. But since then, we have heard nothing. Sure, the right hon. Lady will refer to that in her speech later. The EU has already set out a plan to shift frozen assets into a fund to help rebuild Ukraine. As has been said, Canada has already legislated to do that, so why have our Government not done the same? Ukrainians do not have the luxury of time. This is an urgent point, so I ask the Foreign Secretary once more: what steps have this Government taken since July 2022 to ensure that seized Russian state assets can be used for the benefit of Ukraine? Further, will the Government support the Bill of my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Sir Chris Bryant), which would allow Russian state assets to be used for that same purpose?
Throughout the horrific last 12 months, the body of evidence of Russian war crimes in Ukraine has grown and grown. On a weekly basis we hear horrific reports of mass graves discovered in liberated areas. On the TV, we see sickening videos of schools, hospitals and churches bombed to destruction, and innocent civilians murdered and tortured. These crimes demand accountability and they demand justice. We strongly support all international efforts to document, investigate and prosecute these crimes. Again, we believe we should go further.
Since March, Labour has been calling on the Government to support the creation of a special tribunal to prosecute Putin and his top brass for the crime of aggression. The Foreign Secretary knows that, while the International Criminal Court can investigate war crimes committed in Ukraine, it cannot investigate Russia for the crime of aggression. Only a special tribunal, working alongside the ICC, can ensure that this gap of accountability is bridged. The Ukrainian people want this tribunal. Zelensky wants this tribunal. The EU Commission wants this tribunal. France, Germany, Estonia, Latvia and countless others have called for it. So will the Foreign Secretary commit to its creation and, if so, what steps has he taken to make it happen?
Finally, Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has demonstrated more clearly than ever before how our security is connected with the security of the rest of Europe. The past 12 months have shown vividly what can be achieved when we stand united with our allies on the other side of the channel.
Liam Byrne
My right hon. Friend is making a brilliant speech. Was he as surprised as I was that there was so little mention of that kind of threat in the Integrated Review? Does he support the call that the next iteration of that Integrated Review absolutely has to put the re-containment of Russia centre stage?
Mr Lammy
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. He has been crystal clear on that from the Back Benches. We await that review, but what he says has to be central. We must get it right. Obviously, we will scrutinise it in every detail. In many of the areas that have been critical to supporting Ukraine defend herself against Russia—sanctions, energy security and defence—our co-operation with the European Union has been critical—it has been critical to our support for Ukraine and, through that, Ukraine’s survival. It is more important than ever that we have strong structured mechanisms for dialogue and co-operation with our allies in Europe. That is why Labour has proposed a new UK-EU security pact that could cover deeper co-operation on foreign policy, defence, security and law enforcement.
Labour’s commitment to NATO is unshakeable, yet the UK’s leadership in NATO could be at risk, with growing concerns over our capacity to meet NATO’s obligations in full. While 20 NATO nations have revised their defence strategies since the start of the invasion, this Government have not done so, so I ask the Foreign Secretary: will the Government commit to rebooting our defence plans, and will they halt their planned cuts to the British Army?
Fleur Anderson (Putney) (Lab)
I support all that has been said about the need for a long-term plan to defeat Putin and to see justice done. Does my right hon. Friend also agree that we should heed the calls of not only Ukrainian civil society to provide more support for their lawyers and judges on the ground so that they can hear the tens of thousands of cases in Ukrainian courts, but the calls for psycho-social support for those Ukrainians who are going through trauma and who will need to be supported once Putin has been defeated?
Mr Lammy
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her intervention. Earlier last month, I spent time with women in Kosovo, who reminded me of the horrors of war and sexual violence. In their own pain, they told me about the work that they were doing to help their Ukrainian sisters at this desperate time. It reminded me of the importance of that psycho-social support and the huge humanitarian effort in which we and others must play a part, not just over the next months, but for many, many years to come.
Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)
Inevitably, some people will flee the Russian advance that is coming in the spring, and some might reach the United Kingdom. Does the shadow Secretary of State agree that proper provision must be made to welcome them and also to find permanent accommodation for them if necessary?
Mr Lammy
The hon. Gentleman is right. It is why so many British people have opened their homes to Ukrainians at this desperate time. Of course, as this new offensive begins, there will most likely be further need over the coming months.
It is important to stress that this war did not begin for the Ukrainians one year ago. In fact, it begun in 2014 when Putin moved into the Donbas and when he annexed Crimea. One year ago, we hoped for the best, yet, faced with what seemed like unsurmountable odds, we feared the worst, but Ukraine stands defiant. The price Ukrainians have paid for their continued freedom is immense: tens of thousands of people lost; cities destroyed; and families shattered. While Ukraine stands tall, Putin stands condemned and isolated. While Ukraine has won the admiration and respect of the world, Putin’s ego has made Russia a pariah. While Putin expected the west to fracture and divide, his actions have drawn us together. But we cannot become complacent. In the coming weeks and months, Ukraine will yet again face new challenges and hardships designed by Putin to test her resolve and the resolve of us all. It is our duty to the people of Ukraine to do all we can to ensure that the country overcomes these challenges, in the same way that it has all the others. Ukraine must and will prevail.
Boris Johnson (Uxbridge and South Ruislip) (Con)
I pay tribute to the Foreign Secretary and the shadow Foreign Secretary for the quality of their speeches this afternoon.
In the year since Vladimir Putin launched his vicious and unnecessary war in Ukraine he has failed in almost all of his objectives. He has failed to take Kyiv. He has been sent scuttling from the Kharkiv region. He has been forced to evacuate Kherson. He has cost the lives of at least 60,000 Russian troops, and seen probably more than 100,000 injured. In the areas that he has occupied in Ukraine, he has created a new Flanders Fields of mud, trenches and blasted trees, where months of high-intensity shelling and bloodshed produced gains that could be measured in yards. He has been forced to such desperate expedients as sending to the front prisoners or terrified members of ethnic minorities recruited from remote provinces. As my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary pointed out in his powerful speech, he is running pitifully low on the technically advanced weaponry that he increasingly needs.
The seemingly irresistible force of the Russian military is breaking on the immoveable object of Ukrainian resistance. We in this House remain lost in admiration for the Ukrainians, for their heroism and for the continued inspiration that they are given by Volodymyr Zelensky. Yet it remains all too possible that Putin can still achieve something that he can call a victory. All that he needs to do is hang on to some piece of land that he has conquered and the signal will go around the world that aggression can pay, and that borders can be changed by force. All he needs to do to claim some kind of victory is to continue the cynical policy that he has followed since the first invasion of 2014, which the shadow Foreign Secretary rightly dwelt on, to use his foothold in Ukraine to destabilise the whole country.
Unless Putin is purged from Ukrainian territory, he will twist his knife in the wound. He will bide his time. He will wait until he can attack again. He will continue to menace the lives of the Georgians, the Moldovans—as the hon. Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) rightly pointed out—the Balts, and everyone living in the periphery of the old Soviet empire. Unless he is finally defeated in Ukraine, Putin’s revanchist ambitions will be unchecked. That is why it is so crucial that we now accelerate our support for Ukraine and give them the tools to finish the job. We can all be proud of what successive Governments have done to help the Ukrainians whose armed forces continue to fight like lions. Indeed, it is they who deserve the credit, but we should be in no doubt that western equipment has been invaluable.
The story of the past 12 months is that, sooner or later, having exhausted all the other options, we give them what they need—from anti-tank missiles to HIMARS to tanks. If the choice is sooner or later, then, for heaven’s sake, let us give these weapons sooner. It is absurd for western supporters to keep pressing the Ukrainians, as they did at the Munich security conference, on how long this is going to take; the answer to that question is to a large extent determined by us.
It is a fine thing that we have finally promised tanks, but there is no conceivable ground for delay in getting them to Ukraine. We need those machines—Abrams, Challengers, Leopards—to make a real difference in real time in the next few weeks, not next year. It is admirable that we are proposing to train Ukrainian fighters to fly NATO fast jets—I hear the caution of my right hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart)—but it is curious that we are doing so before we have even taken the decision in principle to give them the planes. Let us cut to the chase and give them the planes too. If the House was in any doubt about the urgency of increasing our supply of equipment to the Ukrainians, it is becoming ever clearer that China is preparing to arm the Russians.
The Ukrainians have shown what they can do. They have the elan and the courage to sweep Putin from their lands, and they have the inestimable psychological advantage that they are fighting for hearth and home. With the right kit, including more long-range artillery, they can punch through the land bridge, cut off Crimea and deal a knockout blow to Putin’s plans, and they should not stop there.
It is time for us all to end our obfuscation about what we think of as a Ukrainian victory and what we think of as Ukraine. The Ukrainians must be helped to restore not just the borders of 24 February last year, but the 1991 borders on which they voted for independence. It was the west’s collective weakness in 2014, its effective acquiescence in Putin’s aggression, that helped to convince him that he could launch an attack last year. Whatever the good intentions of the Normandy format, we cannot say that it was a success; nor, frankly, can we say that the UK was right to absent ourselves from that format and from those discussions. We must not make that mistake again.
After a year of slaughter, we must do more collectively to show the people of Russia what they are losing by Putin’s misrule. We should tighten the sanctions on oil and gas wherever we can. I hear the arguments that hon. Members make about the need to use frozen assets and, whatever the complexities, I think the House deserves to hear those arguments properly thrashed out. We should be making it clear to Putin’s entire war machine, as well as to the regime in the Kremlin, that they will be held to account for their crimes, for the torture, rape, and indiscriminate killing they have sponsored. We must show them that the mills of justice grind slowly, but they grind small.
We should designate Russia a state sponsor of terrorism, placing that country where it now rightly belongs on the list that includes Cuba, North Korea and Syria—and, by the way, we should designate the infamous and bloodthirsty Wagner Group a foreign terrorist organisation. That is a badge that is now richly deserved and long overdue.
Boris Johnson
I am just winding up.
Above all, we must give the Ukrainians what they need to win this war this year. By ensuring that Ukraine wins and Putin fails, we are making the best and most financially efficient investment in the long-term security of not just the Euro-Atlantic area, but the whole world. We all know that we in this country made a promise to Ukraine under the 1994 Budapest memorandum, when the Ukrainians gave up their vast nuclear arsenal. We said we would come to their aid in the event of an attack. Now is the time, finally, to do what we can to honour that promise. The Ukrainians are fighting not just for their freedom, but for the cause of freedom around the world. We should give them what they need, not next month, not next year, but now.
Dave Doogan (Angus) (SNP)
I start by echoing much of what has been said. It is very rare for us in this place to be in accord with one another—would that it was not the case that we had to talk about this at all, but it is, and on Ukraine we are in full accord.
I want to touch on some international comparisons. Estonia proposes an EU-wide ammunition purchase programme for supplying Ukraine. It would not have to be through the EU—pan-European or pan-NATO is probably a more helpful term in this legislature—but we need something to increase the co-ordination and depth of the ongoing ammunition delivery programme. I do not want in any way to undermine that which has been achieved, but it is quite clear that Russia is looking to prosecute a war of attrition for a very long time, and it would be helpful to demonstrate to the Kremlin that the west will meet that with renewed resurgence in its supplies to Ukraine.
Of course, doing so depletes the United Kingdom’s defence supplies and the supply chain has been caught short. That is not their fault, but the fault of a slightly less than strategic defence procurement plan—dating back many Defence Procurement Ministers, I hasten to add. We must ensure that we step that up at renewed pace. Interestingly, Norway has passed a five-year, £6.15 billion Ukraine support package and the terms on which it will be expended will be decided in concert with those in Ukraine. I wonder whether the UK should seek to emulate that, with ringfenced, dedicated funds over the next five years to send, again, a strong message.
I am not suggesting to the Foreign Secretary that the UK has not chipped in—of course it has, with many billions of pounds and no small measure of moral support as well—but such measures would help to show Putin that we are not going away and we are not shrinking from the challenge, however he wishes to present it. Canada, as other hon. Members have touched on, has changed its law to allow the seizure of Russian funds and started the process of seizing a first batch of frozen funds to send to Ukraine. The UK should follow suit in short order.
What progress has the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office made with our friends in India, to demonstrate to them that it is not acceptable to ride two horses in this way and that Russia’s criminality cannot just be dealt with by turning a blind eye or holding their nose on the altar of cheap oil prices? It is either in the rules-based international system, or it is not; I wonder whether that information has been conveyed to India in the most robust terms by the United Kingdom.
China is a concern. We in the west need to develop a narrative that goes beyond cultural differences, that is not open to interpretation and that lays out extremely clearly to Beijing that, if it were ever to make the miscalculation to supply Russia with arms, munitions and other supplies that would help it to prolong this egregious invasion of Ukraine, that would be met with very significant consequences from the west. I would be interested to know what the United Kingdom Government are doing in that respect.
I will get on to air power in a minute, but the threat of escalation by Russia is material and we should concentrate closely on it. Over the last 12 months we have, perhaps understandably, mithered over the definition of whether something is lethal or defensive, whether it is tactical or strategic, and now, we have moved that on to air power. Ukraine has received an extraordinarily large amount of financial support and military assistance, but there is a pattern perhaps coming into view whereby Ukraine gets the weapons it was previously asking for while it is asking for the next set of weapons. We should redouble our focus on what, whether or which we can do to support Ukraine with air power.
In terms of logistics, as I have mentioned, the west, or certainly the United Kingdom, is running out of surplus or even stores in ready use and further equipment purchases will need to be made. However, I do not have confidence that the supply chain of the defence procurement apparatus as it exists currently in the United Kingdom is up to that job. I would welcome any reassurance that the Secretary of State can give me in that regard.
We should commit to a multi-year spending package of ringfenced money to support Ukraine; again, that would provide the clearest possible message. I am pleased, to a certain extent, that the United Kingdom is training combat pilots for Ukraine, but I am left wondering to what end. I also wonder what is happening to the combat pilots in training with the Royal Air Force, some of whom—I am not making this up—are having to wait eight or even nine years to become qualified. What is the knock-on effect of training Ukraine’s combat air pilots? That is not to say that it is not the right thing to do, but every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and we should see the whole picture before we celebrate perhaps prematurely.
Mr Mark Francois (Rayleigh and Wickford) (Con)
The fast-jet training programme that the hon. Gentleman is referring to, which is known as the military flying training system, is broken and everyone involved in aviation knows it. But we also have some tranche 1 Typhoons that have a lot of time left in their airframes and are sitting in a warehouse having been taken out of RAF service. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, if given to the Ukrainians, a squadron of those could do a lot more to defend freedom, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) suggested a few moments ago, than it could sitting in a warehouse gathering dust?
Dave Doogan
The right hon. Gentleman makes a valuable point. He asks whether I agree with him, and I am afraid that I do not. My understanding is that although tranche 1 Typhoons may have hours left, by the time the penalty factor for what they did when they were flying is applied, there would not be many hours left. They may look like Typhoons, but their combat air systems are very old, and they are perhaps not exactly what Ukraine is looking for. That is nevertheless a valid point, and it leads me directly to my next point.
Not a single Typhoon in the United Kingdom is available for use by Ukraine, which makes me wonder what we are training its pilots on—unless we are training them on NATO combat air standard protocol. That is all we can do, because they will not be getting Typhoons—mark my words—and they do not actually want Typhoons. People talk about getting pilots for Ukraine, but pilots are just the tip of the arrowhead. They need maintenance crews, avionics specialists, refuellers and armourers. The logistic tail for a fourth-generation combat aircraft is enormously long, and none is quite as long as the Typhoon’s. What Ukraine actually needs is something more akin to the Gripen or the F-16, and the United Kingdom does not have any of those. That means that the United Kingdom is just part of the puzzle of working with allies in NATO and in Europe. The Gripen in particular is ideally suited to the types of facilities that Ukraine will be able to operate from.
The Secretary of State said that Ukraine must “take back more land.” I wonder how he intends for Ukraine to do that without exercising air superiority. There will be a spring offensive, as I think most Members agree. We need to make sure that that offensive belongs to Ukraine.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I remind all Members that if they take part in the debate—not in an intervention but in a speech—they will be expected to be here for the wind-ups. I call Liz Truss.
Elizabeth Truss (South West Norfolk) (Con)
One year ago on Friday, I got a phone call, at 3.30 in the morning, from my private secretary at the Foreign Office telling me that Vladimir Putin had begun a whole-scale invasion into Ukraine. Air strikes and a land invasion were targeting cities across that country, including Kyiv. It was devastating news, but although it was devastating, it was not unexpected. We had been seeing for months the way in which troops were being amassed on the border of Ukraine. We had very good intelligence showing us exactly what Putin’s plans had been.
We tried for months to forestall that invasion. At the Liverpool G7 summit back in 2021, we worked with our allies to come up with a package of severe sanctions, and we warned Russia that they would be put in place in the event of an invasion. For the first time in our history, we unveiled intelligence about what the Russians were planning. They were planning to install a puppet regime in Kyiv; they were planning to install false flag operations, with a view to trying to convince the world that it was not their fault that they had invaded Ukraine and that they had been provoked. Our intelligence prevented the world from believing that.
From 2015, we started training Ukrainian troops. We were also the first European country to supply weapons to Ukraine. We called out Russia internationally. I personally visited Moscow—as did many of my counterparts—to give directly to Sergey Lavrov and others in the Russian Administration the message of the severe consequences of their actions. Nevertheless, Putin went ahead. Despite the warnings, despite what he knew would happen, he went ahead, because fundamentally, he did not believe that the Ukrainians would fight, and he did not believe that the free world would have the resolve to stand up to him. He was proven wrong in both cases.
From day one, we saw sheer bravery on the part of the Ukrainians defending their country. We saw an Administration in Kyiv whom many people had expected to leave their posts—people expected Zelensky and his Cabinet to flee the country—but they did not; they stayed there. I remember being in a videoconference that evening with the Defence Secretary, and our counterparts, who were not in Poland or the United States but in Kyiv. They were defending their country and asking us for our help in what we could do.
We did all that we could. Together with our allies, not just in the G7 but from around the world—everywhere from Australia and Singapore to Switzerland—we put on the toughest sanctions. We pushed back the Russian economy by decades. We also supplied weapons to Ukraine. Many in this Chamber have said that maybe we should have supplied weapons earlier, but I can tell them—from working inside the Government—that we did all we could, as quickly as we could, to persuade allies, and we have now built up an alliance of countries supplying those weapons. I cannot wait to see tanks and fighter jets in Ukraine helping those brave Ukrainians. We also co-ordinated with our allies an international response. At the United Nations, 141 countries stood up against the Russian invasion and what Russia had done—that, too, was unprecedented.
But let us all be honest: we should have done more earlier. The reason why Putin took the action that he did was that he did not believe that we would follow through. And we did not take him at his word. As far back as 2007, at the Munich security conference, Putin made his intentions very clear. He has talked on many occasions about creating a greater Russia. He took action, as we know, in Crimea and the Donbas, but we did not do enough. We let it pass; we collectively turned too much of a blind eye. I am afraid to say that we—not just the United Kingdom, but Europe and the free world—also imported Russian gas and oil. We saw money flow in from Russia—money that was later to be used to buy the weapons that would be used against the Ukrainian people. We also failed to take action on defending Ukraine.
As my colleague the Member for Uxbridge—[Interruption.] I apologise; as my right hon. Friend Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson)—let us be honest, I should have more respect after everything—commented earlier, we signed the 1994 Budapest memorandum, which guaranteed the security of Ukraine. We should have provided more weapons to Ukraine and we should have allowed Ukraine to join NATO. Can we imagine this situation if Ukraine had been a NATO member under article 5 protection? It would simply not have happened.
Bob Stewart
The 1994 Budapest accord, which guaranteed the sovereignty of Ukraine, was also signed by Russia, so Russia is to blame as well.
Elizabeth Truss
I completely agree with my right hon. Friend that Russia is, of course, to blame, but we should hold ourselves to high standards and follow through on the commitments that we make, as should our allies such as the United States.
There is unfinished business in terms of offering Ukraine the security that it needed, which is why we need to learn the lessons of what happened. Frankly, we were complacent about freedom and democracy after the cold war: we were told that it was the end of history, that freedom and democracy were guaranteed, and that we could carry on living our lives without worrying about what else had happened. We were told that there would be no challenge to those basic principles and that we had won the argument. We know now that that argument is never finally won. We need to keep winning the argument, and we need to keep defending our values with hard security and economic security, if we are to succeed.
First, we need to do all we can to make sure that Ukraine wins this war as soon as possible. Every extra day means lives lost, women violated and towns destroyed. We need to do all we can, as fast as we can—in my view, that includes fighter jets. We have had a discussion today about which are the best possible options, but having spoken to the Ukrainians about it months ago, I know that what they want is an option. Let us work with our allies to get them an option to use, otherwise they will not be able to prevail. We also need to make sure that Ukraine has the economic wherewithal to continue the fight and that we are continuing to support it internationally.
Secondly, we must not be complacent when that war is won. I do believe that Ukraine will win the war—there is no way that Russia will win the war—but we need to make sure that the future of Russia is a more positive future than the one that we enabled at the end of the cold war. What does that mean? It means that we should never again be complacent in the face of Russian money and Russian oil and gas. Instead, we should make sure that any lifting of sanctions is tied to reform in Russia. We can never again have the situation where we enable freedom and free trade between the west and Russia, and that is then used to develop a kleptocracy, which is exactly what we have seen take place.
We need to make sure that Russia pays for the crimes that it has committed and that it is held to account for the appalling atrocities and war crimes—all of them. We need to make sure that money seized from the Russian state is used to rebuild Ukraine. That is vital. Of course, we in well-off countries such as Britain should contribute, but I cannot imagine a situation where Russia simply goes ahead as if nothing has happened and does not contribute to rebuilding Ukraine. That is vital and I will be pushing for it to happen.
Thirdly, we need to learn the lesson about how we deal with authoritarian regimes more broadly. President Xi has made very clear his intentions with respect to Taiwan. We have to take those seriously. During the Russia-Ukraine conflict—the invasion by Russia of Ukraine—we have amassed, for the first time in history, a group of nations that is prepared to put on sanctions and act together. We need to formalise this grouping, which I have described as an economic NATO—the G7 plus our key allies, such as the EU, South Korea and Australia. We need to bring that group together and start developing our plans now because, although we ended up doing those things after the invasion of Ukraine, prevention is far better than cure. Let us develop these economic tools and let us be clear with China exactly what would happen if there was an escalation with respect to Taiwan. Let us be clear about that now.
Let us also make sure that Taiwan can defend itself. Let us not leave another free democracy undefended for an authoritarian regime to invade. That is a very important principle. The reality is that, as a proportion of the world’s population, fewer people are living under democracy now than 30 years ago. Can we imagine what the world will look like in 30 years’ time if we do not act now? It is not a world that I want to live in.
We have heard some excellent contributions to the debate and I am pleased about the unity that we have seen and continue to see across the United Kingdom. We need to do all we can to support Ukraine and we need to act as quickly as possible. I am familiar with the vagaries of the Government machine, after spending 10 years in various Government Departments, so I will do all I can to support my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary in his efforts to make sure that things happen as quickly as possible.
We also must not forget the broader arguments. Freedom and democracy are the lifeblood of our society and other free societies around the world. We need to be prepared to do all we can to defend them now, before it is too late. The fact is that being tough is what will bring us peace, and that is what we need to do.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
I also welcome our friends from Washington in the United States of America, who are in the Gallery. You are most welcome to our proceedings today.
Liam Byrne (Birmingham, Hodge Hill) (Lab)
It is a great privilege to follow the excellent speech of the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), as well as that of the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), the Foreign Secretary and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy).
I will add three points to the debate: first, on the importance of how we break the balance of force that we see arranged on the ground; secondly, on how we choke the oligarchs of war who are helping to supply Putin’s war machine; and thirdly, on how we commence the pursuit of justice. There is more to say about that, because I was unhappy to hear the Foreign Secretary, who is just leaving his place, not row in behind the Vice President of the United States and say that our Government had also arrived at the conclusion that Russia was committing crimes against humanity. One has to ask, how much more evidence do they really need?
We have heard the call loud and clear from two former Prime Ministers about the need to supply what Ukraine needs now. The truth is that both sides of the conflict will find it difficult to summon the 400,000 to 500,000 troops necessary to make a breakthrough one way or the other, so the challenge that may lie ahead is that Ukraine continues to suffer the pattern of more and more troops being thrown into infantry attacks under artillery fire in the east of the country and endless missile strikes on population centres. That is a grinding, terrible waste of life.
We have to leapfrog out of this bad habit that we have gotten into where first we say no, then we say yes, with an extended time period in between. On air defence, we said no to Patriot missiles until we said yes. On tanks, we said no until, months and months later, we said yes. Now, can we please just short-circuit the process and send the F-16s as fast as possible, with trained pilots? It is great to hear that we are training pilots, but at last week’s Munich security conference there was a clear consensus among Democrats and Republicans to send a very clear message to the President of the United States that it was time that fast jets were sent to support our allies in Ukraine. We heard directly from President Zelensky, just a few yards from this Chamber, that the wings of freedom are needed today, so let us jump out of the no and get to yes as fast as possible.
Mr Francois
We gave 14 Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine. Those are very capable tanks, but in and of themselves they will not change the whole course of the war. What they did do, however, was help unlock the delivery of hundreds of Leopards. What the Ukrainians really want are MiGs, which they are familiar with using, and F-16s. By the same argument, if we gave one squadron of older Typhoons that then unlocked hundreds of MiGs and F-16s, that would be worth doing, would it not?
Liam Byrne
Personally, I think it would, but my key point to those on the Treasury Front Bench is: can we please short-circuit the time it takes to get from no to yes? We have gone through this loop—this doom loop—at least twice before, so let us short-circuit the nonsense now and crack on with it. The Treasury Front Benchers will find that there is cross-party consensus on that question, so please just put the decision in front of us from the Dispatch Box. Last week, we heard from the head of the Ukrainian air force that those fast jets are needed now in order to change the balance of power on the battlefield, but also to protect the population centres from Iranian drones as well as Russian cruise missiles. Every single day that we do not take that decision is a day when Putin is allowed to continue raining terror down, not just on the troops of the brave Ukrainian armed forces, but on the civilians of Ukraine. He is using that capability now to perpetrate war crimes, and we in this country have a moral responsibility to damn well stop him.
Secondly, we have to move harder and faster to choke to death the oligarchs of war, starting with the dogs of war at the head of the Wagner Group. Frankly, we were too slow to implement the sanctions that we now have. I am glad that this House passed the measures with cross-party consent, basically allowing us to cut and paste the EU sanctions regime with a little bit of the American regime and to get that into place. It was a shame that it took the war in Ukraine to move a little further ahead with some of the anti-kleptocracy laws that we now have, but here we are—all progress is good.
There is clear evidence, however, that sanctions are being widely evaded, with goods and oil being exported to India and China, rebadged, and then re-exported from there. Given that the Treasury’s Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation thinks it is okay to issue sanction waivers to Prigozhin and his lawyers, I urge Treasury Front Benchers—together with the Americans, if necessary—to get a lot tougher in clamping down on that export and re-export business, because right now that business is supplying dollars that are buying weapons to support Putin.
The symbol of a different order of things has to be a radically different approach to taking on the Wagner Group. We know that today, the Wagner Group is recruiting from prisons—it is recruiting from all over. It is mobilising forces on the eastern front in Ukraine, and frankly, it has opened a second front against democracy in Russia as well. It is active in at least five countries and has business interests in at least another 15. It is short-circuiting the sanctions regime by trading in oil, manganese, gold and uranium—you name it—so it is a matter of concern to this House that we are woefully behind the sanctions regimes that the United States and the Europeans have put in place to suffocate Prigozhin and his forces.
Mr Dhesi
My right hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does he agree that we also need to try to rein in the Wagner Group’s growing influence in Africa? It is having more and more of an impact on eroding democracy in many nations across the globe, so it is about time that our Government, working with allies, try to clamp down on that.
Liam Byrne
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The right hon. Member for South West Norfolk talked about the need for a global alliance to defend democracy—well, that global alliance has to extend to Africa. We should be concerned about the fact that the Wagner Group is now active in five countries and is poised to make something of a breakthrough in the Sahel after the French evacuation from Mali. Frankly, we should be getting a lot tougher on the Wagner Group, and that should start with a much more comprehensive sanctions regime. When the Minister winds up, I urge him to tell us that the Government will replicate the United States sanctions regime on 21 different individuals who are associated with the Wagner Group and on 16 different corporate entities. That is three times as many sanctions as we have against individuals or businesses associated with Prigozhin.
Let us go further. On 26 January, we heard a very clear pronouncement from our allies in the United States declaring the Wagner Group to be a proscribed organisation, because it is patently a transnational criminal organisation. That contrasts with the situation a couple of weeks ago, when the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, the hon. Member for Aldershot (Leo Docherty), who is not in his place, came before the Foreign Affairs Committee. We were grateful to him for doing so, because for some time the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Defence could not quite decide who was the Minister responsible for taking on the Wagner Group. In due course, the machine did its job and the poor Minister was summoned before us. He was not able to say when the Wagner Group was going to be sanctioned; indeed, he extracted himself from that line of questioning by saying, of course, that it was not his job but a matter for the Home Office—joined-up Government at its very best.
What we have at the moment is not good enough. We need a clear plan, a clear timetable and a clear commitment from the Minister responding today that the Wagner Group will be sanctioned here, just as it is in the United States of America. We need a clear commitment that the individuals who have been sanctioned by the Americans and the European Union will also be sanctioned here.
Finally, while we are at it, could we now end the complete scandal of the Treasury itself licensing sanction waivers for Russian warlords to fly lawyers from London to St Petersburg to summon up a case and to sue journalists such as Eliot Higgins in English courts? What a complete scandal. To top it all, Eliot Higgins was told last week that he is the security risk, and as such cannot be allowed to go to cinema showings of the new film about the brave Mr Navalny. What have we become when we are licensing English lawyers to sue English journalists in English courts? It is not good enough. It is an outrage and it needs to stop, and we need to send a clear signal from this House this afternoon that it ends now. While the Minister is at it, he might consider paying Mr Eliot Higgins’s legal bills. This will surprise the House, but I am told that Mr Prigozhin has not paid his legal bills, which are about £116,000, while poor Mr Higgins has. He has had to cough up about £70,000, so perhaps the Government could do a little whip-round for Mr Higgins and supply an apology to him and to Bellingcat at the end of the debate.
We have to make sure that the weapons supplies are in place and that the sanctions regime is far more effective, and the third piece of the puzzle is that we have to commence the search for justice. It is excellent that the United Kingdom has come together with its allies to ensure that there are prosecutions for war crimes, but many of us in this House will want to see prosecutions for the crime of aggression as well. The abuse that has been laid out has been appalling, with murder, torture, rape, deportation, executions, electrocutions and the crimes of Bucha. The sexual assault of a four-year-old child was reported to the United Nations last week. That is why all of us in this House today should welcome the statement by the vice-president of the United States last week that the US has formally determined that Russia has committed crimes against humanity. We should make the same declaration ourselves. We should do it quickly, and I hope we will hear a gameplan for just that from the Minister at the end of the debate.
Bob Stewart
Speaking as someone who has given evidence in war crimes trials—five of them—the thing that really horrified me was that we only got a very small percentage of the people who carried out such crimes. I am talking about genocide and war against humanity. It was a percentage so small that it is almost impossible to measure. If we are going to do this properly, we have to put a heck of a lot of effort into having war crimes trials—almost more effort than with the Nuremberg trials and so on.
Liam Byrne
The whole of the House is grateful for the work of the right hon. and gallant Member, because we know that more people were prosecuted because of the work he did than otherwise would have been the case. He is absolutely right to say what he has said. It was 80 years ago that the free world came together to ensure the prosecution of the guilty at Nuremberg. The table of crimes presented was clear. It was crimes against humanity, and we should remind ourselves in this House exactly what that table of crimes entailed: murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation and persecution on political, racial and religious grounds. Those are precisely the crimes that President Putin has committed in Ukraine, and we must make sure, just as we did in Nuremberg, that the free world comes together once more to hold him, as well as his henchmen, to account.
Sir Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)
It is a matter of great satisfaction that we have American visitors present today to witness the absolute unity of outlook on both sides of this Chamber. It can never be stressed too often that three concepts lie at the heart of defence and security: deterrence, containment and the unpredictability of future conflicts. To give an example of the last, one has only to look at the exchange between the former Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) and myself on the day of the invasion. I asked him:
“If, as appears likely, Ukraine gets overwhelmed, will we offer to give sanctuary to a Government in exile, pending Ukraine’s future freedom?”
The then Prime Minister replied, quite sensibly:
“One of the points I made to President Zelensky this morning was that it might be necessary for him to find a safe place for him and his Cabinet to go.”—[Official Report, 24 February 2022; Vol. 709, c. 570.]
I was quite sensible in asking that question, and my right hon. Friend was quite sensible in giving that answer because, let us be frank, not many people—at least, not many outside the Cabinet and Government of Ukraine—thought that Ukraine had much chance of resisting what appeared to be, and indeed was, a massive, albeit ill-conceived, onslaught against numerically far smaller forces. I said there are three concepts, and that is an example of the unpredictability of future warfare.
I remind amateur strategists, such as myself, in all parties, that just as we were not prepared for the successful resistance of Ukraine, we should not now become too complacent that Ukraine cannot possibly be defeated. We could wake up tomorrow to find that there has been some terrific, unexpected Russian breakthrough and the whole strategic situation has changed completely. That is why the appeals being made so strongly from both sides of the House are that we must, to coin someone coining someone else coining a phrase, “give them the tools to finish the job”.
It can be argued that deterrence failed, but why did deterrence fail in terms of Russia invading Ukraine? I am sorry to share this with friends from across the Atlantic, but one reason deterrence failed in this context was that the invasion of Ukraine by Russia came almost six months to the day from the catastrophic and bungled exit from Afghanistan by NATO. I am not saying that that planted the seed in Putin’s mind to do what he did, but it certainly may have affected the timing of him doing something that he had almost certainly wanted to do for a long time. We have to bear in mind what sort of signals we were sending. The answer is that we were sending signals of weakness, and when signals of weakness are sent to an authoritarian—that is the rather mild term used these days for what most of us from another era would call the totalitarian—type of government, we ought to know what to expect their behaviour to be.
I have talked about unpredictability and the limitations of deterrence. There is one element of deterrence—nuclear deterrence—where the results are more certain, should one dare put it to the test; but it nevertheless has to be considered in every scenario, no matter what sort of terrible fighting and atrocious behaviour may go on below the level of the nuclear threshold.
Let us talk a little bit about containment. Containment is what one has to do when faced with a deeply hostile opponent. It is no good talking about battling for “mutual understanding”. The trouble is, we can have mutual understanding where one person understands that the other person is a democrat and the democrat understands that the other person is a totalitarian dictator. That is not a recipe for peace; it is actually a sound portrayal of a situation where, unless the democrat shows the dictator that he cannot get his own way by force of arms, the dictator will try to get his own way by force of arms.
I have two other topics I shall touch on briefly in this contribution. One is to draw attention to an important analysis that appeared on the website “Desk Russie” on 30 December 2021, just two months before the invasion. It was by an old friend of mine whom I have known for the best part of 40 years. She is a brilliant French historian and former Sovietologist called Dr Françoise Thom. She drew attention to the texts of two draft treaties that were unveiled by the Russian Foreign Ministry on 17 December 2021. One was a draft treaty between the United States and the Russian Federation on security guarantees, and the other was a draft agreement on measures to ensure the security of the Russian Federation and the member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. It was made absolutely clear that these were take it or leave it offers. They were encapsulated by the deputy Foreign Minister Grushko, who said:
“The Europeans must also think about whether they want to avoid making their continent the scene of a military confrontation. They have a choice. Either they take seriously what is put on the table, or they face a military-technical alternative”—
that is war to the rest of us. This is a deputy Foreign Minister stating in terms that unless European states do what Russia wants, they can expect to be embroiled in armed conflict.
A former deputy Minister of Defence, Andrey Kartapolov, of the Duma Defence Committee, said as follows: “Our partners”—meaning our partners in the west—
“must understand that the longer they drag out the examination of our proposals and the adoption of real measures to create these guarantees, the greater the likelihood that they will suffer a pre-emptive strike.”
What was in those draft treaties? I will give the Chamber one example. Article 4 states, in part, that
“the Russian Federation and all participants which were, as of 27 May 1997, member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, shall not deploy their armed forces and armaments on the territory of any other European state in addition to the forces stationed on that territory as of 27 May 1997.”
What is the significance of 1997? Well it is this, Madam Deputy Speaker: it was only after 1997 that 14 of the present 30 members of NATO joined the alliance. Starting in 1999, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland joined, and then almost a dozen more followed.
What the Russians were basically saying was that, unless America agrees to withdraw its support from all those newly freed democracies, and unless all NATO countries agree to withdraw their armed forces from all those NATO member countries, they can expect to find themselves in an armed conflict with Russia. The trouble is, statements of that sort do not get reported in the west as clearly as they should be—if they do at all. They are generally kept in, as it were, the specialised centres and the highly learned brains of people like Dr Françoise Thom.
I am basically saying that there are three outcomes when we get into a situation such as this. The first is that we can capitulate. The second is open warfare. The third is containment, otherwise known in the old days as cold war. I really resent it when people say, “Oh, you don’t want to go back to the cold war.” If the alternatives are capitulation or open warfare, then cold war is the very best we can do in staring down an aggressor.
I end where I began when intervening earlier to draw attention to the state of the UK’s defence budget, notwithstanding the considerable injection of cash that was made under the previous Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip. Even that only brought our percentage of defence expenditure up from about 2.1% of GDP to 2.3%.
A few years earlier, in 2015-16, there was a change in the accounting methods for calculating what our expenditure on defence was as a proportion of GDP. That was not an illegitimate change; it just led to us including certain items which NATO counts towards defence expenditure that we had not previously counted. If it had not been for that change in accounting, our expenditure on defence would not have been at 2.1%, which was what it was before the cash injection given by my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip; it would have been at 1.8%. My right hon. Friend’s cash injection would have taken it up to 2.1%.
Under the old system of accounting, in the mid-1990s, we were still spending 3% of GDP on defence. At the height of the cold war, in the mid-1980s, as I have said time and again to this House, we regularly and consistently spent—under the old system of accounting—between 4.5% and 5% of GDP on defence. We hear talk of arguments between the Ministry of Defence and the Treasury on whether some extra billions will be made available. We all recognise that if Ukraine succeeds in defeating this aggression, while they will be doing it for their own benefit, they will benefit the whole of the western world. It will mean that the odds of us ever having to engage in that sort of fighting ourselves, against a regime of the sort there is in Russia, will be massively reduced.
Ask yourself, Madam Deputy Speaker, what we would do if we found ourselves against our will forced into a conflict of that sort. Immediately, the amount we had to spend on defence would shoot up, not to 3% but probably to something like 10% or 15%. It would take every single scrap of effort, financially, economically and industrially, that this country could possibly generate. That is what always happens if we find ourselves in a war—not to mention all the costs in human life, treasure and misery. Therefore, this should be seen as an investment. If we increase our defence budget, we are investing in the freedom of Ukraine, and we are investing in the freedom and peace of the whole of the western world.
Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis), and to hear such unity across the House. A year on, this war will leave lasting imprints on every Ukrainian and, indeed, on world history. This time, and this milestone, will mean something different to every person affected by the war. Here today, we know that this moment shows that history will stand on the side of the Ukrainian people.
International security and the stability of the world order were threatened when Russian Federation forces began their invasion on 24 February 2022. While the future appeared uncertain, through the indescribable bravery and resilience of the Ukrainian people, its military forces and its Government, Ukraine has exercised its power and turned what could have been a brief moment in time into an historic struggle for freedom.
I have spoken before in this place about the human impact of this war. In December, I visited Lviv, Kyiv, and the region of Kharkiv with the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith). We joined the charity Siobhan’s Trust, whose humanitarian aid reflects our core British values. Its work in feeding over 4,000 displaced Ukrainians every day is to be both admired and applauded. Everywhere we went, the real power of the Ukrainian people was clear to see. Putin’s forces had inflicted horrific damage on their towns, cities and villages. I saw blocks of flats—people’s homes—gutted by missile attacks in Kharkiv, schools destroyed in Slatyne, and homes peppered with shrapnel in Ruska Lozova.
One soldier told me about the horror of removing the dead bodies from bombed out buildings—mostly homes. He showed me a photograph of a dead little boy laid out on a bench. He told me that the boy’s father had clung on to the boy with desperation and had had to be pulled from his son. In typical Ukrainian understatement, he said, “It’s hard.” He told me of his men who had found it too hard and had gone home and shot themselves. He worried for his men—men who urgently needed help in dealing with the impact of stress while still serving on the frontline. Despite the inhumanity of war, the Ukrainian people live with dignity and compassion as they fight on bravely towards victory.
I met with businesses that were working to keep Ukraine’s economy functioning in the most challenging of circumstances, under bombing and planned power cuts. Businesses such as the potato factory have, despite the war, kept their investments in Ukraine. That is their contribution to the war effort: to keep the economy going, to provide food for the nation and jobs for workers, and to pay taxes to fund Ukraine’s war efforts. Those people and businesses defy Putin’s best efforts to crush the free spirit of Ukraine. They are essential to success in the war, and when the time comes, they will continue to support Ukraine as it flourishes again as a peaceful and independent state.
Of course, we must continue to support Ukraine by providing it with the necessary military capabilities. Equally, we must support the recovery effort. I praise the upcoming Ukraine recovery conference, jointly hosted by the UK Government and Ukraine, because no matter when the war ends, we must begin laying the foundations for structural and economic recovery now.
To close, everywhere I and the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green went in Ukraine the same message was delivered to us: “Do not forget us!” Ukraine can claim astonishing victories already. The war may well continue, but Ukraine has achieved what many had once believed was impossible. For the last year, it has firmly withstood a hostile invading force intent on bringing democracy to its knees. History is being rewritten. History is being written by Ukraine. Freedom will win. Slava Ukraini!
Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)
It is an honour to follow both the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis) and the hon. Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins), who really brought this back down to the individual experience of a terrible war, for which I am grateful.
I am going to spend the next few minutes arguing that we should provide for war and prepare for peace. We in the UK should increase seriously our industrial production for defence—Ukraine’s and our own—while also isolating Russia and seizing diplomatic opportunities when they arise. We could characterise this as better preparation and jaw-jaw. I would also like to identify a couple of events from the last century or so that can shine a light on the situation that Ukraine finds itself facing and that Ukraine’s partners find ourselves facing: the 1915 shell crisis in Britain, and the 1999 withdrawal of Yugoslav security forces from Kosovo.
First, however, let us recall NATO’s role in this war. In Russian propaganda now, Moscow is characterising this as NATO’s war. The Kremlin suggests that the Government in Kyiv is a puppet and that NATO is pulling the strings, but that could not be further from the truth. The provision of arms by Ukraine’s partners, such as the UK, is often a reactive response to requests for support. I give credit to the British Government and credit to the Secretary of State for Defence and the Ministry of Defence for repeatedly stating that this is Ukraine’s war. Ukraine is our close partner and we are supplying Ukraine with equipment and support, but contrary to Russian propaganda, this is not NATO’s war and there is no sense in which NATO is threatening Russia.
However, we are not in the business of subcontracting policy to the Government in Kyiv. We should not be answering each and every request on this reactive basis. There are times when we should be supplying equipment proactively. For example, the British Government announced they would be supplying Warrior infantry fighting vehicles when asked, though the Liberal Democrats had been calling for this in the months prior to that announcement. We should anticipate requests by Ukraine, rather than wait for them to land. The right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne) suggested that there is a pattern of saying no until we say yes, but the UK is rightly stepping up its provision at a time when we know that our allies have moved or are ready to move.
Liam Byrne
We may as well try to round out the cross-party consensus that I think is emerging. Would the hon. Member agree that we should be doing everything we can to send fast jets to Ukraine?
Richard Foord
I suggest to the right hon. Member that if we send fast jets to Ukraine, it is going to be a symbolic gesture. When he and I visited Kyiv last September, Minister Reznikov was asking for Gripen aircraft, as we have heard in this Chamber today. If we are to do so, it would not be because we have a capability that is particularly useful to Ukraine, but because it would be a symbolic first mover gesture that others can follow.
Another example of this is the provision of main battle tanks once we knew that other countries were at least considering or almost ready to provide them, but we must have greater anticipation of what demand will arise before it takes Zelensky to visit us to make such requests.
We have heard that Ukrainian forces are firing up to 5,000 artillery rounds per day. Ukraine’s partners will struggle to maintain supply at that level from our existing stockpiles, and we are going to need to procure artillery rounds quickly. Just-in-time acquisition might play well on spreadsheets, but it has not played well in relation to our inventories.
There are times when matters of supply really are crucial. Britain found itself short of high explosive rounds in 1915. David Lloyd George was appointed the inaugural Minister for Munitions—a position that, when he became Prime Minister, he gave to his fellow Liberal Winston Churchill, who became Minister for Munitions in 1917—and the creation of a Ministry for Munitions indicated just how serious Britain was in prosecuting the war. I am not for a moment suggesting that we need to promote the Minister for Defence Procurement in such a way, but we do need to co-ordinate the purchase of munitions with our allies, given that we are drawing on the same western suppliers in many instances, and we need to do it on an enduring basis.
We see now that Russia is moving increasingly towards a total war footing, where it is increasingly mobilising the resources of its society and its economy to the war effort. It may have sought to play down the so-called special military operation last February, but it is increasingly having to recognise what it has created following the full-scale invasion. The time will eventually arrive for Ukrainian negotiation, and it should come from a position of strength for Ukraine. When the time comes for negotiation, we should be open to the leverage that Beijing will have with Moscow that NATO nations do not.
To illustrate that, recall how the orders were eventually given for the withdrawal of Yugoslav security forces from Kosovo. Yugoslavia conceded when it realised that it was isolated. If we think about the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in the spring and summer of 1999, NATO was bombing military sites across Serbia and Montenegro in pursuit of the withdrawal of Yugoslav security forces. This followed ethnic cleansing that Yugoslav security forces had perpetrated against Kosovo Albanians. The NATO bombing campaign had gone on for more than 10 weeks, but there was no sign that Slobodan Milošević was prepared to concede and to withdraw Yugoslav military and paramilitary personnel from Kosovo.
The NATO enforcement action seemed to be stuck, and NATO bombing sorties were striking the same targets repeatedly. President Yeltsin played an important role in persuading Milošević to withdraw Yugoslav security forces from Kosovo. As Boris Yeltsin’s Balkans envoy, Viktor Chernomyrdin communicated to Milošević that Belgrade could no longer depend on diplomatic support from an ally. Chernomyrdin was later to become a dreadful Russian ambassador to Ukraine, and he is rightly very unpopular in Ukraine, but he was successful in persuading Milošević that he had no ally to whom he could turn for support. Milošević chose to consent to the withdrawal of Yugoslav security forces only when he realised just how isolated he was.
So let us not be too dismissive of China’s offer before we know what it is. Of course, we should pay careful attention to the speech by President Xi coming up on Friday. It will probably be full of platitudes, and it may offer nothing except a ceasefire based on the current possession by Russian forces of Ukrainian land, in which case it would clearly be completely unacceptable. However, the current statements made by China relate to the importance of sovereignty and territorial integrity. We are not there yet, but China may have a role to play in pressuring Russia into its eventual withdrawal from Ukraine.
We would have such a discussion while not being naive about China’s motives. Russia and China have been adversaries, so it might suit China to have Russia and the west depleting their weapons stockpiles in a conflict taking place far away from the Asian Indo-Pacific. However, it does not suit China to have the west threatening consequences against China, as Blinken has warned would result from the supply of arms by China to Russia. Russian people need to know that this is Russia’s war. It is not NATO’s war, nor is it China’s war. We in the UK do need to prepare UK defence now as if this war is our own. We must supply Ukraine so that it can capture more of its territory before it seeks to enter into a ceasefire. At that point, we should be open to recognising the value that Russia’s partners can have in persuading Putin to pull back.
Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Richard Foord) and Members from across the House.
I speak as a socialist, an anti-imperialist, and someone who feels disgust at the thought of war. It is not despite those values that I support the Ukrainian resistance; it is because of them. To me, socialism means self-determination for ordinary working people, not ceding power to tyrants seeking to oppress them. Anti-imperialism means opposing all states that seek to extend their power by dominating others, regardless of what flag they fly. It is impossible to talk about the war in Ukraine without addressing the bloody history of Russian imperialism. It is a history that our friends across eastern and northern Europe do not need to be reminded of. They know that what is at stake is not just lines on a map and whose flag flies above a town hall. No—a nation that survived the holodomor understands the invader’s aims: the erasure of a people, the eradication of its culture and the destruction of its democracy.
It is easy to debate geopolitics from the comfort of London, but the stakes feel very different when I hear directly from someone sleeping in a bomb shelter. When I speak to workers, to trade unionists in Ukraine, or to refugees hoping to see their home again, their message is clear and heartfelt: don’t abandon us. It would not be an anti-war stance to turn our backs on Ukraine. It would be sending a message to despots around the globe that war crimes pay. It would be accepting a global order based not on international law and respect for sovereignty, but on torture, murder and nuclear threats. The Ukrainian resistance is not asking us for thoughts and prayers. Solidarity means helping Ukraine to defend itself—and we can and must do more. Over 1,000 military vehicles were sold off by the Ministry of Defence last year. Why are we not donating them to Ukraine instead?
But of course, Putin does not just fight with tanks and missiles; he fights with disinformation and manipulation, flooding the internet with propaganda. Discouraging Ukraine’s allies is a key part of his plan, and we will not fall for it. As the UK struggles with a painful cost of living crisis, Putin wants us to blame support for Ukraine, but while soaring energy bills are forcing workers into food banks, energy giants are popping champagne bottles, celebrating their record profits. Instead of giving up on solidarity, we must tax those who profit from war and misery.
If we talk about poverty, we must think about Ukraine too. After a year of relentless attack, the country is devastated and ordinary people are paying the price: its economy contracted by a third last year; inflation stands at 26%; and more than a quarter of people are unemployed. It will take years for the nation to heal and rebuild. And when Russian troops are finally pushed out, our solidarity cannot end. It is not enough to freeze Ukraine’s debt; it must be cancelled. Let us close loopholes in our sanctions regime and liquidate seized assets to fund reconstruction.
Future economic support cannot come with conditions of brutal austerity. The international community must come together to support the rebuilding of Ukraine’s public services, the creation of green jobs and the strengthening of its democracy. Decisions about the reconstruction process cannot be made by oligarchs and foreign companies seeking to profit from it, but by the Ukrainian people themselves, with input from trade unions and civil society. Meanwhile, we must accept all refugees seeking safety from the war, and ensure their access to decent housing and the services they need.
To all Ukrainians in the UK today, I say: you’re always welcome here and to call this country your home, but I know that is not what many of you want, so I hope—and sincerely believe—that soon you will be able to return to a free and peaceful Ukraine. Slava Ukraini.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
It is a pleasure to speak in this debate. All speakers this afternoon have referred to the war, but I want to be more specific. My stance on Ukraine is well known in this Chamber and has been consistent, as has everybody else’s: I believe we need to do more to support our allies in Ukraine. I said that before the visit of President Zelensky, who by his very nature inspires everyone he meets, and provides the leadership that Ukraine needs.
Russia’s aggression must be halted, not simply for the lives destroyed in Ukraine, but for the message that must be sent. My heart aches as I watch the news and see lives torn apart in Ukraine, and as I look into the eyes of the refugees who have come from Ukraine to Northern Ireland and see their hurt. The eyes tell much when it comes to conveying the issues and how people feel. Through the all-party parliamentary group for international freedom of religion or belief, I had occasion to visit Poland and see some of the conditions it offered. The refugees there never had to tell us anything about what they had been through; their eyes told us everything of their pain, suffering and memories.
In Northern Ireland, we have been pleased to take many refugees, but they have left their loved ones and their homes behind. As they wonder whether they will ever be able to go home and what that home will now look like, and as we see the bombs and the Russian destruction, it is clear that this House and our Government, perhaps with others, must step up and do more. In an intervention on the Secretary of State, I mentioned Russia’s aggression and the systematic abuse carried out by Russian soldiers who have been given authority at the highest level of government—from generals right down. To give the House an idea, that systematic cruelty has included the rape and sexual abuse of women and girls, some as young as four and some as old as 83.
I would also like to draw attention to the violations of freedom of religion or belief. As Russia’s invasion of Ukraine enters its second year, it is important to note that attacks on religious freedom and other human rights are escalating. Reports show that the Russian military have destroyed, damaged or looted at least 494 religious buildings, theological institutions and sacred sites in Ukraine since the start of the invasion last year. According to international humanitarian law, unjustifiable attacks against religious sites constitute war crimes; we in this place all recognise that.
Such attacks are happening in tandem with attacks on pastors and religious leaders in the region. The attacks are against not only the Ukrainian Orthodox believers and their churches, but evangelicals and evangelical prayer houses—there are many home churches across Ukraine, especially in the east of the province—and Catholic, Jehovah’s Witnesses’, Jewish and Muslim sites.
The Institute for Religious Freedom has found that Russian forces have abducted Ukrainian pastors, and tried to enlist them as Russian spies and propagandists. Baptist churches have been systemically destroyed and damaged by bombs in the eastern part of Ukraine. Baptist pastors have gone missing over the last four to five years, and some have never been found; we question just what has happened to them. From 24 February to 15 July 2022, the institute recorded 20 cases of illegal imprisonment of Ukrainian religious leaders, accompanied by attempted rape; mock executions; deprivation of water, food and access to toilets; and threats of violence against not only Church leaders, but their families as well.
It is not only Ukrainians who suffer at Russia’s hands; Russia’s religious leaders who voice opposition to the war in Ukraine also fear for their lives. Moscow Patriarchate priest Aleksandr Dombrovsky fled Russia in January, shortly after the police told him the FSB had opened a criminal case against him. He had repeatedly preached against the war in Ukraine;
“Everything related to my anti-war position was recorded in a most thorough manner,”
he told Forum 18. That is just one of many cases where religious leaders are targeted and suffer for speaking the truth and in accordance with their conscience.
I want to put on record my thanks to our Government, our Ministers, and the former Prime Ministers who have both spoken in this Chamber today, the right hon. Members for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) and for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), for their strong stance on these issues; their leadership at that time inspired not just the United Kingdom but the rest of NATO and countries across the world to stand strong with Ukraine, and I thank them for that.
One thing is clear: we must not allow Russian aggression and Putin to beat us with this long-waged war. War fatigue is real, and I welcome President Biden’s commitment today to another $500 million in military aid and the commitment from our Prime Minister and Government along those lines, but some of the other European countries should step up and match that.
The right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) told us at an earlier time that he was in Ukraine about a month ago and that many soldiers were suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. The papers referred to that today, and I ask the Minister if we can do any more for soldiers who are suffering from PTSD, and who perhaps have war fatigue, because that is a real condition.
As our attention rightly goes to global emergencies such as the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, we must not allow ourselves to be distracted from our commitment to Ukraine, and I trust the message today from this House is clear: we will not be deterred from helping our allies; we will continue to stand against Putin, and all the badness, evil and wickedness he represents; and it is not all quiet on this western front, where the battle is. We will be using our voices in this Chamber, munitions from our factories, and our voices elsewhere to continue to reject the invasion of Ukraine. In keeping with the Ukrainian spirit—that courage and inspiration they have given all of us across the world—we will not be beaten down; we will not give in to this despot.
Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)
The grim reality is that war in Europe is no longer in our rear-view mirror; it is happening now. We are living through a bleak new chapter in the history of Europe as Putin seeks to destroy the sovereignty of our Ukrainian friends and to attack the principles of democracy that the rules-based world order is built on.
As the UK falls silent on Friday morning for a national moment of reflection for Ukraine, we are reminded of the devastating toll that this war has taken on the Ukrainian people: the tens of thousands of lives that have been needlessly lost; the families that have been torn apart and displaced from their homes, with over 100,000 of them now here in the UK ; the women who have been raped and violated; the children who have been stolen by Russia; and with the economic and social fabric of the nation left in tatters.
There is the ongoing struggle for peace: it is the Ukrainians’ fight, but it is also our fight. Yet despite all the suffering and horror that Ukraine has endured, the flame of freedom burns bright in Kyiv: we need only look at the extraordinary resilience of the Ukrainian people in the face of Russian aggression that we have heard about in speeches from both sides of the House today, praising the skill, bravery and fortitude of the Ukrainian military to defend their homeland, and, as we heard from the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), the incredible and inspiring leadership of President Zelensky. Just under a fortnight ago, Members in this House were privileged to hear from President Zelensky in his address in Westminster Hall. His speech moved us all and reminded us what is at stake.
Colleagues from across the House have made extraordinary contributions in this debate and I am saddened that more of us were not present to hear them. It is good to have two former Prime Ministers speaking in a debate; if I am honest, it is not normal for those two individuals to elicit cross-party support given the events of the past year, but there has been an extraordinary level of cross-party consensus in this debate. There is a unity that goes across political parties, across nations, and across our continent in our support for Ukraine and our determination that Putin must lose. That is a message Putin hoped would never be thought or shared, because he hoped to fracture the west and to change the united position we had to one of division where we turn against each other, and that has not happened.
Bob Stewart
I think I am the oldest person in this Chamber by a long way. I remember the Vietnam war, and the Americans were forced to withdraw from Vietnam by public pressure at home, largely. We have not talked in this debate about what is happening in Moscow and other parts of Russia, but it must be horrendous, with 60,000 dead, and with huge numbers returning with post-traumatic stress disorder, I am sure. We must put huge effort into getting through to the Russian people, to convince them that this war is not fair and not right and they should put huge pressure on their own Government to get rid of Putin and sort this out and withdraw. As the former Prime Minister my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) has suggested or implied—perhaps he will correct me—in the end we also must have a Russia that works and is a decent place for Russians to live, because Russian soldiers are just like our soldiers: they are doing their duty and they do not really have much choice.
Luke Pollard
I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that intervention. “You are what you eat”: that is true of food as it is of the media we consume, and the media the people of Russia are able and allowed to consume tell a very one-sided story. They tell a story only from the point of view of the Putin mouthpiece in the Kremlin. There is no challenge and no debate, so how we deal with misinformation and Putin’s deliberate calculation to deny his own people the truth is quite a challenge. We must address that in terms of information operations and how we tell a story, which the BBC World Service has been so good at, and which is a purpose for it now.
In this debate we heard about the UK’s past complacency in respect of Russian gas from the former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), who, sadly, is not in her place at the moment. We also heard from Members on both sides of the House about why the Wagner Group should be listed as a terrorist organisation—it not just a sponsor of terrorism; it is the terrorism. If we do not act now, we will be repeating the mistakes of the past, because we are looking in the rear-view mirror to comment on what has happened when we should be looking forwards. We have seen what the Wagner Group has done in Syria and we see what it is doing in Ukraine, and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Mr Dhesi) said, we can see what it could potentially be doing in Africa as well. So we need to hurry up and make that decision.
Putin’s criminal invasion of Ukraine is appalling, brutal, and unjust. Putin displays contempt for international institutions, humanitarian law and the rules of military conflict. Above all, Putin shows a callous disregard for human life, Ukrainian and Russian. He treats human life as nothing more than pawns to satisfy his monstrous ambitions, and that is why the Leader of the Opposition has said clearly that he should stand trial for his crimes at a special tribunal at The Hague.
As we know, Putin’s aim is not simply to take Ukraine. We are facing a tyrant ready to use his war to redraw the map of Europe. He wants to destroy the unity of the west, and one year on, as the former Prime Minister the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip has said, there is still no sign that any of Putin’s strategic aims have changed, but nor have they been achieved.
This war can only end in failure for Putin: he will fail because he miscalculated the incredible resolve of the Ukrainian people to defend their homeland; he will fail because he has underestimated the strength of resolve on these shores and across the west to support Ukraine for as long as it takes to defeat Russia; and he will fail because the millions of voices defending democracy will over time drown out the hate and division of tyrants and dictators.
The Government have had Labour’s fullest support on Britain’s military help to Ukraine. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition said on his visit to Kyiv only a few days ago, for as long as Putin continues to wage this criminal war, the Government will continue to have Labour’s fullest support, but as we head into the second year of this conflict there are several important questions that I would like to press the Minister on.
Nadia Whittome
Does my hon. friend agree that rather than the Ministry of Defence selling off 1,105 vehicles last year, either to authoritarian regimes or auctioned to private arms dealers, those vehicles should have been donated to Ukraine to support its resistance?
Luke Pollard
It is really important that when it comes to military disposals we look carefully at where the equipment goes. There has been good support for Ukraine so far, but we would like it to go further, which I think was the point my hon. Friend was trying to make.
As the shadow Foreign Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy), said, although 25 NATO nations have rebooted their defence plans since the start of the invasion, the UK Government have yet to do so, despite Labour having been arguing for Ministers to reboot defence plans since last March. In next month’s review of the integrated review, and in the spring Budget, the Government must take the opportunity to move on from ad hoc announcements and set out a more systematic approach to support for Ukraine.
Will the Minister confirm when the Government will set out a full 2023 action plan for military, economic and diplomatic support to help to give Ukraine confidence in a sustained stream of future supplies, as Labour has consistently argued for? Will he also say whether now is still the right time, as he has suggested, for the Government to proceed with cuts to our armed forces before the integrated review reports? Will the Minister also reflect on calls from Members on both sides of the House to restrict the Wagner Group? My right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne) set it out clearly when he set the objective of suffocating the Wagner Group and closing the sanctions loopholes. There is cross-party support for that and I encourage the Minister to get on with it.
Let me turn briefly to the issue of stockpiles, which was raised by Government and Opposition Members. Labour Members welcome the £2.3 billion that the Government allocated for Ukraine last year and this year, and the £560 million to fill some of the empty stockpiles, but we need to be clear that that is not enough. There is an immediate need to replenish our stockpiles, which have been depleted in supporting Ukraine. To date, the Government have acted too slowly to replenish them. My hon. Friend the Member for Slough, the hon. Member for Angus (Dave Doogan) and the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Sir Julian Lewis) made that point quite clearly.
There is now a growing need to set out a clear stockpiles strategy to sustain support for Ukraine and re-arm Britain in the long term—a clear strategy that works with industry, allowing it to invest with certainty. We need to be certain, when we make a pledge to support our friends in Ukraine, that we have the industrial capability to honour that promise. That has been said by Members on both sides of the House. For example, in respect of the NLAW anti-tank missiles that have been vital to Ukraine, it took 287 days after the latest invasion before the MOD got its act together and signed a new contract, and the first new NLAW will not come off the production line until 2024. We need to shift parts of our defence industry and MOD procurement to an urgent operational footing, both to support Ukraine for the long-term and to rebuild the UK’s stocks for any future conflict.
Will the Minister set out how long it will take our armed forces and our industry partners to replenish UK stockpiles to ensure that we can defend our shores while honouring our commitments to Ukraine and NATO? If the UK is to be the first nation to send long-range missiles to Ukraine, as the Prime Minister stated in Munich, by what date will they be sent? Assuming that they will be Storm Shadow missiles, how will they be replaced and what is the plan? What plans is the Minister’s Department making to urgently ramp up our own industry so that we are better equipped to deal with future conflicts? The Government have far too often raided the stockpile to make efficiency savings. That is a mistake that has now come home to roost and we need not to repeat it.
Russia is not a spent force, in spite of the huge damage that Ukraine has inflicted on its military. The spring offensive that is now perhaps only days or weeks away will see Russia massively expand its war effort. It is conscripting more people and, although it is sending them into a bloodbath that few of them will survive, against high-end western weaponry, the war could continue for a very long time. Only last week, NATO’s Secretary-General said that
“we are seeing the start already”
of a new Russian offensive in Ukraine. Will the Minister update the House on whether the UK is on track to send the 14 Challenger 2 tanks to Ukraine in order to support Kyiv with the new spring offensive? How will they be supported in the field? It would be much easier for the Minister if he would agree to set out a long-term plan rather than making ad hoc announcements.
I pay tribute to all those people across the United Kingdom who have welcomed Ukrainian refugees into their homes and fundraised for them, and who have gone the extra mile to deliver supplies and aid to our friends in Ukraine themselves. This has been a huge undertaking. I also thank the officials in the Home Office who have helped to facilitate the Homes for Ukraine scheme, along with colleagues in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. But we need to recognise that there are now holes in those schemes that need to be filled. That is not a partisan critique; it is just about making something work properly. We need to look at those schemes properly to make sure that if the war continues, as I fear it may do, the support we can offer to those who have fled war can be consistent and long lasting.
The invasion of Ukraine did not start a year ago: it started nine years ago. We must learn the lessons from how we were complacent at that time, how the west was sleeping and how we effectively gave a dictator and tyrant in the Kremlin the green light by not taking stronger action. The UK must be prepared to support Ukraine for the long term, renewing our resolve in confronting Russian threats, pursuing Putin’s crimes and standing with Ukraine. It is important to say that should there be a change of Government at the next general election, there will be no change in Britain’s position of support for Ukraine. The phrase “never again” is said too often in this House, but never again is now. We must rise to the same heights as our Ukrainian friends to ensure that Putin loses and Ukraine wins.
The Minister for Defence Procurement (Alex Chalk)
We have had a serious, sombre but spirited debate, as befits the subject at hand. There have been many powerful speeches—including from two former Prime Ministers, no less—and I will touch on a number of them in due course, but let me begin by noting a clear and overriding message that emerged from our deliberations: the solidarity from all sides of the House for our Ukrainian friends. Their sheer bloody-minded defiance in the face of unprovoked and brutal aggression has moved and inspired us all.
And it is indeed unprovoked and brutal aggression. History is littered with examples of conflicts where, in truth, it is far from clear which side has the better claim to the moral high ground. The issues are murky, facts are contested and arguments cut both ways. This is not such a conflict. Putin’s actions—invading a sovereign country at peace with its neighbours and that posed no threat—are self-evidently morally bankrupt. They lack even a shred of justification. Indeed, Putin’s pretext—namely, that the Jewish Ukrainian President was somehow a fascist—is as preposterous as it is desperate. No, the Kremlin’s invasion is depraved, cruel, unnecessary and illegal. It is a war of choice that has brought needless death and destruction. It has taken thousands of lives and wrecked countless more, and it has brought appalling suffering to innocent people, including countless children. The world knows it. Ukraine knows it. Vladimir Putin knows it.
This debate has a special poignancy, coming as it does so close to the one-year point since the full-scale invasion. Until that first missile was launched into Ukraine, in truth many doubted that Putin’s illegal invasion would actually happen. “Surely this is just sabre-rattling,” they thought. It is important to note that it was this country, under the leadership of my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson), that worked with the United States to expose a cynical Kremlin plan for a false-flag attack involving fragments of unmanned aerial vehicles and staged casualties in Russian-occupied territory to set up the phoney pretext for an invasion.
On 17 February 2022, the Ministry of Defence published the first defence intelligence showing Putin’s planned invasion routes, just as the Russian President was denying harbouring any such intention. By the date of the full-scale invasion, 22,000 Ukrainian service personnel had already been trained by British soldiers across land, sea and air. Weapons and ammunition, including the now-famous NLAWs made here in the UK, were already in the hands of the Ukrainian army, ready to defend that country from the onslaught to come. Indeed, the United Kingdom was the first European country to provide lethal aid. And how the Ukrainians used it. In those vital first few weeks, they used it to hold back the Russian flood. Russian soldiers, who had packed special uniforms for the expected victory parade, were stopped in their tracks and instead harried with an intensity and bravery that stunned the world. It was a feat of arms against overwhelming odds that takes its place in history.
Russian forces were pushed back in a great sweeping retreat, forced into a gruesome drive-by past the scene of their many crimes, not least Bucha, a name destined to forever stain the conscience of the Kremlin. Russian forces have now abandoned all territory west of the Dnipro river. At day 361, Russian forces are still not where they expected to be on day three. Meanwhile, the combat effectiveness of their army has been reduced by 40%. Nearly two-thirds of their modern tanks have been destroyed or disabled. Indeed, Putin’s campaign appears to have failed to meet any of its operational and strategic objectives, while Ukraine has managed to wrestle back more than half of its stolen territory. Despite all the bombast, despite the continual indiscriminate assaults on civilians and civilian infrastructure, and despite the repeated human wave attacks with young men used as cannon fodder, Russia continues to fail. A little over a week and a half ago, a Russian brigade attacking Vuhledar was completely wiped out, losing more than 1,000 people in two days. Those figures must be added to the thousands and thousands that have gone before. The Russian military has suffered up to 200,000 casualties, including between 45,000 and 60,000 dead. That is the blood price of a perverse and ahistorical nationalist fantasy. Meanwhile, Putin breaks his army on the anvil of Ukrainian resistance.
Ukrainians are displaced, towns have been razed to the ground, and there are credible reports of rapes and the forced deportation of thousands of children. There were the harrowing accounts relayed by the hon. Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins). She reminded us that some had said, “Don’t forget us.” We will not. Those responsible for unspeakable acts will have to answer for them. Indeed, the Deputy Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Dominic Raab) and the Minister of Justice and Security for the Netherlands will be hosting the Joint Ministerial Council in March to support the vital work of the Office of the Prosecutor in the International Criminal Court. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) was right when he referred to systematic cruelty. Let that be exposed. Let those crimes be brought to justice. Let people pay for the cruelty and illegality they have perpetrated. Just as time and again Russia has reckoned without the courage, tenacity and ingenuity of Ukrainian people, so too did it underestimate the resolve and unity of the international community.
Dean Russell (Watford) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that when Putin invaded Ukraine, he thought the west would look the other way? A year on, he is probably deluded in believing that we would be apathetic over time in our support for Ukraine. What the debate today shows, and what the minute’s silence on Friday will show, is that we will never give up. Slava Ukraine.
Alex Chalk
My hon. Friend puts the point extremely well and I cannot improve on that. He is right. Today, NATO is stronger than ever. And by the way, it is not just NATO. We should not fall into the trap of assuming it is NATO. What about Australia, which is providing support to Ukrainians? What about the New Zealand troops here in the UK who are helping to train Ukrainians? Let us not give in to that Putinesque rhetoric and narrative. This is the world community coming together. It is a fact, however, that NATO is set to grow, with the accession of Sweden and Finland. The UK alone has sanctioned almost 1,300 individuals and over 130 entities since the start of the invasion. Other countries have acted decisively, too. We have sanctioned the Wagner Group. We have sanctioned Yevgeny Prigozhin. We have sanctioned his family. We have sanctioned Dmitri Utkin. We have sanctioned Arkady Gostev, the director of the federal penitentiary service of the Russian Federation.
Liam Byrne
While the Minister is going through his list, would he be good enough to explain to the House why the Americans have sanctioned three times more people associated with the Wagner Group than we have? It is a simple question.
Alex Chalk
We have sanctioned the Wagner Group in its entirety, so there really is no place to hide. [Interruption.] Yes, we have. And there is no place to hide for those who aid, abet, counsel or procure the actions of the Wagner Group.
The UK has been amongst the foremost nations supporting Ukraine politically, militarily and with humanitarian assistance. It is worth taking a moment to consider what that support actually involves: over 100,000 rounds of ammunition and 5,000 anti-tank weapons. A point was made about armoured vehicles. The UK has provided over 200 armoured fighting vehicles, including some of the so-called dogs of war that saw service in Afghanistan: the Mastiffs, the Wolfhounds, the Ridgbacks and so on. That is what we have done, to say nothing of the winter weather gear, the Sea King helicopters and 3 million rounds of ammunition. All that we do, and more. We do it so that we send a message that might is not always right, that the international rules-based order stands up and stands for something, and that this country will meet aggression where we find it.
Last month, the Defence Secretary announced we would be sending Challenger 2 tanks and AS90 self-propelled guns. As I indicated, that comes after NLAWs, Javelins, Brimstone missiles, night-vision goggles, medical supplies, winter clothing, and search and rescue helicopters. The training for tank crews has already begun, and our armed forces are putting Ukrainian recruits through their paces in a range of crucial battlefield skills. I will just share this with the House. There are few more poignant sights than flying over the training grounds, with Ukrainian troops beneath, and seeing trenches scarred and etched into those fields of the United Kingdom. That is what this has become: trench warfare in parts of our continent.
In 2022, we trained 10,000 new troops. In 2023, we intend to double that number. As hon. Members will be aware, our armed forces will be training Ukrainian aviators to fly sophisticated NATO-standard fighters in future. We expect to begin training the first Ukrainian pilots in spring. We cannot supply the jet before we have trained the pilot and no time is being wasted in that endeavour. We have committed to match the £2.3 billion of military aid spent last year. We continue to lead the international military and diplomatic effort, too. As we saw with our tank donations, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) indicated, our role can be to have a force multiplier effect. We can catalyse the work of other nations. That is why the Prime Minister signed the London declaration with President Zelensky, cementing our unwavering commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and urging others to do the same.
There is much more I could talk about, but let me just come to this. On Friday, the nation will stand in silence to commemorate a year on from the invasion. As well as His Majesty the King sending his support to Ukraine, over 100 events will take place across Whitehall. This will be an opportunity to remember all those who have lost their lives and all those who have seen their lives irrevocably changed. It will be an opportunity to remember all those who continue to fight for their liberty. It will also be an opportunity to redouble our resolve, ensuring that when the time comes, that proud nation will build back stronger than before. That is why on 21 and 22 June the United Kingdom, jointly with Ukraine, will host the international Ukraine recovery conference.
The signal we are sending to Vladimir Putin could not be clearer. He has turned his country into a pariah and the most sanctioned nation on the planet. Meanwhile, the world stands with Ukraine, ready to support that proud and defiant country to defend its territory and its people. One year on, with Russia gearing up for a new offensive, Putin remains unrepentant. His only coherent war aims are for more war, more death and more suffering. His desperate hope is that the world will lose its nerve. It will not. Together we will defy him. Together we will prove him wrong. As President Zelensky told us in his stirring address to the House two weeks ago:
“We know freedom will win. We know Russia will lose. And we really know that victory will change the world”.
Slava Ukraini, heroyam slava.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the situation in Ukraine.
Government Support for Breastfeeding and the 2023 Lancet Series
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
I have repeatedly brought matters to this House concerning infant feeding. For an issue that concerns every child ever born, it generally gets remarkably little attention from Governments. Madam Deputy Speaker, I can assure you that breastfeeding is an issue of the utmost importance. According to the World Health Organisation, breastfeeding has the potential to prevent 800,000 child deaths globally each year. As The Lancet paper editorial states:
“Breastfeeding has proven health benefits across high-income and low-income settings alike: it reduces childhood infectious diseases, mortality, and malnutrition, and the risk of later obesity; mothers who breastfeed have decreased risk of breast and ovarian cancers, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.”
Yet despite those clear health benefits, around the world and here in the UK, we see a growth and embedding of commercial milk formula in our culture.
I stress that this is not a criticism of individual parents, or a value judgment. This is not about formula versus breastfeeding; it is a structural issue, relating to recognition of the importance of breastfeeding and to the lax regulations that have allowed a commercial industry to flourish. The recently published Lancet papers tackle the structural reasons for which breastfeeding does or does not happen. Commercial milk formula is a multibillion-dollar industry which directly targets families with multifaceted and sophisticated marketing practices—practices that influence our beliefs and values, prey on our insecurities and weaknesses, and are exacerbated by the absence of comprehensive Government support for breastfeeding.
There are three Lancet papers, each highlighting the impact of several aspects of commercial milk formula marketing. The second states:
“The marketing of commercial milk formula…for use in the first 3 years of life has negatively altered the infant and young child feeding ecosystem.”
Successful breastfeeding depends on a network of policy and society responses. It is the responsibility of Government to regulate the industry, and to implement structural policies to mitigate the impact of formula marketing. Women who do breastfeed do so despite billions of pounds’ worth of marketing designed specifically to undermine them.
However, this commercialisation does not just affect breastfed babies and their families. The cost of the marketing literally adds to the price of commercial formula on supermarket shelves. Research by Leicester Mammas—presented recently to the all-party parliamentary group on infant feeding and inequalities, which I chair—shows the influence of advertising, with many parents choosing the most heavily advertised first- stage formula rather than the cheapest. All first-stage formulas are exactly the same by law.
In 2018, the APPG produced a report highlighting the significant impact of the cost of commercial milk formula on family budgets. Inflationary pressures are much worse now than they were in 2018, with profound consequences. Feed UK has highlighted the increased costs in its own more recent research, and just yesterday an article in The Guardian revealed that supermarkets such as the Co-op are now keeping formula behind the counter to prevent shoplifting. It said:
“The cost of infant formula has soared over the past year - with the price of the cheapest brand increasing by 22%. Even if a parent is able to access the cheapest brand, Aldi’s own label, the cash value of Healthy Start vouchers, £8.50 a week, is no longer enough to pay for the amount of infant formula needed to safely feed a baby in the first six months of their life.”
That is a very difficult increase for many families to bear. The Minister should be concerned about the risks of parents’ watering down formula, feeding babies under a year old cows’ milk, or thickening milk with porridge because they simply cannot keep up with the spiralling costs of infant formula. Inadequate nutrition at an early stage can have devastating long-term health and developmental impacts. I have raised this matter with Ministers before, and I encourage them to take it seriously. I am presenting the debate this evening because I feel that it is important for the Government to engage meaningfully with the findings of The Lancet report.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I commend the hon. Lady for initiating the debate, and for the leadership that she brings to the APPG. Her voice on behalf of breastfeeding women throughout the United Kingdom has been welcome.
In Northern Ireland, our community midwives team are extremely focused on aiding breastfeeding, yet, as the hon. Lady will know, we have the lowest breastfeeding rates in the UK. Does she agree that providing breast-milk pumps for women in low-income families who are put off by the prohibitive cost of the pumping equipment, but who need their child to be minded after the end of their all too short maternity leave, may be a useful tool to help mums to realise that “breast is best” can work in tandem with their return to work?
Alison Thewliss
The provision of those pumps can indeed make a huge difference to working families by giving women the flexibility to return to work. Many of them want to breastfeed, but find that returning to work presents a barrier to it. I will say a little more about the pressures from maternity leave later in my speech.
In this post-Brexit landscape, health industry professionals are making it clear that there should be no reduction in regulation on commercial milk formula. Existing regulations should be maintained as a minimum, and work should be conducted to improve on them.
Let me now take a bit of time to discuss the different angles of the three papers. The first explores the challenges of breastfeeding in a market-driven context. Many of us will be familiar with the stress of having a newborn: are they feeding enough, too much, too little? Are we getting enough sleep? Why are they still crying? Commercial milk formula companies thrive on this self-doubt. They want to exploit what are normal developmental phases and present them as problems to which only they can provide a solution. Online forums and baby clubs, apps, emails and pop-up ads are rife. They consistently undermine parents’ confidence, so that a product can be sold as the answer to their problems. When you are exhausted and your baby has been crying for hours, commercial milk formula companies are there to sell you a good night’s sleep, peace of mind, or a special type of formula to stop your baby fussing.
No one would judge parents in that position. We have all been there, and would gladly hand over all the money in our wallets to get that peace of mind. Companies have stepped into this space to offer specialist formulas in a quite unregulated way: formulas sit on the supermarket shelf offering solutions to colic and spitting up, for “hungry babies”, and to deal with allergies. The truth is, however, that there is no solution—not one that comes in a tin, anyway. Fussing and crying and disrupted sleep patterns are all extremely normal parts of human development and baby behaviour. Normal sleep patterns of babies sadly do not align with the sleep patterns of adults, no matter how they are fed. The responsibility lies on us, as policymakers, to ensure that parents are informed and helped to make the best choices for their babies. We need to ensure that any vacuum of information is not filled by aggressive marketing.
The second paper looks at the marketing playbook used by commercial milk formula companies. I should say at the outset that I am not arguing that marketing is inherently bad, or that companies should not make profits, but there is a case for an overhaul of the regulations. When marketing impacts human development and health outcomes to such an extent, Governments need to step up to the plate.
Commercial milk formula sales were worth $55.6 billion in 2019. Let me put that figure in context: it far exceeds the Scottish Government’s budget in the same year. Sales per capita have increased substantially across the world over the last decade. There are many reasons for that—poor breastfeeding support, work constraints, perceived issues with milk supply or fussiness—but the major contributor is marketing. Between $2.6 billion and $3.5 billion is spent on milk formula marketing every year, and that is likely to be the tip of the iceberg, because it does not include the costs of lobbying, social media or sponsorship of health workers, all of which are key entry points in shaping beliefs and altering consumer decisions. Industry lobby groups work to influence policy environments in favour of the milk formula industry and their shareholders.
Medical professionals are targeted as well, through deliberate efforts by formula companies to encourage the diagnosis of health issues which they claim that their products can alleviate. Dr Chris van Tulleken is among several health professionals who have explained how this has led to over-diagnosis of health issues such as cows’ milk protein allergy, an activity that is being led by formula companies presenting their products as a “solution” to normal baby behaviour. He found that, astonishingly, between
“2006 and 2016, prescriptions of specialist formula milks for infants with CMPA increased by nearly 500% from 105,029 to over 600,000, while NHS spending on these products increased by nearly 700% from £8.1m to over £60m annually.”
There is little evidence to suggest that prevalence has increased, but it is clear from those figures that industry influence has. This is a cost to the NHS of which the Government should be mindful.
The report finds that the World Health Organisation’s “The International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes” has been routinely blocked, reinterpreted, circumvented, or ignored entirely in order for companies to achieve astronomical profits. One example is the creation of follow-on milks as a response to the marketing constraints that do exist: they are completely unnecessary, and often contain additional harmful sugars. The aim is to sell them to promote first-stage formulas that cannot be advertised on television. In the UK, the existing regulations are poorly enforced, and could well end up being scrapped in the bonfire of regulation that is the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill. I seek an assurance from the Government that that will not happen. I also ask the Government to use their voice at the meeting of the Codex Alimentarius Commission to tighten regulations globally, instead of allowing industry to have its own way.
The third paper highlights the way in which the political economy influences breastfeeding outcomes. The paper finds that inadequate maternity rights and poor working conditions make it difficult for many mothers to breastfeed, and, as was pointed out by the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), a rise in insecure and underpaid work has made it even more difficult. There is evidence from around the world that where Governments fail to protect maternity rights, formula companies thrive.
This paper highlights how women’s labour is systematically undervalued. If a tin of formula is purchased in a shop, that contributes to GDP figures, which the Government record as an expression of national wealth. If that same baby is breastfed, it does not count towards GDP because women’s time is just not valued the same way as a commercial product. The paper found that if we were to put a monetary value on the milk produced by breastfeeding women globally, it would amount to an astonishing $3.6 trillion. Commercial milk formula companies are aware of that, and this report exposes how their interests are aligned with poorer maternity protections. The incentives and resources are there for lobbying companies to persuade Governments to reduce workplace rights. This acts as a distortion on the labour market and needs to be actively resisted.
Scotland has legislation specifically protecting breastfeeding in public, for which I thank the former Labour MSP Elaine Smith. The SNP Scottish Government also put breastfeeding into their programme for government, with investment which led to an increase in breastfeeding rates. It is progress, but so much more needs to be done. As I hope I have outlined, this matter goes far beyond individual choice. Ultimately, a healthier population is a positive externality: it benefits everyone, saving money for the NHS through infant and maternal health, a healthier workforce and better outcomes in education. Encouraging breastfeeding and regulating formula effectively should be seen not as a drain on the public purse but as an investment for the future.
I have some asks for the Minister. Almost exactly six years ago, I published my Feeding Products for Babies and Children (Advertising and Promotion) Bill, and I would be glad to speak to the Minister further about it, because it presented the Government with credible options that could make a difference. As I mentioned earlier, we are also at an important juncture with the retained EU law Bill, which could see current infant formula regulations being scrapped. Let us not forget that these important regulations across Scotland, England, Wales, and Northern Ireland protect the health of our youngest citizens. They must be retained, but they must also be strengthened.
Prior to Brexit, when I asked about the prospect of the UK Government joining the countries that have fully implemented the World Health Organisation’s international code of marketing of breastmilk substitutes, I was told that our membership of the EU presented a barrier to doing that. That excuse has now vanished, so I would like the Minster to tell me tonight when he aims to implement the code in full.
Will the Minister meet the authors of The Lancet reports and representatives of the all-party parliamentary group on infant feeding and inequalities to discuss further what the Government intend to do in response to these findings? Will he accept that child and maternal health should come before the profits of commercial milk formula producers? Will he commit today to exploring the role of the UK Government in stopping the aggressive marketing of the formula milk industry? As The Lancet so clearly set out, superficial slogans to encourage breastfeeding are a poor substitute for addressing the sociocultural, economic and commercial determinants of infant and young child feeding. I urge the UK Government to engage with the reports and to do much better by our youngest citizens.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Neil O’Brien)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) on securing this timely debate. I know that she has a keen interest in this important matter and shows great leadership in ensuring that infant feeding remains a priority Government policy, perhaps most notably as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on infant feeding and inequalities. I welcome the publication of the 2023 Lancet series and the information it provides to add to the debate on promoting breastfeeding.
Breastfeeding is a crucial aspect of infant health and nutrition, and this Government are committed to promoting and supporting breastfeeding policy to ensure that all infants have the best start in life. The Government understand the many health benefits that come with breastfeeding for both the mother and the child, and it is our priority to encourage, support and empower women to breastfeed. We recognise that for some women, breastfeeding may not always be a viable option—for some, it may simply not be what they want to do—but the Government continue to create a supportive environment that informs and supports families when starting the infant feeding journey, ensuring that they are able to make informed decisions about how best to feed their babies. This includes providing breastfeeding advice and guidance through a range of approaches, including paid-for social media activity, personalised email programmes and the NHS Start for Life website.
In line with these commitments, we have taken a number of steps to improve support for infant feeding. From 2022-23 we are investing around £300 million in family hubs and Start for Life services, targeting the three years of funding at 75 local authorities in England that have high levels of deprivation and disproportionately poor health and educational outcomes. These 75 participating local authorities have already received at least half their year 1 allocation. As part of this, 14 local authorities have been identified to become trailblazers to lead the way and support other local authorities to improve the services offered to families. This funding package includes £50 million to invest in infant feeding services, which will enable participating local authorities to design and deliver a blended offer of advice and support for families in line with local needs to help all families to meet their breastfeeding goals. Services will enable parents to access face-to-face, virtual, and digital infant feeding support when and where they need it.
The Government also recognise the importance of creating a breastfeeding-friendly work environment, and we recommend that employers take steps to enable women to breastfeed as a matter of best practice. For example, the Health and Safety Executive has published comprehensive guidance on how employers can meet their legal requirements to support new mothers, and it advises employers that it is good practice to provide a private, healthy and safe environment for breastfeeding mothers to express and store their milk. The Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service has also published guidance to support employers in accommodating employees who return to work while breastfeeding or expressing milk.
As is recognised in The Lancet series, it is critical that Governments gather reliable data on rates of breastfeeding to ensure that policies are having their desired effect and to better target our interventions. Therefore, work is currently under way on the delivery of a new infant feeding survey, commissioned for England by the Department of Health and Social Care’s Office for Health Improvement and Disparities. The new survey, which last ran in 2010, will provide valuable information on infant feeding behaviours and other related factors. Data collection is expected to commence this year and we anticipate that the results of the survey will be available in 2024.
These investments and strategies all build on existing measures that this Government continue to uphold. This includes legislation that governs the marketing, composition and labelling of infant formula and follow-on formula. The legislation reflects the latest scientific advice on the essential composition of infant formula and follow-on formula. This legislation upholds the Government’s commitment to the general principles and ambitions of the World Health Organisation’s international code of marketing of breast milk substitutes by prohibiting the promotion, marketing and advertising of infant formula to ensure that breastfeeding is not discouraged. The legislation mandates that the labelling of infant formula and follow-on formula includes information stating the advantages of breastfeeding, includes the necessary information on the appropriate use of the products and does not include pictures or text that idealise the use of the product.
I understand that there have been calls to strengthen this legislation or even go further than is specified in the WHO code, as is suggested in The Lancet series that prompted this debate. The Government of course welcome challenges to our existing ways of doing things and we are committed to ensuring that our legislation continues to be based on comprehensive evidence and sound analysis.
Alison Thewliss
The UK Government’s current legislation falls far short of the code’s recommendations, and it is not enforced in any meaningful way. Many tins found in shops do not comply with the legislation as it exists, never mind the code’s stronger recommendations. These tins of formula have idealised images, such as cartoon bears and animals, on their labels, which would not happen if the Government enforced even their current legislation.
Neil O’Brien
I will come to the hon. Lady’s point about legislation in a moment, but I will first complete my thought.
We must not forget that there are non-legislative routes by which we can achieve many of the same goals. For example, as part of the NHS’s ongoing vision to improve post-natal care, the long-term plan includes a commitment that all maternity services that do not deliver an accredited, evidence-based infant feeding programme, such as the UNICEF UK baby-friendly initiative, will begin the accreditation process with a view to all services achieving full accreditation by March 2024. Local maternity systems in England are responsible for ensuring that all maternity services are on track to achieve this commitment, which will help to improve standards and reduce variation in the care that women and families receive. Targeted support is now available for local services to fulfil the commitment.
I recognise there is always room for improvement, and we continually work to enhance our efforts and to ensure our legislation and policies reflect the latest scientific advice and evidence. The UK has strict legislation in place that gives effect to the aims and principles of the WHO international code of marketing of breast-milk substitutes, which is governed in Great Britain through retained EU legislation. There are currently no differences in GB legislation on the areas covered by the code. The protocol on Ireland/ Northern Ireland provides that EU legislation relating to nutrition continues to be directly applicable in Northern Ireland, and this includes Commission delegated regulation 2016/127 on infant formula and follow-on formula, so we have precisely the same rules in place as the European Union. I know that, in general, the SNP is always keen on that.
The Government have demonstrated, through our continued significant policy development and ongoing investment, a steadfast commitment to promoting and supporting breastfeeding, where appropriate, to ensure that all children have the best start in life. We remain committed to protecting our children, and we will continue to take the necessary steps to ensure that all mothers and families have the information and support they need to make informed decisions about how to feed their babies.
Question put and agreed to.
FORENSIC SCIENCE REGULATOR DRAFT CODE OF PRACTICE 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Minister for Crime, Policing and Fire (Chris Philp)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the motion, That the Forensic Science Regulator draft Code of Practice 2023, which was laid before this House on 26 January, be approved.
As always, Mr Pritchard, it is a huge pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. Forensic science is one of policing’s most important tools for investigating crime. The prosecution of county lines crime and violent crime types including knife crime relies on high-quality forensics, including digital forensics and DNA. We should always remember that the Stephen Lawrence case was ultimately solved only because British scientists were able to detect and analyse a drop of blood measuring less than 1 mm in diameter. That illustrates the importance of good forensic science to law enforcement.
This country is fortunate to have some of the world’s best forensic scientists, both in public law enforcement and in the private sector. Upholding quality standards in that science is vital to our criminal justice system, which is why the Government wholeheartedly supported the private Member’s Bill introduced by the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones), which ultimately became the Forensic Science Regulator Act 2021. I put on the record our thanks and congratulations to him for securing and passing that important Bill. It is a good example of cross-party working and private Members’ Bills operating exactly as they should.
That Act established the regulator as a statutory office holder, and allows them to take action as a last resort when they have reason to believe that forensic science activities are being conducted in a manner that might create a substantial risk to the course of justice. It also requires the regulator to produce a statutory code of practice that formally defines which forensic science activities will be regulated and sets out the standards that providers will be expected to meet. This is the first time that a statutory code relating to the provision of forensic science has been produced anywhere in the world, and it will underpin the regulator’s new statutory powers.
The draft code has been subject to a lengthy and serious consultation, and was broadly welcomed by the forensics community. In fact, 83% of the respondents to the consultation, including from policing, the commercial sector, academia and the judiciary, expressed support for the model of regulation set out in the code. A copy of the code is available in the room; Members will notice that it runs to 362 pages.
I must admit that I was concerned that the code might impose unreasonable burdens on the sector, but I looked at the consultation responses in some detail and I was assured, first, that the respondents who will be subject to it were not unduly concerned about that, and, secondly, that although much of the content of the code is being put on a statutory basis for the first time, it draws together existing non-statutory codes of practice. Members will have seen in the impact assessment that the cost implications are not unduly high. For those reasons, I am satisfied that it is proportionate. I hope that if the Forensic Science Regulator looks at the transcript of these proceedings, he will see that Members on both sides of the House think the code should be policed reasonably and proportionately, and not in a way that introduces excessive or unreasonable burdens on policing or the forensic science community. We want high quality and the maintenance of standards, but not to the extent that that creates unreasonable bureaucracy or cost.
Adherence to the code will play a key role in ensuring the evidence used in investigations and presented to court can be relied on. Forensic providers in the public and commercial sectors will have to declare compliance with the code, and may need to obtain accreditation and establish quality management systems for the activities they undertake, which will of course give the courts confidence in the forensic evidence they receive.
I should stress that non-compliance with the code will not in itself make forensic evidence inadmissible. It is always for the court ultimately to decide whether or not to accept evidence, but I would expect courts to place extremely high weight on, first, whether a forensic science provider is accredited and, secondly, whether it is in compliance with the code. If it does one or, ideally, both of those things, I am sure the court will place great reliance on that.
The code will encourage providers to provide high-quality forensic evidence to courts, protecting the integrity of our criminal justice system and helping to guard against miscarriages of justice. On that basis, I commend the draft code of practice to the Committee.
Sarah Jones (Croydon Central) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard.
Just over a year ago, I responded for the Opposition in a debate on forensic science with the previous but one Policing Minister. It was clear that a lot of work is needed on forensics in this country. We welcome the move to put the Forensic Science Regulator on a statutory footing, which has been called for for years. In 2018, for example, the Science and Technology Committee again asked the Government to do that.
As the Minister said, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones) successfully introduced a private Member’s Bill that passed into law as the Forensic Science Regulator Act 2021, which required the regulator to produce a code of practice. I pay tribute to him and to his work. He is a real champion of the cause and I know he shares our view that forensics are a vital part of law enforcement.
The draft code of practice builds on the non-statutory codes of practice and conduct, as the Minister said, incorporating much of their content. The codes were issued by the previous regulator, whose role was established under the royal prerogative. As set out in the draft code, a number of forensic science activities, ranging from human DNA analysis to toxicology and geolocation analysis, require proper definition and compliance. The code applies to all those doing forensic science activities mentioned in the code, whether they are individual practitioners or academics, in the public or private sectors, or forensic science units, with a view to upholding and maintaining proper standards.
We welcome the publication of the code now. It shows action on forensics that we think is long overdue. Forensic science is crucial to the investigation of crime and the administration of justice. We all know that the stakes are high when it comes to forensics—we must get it right. A recent report by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services showed that digital forensics were in a truly shameful state, with an appalling 18-month delay in getting evidence. There has been a vacuum of leadership from the Home Office, and I hope that the code of practice will lead to improvements. Any information from the Minister on what progress has been made following the recommendations of that report would be welcome.
The Home Office completed an impact assessment on the forensic regulator in 2013, but there has been no published update since. Will the Home Office be publishing its internal impact assessment from 2021?
On accreditation, my understanding is that there was a proposed deadline of October 2022 for all police laboratories to be accredited. Will the Minister update us on progress?
There has been a leadership vacuum on the issue in the Home Office, but I hope that the code of practice will lead to improvement and we are happy to see it come into force.
Chris Philp
I have very little to add to the remarks made by the shadow Minister, my constituency neighbour. I am grateful to the Opposition for their support.
We are investing in improving forensic science and putting more money towards it. We are supporting the police, principally through the National Police Chiefs’ Council, to ensure that they have resources available to them and that forensic services are delivered in a timely fashion to assist in investigations. For example, in the context of serious sexual assaults, there is now a standard that a complainant’s device is returned within 24 hours. That will be the case in every force by the end of June; it is the case in almost all forces already.
I hope that gives the Committee the sense that a lot of work is being done to ensure that digital forensics, as well as forensics more widely, are fit for purpose in the 21st century. I am grateful to the shadow Minister for her support.
Question put and agreed to.
DRAFT POSTPONEMENT OF LOCAL ELECTIONS (NORTHERN IRELAND) ORDER 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr Steve Baker)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Postponement of Local Elections (Northern Ireland) Order 2023.
I am delighted to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Graham. The draft order will allow for a short postponement of local elections in Northern Ireland to allow for their smooth running, ensuring that the count does not clash with the forthcoming coronation.
I should set out the background to the proposal to postpone these important elections by two weeks, from 4 to 18 May. The local council elections for Northern Ireland are currently scheduled to take place on Thursday 4 May, with counting and the declaration of results spanning 5 and 6 May. As the Committee knows, the coronation of the King will take place on 6 May. Statute requires that local elections in Northern Ireland be held on the first Thursday in May every four years. All 462 seats across all 11 local councils are contested.
The elections are run using the single transferable vote system, which allows electors to state as many preferences as there are candidates. Each of the 11 councils is broken down into at least five district electoral areas, all of which require a separate count, making local elections by far the largest electoral event undertaken in Northern Ireland, with a commensurately complex and time-consuming manual count.
Based on all previous local election counts in Northern Ireland, the time required for the count and verification means that it would continue well into coronation day on 6 May. The chief electoral officer for Northern Ireland has advised that even if as many as possible of the counts were held concurrently and counting hours were extended into the early hours of the morning, it would not be possible to conclude the count process in advance of coronation day. It is important that all those who wish to celebrate the coronation can do so, and it is not feasible for local councils to run celebratory events and a single transferable vote count over the same weekend.
Both the chief electoral officer and the Electoral Commission have raised concerns that it will not be possible to secure sufficient staff over the coronation weekend to safely deliver the count if the election takes place on 4 May. In addition, concerns have been raised about the possible cost of casual staff over the bank holiday weekend of the coronation. It is anticipated that councils would have to pay significantly higher hourly rates in an attempt to secure sufficient staff.
The draft order will therefore allow for a short delay of two weeks to avoid these issues. It will ensure that everyone in Northern Ireland who wishes to celebrate the coronation can do so. It is important that both events can take place successfully; the order is intended to safeguard that.
We informed councils, political parties, the Electoral Commission and the chief electoral officer of our plans to change the date of the election and all were supportive of the short postponement. Hon. Members may wonder why postponement is needed for Northern Ireland but not for England, where there are also local elections to be held on 4 May; it is because of the STV system and the much more complicated count process that follows from it. There are no planned elections in Scotland or Wales.
I hope hon. Members will agree that ensuring the smooth and effective running of local elections is a priority for the democratic process and that the draft order will allow that, while allowing all those who wish to do so to celebrate the coronation. I hope that the House will therefore support the order. I commend it to the Committee.
Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab)
It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Sir Graham. Extraordinary events call for flexibility, even with election dates. With that in mind, the Opposition offer our support to the draft order, which will move the date of the local elections in Northern Ireland.
Along with the parties in Northern Ireland, we recognise the administrative challenge of counting the ballots over the coronation weekend. In the light of the current political situation in Northern Ireland, already stressed public officials are under increased pressure to ensure the provision of essential services. The additional efforts being made by workers across the public sector should be recognised, and it is those same workers who will be managing every aspect of local elections, from nomination processes to counting the ballots. These workers certainly deserve to enjoy their extended weekend, courtesy of the bank holiday. As anyone who has ever been involved in an STV ballot will tell you, it does not lend itself to relaxation.
We support the draft order and are hopeful that local authority elections will not be the only ones held in Northern Ireland this year.
Question put and agreed to.
DRAFT INTERNATIONAL FUND FOR AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT (TWELFTH REPLENISHMENT) ORDER 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Anne-Marie Trevelyan)
I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft International Fund for Agricultural Development (Twelfth Replenishment) Order 2023.
The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) would have been taking part in this debate, but he is travelling on ministerial duties in Turkey, visiting earthquake sites. He sends his apologies.
It is therefore my pleasure to present this order on the Government’s behalf and to seek the Committee’s support for a UK contribution of up to £36.96 million to the International Fund for Agricultural Development over the 12th replenishment period from 2022 to 2024. This represents a 44% reduction compared with our contribution to the 11th replenishment, in line with our international development strategy, which sets out how we will shift the balance of the aid budget toward bilateral programmes. This will give us greater control and flexibility over how taxpayers’ money is spent. At the same time, we recognise the importance of multilateral organisations such as IFAD. That is why we are continuing our support.
IFAD is unique. It is both a specialised United Nations agency and an international finance institution. It provides loans and grants to developing countries for programmes that improve food security and nutrition, support adaptation to climate change, empower women and increase incomes. IFAD is a comparatively small organisation, with a very specific mandate. It works exclusively in the rural areas of developing countries—where around 80% of the world’s poorest people live—to help to end extreme poverty and hunger. Most of those people depend on agriculture, and growth in this sector is up to three times more effective than in other sectors in raising incomes among the poorest. Investing in IFAD makes sense in order to reduce both poverty and food insecurity. Agriculture is crucial to economic growth, and in some of the least developed countries, it can account for more than 25% of GDP.
Covid-19 and climate change have had a devastating impact on the lives and livelihoods of some of the world’s poorest people. IFAD’s 12th replenishment consultation focused on supporting recovery and building back better. Since then, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has multiplied the threats for developing countries, exacerbating the risks of a food security crisis.
For the first time in two decades, extreme poverty is on the rise. Up to 828 million people faced hunger in 2021 worldwide, and the number of undernourished people has increased by about 150 million since the covid-19 outbreak. In 2021, a third of the global population was affected by food insecurity. IFAD12 is helping to respond to that global challenge. It has committed to reforms to continually improve its performance, and it was ranked first overall in the Centre for Global Development’s “The Quality of Official Development Assistance” report in 2021.
In the IFAD12 replenishment negotiations, the UK, together with the other member states, secured commitments from IFAD to allocate 100% of core replenishment funding to the poorest countries and at least 50% to Africa; to step up focus on climate change and ensure that at least 40% of core funding supports that; to dedicate at least 25% of core resources to fragile situations, particularly in the Sahel and the horn of Africa, strengthening collaboration with partners to help reduce humanitarian need; and to continue strengthening its focus on social inclusion, empowering women and girls, indigenous peoples and persons with disabilities.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
I have just been looking through the House of Lords Library paper, “Horn of Africa: Projections of a famine in 2023”. It states:
“The Horn of Africa is experiencing its longest drought in 40 years. Compounded by high food prices and political instability, this has led to 36.4 million people suffering from hunger across the region…Although a famine has yet to be officially declared, it is projected to occur in 2023.”
How will cutbacks in the IFAD contribution affect the UK’s support for the horn of Africa?
Anne-Marie Trevelyan
I will cover that. The hon. Gentleman raises exactly the point about the challenges of food insecurity and the extended challenges that so many communities and countries face, not only because of the impacts of the disruption to supply chains from covid-19, but because the climate change impacts driving such things as famine are becoming more and more common.
Although IFAD is a small organisation, it will continue to focus on—and has made commitments to focus on—those countries most in need. Helping to improve their agricultural base and provide food opportunities for growth for those communities is at its heart. It is a relatively small organisation and, of course, if the challenges of famine hit countries and areas of Africa as they have done, the challenges for the World Food Programme and other organisations will continue to rise—that has been one of the great challenges. The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield, is in Turkey visiting the earthquake sites, and the work that Turkey did to help get the Black sea grain initiative up and running to ensure that Ukrainian grain could get out to some of those poorest countries, for which that grain was critical and delivered often by the World Food Programme, was really important.
So many of these disruptions happening all at once are putting our most vulnerable friends and neighbours under enormous strain. The hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent is absolutely right that finding funding in all our restrictive financial envelopes continues to be a challenge, but we are pleased to support IFAD and its 12th replenishment.
Nick Smith
I thank the Minister for her response. Will she tell me in detail why there has been, or what has happened, with the 44% reduction in the UK’s pledge to IFAD, and about its possible effect on what is going on with a probable drought in the horn of Africa?
Anne-Marie Trevelyan
As I set out, redirecting our funding towards a more bilateral programme was a decision taken by the Foreign Secretary. My right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield, the Minister responsible for development, is working through that.
The realities of the challenges we are facing with limited budgets for ODA and the huge costs that the refugee crises are adding to the ODA budget mean that there is a reduction in the commitment this year. We have wanted to continue to make a contribution to IFAD’s replenishment, because we consider it to be an important and very effective organisation in helping to reach some of the poorest communities. I do not have the details of whether the horn of Africa will be in this. I am happy to write to the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent about that specifically, because I do not have the details of the country-by-country plan.
Nick Smith
This is my last contribution, and I thank the Minister for her response. I said “drought”, but I meant famine. I would be really grateful if the Minister could outline what resources are being made available to help with the famine in the horn of Africa.
Anne-Marie Trevelyan
I will ensure that my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield writes to the hon. Gentleman with the appropriate information in the coming days.
I will set out IFAD’s aims over the coming replenishment period. It aims to increase the incomes of over 60 million people and help to improve the agricultural production of over 50 million people, while improving market access —the all-important aspect—to sell produce to over 50 million people and enhance the resilience of 28 million people, including, as the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent mentioned, to the challenges that climate change is bringing to some of those communities.
The objective is to reach the most vulnerable people at risk of being left behind, and there is a particular focus on women, young people, indigenous groups and people with disabilities. For example, in Asia, where more than 418 million people are estimated to suffer from hunger, IFAD is supporting projects such as the adaptation for smallholders in Nepal, promoting climate-resilient farming and better community infrastructure. These are practical, targeted projects that can help to make a difference.
IFAD is also increasing its work on climate change, building on the UK-supported adaptation for smallholder agriculture programme to channel climate finance directly to the most vulnerable. The programme has reduced forest and land fires in Indonesia and boosted prosperity for local people. The challenges of bringing enhanced sustainable management to over 3 million hectares of peatland across Indonesia, for instance, have helped to prevent 20 million tonnes of carbon emissions and restore nature. IFAD is focused on those most critical areas.
IFAD is also partnering with the Green Climate Fund and others to help countries access larger pots of climate finance, particularly in Africa. That includes the joint programme for the Sahel in response to the challenges of covid-19, conflicts and climate change. The programme will strengthen the livelihoods of small producers, especially women and young people in very challenging, fragile contexts. Since its creation, there has been strong support across the House for IFAD and its impact on the lives of millions of the world’s poorest and most marginalised people.
I recommend that we continue our support to IFAD. In doing so, we will deliver our objectives to reach some of the world’s poorest people in countries with the greatest need, boosting food security and enhancing economic opportunities and growth. I commend the order to the Committee.
Preet Kaur Gill (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab/Co-op)
I am grateful to the Minister for outlining the IFAD order. I welcome the support that the replenishment indicates for tackling poverty, food insecurity and climate change, and for promoting agricultural development in the world’s poorest countries.
IFAD’s 45 years’ experience of supporting rural communities in developing countries equips it well to meet the current global crisis. IFAD was created to fund agricultural development projects, especially for food production, and to strengthen the systems to deliver food and economic security to millions of smallholders. Since it was founded in 1977, global extreme poverty has dropped from around 40% of the global population to 10%. It is international development, driven often by concerted multilateral efforts, that has helped to drive progress forward.
In 2023, the final frontier in the fight against extreme poverty depends on us reaching the most remote rural communities. An estimated 3 billion people live in rural areas in poor countries, most of whom depend on agriculture for their food and income. They are also among the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people, with 80% of women, children and men in extreme poverty living in rural areas. Where we have made so much progress in recent decades, reaching people over those last 10 miles will be integral to ending extreme poverty by 2030. That is exactly what IFAD specialises in and was set up to do.
We face a global food security crisis—800 million women, children and men are too hungry to live normal and productive lives. The people who grow our food do not have enough to feed themselves. The ripple effects of Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine have shaken global food systems and supply chains. Food prices reached an all-time high last year. High fuel and fertiliser costs hampered food production, and price hikes forced many small-scale farmers to choose between spending their limited financial resources on purchasing food or planting crops.
Small-scale food producers in poor countries have been among the hardest hit by the food crisis, which has been compounded by the lingering effects of the pandemic, global inflation, accelerating climate change, and conflict. Our continued commitment to IFAD is therefore completely necessary if we are to achieve sustainable development goal 2 by 2030. I am happy to confirm that we will not seek to divide the Committee on this issue today.
We know the consequences when extreme poverty is allowed to fester: conflict, as in the Sahel; irregular migration and displacement; and the deep moral injury of lost lives, lost opportunities and lost human potential. It is firmly in the UK’s interests to continue to invest in IFAD’s work for that reason. Every billion of investment has increased the incomes of 8.6 million beneficiaries by 20%. IFAD’s work is at the frontline of some of the great challenges facing the world, creating enough sustainable jobs and food to meet the challenges of population growth; adapting and building resilience to climate change; and addressing a global hunger crisis that is, at this moment, killing someone in east Africa every 32 seconds. I therefore welcome that at least half of IFAD’s funding in the replenishment will go towards rural development projects in sub-Saharan Africa—a continent of 1.4 billion people just miles from Europe. Africa’s strategic importance to the UK should not be understated.
I put on record my support for the news this week that IFAD has welcomed Ukraine as its 178th member. The war has had far-reaching consequences for food security worldwide, given Ukraine’s role as a leading global exporter of cereals, but less often talked about is food insecurity and poverty in the country itself. According to a recent report, many rural populations in Ukraine are on the brink of poverty, with 44% living on incomes below the subsistence minimum and 7% experiencing malnutrition. In this week of all weeks, as we mark a year since Russia’s barbaric invasion, it is important that the UK contributes so that Ukraine will benefit from IFAD’s work in the years to come.
I must remark on the fact that our contribution to IFAD has been depleted in this replenishment. When other countries are stepping up and have supported IFAD with record contributions, the UK has dropped from being its top donor and influencer to 11th. I ask the Minister: why? After the raft of reforms that the Government said they succeeded in securing in the previous replenishment, why has the UK suddenly stepped back from the role it once played, in the middle of a global food security crisis?
IFAD is clearly a strong investment. The Government’s multilateral development review in 2016 found that it had a good impact, provided value for money and aligned strongly with the United Kingdom’s priorities. In the Centre for Global Development’s 2021 report on quality of ODA, which compared UN agencies and Governments across the world on the quality of their development work, IFAD came top out of all 49 countries and agencies assessed. It was rated among the top agencies on all metrics for its prioritisation of long-term challenges over short-term results, for its collaboration and capacity building in partner countries, and for its transparency, accountability and improvement. The UK, by comparison, dropped to 16th.
I am concerned about how long it has taken to introduce this statutory instrument. The 12th replenishment of the International Fund for Agricultural Development was agreed in February 2021. It has been two years since then. It took until June 2022 for us to announce any commitment, and it took a further seven months to bring forward this SI. Our last payment to IFAD was June 2021 and, at the earliest, our next will come 14 months into the 36-month funding cycle. Where on earth has the UK been? If every donor had taken the same course of action as us, the 20 million people IFAD helps would go hungry. Why have the Government taken so long to bring in this order? What assessment have they made of the impact of IFAD’s ability to plan and deliver projects, and of the UK’s influence on its board?
As they say, trust takes years to build, seconds to break and forever to repair. Does the Minister accept that the FCDO’s chaotic management of the ODA budget has done serious harm to the UK’s hard-won reputation as a trusted partner on the world stage?
On reform, what monitoring of progress against the reform secured in the last replenishment has taken place? What reassurance can the Minister provide that the money spent through the International Fund for Agricultural Development will remain focused on local producers and domestic markets that support food security and local economies around the world? Can she reassure us that that is not undermined by steering small-scale farmers towards disproportionately focusing on links to international commodity markets, where they face immense power imbalances? What efforts have been made to steer IFAD to do more—through not just Governments, but other partners and agencies—to ensure that its work reaches smallholders in fragile and conflict-affected states in an effective and cost-effective way? I again ask the Minister to publish the global food security action plan so that the House can scrutinise how our investment in IFAD and other initiatives and partners joins up with the rest of the UK’s work in this very important area.
The next Labour Government’s approach to international development would underline the importance of tackling global poverty. We would reclaim the UK’s past leadership on international development within the multilateral system and bring Britain back to the world stage as a trusted partner. It is both the right thing to do and in Britain’s interest to invest in climate action, eradicate poverty and improve global food security for the century to come.
The International Fund for Agricultural Development has played a big part in helping us to achieve that over many years, and has been a very effective vehicle for doing so. We do not oppose the order, but I reiterate my regret about the Government’s retreat from the multilateral system and the damage done to Britain’s reputation and influence on the world stage.
Anne-Marie Trevelyan
IFAD is an important partner in supporting the poorest and most vulnerable people in the world. Its work helps to build resilience to crises, from natural disasters to the impact of covid-19 and the war in Ukraine. Its reforms are allowing it to bring together partners to increase investment in hard-to-reach rural areas of developing countries. As the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston highlighted, the most in need are deepest in those most rural communities.
The hon. Lady is aware of the incredible work that the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield, has been doing since he took up the post. He is ensuring that our restricted ODA budget this year is put most effectively to use to deliver the greatest impact. I am pleased to reassure her that IFAD has received contributions that will assure its ability to deliver its plans through this replenishment period. Its work is changing lives around the globe. It is increasing the reach and scale of UK aid, and it is working to match with organisations such as the Green Climate Fund to ensure the maximum output.
In supporting this order, we continue to promote IFAD’s reforms, which are helping to deliver the best possible results. I welcome the Committee’s support for IFAD and its 12th replenishment. I thank Members for the points that they raised; I will ensure that those I have not been able to answer today are responded to in due course. I commend the order to the Committee.
Question put and agreed to.
Ministerial Correction
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Cabinet Office
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Sir Chris Bryant
There is, literally, one rule for all normal MPs and another for Ministers in relation to transparency. All ordinary MPs must declare all their financial interests within 28 days, whereas, as has already been revealed, Ministers do it considerably later, if at all. Why do we have to wait until May to know what Ministers’ financial interests are? Only a few weeks ago, when we had a vote on this matter, the Leader of the House promised that she would ensure that all Ministers were held to the same timetable as other MPs. When is that going to happen?
Oliver Dowden
Ministers are required, under the ministerial code, to provide full declarations, so I dispute the hon. Gentleman’s claim in that regard. However, he raises an important point which I have discussed with the Leader of the House. We are taking steps to move to more rapid declarations of ministerial interests so that they align more closely with the declarations of Members of Parliament, and we are working through those processes with our private offices.
[Official Report, 2 February 2023, Vol. 727, c. 453.]
Letter of correction from the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, the right hon. Member for Hertsmere (Oliver Dowden).
An error has been identified in my response to the hon. Member for Rhondda (Sir Chris Bryant).
The correct information should have been:
Oliver Dowden
Ministers are required, under the ministerial code, to provide full declarations, so I dispute the hon. Gentleman’s claim in that regard. However, he raises an important point which I have discussed with the Leader of the House. We are taking steps to move to more rapid sharing of Ministers’ transparency publications so that they align more closely with the declarations of Members of Parliament, and we are working through those processes with our private offices.
Written Statements
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Public Service Pension Scheme Indexation and Revaluation 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)
Public service pensions continue to be among the very best available. Scheme Police Firefighters Civil Service NHS Teachers LGPS Armed Forces Judicial Revaluation for active members 11.35% 7% 10.1% 11.6% 11.7% 10.1% 7% 10.1%
Legislation governing public service pensions in payment requires them to be increased annually by the same percentage as additional pensions, state earnings related pension and state second pension. Public service pensions will therefore be increased from 10 April 2023 by 10.1%, in line with the annual increase in the consumer prices index up to September 2022, except for those public service pensions which have been in payment for less than a year, which will receive a pro-rata increase.
Separately, in the career average revalued earnings public service pension schemes introduced in 2014 and 2015, pensions in accrual are revalued annually in relation to either prices or earnings depending on the terms specified in their scheme regulations. The Public Service Pensions Act 2013 requires HMT to specify a measure of prices and of earnings to be used for revaluation by these schemes.
The prices measure is the consumer prices index up to September 2022. Public service schemes which rely on a measure of prices, therefore, will use the figure of 10.1% for the prices element of revaluation.
The earnings measure is the whole economy year on year change in average weekly earnings, non-seasonally adjusted and including bonuses and arrears, up to September 2022. Public service schemes which rely on a measure of earnings, therefore, will use the figure of 7% for the earnings element of revaluation.
As announced by the then Secretary of State for Health and Social Care as part of the Government plan for patients on 22 September 2022, the effective date of revaluation will be 6 April 2023 for the NHS Pension Scheme England & Wales, subject to a consultation by the Department for Health and Social Care. The NHS Pension Scheme (Scotland), the Local Government Pension Scheme England & Wales and the Local Government Pension Scheme (Scotland) will also use 6 April 2023 as the effective date, subject to consultation and other processes by the Scottish Government and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. For all other schemes in scope of this order, the effective date of revaluation remains 1 April 2023.
Revaluation is one part of the amount of pension that members earn in a year and needs to be considered in conjunction with the amount of in-year accrual. Typically, schemes with lower revaluation will have faster accrual and therefore members will earn more pension per year. The following list shows how the main public service schemes will be affected by revaluation:
[HCWS566]
2023 Strategic Policing Requirement
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Suella Braverman)
The strategic policing requirement (SPR), as set out in section 37A of the Police Act 1996, sets out my view as Home Secretary, as to what the national threats are and the national policing capabilities required to counter those threats. The SPR supports police and crime commissioners (PCCs) and chief constables in balancing local and national priorities effectively, and in driving improvements to their force’s response to serious and cross-boundary threats.
Following an extensive review and consultation, I am today issuing an updated SPR which builds upon the previous SPR and confirms the existing threats of terrorism, civil emergencies, public disorder, cyber-security incidents, child sexual abuse and serious and organised crime. For the first time, it also includes violence against woman and girls (VAWG) as an additional national threat and recognises the risk it currently presents to public safety and confidence. This will ensure that PCCs and chief constables focus resources and capabilities to tackle this issue of national importance.
The addition of VAWG as a national threat is recognition of the risk it currently presents to public safety and confidence. The updated SPR sets clear expectations around the local and regional police capabilities response to tackle VAWG and how their local force works with others, including collaborating with other agencies. This addition also responds to the recommendation made by the His Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary, fire and rescue services (HMICFRS) review into the policing response to VAWG.
The Prime Minister and I have made tackling violence against women and girls a key priority and as such no woman or girl should ever have to feel unsafe in her home or community. For example, the Home Office continues to fund DCC Maggie Blyth’s role as the national policing lead for VAWG, alongside funding to support the continued excellent work of the NPCC VAWG taskforce in driving co-ordination and improving the national policing response to VAWG.
The other changes in the revised SPR include:
A more detailed description of how national threats should be tackled by police forces. The response to the national threats is now set out according to the six headings: outcomes; capabilities; capacity requirements; consistency and standards; collaboration; and connectivity with partners.
Strengthened governance and assurance arrangements, including a requirement for more distinct references to the SPR in police and crime plans.
An enhanced summary of each threat, including the numerous related crime types. For example, the serious and organised crime threat now covers in detail crime types such as fraud and organised immigration crime. The public disorder threat summarises the risk of disruptive protests and the capability response required.
My officials have consulted extensively with police leaders and other relevant partners while reviewing the SPR.
The Policing Protocol Order 2011 requires PCCs and forces to have regard to the SPR when exercising their functions. I have committed to reviewing the SPR within two years of publication to ensure it reflects any key changes or shifting threats and priorities in the policing landscape.
A copy of the SPR will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses and can also be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/strategic-policing-requirement
[HCWS565]
Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Suella Braverman)
Violence against women and girls (VAWG) are despicable crimes that must be tackled with a whole-of-society approach. These crimes are deeply harmful, not only because of the devasting impact they can have on victims, survivors, and their loved ones, but because of the harm they inflict on wider society. Domestic abuse alone affects 2.4 million adults every year. One in five cases of murder and manslaughter is domestic abuse-related, and a Home Office funded project found that there were 64 victim suicides following domestic abuse in the year to March 2022, although this is likely to be an underestimate. Families should never have to grieve loved ones who have lost their lives through domestic abuse-related murder, manslaughter and suicide.
This Government have made tackling violence against women and girls a key priority. The 2022 cross-Government tackling domestic abuse plan committed to investing over £230 million over three years. The plan complements the tackling violence against women and girls strategy, published in 2021, which committed to supporting victims and survivors with more than £300 million being invested in that year. The strategy aimed to ensure that women and girls are safe everywhere—at home, online, at work and on the streets. Together these commitments aim to transform the whole of society’s response to these crimes with actions to prevent abuse, support victims and pursue perpetrators, as well as to strengthen systems to respond to violence against women and girls.
But the fact remains that these crimes are still far too prevalent, and we need to go further.
Today, we have announced a package of measures that will bolster the work to hold perpetrators to account and better support victims. It is completely unacceptable that women and girls are still subject to these crimes and I am committed to tackling offenders and providing victims with the support and justice they deserve. I believe this type of crime can be prevented and I am taking action to reduce the terrible harm it causes.
Adding the most dangerous domestic abuse offenders to the violent and sex offender register
I want to ensure we are managing and targeting the most dangerous offenders. This is why we will legislate so those with convictions of controlling or coercive behaviour (CCB) with a sentence of 12 months or more imprisonment or a suspended sentence will be subject to more intensive management by police, probation and prison service through changes to the multi-agency public protection arrangements. This will also place a duty to co-operate on other relevant agencies to ensure the risks associated with that offender are properly targeted and managed. Currently, CCB offenders are managed in this specific way on a discretionary basis. This policy seeks to remove that discretion and make it automatic where the offender meets the sentencing threshold, putting CCB on par with serious physical violence. This is crucial as we know that this is a key risk factor in domestic abuse-related cases of murder and manslaughter. We will seek to legislate for this change at the earliest possible opportunity.
We will also add these offenders to the violent and sex offender register so there is a record of the most dangerous domestic abuse offenders and information about them is appropriately shared. However, we cannot wait for legislation to start recording these dangerous offenders on the violent and sex offender register. We will start work immediately to ensure they are placed on this database so that information about them can be appropriately shared and they don’t fall through the cracks.
Adding violence against women and girls to the strategic policing requirement
Today, for the first time, violence against women and girls has been elevated to a crime type that policing leaders must treat as a national threat, as part of the revised strategic policing requirement (SPR). Inclusion in this key operational document places VAWG on the same footing as serious organised crime and child sexual abuse and sets my clear expectations of police and crime commissioners and chief constables to focus their resources and capabilities to tackle this issue as one of the utmost national importance. The updated SPR sets clear expectations around the local and regional police capabilities response to tackle VAWG, and how their local force works with others, including collaborating with other agencies. The addition of VAWG as a national threat is recognition of the risk it currently presents to public safety and confidence.
Piloting the expansion of the “Ask for ANI” codeword scheme
In January 2021, the Home Office launched the “Ask for ANI” (Action Needed Immediately) codeword scheme to provide victims of domestic abuse with a simple and discreet way to signal that they need immediate help from the safety of their local pharmacy. The “Ask for ANI” scheme was developed with the help of partners, including the domestic abuse sector, pharmacy associations and the police, and is designed to work alongside and build on the existing work carried out by local areas; it provides an additional tool that can be used to help the most vulnerable victims access emergency support in the community.
Since its launch, the “Ask for ANI” scheme has been a success; over 5,000 UK pharmacies, including both independent pharmacies and chains like Boots and Superdrug, are now enrolled in the scheme. In the tackling domestic abuse plan, we highlighted the importance of making it easier for victims to ask for help. That is why we committed to work with the Department for Work and Pensions to trial, and if successful, consider a national roll-out of the “Ask for ANI” codeword scheme in jobcentres.
Today we have launched the “Ask for ANI” scheme in 18 pilot sites; 14 jobcentres in England, Wales and Scotland and 4 jobs and benefits offices in Northern Ireland. We aim to undertake an independent evaluation to understand the impact of the scheme across the jobcentre network, and if proven to be successful we will consider a national roll-out. We have also launched an online postcode checker where everyone can check their nearest “Ask for ANI” provider, including both participating pharmacies and jobcentres.
Piloting new domestic abuse protection notices and orders
In the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, the Government legislated for a new civil domestic abuse protection notice (DAPN) to provide immediate protection following a domestic abuse incident, and a new civil domestic abuse protection order (DAPO) to provide flexible, longer-term protection for victims. DAPOs will be available in all court jurisdictions, and breach of any requirement will be a criminal offence. The court will be able to impose positive requirements such as attendance on perpetrator behaviour change programmes, alongside electronic monitoring and mandatory notification requirements of changes to the perpetrator’s name and address to the police.
Today, we can announce that the new notices and orders will be piloted from June 2024 for two years in Gwent, Manchester, and three London boroughs, with the Metropolitan Police and the British Transport Police, and other partners. The pilot will be independently evaluated, which will inform whether the notice and orders are rolled out nationally.
Creating a new digital domestic abuse harm risk assessment tool
We will develop a digital tool so that police forces can quickly identify their highest-risk domestic abuse perpetrators and take the appropriate action. This includes domestic abuse perpetrators without a conviction, which is crucial as in the year ending March 2022 there were 910,980 domestic abuse-related crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales, compared with just 40,647 convictions. We will appoint the tool’s developer this spring and identify police forces to trial and pilot it next year.
In the meantime, we are clear that we expect police forces to be proactively identifying and managing the most dangerous perpetrators in their area.
Domestic violence disclosure scheme
Today, we have published updated guidance for the domestic violence disclosure scheme, also known as “Clare’s Law”, ahead of next month’s commencement of section 77 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, which places the guidance into statute.
Putting the guidance on a statutory footing will mean the police can apply the scheme consistently across the country. The domestic violence disclosure scheme allows the police to disclose information about an individual’s previous violent or abusive offending in order to protect a victim or potential victim. Under the new guidance, the police will be required to disclose information on perpetrators quicker. Police will have 28 days to disclose the information, down from the current guidelines of 35. This will mean victims and potential victims should have the information that could be critical to their safety faster.
Funding interventions for domestic abuse perpetrators
We continue to invest heavily in funding interventions for perpetrators of domestic abuse. We are clear that the onus must be taken off victims and placed on the abusers to change their behaviour. The Home Office has committed up to £36 million over two years to fund more domestic abuse perpetrator interventions. The funding will be for police and crime commissioners to work with partners to deliver interventions tailored to the needs in their local areas, and the next iteration of funding will commence in April 2023.
This is in addition to the £40.9 million of funding we have given to local areas since 2020 for perpetrator interventions and the £2.36 million invested in research into improving our understanding of perpetrators so we can better prevent harm and understand “what works”. This will bring the total funding committed to tackling domestic abuse perpetrators to over £79 million since 2020.
Funding support services for victims
We must first and foremost seek to prevent domestic abuse from happening. But when it does occur, we need to do everything in our power to support victims and survivors. This is why the Home Office has allocated up to £8.4 million over two years for victims’ services. This is targeted to fund between 17 and 33 projects or programmes, which will mobilise on 1 April 2023. This will fund specialist organisations, many of which work within the communities they serve and are a vital component in providing the trauma-informed, tailored support the tackling violence against women and girls strategy committed to. Funding will also allow organisations to develop the “whole-system” capability of providing support to victims of sexual violence and the employers’ response to victims of domestic abuse. This is part of the wider Government commitment in the tackling domestic abuse plan to invest £140 million to support victims.
Together, these measures will help us to build a society that has zero tolerance to violence against women and girls and lets us take the necessary steps to protect the safety and freedom of women and girls across the country.
[HCWS564]
Bus Funding
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Transport (Mr Mark Harper)
The Government recognise the importance of local bus networks to ensuring communities can stay connected, and in enabling people to access work, education and vital local services such as healthcare. We also know that the bus sector faces challenges following the covid-19 pandemic, including lower levels of bus patronage compared with pre-pandemic levels.
The Government to date have taken action to help address some of the challenges faced by the sector and passengers following on from the pandemic, to protect vital local bus services by providing £2 billion in additional funding, including investing £60 million to help operators cap single tickets at £2 in England outside London from 1 January to 31 March. We have also announced our intention to invest up to £75 million to extend the £2 bus fare cap for a further 3 months until 30 June 2023.
Over 140 operators covering more than 4,600 routes are currently signed up to participate in the scheme, which is designed to help passengers to save on their regular travel costs and boost patronage on buses. The scheme is showing early signs of increased bus use, with an independent survey of 1,000 people from passenger watchdog Transport Focus showing 7% of people saying they are using the bus more. Participation in the scheme from operators is voluntary, and as such the Department for Transport will now work with the operators to reconfirm their participation for this extended period.
It has also become clear that without further support for the bus sector once the bus recovery grant ends—a temporary grant provided to help adjust services to new travel patterns following on from the covid-19 pandemic —there would be a risk of reductions to bus services throughout England, outside of London. The Government have therefore announced on 17 February that we will be extending the bus recovery grant for a further three months at a cost of up to £80 million to continue supporting bus services until 30 June 2023.
The £155 million additional funding to extend the bus recovery grant and the £2 bus fare cap we have announced demonstrates this Government continued commitment to supporting local bus services, and working closely with bus operators and local transport authorities to deliver on the ambition set out in the national bus strategy for everyone, everywhere to have access to affordable and reliable bus services.
[HCWS567]
Rail Strikes: Minimum Service Levels
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Huw Merriman)
Our railways play an important role in connecting communities and keeping the economy moving. Whether it is travelling to a medical appointment, school, work or to visit a relative, for many, our railways are a lifeline.
Over the last year, passengers, through no fault of their own, have been subject to severe disruption on the railways due to sustained industrial action. This has had a nationwide impact. It has stopped key workers getting to work, children going to school, and restricted people’s access to essential services such as hospital care.
The Government recognise the importance of workers’ ability to take strike action, and this will be protected. Recent industrial action, though, has demonstrated how strikes disproportionately impact people from accessing the services they require.
The Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill, which is currently before Parliament, will set a legislative framework to balance workers’ ability to strike with the public’s ability to get to work and access vital services.
Today, I am pleased to confirm that a consultation on setting minimum service levels for passenger rail has opened and will run for 12 weeks from 20 February to 15 May. The Department is seeking views from the public, from the rail sector, trade unions and wider industries to develop a more detailed understanding of the impact of strike activity and how minimum service levels might be applied for passenger rail to reduce the disruptions caused by strikes. Subject to the outcome of the consultation, and the Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill receiving Royal Assent, minimum service levels for passenger rail would then be delivered through regulations.
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Grand Committee
Financial Services and Markets Bill
Monday 20th February 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Financial Services and Markets Act 2023 View all Financial Services and Markets Act 2023 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 80-V(a) Amendment for Grand Committee (Supplementary to the Fifth Marshalled List) - (20 Feb 2023)
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)
My Lords, if there is a Division in the Chamber while we are sitting, the Committee will adjourn as soon as the Division Bells are rung and resume after 10 minutes, but self-evidently we are not expecting a Division.
Clause 27: Review of rules
Amendment 78
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to open day five in Committee on the Bill. First, I will relay apologies from my noble friend Lady Kramer, who is not in her place, having had knee surgery last week. She is recovering well and will return as soon as she has permission from her surgeon.
Several of today’s groups concern accountability, both how regulators are accountable to Parliament and then, as with this first group, what that accountability to Parliament means. Is it more than a hot-seat grilling every now and then? What happens to the output of that accountability?
Here I challenge the Government, who have made much of the regulators’ accountability to Parliament in the consultations but then, during the passage of the 2021 Act, said that that accountability has nothing to do with government. We can all see through that. The examples that the Government have set are: failing to reply to committee reports in the allocated time; failing to find parliamentary time for debates on committee reports; and even failing to attend Lords committees, including such important committees as the Economic Affairs Committee and the Industry and Regulators Committee, which engage in financial services matters, and on both of which I and other noble Lords present have served for many years—so we know what we are talking about.
The question is: do the Government want to be part of this scrutiny or not? Do they want the regulators and Parliament to form their own arrangements together and maybe gang up on the Government? I have had experience of organising that in order to challenge the European Commission, and I can see similar seeds being sown here. This is the last chance saloon for the Government to stand by their advertising on parliamentary scrutiny.
I have eight amendments in this group, but it is really four for each of the FCA and PRA instances. I can be brief on the detail. They all relate to the independent reviews of regulators’ rules that can be commissioned by the Government. Amendments 78 and 145 insert into the Government’s powers of review the possibility to seek thematic review as well as reviews of specific rules. They do not compel the Government to do this; it is an empowerment. The Government would still have control over what they choose to implement, but it seems a reasonable power to have. The noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, has supported this amendment so, to go by the commentary that has been made, if we two agree then there must be something in it. It may well be that a thematic review would in fact be more useful for general issues rather than having to identify specific rules, which might not be comprehensive. I would want this if I were the Government.
Amendments 81 and 148 are related and more prescriptive, in that they require the Treasury to establish a rolling programme of thematic reviews and report annually to Parliament on that programme and any changes made to it in the light of other reviews that might be carried out for other circumstances. They also require a work programme for the next three years, along with indicative timetables. The Government would still have control of the programme, but a programme is required.
I have tabled these amendments because somebody should be, if you like, regulating the regulators. My attempt during the passage of the previous Bill to establish an oversight body failed to inspire the Government. These amendments highlight that all the responsibility therefore falls on government, and it is what a responsible Government might be expected to do.
Amendments 79 and 164 include parliamentary committee requests as a potential trigger for the Government to commission an independent review. Again, this is not a compulsion, as the power to seek that independent review would still reside with the Government. The Government claim that there is parliamentary oversight of regulators; this would be a small step in recognition of that, while respecting the work of committees and the evidence that they collect.
Finally, Amendments 80 and 147 require the person appointed to do the independent reviews to be approved by the Treasury Select Committee, as well as by the Treasury. If Parliament is to be regarded as having oversight, these are the kinds of things that endorse that status. I beg to move.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)
The noble Baroness mentioned Amendment 164 but I wonder whether she meant Amendment 146, because Amendment 164 is in a later group.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, I support Clause 27 and, in particular, its new Clause 3RC of FSMA, which allows the Treasury to require the regulators to review their rules. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles of Berkhamsted, said, I have added my name to her Amendment 78 because it is important to widen out the scope of the reviews which the regulators will have to carry out. I also support her Amendment 145 for the same reason and should have added my name to it as well, so that we cover both the PRA and the FCA.
A lot of the things that regulators do are grounded in the specific rules that they apply, which is the focus of new Clause 3RC, but it should also be possible for the Treasury to tell the regulators to review, for example, the cumulative impact of rules as they affect innovation or new market entrants or any particular segments of the financial services industry. The Bill as drafted simply does not give the Treasury that power.
My Amendment 79A in this group seeks to involve more parties in the review-initiation process. At the moment, it involves only the Treasury and the regulators. My amendment is designed for other voices to be heard and responded to by the Treasury; it would require the Treasury to “consider any representations made” by various sources. I have included all the statutory panels attached to the regulators, including those created by the Bill. These panels ought to have good insights into how the rules work in practice and their opinions on which should be reviewed should be heard, so my amendment says that the Treasury must consider representations from representative bodies, which would include all trade and consumer bodies involved in the sector.
My noble friend the Minister may well say that the Treasury will of course consider any representations made to it in respect of the review of rules and that it is quite unnecessary to put that into statute. I accept that, but only up to a point. The relationship between regulators and their sponsoring departments is often much too close and certainly has the potential to shut out anything that might be uncomfortable for either the regulators or the sponsoring department, or both. That is why the second leg of my amendment requires the Treasury to “inform the body” making the representations if it decides not to require a review.
I do not believe there should be any power for outside bodies to tell the Treasury what it should do, but there needs to be something to counteract the imbalance of power that the Treasury has. Transparency is often the best remedy and it is, in effect, what I propose in my amendment by requiring the Treasury to respond with reasons for not pursuing a particular review. If Ministers do not like the idea of transparency by the Treasury, my noble friend will need to be very persuasive when winding up this debate.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, I will not make any specific comments on this group but I will comment on all that we are doing today—certainly the first three groups, all of which seem to me to have a common theme: the accountability of the Executive to Parliament. The degree of consensus between the amendments is almost historic. I said to my researcher, “I think I am in support of all today’s amendments.” She said, “You mean other than ours?”
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
I will not get carried away—I will probably declare neutrality and opt out—but this issue is so important. I suspect that this Bill is much more constitutional than we expected when we first picked up the document. It is about filling in the space between primary legislation and secondary legislation in all these difficult areas relating to financial services. Members of the Committee have done a great job of putting together a series of proposals.
As far I can see, the proposals in this grouping are to use, in different ways, the age-old device of requiring reports. I can see the value of that. My own experience is that, because time goes on, they are not as effective as one might hope; however, once again, that is down to the membership of Parliament in particular. I support the general thrust of this group but I see it as part of our looking at the first three groups and, with or without the Government’s co-operation, working together after the end of Committee and before Report to try to achieve a common thrust that, if necessary, we can vote through in order to make the important step forward in the relationship between the Executive and Parliament that is so needed.
Lord Harlech (Con)
My Lords, the Government agree that the regular review of rules after implementation is essential to ensure that they remain appropriate and continue to have the desired effect.
The Bill makes a number of substantial changes to the regulators’ framework to ensure that such reviews will be an integral part of the regulators’ functions going forward. In particular, Clause 27 inserts a new provision into FSMA that will require the FCA and the PRA to keep their rules under review. To supplement this duty and ensure that there is a mechanism to require the regulators to conduct reviews of their existing rules where needed, Clause 27 also inserts a new power into FSMA for the Treasury to direct the regulators to review their rules where the Treasury considers it is in the public interest. Clause 46 inserts similar provisions into FSMA for the Bank of England in relation to its regulation of CCPs and CSDs.
I will speak first to Amendments 78 and 145 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles. I assure her that the powers inserted into FSMA by Clauses 27 and 46 of this Bill already allow the Treasury to require these regulators to review a range of rules, entire regimes and interrelated rules, as appropriate, where that is in the public interest.
I turn next to Amendments 79 and 146, also in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles. In order for the Treasury to direct the regulators to review their rules, certain criteria must be met. One of the key criteria is that the Treasury considers the review of the rule or rules in question to be in the public interest. It will be important for the Treasury to work with parliamentary committees to understand the evidence base for whether it is in the public interest to exercise the power.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
I am most grateful to my noble friend; I apologise for not having been able to attend all the Committee’s meetings. Can my noble friend help me by defining “public interest”—that is, how it will be defined?
Lord Harlech (Con)
I understand what my noble friend is getting at and think that, when each issue is put to the Treasury, it will consider whether or not it is in the public interest.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
I think that is merely restating the problem. Could my noble friend have another go?
Lord Harlech (Con)
I will write with a full definition of what constitutes “in the public interest”.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
I am most grateful to my noble friend and do not want to detain the Committee, but the whole point of the noble Baroness’s amendment is to avoid exactly this kind of debate. To my mind, what is in the public interest suggests a very substantial test, leaving the regulators to mark their own homework.
Lord Harlech (Con)
Like I said, I will speak to the department and write with a definition of what constitutes “in the public interest”.
Parliamentary committees can already conduct their own inquiries and hearings, call for papers, and call for individuals and organisations to give evidence. The power in Clause 27 seeks to complement, rather than substitute or detract from, the important role played by parliamentary committees. It will be important for the Treasury to work with parliamentary committees to understand the evidence base for whether it is in the public interest to exercise the power.
On Amendment 79A, from my noble friend Lady Noakes, as with parliamentary representations, it will be important for the Treasury to consider the views of the regulators’ statutory panels and representatives of those affected by the rules. However, it would be inappropriate for the Treasury to provide a running commentary on the individual representations made. In addition, the FCA and the PRA have committed to ensuring that there are clear and appropriate channels for industry and other stakeholders to raise concerns about specific rules. These channels will be set out in the regulators’ policy statements on rule review, required by Clause 27, in due course.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
Could my noble friend explain why it is inappropriate to have transparency on why the Treasury chooses not to pursue representations that have been made to it by bodies that clearly have an interest in and experience of the matters under consideration?
Lord Harlech (Con)
I do not think I said that it would be inappropriate; I said that it would be inappropriate to provide a running commentary, not that there would be no comment on individual representations. Again, my understanding is that it will be done on a case-by-case basis.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
Could my noble friend explain that a little further? If I am a panel, consumer body or one of the trade bodies and I make a representation to the Treasury, what can I expect from the Treasury?
Lord Harlech (Con)
I am sorry; at this stage, I will have to take that back to the department and write to my noble friend.
On Amendments 80 and 147, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, the new rule review powers inserted by Clauses 27 and 46 concerning the appointment of an independent person are in line with the practice of other powers in the regulatory framework. For example, the appointment of Dame Elizabeth Gloster to investigate the FCA’s regulation and supervision of London Capital & Finance plc was approved by the Treasury. The Government do not consider that it would be appropriate to require that appointment to be subject to approval by a parliamentary committee, which, as I have mentioned, can already undertake its own inquiries.
Amendments 81 and 148 were also tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles. The primary role of the Government in the regulatory framework is to ensure that the regulators operate effectively and in accordance with the framework, as set out by Parliament in legislation. Where there is a case for external review of the rule-making of the regulators, the Bill provides powers to enable this.
Section 1S of FSMA and Section 7F of the Bank of England Act 1998 already permit the Treasury to appoint
“an independent person to conduct a review of the economy, efficiency and effectiveness”
of how the FCA and the PRA use their resources. In addition, Section 77 of the Financial Services Act 2012 allows the Treasury to direct an investigation into relevant events, such as the FCA’s regulation and supervision of London Capital & Finance plc.
The Bill further strengthens these accountability arrangements with regard to specific rules through Clauses 27 and 46, allowing the Treasury to direct the regulators to review their rules. In addition, as we have already discussed in this Committee, Clause 37 inserts new provisions into FSMA which permit the Treasury to direct the FCA and the PRA to report on performance where that is necessary for scrutiny of the discharge of their functions. Clause 47 modifies FSMA so that these provisions also apply to the Bank of England in relation to its regulation of CCPs and CSDs.
Finally, as I have already mentioned, Parliament is already able to conduct thematic reviews where it considers these necessary. Clause 36 is designed to support this scrutiny by requiring the regulators to notify the Treasury Select Committee of their consultations and to respond to representations to consultations by parliamentary committees. We will discuss noble Lords’ views on the operation of those specific provisions later today.
With that, I hope I have provided sufficient reassurance to the noble Baroness to withdraw Amendment 78, and that she and my noble friend do not move the remaining amendments when they are reached.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
My Lords, I am afraid that the Minister has not given me any reassurance. I think the only thing I have learned is that the Treasury is all at sea and does not understand what parliamentary scrutiny is actually about. It has to have effects and consequences. It is no good saying that Parliament can do its own inquiry and its own report and it is a very pretty document—yes, quite a lot of people praise such reports from time to time—but nothing happens. The attitude of the Government is that these reports can be completely ignored, that there is nothing in them that they wish to do—they do not want anybody else to have any ideas. That is a poor state of affairs.
There are some things that the Treasury does all right. I agree that, for example, when it appointed Dame Elizabeth Gloster to investigate the FCA, it appointed a good person and there has been a good report. I think that in general the people who have been appointed by the Treasury have been reasonably okay, but that does not mean that the responsible committee should not be able to have a view. I can think of instances in other departments where totally unsuitable people have been appointed to do some reviews.
What is wrong with Parliament having a say? I do not think that the constitutional point, as made by the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, has been understood. We still do not know how high a barrier this “public interest” is. The public interest is just what the Treasury thinks from time to time, by the sound of it. I do not think that there are sufficient safeguards there for when the regulators, as the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, said, are, in essence, marking their own homework. This is something that has gone wrong in the past.
Yes, Section 1S is there but it is not used often enough. It is a last resort when you have had a whole history of errors and similar things happening and then there is a review. The whole idea of regular review is to make sure that you can intervene before big things happen, that there is the ability to nudge if something is heading off in the wrong direction. You can say that the review is, “All clear: it’s going well”. Why is there such a fear of them?
We will continue this discussion, because there are many formulations in which this can be done. If the Government do not want to have responsibility for it, maybe there has to be some kind of independent body to do it. While Parliament may be ready and willing to do it, what is the point when you are going to ignore what Parliament says? That is not parliamentary scrutiny; scrutiny must have a purpose and must lead to a result.
As this stage is exploratory I will, of course, withdraw my amendment but, as we go through the rest of this group, I hope that some enlightenment will dawn on the Treasury that these are not issues that can be just left. There is a body of opinion around the Committee, on all sides and none, that something has to be done. Most certainly, I will support things returning on Report.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
“The Financial Services Regulators Committee of Parliament
(1) There is to be a body known as the Financial Services Regulators Committee of Parliament (“the FSRC”).(2) The FSRC is to consist of nine members who are to be drawn both from the Members of the House of Commons and from the members of the House of Lords.(3) Each member of the FSRC is to be appointed by the House of Parliament from which the member is to be drawn.(4) A person is not eligible to become a member of the FSRC if the person is a Minister of the Crown.(6) A member of the FSRC is to be the Chair of the FSRC chosen by its members.(7) Schedule 7A makes further provision about the FSRC.”Member’s explanatory statement
These new Clauses, together with a new Schedule 7A, create a joint committee of both Houses of Parliament to oversee the FCA, PRA and the Payment Systems Regulator.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, in moving Amendment 86 I will also speak to the other amendments in my name in this group. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles of Berkhamsted, the noble Lord, Lord Vaux of Harrowden, and my noble friend Lord Trenchard for adding their names to the lead amendment.
As has already emerged again this afternoon, there is clear agreement in this Committee that Parliament needs to exercise more oversight of the financial services regulators than has been the case in the past. The proximate cause is that huge new rule-making powers will be granted to them by the Bill, but a number of other issues, which noble Lords have raised in connection with the Bill and doubtless will continue to raise through Committee, also point to the need to put more effective accountability arrangements in place.
The Government have been on something of a journey on this. Their consultation on the future financial framework in October 2020 basically said that the existing arrangements involving the Treasury Select Committee in the other place were fine; your Lordships’ House did not even get a mention. By the time the Government’s final proposals came out in November 2021, they rode in behind the views of the Treasury Select Committee, which, by then, had reported that it was well equipped to carry out the accountability role. It subsequently set up a sub-committee for this purpose.
The November 2021 document did acknowledge that there were serious debates in your Lordships’ House during the passage of the then Financial Services Bill 2021, in particular the view expressed by a number of noble Lords that a Joint Committee of both Houses was the appropriate way forward. I think many of us felt then that the expertise that noble Lords would be able to bring to that accountability should be harnessed. The Government, however, said that this was a matter for Parliament. Well, we now have an opportunity for Parliament to express its views and determine the issue in this Bill.
My Amendments 86, 87, 88 and 156, together with the other amendments in my name that are consequential, would create a Joint Committee of both Houses. I have called it the financial services regulators committee, or FSRC. This would not technically be a Select Committee of Parliament, but the only difference between a committee of Parliament set up by statute and one set up by Parliament itself is the absence of parliamentary privilege, which I do not see as a crucial feature of any accountability oversight committee.
The main amendments in this group are based on the precedent of the Intelligence and Security Committee, a committee of both Houses of Parliament set up by the Intelligence Services Act 1994 and given stronger powers by the Justice and Security Act 2013. It is a committee that has demonstrably worked well on a joint basis.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
My Lords, it might be helpful for me to speak now as my noble friend referred to my amendment, which is in the next grouping. My noble friend has always been cleverer than me; I absolutely, 100% support what she puts forward in this amendment. I have an inkling that the Minister will say, “Ah, but we cannot be instructing Parliament on what to do”; that is why my amendments are in the next group, which we may or may not come to.
My noble friend is presenting the Committee with a Rolls-Royce, whereas my amendment is a Trabant, but it provides an opportunity to do what this amendment would do: set up a powerful Joint Committee of both Houses that is properly resourced. In my view, that is the right solution. I entirely agree with everything that my noble friend said. It seems to me that for the Government to resist this is a great mistake because it actually damages the position of the regulators. The regulators themselves would benefit from having proper scrutiny and accountability.
It is important to remember what this Bill is doing, which is extraordinary. It is taking all our financial regulation, giving it to a bunch of regulators who are not in any way democratically accountable and leaving it to them to decide what they will change, at what pace and everything else. It is absolutely essential that there is parliamentary scrutiny. My noble friend is right in the structure that she is proposing, where the elected House will have a pre-eminent position, but it strikes me as very foolish in this legislation to exclude from any role of scrutiny the House of Lords, which, at the risk of flattering members of the Committee and others, contains people with considerable experience and expertise in this area who could add an enormous amount to the regulators in carrying out their duties.
I seem to recall at an earlier stage—my noble friend Lady Noakes follows these things much more closely than I do—the regulators themselves saying that we need to have proper parliamentary scrutiny in order for us to be certain that we carry the degree of consensus and support that is necessary in the regulatory framework. I hope that my noble friend the Minister will accept this amendment. Then we will be able to make enormous progress because we will not need to discuss my amendment.
Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)
My Lords, after a number of days in Committee and at Second Reading, it is clear that the major theme of scrutiny of the regulators has emerged and that we have an extraordinary level of cross-party agreement on the Bill—almost unprecedented, as the Minister will see if she turns around and looks behind her.
This is so important because, as the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, just said, the Bill transfers huge amounts of power to the regulators but does very little to provide Parliament with the means to scrutinise what they do. This has been raised by a number of parliamentary committees, including the EU Financial Affairs Sub-Committee, of which I was a member before it was wound up, and the European Union Committee, among others. The Bill does give strong oversight, scrutiny and direction rights to the Treasury but that is not the same as parliamentary scrutiny.
The Minister said this at Second Reading:
“It is also imperative that the regulators’ new responsibilities are balanced with clear accountability to the Government and Parliament. I assure noble Lords that the Government recognise the importance of parliamentary scrutiny of the work of the Treasury and the regulators.”—[Official Report, 10/1/23; col. 1332.]
However, nothing in the Bill does that. All the Bill does at the moment is make requirements for the regulators to notify the Treasury Select Committee of the consultation and for the regulators to respond in writing to responses to any statutory consultations from any parliamentary committee.
I am sorry, but that is not the same as providing for genuine parliamentary scrutiny of the activities of the regulators. Are the regulators meeting their objectives? Are they protecting consumers from excessive risk and fraud? Are they ensuring stability? Are they carrying out their activities efficiently? Are they encouraging growth and competitiveness? Are they acting in accordance with the climate change rules? Are they horizon scanning for future risks and so on? Nothing in the Bill, as currently drafted, provides for real parliamentary scrutiny as I would understand it.
I am afraid that the noble Baroness has form in this respect. Perhaps I could take her back a few months to the discussions we had around the UK Infrastructure Bank Bill when we queried her reference to parliamentary scrutiny of various documents within that. To paraphrase, she suggested that the more informal parliamentary scrutiny, such as the ability to ask Oral Questions and such like, was sufficient. We seem to be heading down the same way with this Bill. It is not acceptable.
The other day, the noble Lord, Lord Bridges, set out with his usual clarity the three things required for effective scrutiny of the regulators. To paraphrase, they were reporting, independent analysis and parliamentary accountability. There are various amendments in this group and the next group dealing with the third of those: parliamentary accountability. I have added my name to those in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, which aim—as she has explained—to create a bicameral committee that will focus specifically on scrutiny of the financial regulators.
I have long argued that financial regulation is such a large subject, so complex, and dealing with such an important sector of our economy, that it deserves a committee dedicated to it. It is just too big to be able to be meaningfully scrutinised by a committee that covers a wider subject area, such as the Treasury Select Committee of the Commons, the Economic Affairs Committee or the Industry and Regulators Committee, as we heard a minute ago. I strongly support the idea of creating a new bicameral committee that will focus specifically on this subject.
Importantly, Amendment 87 from the noble Baroness tries to widen the scope of parliamentary scrutiny. It says that:
“The FSRC—
the new committee—
“may examine or otherwise oversee the administration, policy and operations of”
the various regulators and may examine any consultations and reports issued by them. I am slightly nervous about the word “oversee” as I worry that might imply interference in the independence of the regulators. More importantly, I also want to add that the new committee should consider the impact of the regulators, in addition to administration, policy and operations. As I have said before, it is really important that the scrutiny is forward-looking, that we are horizon scanning for future risks, so I would widen the amendment further rather than it just being backward-looking. As I say, I wholeheartedly support the principle of a new, properly resourced bicameral committee with a much wider remit than the narrow focus that the Bill currently provides to the Treasury Select Committee. As we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, the involvement of this House is incredibly important. There is enormous expertise throughout the House.
I recognise that there are other ways of achieving proper parliamentary scrutiny, as we can see from the various other amendments in this and the next group in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth. I am not going to get too religious about this. It is clear that there appears to be near-unanimity on the importance of strengthening the arrangements for parliamentary scrutiny of the regulators and of the Treasury, as the Minister said at Second Reading, given the greater responsibility this Bill pushes on to the regulators.
In the interests of time, I am not going to speak on the next group. It would just be repeating what I am saying now. But I hope the Minister will take it as read that I support the theme and concept in the next group. just as I do within this one. What I hope will now happen is that the Minister and all interested Peers can get together between now and Report to try to come up with something mutually acceptable that we can all get behind. Is that something the Minister can facilitate?
Baroness Lawlor (Con)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Vaux of Harrowden, and I support the amendments in this grouping proposed by the noble Baronesses, Lady Noakes and Lady Bowles, the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, and others, for the reasons which have been explained. I have an indirect interest in this subject, which I declare. As a founder and research director of Politeia, I have been involved in publishing some analysis on the question of regulation and, indeed, contributed myself on a problem which is very great in Britain now, that of accountability, and more generally this regulatory state into which we have slipped.
My Amendment 175 should be seen as complementary to this grouping. Its aim is slightly different but complementary; it is designed to focus scrutiny ex ante on the rules proposed. The focus is on new, adapted or maintained regulations that are due to come into operation and to consider how consistent, predictable and transparent they will be, as well as how much they will be in accord with the law. Given the fast pace of how the sector works and the speed with which, by necessity, regulators must act and decide things, it is important that we have this external check before rules come into operation. The regulators will have the power to intervene and make new rules within the broad terms of the law, if they judge that they should, without the searching analysis and testing that are needed beforehand. The sector will in most senses be a guinea pig for this process.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
My Lords, I will make three brief points in support of this amendment.
First, from a constitutional perspective, it is essential that the accountability is to Parliament. It is subdelegated from us. It seems inconceivable to me that any legislative body should give power to a body that is not accountable to it. That is the first constitutional point.
Secondly, it seems to me that the Treasury is not the right body to do this job—partly for the reason I have given and partly because some of the objectives that are already in the Bill span areas way beyond the Treasury’s competence. One can certainly see on climate change, for example, a real worry that, if the Treasury is left in charge, there will be all kinds of considerations—short-term, mainly; certainly not long-term—that will not be able to examine precisely whether the regulators are doing what they should be doing.
Thirdly, we cannot ignore the vast pace of change. It is difficult to stand back and appreciate that many of the things we have developed over the centuries are having to be changed within a few years. The financial markets is one area where change is enormous, such as in dematerialisation and the use of digital assets. This morning we debated electronic trading documents in this Room. Therefore, we need such a body. I am afraid that whoever joins this committee will find it very hard work but that is no excuse not to set it up, because it must be absolutely on top of things and gingering the regulators. I hope the regulators will come to see that this is good. We cannot have delay and, without a special committee to do it, that is what will happen.
Lord Bridges of Headley (Con)
My Lords, I will make a couple of points quickly. In so doing, I once again declare my interests as an adviser to and shareholder in Santander and, more appositely, as current chairman of the Economic Affairs Committee.
I want to pick up on the noble and learned Lord’s excellent points. If I may be very frank, I was disappointed that in the Minister’s response to the previous group he consistently referred to accountability to the Treasury. We are talking here about accountability to Parliament. This is what matters; it is what concerns so many noble Lords who take a great interest in this debate. There is just nowhere near enough of that in the Bill. I am very disappointed by the tone and approach that the Government seem to be taking, so far, to what I see as a highly constructive set of amendments, especially my noble friend Lady Noakes’s amendment, which I entirely support. I have two brief points to make about the committee structures of this House and of the other place.
As we have seen and are already seeing, the remit of committees here and in the other place is not set up to handle and scrutinise the avalanche of regulation coming out from all the regulators. It is nowhere near adequate to handle the consultations, let alone everything else. They do not have the resources either. It is imperative that the Bill is amended to reflect this. I very much hope that when my noble friend responds she will give this amendment some warm words of support, go away and think of ways in which she might support it. I will be speaking again in support of my noble friend’s other amendments.
Lord Sharkey (LD)
My Lords, I strongly support the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, and observe that the Government have said, more or less consistently, that it is for Parliament to decide what form of scrutiny it requires. This acknowledges the importance of the issue. This is Parliament, and the amendment sets out a clear way ahead to establish parliamentary oversight. If the Government mean what they say, they will not oppose these amendments. They might join in a constructive discussion of how to make them better, but they will not oppose these amendments if they are to be at all consistent.
It is worth noting, though, that accountability and scrutiny are not quite the same. Even if we were to pass the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, we would need to take a closer look at the delegated powers mechanisms that the Bill contains. As things stand, Parliament will have no meaningful say in whatever the new rules may be. Unless I have misunderstood, the proposed financial services regulators review committee will not be able to intervene as the new rules become law. We will need to think about that carefully as we make progress with the Bill.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
Can I say a couple of words about regulation and regulators? This is usually a political divide and I am proud to be on my side of it. I believe that society is the richer for good regulation; I am against bad regulation but in favour of good regulation. When one has good regulation, the problem is often that it is poorly executed. These financial regulators do the execution, so processes to hold them better to account have to be a good thing. That may include the distasteful fact—it may or may not emerge—that they are underresourced. Certainly, this sort of debate will bring out those sorts of issues.
I have to be careful here, but my general view is that this is really a rather good group. I shall consider it carefully and discuss it with colleagues across the House between now and Report to decide on the extent to which we will support it. I strongly recommend that the Minister does as asked and enters discussions with us, to see how much of this can be agreed and included in the Bill. We had a similar tussle two years ago when we did a big chunk of this and tried to draw in the regulators more. The regulators put down on paper that they were willing to talk to us more. The problem was that we did not have mechanisms in the House to take advantage of that. This would be a game-changer, by breaking through into that area and creating processes to have proper accountability and scrutiny—supervision is the wrong term—of these enormously powerful regulators, which are vital to the success of our financial markets, in terms of both opportunities and appropriate restraint to avoid catastrophes.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
My Lords, I strongly support the proposals for a Joint Committee. As ever, the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, has researched this well. I know she has been looking at it for a long time, because we talked about it back when we debated the 2021 Bill. I commend the thoroughness with which she has done that. I also welcome the amendment by the noble Baroness, Lady Lawlor. One thing about that proposal is that it would be slightly larger at 12 members, instead of nine. It is a different committee, as has been explained. I have done this kind of scrutiny and we really need to think what volume of it there will be—especially now, post Brexit.
After the financial crisis, when I was chair of ECON in the European Parliament, we did 40 pieces of major financial services legislation—directives or, if that Parliament wanted them to be more direct, regulations. That is a huge number, and the volume of rules that came out from them is even more huge. It is an enormous task for the regulators doing those rules and for those who have to scrutinise them. My committee, which did that scrutiny work in the European Parliament, had the advantage of doing the legislative side first and then moving on to the rules. Nevertheless, it had some 60 members so could specialise in small groups, rather as we do with a Committee of the whole House; we self-select a group. Some people would do banking, some would do funds and some insurance. There would be a happy band, probably only five or six, who developed extra expertise in the self-selecting sub-committees. Of course, within that idea of self-selection, you could run parallel informal sessions at the same time.
With our small committees, we will not have the ability to do that. There is no way we can emulate it, as we have already said. Nevertheless, we should think about the size of the committee we might want. I thought having 12 was better than nine, but maybe the number has to be odd. If you go to 13, that is not a happy number so let us up it to 15. Maybe that is as far as we can push it.
I think that a lot of the work of such committees will not be everyone wanting to get in on questioning somebody. An awful lot of such work is an awful, dreadful grind of going through document after document, and documents explaining the documents, then asking somebody what the hell it all means anyway. That is time-consuming. We should have a few more people concentrating on that, maybe with the opportunity to specialise. If we rotate the committee membership frequently we might lose that expertise, although in this House at least we do not seem short of people who can turn their minds to these kinds of things. I know that that is more of a comment, but maybe we can bear it in mind as we debate among ourselves what we will do on Report.
The Parliamentary Secretary, HM Treasury (Baroness Penn) (Con)
My Lords, the Government are keenly aware of the interest in Parliament in the appropriate committee structures for scrutinising the regulation of financial services and will listen to the debate that we have on all the different groups very carefully. However, as noble Lords have noted, and I note myself, Parliament is of course responsible for determining the best structure to scrutinise the regulators.
As other noble Lords have also recognised, this debate has been had across different parts of Parliament over previous years, including during the Government’s consultation on our proposals. As my noble friend Lady Noakes said, the Treasury Select Committee considered this question in its report of June 2022, Future Parliamentary Scrutiny of Financial Services Regulations. That resulted in the establishment of a new sub-committee for scrutiny of financial services regulations. I also note that the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Financial Markets and Services published a report in February 2021, which recommended the creation of a Joint Committee.
I note that my noble friend modelled her amendment on the provisions relating to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee, which is a Joint Committee set up on a statutory basis. Let me say to the Committee that the requirements applying to the ISC are quite unique, given the extreme sensitivities concerning the operation of the intelligence services. A large part of the provisions related to the ISC are about limiting its scrutiny powers to ensure that the intelligence services can operate and that the information they require to do their jobs is appropriately protected in those circumstances. The financial services regulators do not handle such sensitive information so the Government consider that a similar approach in statute is unlikely to be required in this instance. As I have said, it is not for the Government to impose an approach on Parliament.
I recognise the contributions from noble Lords saying that, by amending the Bill to create a Joint Committee, Parliament would be expressing its view. However, the point I would make in relation to that is that Parliament has the capability to set up Joint Committees without the involvement of government; they are usually established by Standing Orders in both Houses. This process does not require legislation. Introducing a Joint Committee at this stage of the Bill would be a significant change to the structure of the scrutiny of financial services. There is already a mechanism by which Parliament can establish such a Joint Committee should it wish to do so. Through this Bill, the Government intend to ensure that Parliament has the information it needs to conduct effective scrutiny of regulators, whatever structure it determines to be correct for doing so.
Clauses 36 and 46 and Schedule 7 require the regulators to notify the Treasury Select Committee of their consultations and draw the committee’s attention to specific sections, including those that deal with how the proposals advance the regulators’ objectives and how they have had regard to the regulatory principles. Those references to the TSC are in line with wider requirements elsewhere in existing financial services legislation, which establish that committee as the main committee for financial services matters. However, I note the wide range of sincerely held views on this matter and the fact that a number of different committees have previously been involved in scrutinising the wide breadth of financial services regulation.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
I am trying to follow the logic of my noble friend’s argument. If her argument is that Parliament can set up committees so there is no need for legislation, why is it necessary to reference the Treasury Select Committee in the legislation?
Baroness Penn (Con)
In the legislation, the Government are seeking to formalise and make explicit some of the ways in which committees can have their work facilitated. I recognise that this Bill refers to the Treasury Select Committee. That is the case in existing financial services legislation; for example, Schedule 1ZA to FSMA requires that the person appointed as the CEO of the FCA must appear before the TSC before their term can begin. Also, when appointing independent reviews of ring-fencing and proprietary trading, as required by Sections 8 and 10 of the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Act 2013, the Treasury was required to consult the TSC.
Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)
I am struggling with the logic here. If it is the case that scrutiny by the Treasury Select Committee is in previous legislation, why is it wrong to change that and enhance the scrutiny in this way? Logically, the two seem to be the same thing.
Baroness Penn (Con)
Perhaps I could finish my point; we will also come to this issue in the next group. In seeking to ensure that the relevant committees of Parliament have the information that they need to do their jobs, the Bill references the TSC, but I acknowledge that other committees in Parliament have done this role in the past or may wish to do it in future. That is something we will want to reflect on in our discussions of both this group of amendments and the next one. I recognise the point that has been made to me and will, I think, be made to me again in our debate on the next group. Although there is precedent for the TSC—indeed, it has set up its own sub-committee on this matter—I completely see the value of contributions of committees from this House or, if Parliament determined it, Joint Committees. We want to reflect carefully on how we can ensure that we are able to facilitate that also.
The noble Lord, Lord Vaux, invited me to reflect on this discussion and discuss with noble Lords between Committee and Report if and how we can take the thoughts and ideas further. That is something that I would be very happy to do. We will reflect on the points raised during this debate and consider them carefully before Report.
I wanted to make two points regarding this group. First, it is for Parliament to determine its committee structure and it has the ability to determine that, including the establishment of a Joint Committee, through existing procedure. Establishing a Joint Committee through statute is the exception rather than the rule and reflects the specific circumstances of the Intelligence and Security Committee. It is, I think, the only committee that has been established by statute in the last 100 years or so.
The other point, which we will discuss further, is that although we do not want to determine the correct committee structure, we do want to ensure that committees have the information they need to do their work. We have put clauses in the Bill to reflect that but, as I believe we will come on to, we will want to consider whether they fully reflect the work done in both Houses to scrutinise the regulators.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
I do not know whether the Minister is going to come on to this, but I hope she will also say something about what I called the consequences of scrutiny and what my noble friend called accountability. We can set up all the committees we like within the permissions of the parliamentary structure, but the point is what the Government then do and take notice of. There is no point in doing it otherwise. That is what we want to hear: how are they going to, as I would say, put wheels on it so that the reports are acknowledged? We are not saying that the Government or the regulators have to take everything but they at least need to comment and such things. Will the Minister say something about that, please?
Baroness Penn (Con)
On that point, the noble Baroness referred to the Government responding, but we are broadly discussing the committee’s scrutiny of the regulators and the Government’s role as well. The Bill provides a specific power to ensure that the regulators respond to representations made to them by parliamentary committees in response to their consultations. That clause is not limited to the Treasury Select Committee but applies to any parliamentary committee that makes a representation.
I look forward to debating the next group, which continues the theme, but for now, I hope that my noble friend will withdraw her amendment.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who took part in this debate—with the possible exception of my noble friend the Minister.
I think we were pretty much at one in this Committee on the importance of setting up proper accountability arrangements for the financial services sector. I make no apology to my noble friend Lord Forsyth for trying to design a Rolls-Royce solution. The financial services sector is the biggest contributor to the national economy. What regulators in the financial services sector do has a huge impact, not just on the players in the financial services sector but on the whole economy. For that reason, we have to take this extremely seriously. It is at this point, when we are about to make a very radical change in the scope and responsibilities of those regulators, that we should consider this all very carefully.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, is absolutely right: this is about the importance of accountability to Parliament, and we must not forget that. That is what we have been trying to do.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
My Lords, perhaps I should repeat the declaration of interests I made at Second Reading. I am regulated by both the FCA and the PRA and am chairman of a publicly quoted bank, Secure Trust Bank. In tabling this amendment, I anticipated my noble friend’s response to the previous group. I have Amendments 89, 93, 97 and 109 in this group; Amendments 89 and 97 are the guts of it. Basically, they would enable Parliament to set up a committee—a Joint Committee or its own committee or whatever.
In making her case for the last set of amendments, my noble friend Lady Noakes pointed to a key point, which is about resources. The noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, has talked about the scale of the task that is being put before the regulators. It is hard to believe that without some kind of statutory backing, the huge resources that will be required to do this task and to do it effectively are likely to be forthcoming. I think that is in the nature of things. Certainly, my experience as chairman of the Association of Conservative Peers has been that getting any change in this place is a lifetime task. I just do not see Parliament being able to rise to the challenge.
If my noble friend cannot countenance writing into the statute book that there should be a Joint Committee of both Houses, which I believe is the right solution, these amendments at least provide for that. It is evident from this quite short debate that every member of this Committee thinks that this is desirable, although I quite understand why my noble friend’s briefs say that it is not.
I do not wish to be rude about the Treasury Select Committee in any way but, as a former chairman of the Economic Affairs Committee—I am sure my noble friend Lord Bridges agrees—I have not detected within the Treasury Select Committee the kind of commitment that we see in the Select Committees of this House. That is because their members have constituency and other responsibilities. You can see that in the committee’s attendance and in the way in which it operates. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, pointed out, this is a monumental task.
Now, I hate all this consensus so I will introduce a degree of controversy. I voted for Brexit. I voted for Brexit because I believe in Parliament taking back control over our regulations. I did not vote to give all the European regulations, over which we have had insufficient parliamentary scrutiny and control, to a bunch of regulators who are not subject to any parliamentary control. From the Government’s point of view, when they keep being asked “What did Brexit ever do for us?” to refuse even minimal accountability over our most important earner and job creator is extraordinary.
We should listen very carefully to the points made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, in the debate on the previous group: this is a central constitutional matter. Without wandering into a Second Reading debate, throughout the Bill we have endless examples of where power is being taken away from Parliament by the Executive without being subject to scrutiny.
I am actually speaking to my amendments, in the hope that, at the very least, my noble friend will say that, as I made the case against my noble friend Lady Noakes’s amendments on the basis that it is for Parliament to decide, these amendments enable Parliament to decide what it should be. At the same time, I recognise that they do not deal with the issue of resources although—believe it or not—it is entirely up to Parliament how much resources its committees adopt. It is not within the Treasury’s control; Parliament votes resources to the Treasury, not the other way round.
My noble friend is a very effective and much respected Minister at the Dispatch Box but, if I were a Minister faced with a Committee as unanimous as this, knowing the views that were expressed at the Second Reading on the Bill, I would not hope to proceed without making a major concession in this area. Not doing so would make it more difficult for the passage of this legislation.
It is a great experience for me to have the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, support an amendment in my name. I am not used to this degree of consensus. That in itself ought to make my noble friend aware that she needs to take this away and come back with a government amendment that establishes a Joint Committee.
I will deal with the argument about the ISC, which my noble friend said is unique. It is indeed. It is a unique committee, because the powers that are operated by the security services are great. The powers that are operated by the regulators are great. We can argue that this is about confidentiality—it certainly is—but it is also about ensuring that people who wield great power are held to account, and that is missing from the Bill, as so many have said during this debate.
The other point I make to my noble friend is that yes, it is true that it is the only statutory committee that has been established, but we have made a fundamental change in taking financial regulation away from the European Union, where it was subject to considerable scrutiny—a moment of praise from me for the European Union and the wonderful work that the noble Baroness did as chair of ECOFIN. Whatever criticism one might make of the regulations, there was proper scrutiny, and that is completely absent here. Are we really going to say that we as a Government have delivered Brexit by making sure that there is little democratic accountability and less than was achieved in respect of the European Union?
In responding, I ask my noble friend to accept the amendments, but go further if she can.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)
My Lords, I have to inform the Committee that if Amendment 89 is agreed, I cannot call Amendment 90 by reasons of pre-emption.
Lord Bridges of Headley (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Forsyth for tabling this amendment. As he said, there has been an outbreak of consensus on this point overall, and the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, have also put their names to the amendment, shows what we have heard time and again on this Bill: that it does not go nearly far enough to increase parliamentary accountability and scrutiny.
As I said in a previous debate, and as my noble friend mentioned, we need to improve this Bill in three ways. First, we need to ensure that the regulators publish more data about their own performance. Secondly—this is an amendment we will come to on another Committee day—we need to create a new source of independent analysis of regulators’ actions and performance. Thirdly, by this amendment, as with those in previous groupings, we need to ratchet up parliamentary scrutiny.
I see this amendment—I use this word carefully—as a backstop. My noble friends who have Brexit dispositions may take exception to the word, but it is absolutely a backstop to what we need to achieve here, given the reservations that my noble friend the Minister made about my noble friend Lady Noakes’s previous amendment. As I have said before, and as my noble friend just mentioned, the Treasury Select Committee is an admirable body. We all know that it has created a new sub-committee to scrutinise consultations published by the regulators but, as many noble Lords will be aware, although consultations are very important, they are just one aspect of the regulators’ work. Furthermore, there are numerous consultations. I spent a joyous few minutes counting the number of consultations published last year by the FCA, PRA and the Payment Systems Regulator; I counted 75.
Finally, as my noble friend pointed out, there is expertise in this House. I will spare the blushes of those in this Room, but there is enormous expertise not just here or on the Economic Affairs Committee or the Industry and Regulators Committee but in numerous other aspects. That expertise should be mobilised effectively and systematically to scrutinise this avalanche of regulation. For those reasons alone, it is critical that the Bill ensures that this House—not just the other place—is seen as a key means of increasing scrutiny and accountability.
Before I end—I know that others want to speak—I say just this: increasing accountability and scrutiny should not be portrayed as a means of undermining independence. I very much hope that no one thinks that. The scrutiny of our regulators and their accountability to Parliament should and indeed must go hand in hand with their independence. This is not just to ensure that regulators are accountable, nor simply because there should be no regulation without representation, but because if regulators wield great powers, as my noble friend said, they must be seen to account for their actions in public, and those actions must be seen to be scrutinised and judged by Parliament to be appropriate and within their remit. The point is that doing so increases the legitimacy of the regulators themselves. That is why this debate is not arcane but highly relevant to the power and the position that regulators hold.
I was grateful to hear my noble friend the Minister’s constructive tone in her response on the previous group, so I end by asking her a very simple question; it requires only a yes or no answer. Does she think that this Bill contains sufficient measures to increase parliamentary scrutiny of the regulators in the light of the powers that those regulators are now getting—yes or no?
Lord Naseby (Con)
My Lords, I have a couple of quick comments. I have had the privilege of being across the two Houses for coming up to half a century. In my judgment, this Bill, which has a clear objective of growth—a brand-new element that has not been laid on financial services before—means that Parliament needs to show leadership. We are not often asked to show particular leadership but, with this substantial change, we in Parliament need to show leadership. That is what this amendment is all about.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
My Lords, I have two rather modest amendments in this group. They are again part of my drawing attention to the fact that there needs to be accountability to Parliament. All they would do is insert that, when a regulator does its consultation and is giving the notification to Parliament, it should mention and draw attention to the fact that issues have been covered by a parliamentary report. I know that the regulator will already have responded to a parliamentary report but it might have been some time sooner.
This is a relevant issue. Any sensible regulator would probably make the comment anyway but that does not mean you cannot put little pieces into legislation here and there that just remind people of the status of parliamentary reports. That is what these two amendments would do, with one for the FCA and one for the PRA. When those notifications come to Parliament, they would have to indicate when they have been covered by a parliamentary report. They would not have to say that they agree with it; one presumes that they would comment on it.
I will not say anything more about the scrutiny—I have said a lot already—other than that I basically agree with everything that everybody has said. We are all agreeing with one another. When the Minister has meetings to work out what concessions can perhaps be made, they will have to be substantial, not a little tweak. They will have to recognise the importance and magnitude of financial services—including the great power that they have, as has been said—and move towards what must be great accountability to measure up to that great power.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, I hope I will be forgiven for not going through my various amendments. Their essence seems to be in the general direction of this group of amendments and I think it highly likely that, between now and Report, the supporters of this group will knock together a cohesive set of amendments to achieve our common objective. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, finds it painful but we are agreeing with each other on this group.
One of the problems of society is that people grow old in waves. We are already running out of people who have forgotten about the last financial crisis. It was by a hair’s breadth that the economic system in the world did not fail. It took some brave decisions, in this country in particular and in the United States, to save the world from an economic catastrophe. This is different from the Intelligence and Security Committee but in no way is it less important. It is crucial to this nation.
We are suggesting that we in this House should be a backstop. That is not particularly surprising because that is what we do all the time. When the Government do not have a working majority, I believe that they are much more alert to what happens in this House because, suddenly, they are all there, they have their majority, they have got something through the House of Commons but then it runs into the Lords and new questions are asked. People spend a lot of time worrying about particular points. Yes, our role is a backstop, but we could not be one as the Bill is drafted at the moment because it sees two levels: the House of Commons level and the House of Lords level. This Bill brings us into parity of access. It is not nearly as comprehensive as the proposal from the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, but it is a basic matter of equity to bring this on to a level playing field.
My next point concerns the issue of volume. The volumes will be very significant. One of the best things that the House of Lords does is its committees, where people actually put the time in. I really am quite pleased that I avoided becoming an MP. I only aspired to it before I knew what it was all about. Once you are an MP—I hope that ex-MPs will interrupt me if I am wrong—the first thing it is all about is getting re-elected. That requires a lot of work in the constituency and all that sort of thing. That is all part of the democratic process but the volumes need the sort of people who are in this House—as the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, said, they almost self-select—to put the effort and energy in.
Scrutiny is not a negative process. Too often, in the way we run bits of society, it is a single heroic leader passing down the rules, but very good organisations encourage dissent in their top teams—not external dissent but internal dissent where people ask, “Do you really mean that? Have you thought through the consequences of that?” The effect of those processes is extremely benign. Either things get changed for the better or people understand what they are saying better and are able to present it better. Scrutiny is an extremely positive thing.
The mood that has got us here today has been around for years, I would say. We need a discontinuity; this group of amendments is the minimum discontinuity that I believe this House will tolerate. We will all be working across the House over the coming weeks to put together something that cannot be resisted. I hope that the Minister does not floor us by coming forward us early on in discussions with some sensible concessions to embrace the direction of this group.
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, first, I will briefly speak to the government amendment in my name in this group—I feel I should—before turning to the substantive measures raised by the debate.
Amendment 151 corrects a minor drafting error in Schedule 7 to the Bill. The current drafting requires the PSR, when notifying the Treasury Select Committee of consultations, to set out how the proposals are compatible with the regulatory principles. However, the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Act 2013, which established the PSR, requires it to have regard to its regulatory principles. The Government are therefore bringing forward this amendment to Schedule 7 to align this Bill with that Act. The amendment also aligns the requirements on the PSR with those imposed on the FCA and the PRA through Clause 36 of the Bill.
I turn to the amendments tabled by my noble friend Lord Forsyth and the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe. Through FSMA and, in respect of the PSR, as I just noted, FSBRA 2013, Parliament sets the regulators’ objectives and gives them the appropriate powers to pursue those objectives. I therefore agree with this Committee that Parliament has a unique and special role in relation to the scrutiny of the FCA, the PRA, the PSR and the Bank of England.
I also agree that effective parliamentary scrutiny provides a valuable service for consumers, firms and the regulators themselves. It can help ensure that the regulators’ resources are appropriately targeted to consider appropriate democratic policy input from Parliament and bring important public policy considerations into focus.
I recognise noble Lords’ point that regulators in this sector are in a somewhat unique position and the approach that we take to financial services regulation is somewhat unique in the level of delegation that we give regulators in their rule-making. The Government’s approach, through our FRF consultations and this Bill, is an attempt to recognise that somewhat unique position and role of regulators in this sector, their wide remits and their position as independent public bodies that are accountable to Parliament.
As I mentioned in the debate on the previous group, I will set out the rationale for the Government’s approach in the Bill and our consultations. Our intention is to ensure through the Bill that the Treasury Select Committee has access to the information needed to best scrutinise the work of the regulators. The requirements for the regulators to notify the TSC in Clause 36, and the PSR in Schedule 7, are in line with requirements elsewhere in FSMA that establish the TSC as the main committee for financial services business. This is intended to support more effective accountability and scrutiny of the regulators by Parliament as a whole.
The Bill requires that notifications sent to the TSC must be made in writing. As is usual practice, the Government expect this correspondence to be published. It will therefore facilitate broader awareness of the regulators’ consultations and enable relevant Lords committees to consider the matter. The clauses also require the regulators to respond in writing to formal responses regarding their consultations received from any parliamentary committee. The Government recognise the significant interest of this House and Committee in ensuring that all committees conducting regular scrutiny of financial services are adequately notified of the regulators’ consultations to ensure that they have the information required to conduct that scrutiny.
As I said in the previous debate, parliamentary scrutiny is first and foremost an issue for Parliament to consider. It is not for the Government to determine the best structure for ongoing scrutiny of the financial services regulators, but we do have a role in setting out the suitable mechanisms by which the regulators must give Parliament the appropriate opportunity to scrutinise the work of the regulators in taking forward their functions. I would like to reassure noble Lords that the Government have heard the points made in the debates today and that ahead of Report we will carefully consider the views expressed today.
I recognise the level of consensus among speakers in this Committee. My noble friend picked up my point and said that there was not a range of views on this issue. In the debate on the previous group—and we have touched on it in this debate—in some respects we are talking about the establishment of a Joint Committee of both Houses. If you look across both Houses, there is a range of views about how this should be taken forward. I will listen very carefully to the views of this Committee as we conduct our scrutiny of the Bill at this end—in our House—but, when I made that point, I was maybe pointing to the whole of Parliament, not just our end of it.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
My Lords, my noble friend referred to the range of views and the House of Commons. I hope that this does not get into a kind of turf war between the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The reason I say that is that if I look at the scrutiny the Bill got in the other place, it is not impressive.
The noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, said that he does not regret not becoming a Member of Parliament. When I was first elected as a Member of Parliament in 1983, it was exceptional to have a guillotine in consideration of legislation. Now everything is timetabled in the House of Commons and when you say that it results in almost zero scrutiny, the response one gets is, “Ah, yes, but that’s because all parties agreed that only that time was necessary”. That is why this House spends so much of its time looking at badly drafted legislation that has not even been considered.
If we think about the work that this House has to do and the burden of the legislation that comes our way, it is particularly acute at the moment. I certainly find it difficult to keep up with all the legislation that we are at present being asked to look at. I would like to be speaking today on the legislation in the Chamber but cannot because I am here, and so on. The idea that the main purpose of the House of Commons is scrutiny is completely wrong—accountability, yes, because they are elected. They are accountable to the voters, unlike all of us here.
At the heart of, if I may say so, the Treasury’s misreading of this situation is its not distinguishing between accountability, scrutiny and independence. Yes, we want the regulators to be independent and to have scrutiny, but we also want accountability. They need to be able to explain why they have done or are proposing certain things. To argue that that is achieved by getting them to send a copy of their latest consultation documents, which they might have spent two years thinking about, and that they will respond to letters and representations from committees that are overloaded and focused on long-term scrutiny is just—I am sorry to use the word—fatuous. It does not begin to meet the challenge created by the decisions to leave the European Union and to give the responsibility for these regulations to the regulators.
My noble friend the Minister keeps referring to the legislation that was passed in FSMA. As my noble friend Lord Bridges has said, that was then and this is now. This is a complete sea-change in what is required, and the Bill does not meet the test. My noble friend Lord Bridges asked the Minister to answer the question with a yes or no. Listening to her speech, I thought that was definitely a “yes”—that she does think the Bill provides sufficiently for parliamentary scrutiny and accountability. There is no one else in this Room, who is a Member of this House, who thinks that.
It is not enough to say, “I hear what you say and we will come back at Report stage.” I can see a car crash here. I can see us getting into a fight, which might be represented as a turf war between the Commons and the Lords, but is actually about ensuring that our regulators have the credibility that will come from effective scrutiny and that we get regulations that have been properly accounted for. At the end of the day, it will be for the House of Commons to decide what should happen.
That is the central role of this House. Frankly, it is insulting to this House to say, “Don’t worry your heads about this. The House of Commons and the Treasury Select Committee are the designated bodies to deal with scrutiny on an unprecedented scale.” It is the scale of the thing that I do not think is understood. A little voice in my head says that the Treasury sees itself as providing the scrutiny. Well, how do we hold the Treasury to account for the scrutiny? The argument may be that we do so by asking Oral Questions or Written Questions, but I have heard a few recently and the answers, frankly, do not persuade me that we have effective scrutiny through that route even in this House. I will not give examples as that would be embarrassing to those concerned.
I thought my noble friend the Minister might say, “I’ll grab this as a lifeboat because it is the very least that can be done,” but, actually, my noble friend is sticking to her guns. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, that, if the Government are not prepared to bring forward amendments, we will have to find agreement on a suitable amendment. I think the Government will be defeated; there are very strong feelings on this. I say to my noble friend that she should go back to the Chancellor and to her colleagues and ask whether they really want to get into an unnecessary fight about something that any reasonable person would see is essential for the proper conduct of the financial services in our country, on which we so depend. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord McNicol of West Kilbride) (Lab)
We have had a request from the Minister for an adjournment for 10 minutes, which I am going to grant. The Committee stands adjourned until 5.51 pm, when we will proceed with Amendment 123.
Lord Holmes of Richmond
“(c) be provided with any information or data that the Panel requires in order to fulfil its duties,(d) publish the agendas and minutes of meetings of the Panel, and(e) make publicly available its recommendations in full, including, but not limited to, the evidence base and analysis it used to make its recommendations, the assessed costs and benefits of the FCA’s activities and the range of representations made by Panel members to those recommendations.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require the FCA to provide its CBA Panel with the necessary data and information to undertake its duties and ensure that the Panel’s recommendations were made publicly available.
Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to start this fourth group on day five of Committee. As it is the first time that I have stood up today, I declare my interests in financial services as set out in the register.
I will speak to my Amendments 123, 129, 130, 132, 138 and 139; I thank my noble friend Lady Noakes for co-signing them. In essence, what they try to get at is pretty simple: to enable the CBA panels to be effective in the mission they purport to be set up to achieve.
I present to the Committee a new financial instrument: the ISA. Noble Lords might think that they are familiar with the ISA, but this ISA is “independence, scrutiny and accountability”, which we have heard so much about today and previously in Committee. I gift this particular ISA to my noble friend the Minister. Treat it as a woodworking router or some such device. If we take independence, scrutiny and accountability and apply them throughout the Bill, will she agree that, if current clauses do not stack up, they should be kicked out, improved and changed before Report?
With the CBA panels we currently have a conceptually useful form of ISA approach. However, the difficulty is that, as we have heard with so many other provisions in the Bill, as currently constructed they are the plaything of the regulator, again enabling the regulator to mark its own homework—or, even more so, to simply respond to whatever the CBA panels might say with, to put it in common parlance, “Whatevs”.
Importantly, rather than, for example, the membership of the panels, their agendas and outputs being down to the regulators, this suite of amendments can, in effect, empower a CBA panel to do its job effectively for all our benefit. Consider the membership: would it not be good if at least some of those members came from the sectors, with clear, recent and relevant expertise to bring to bear on the matters at hand?
If Amendment 123 and other amendments in my name—and others in this group, which all have a similar purpose—were agreed, it would enable these panels to operate far more effectively. The panels could also take a cumulative view on the impact of regulatory change. They could have a power of pre-regulatory scrutiny to consider the impact and force the regulator to think again before such regulations are brought into being. They could look at and opine on the overall economic impact of regulatory change. Having such an approach would make it far clearer and more transparent for all to see, when the costs are out there, whether there is necessarily any benefit from a particular change.
When my noble friend the Minister responds, will she agree that the CBA panels are a good thing, but it would be a great thing to fully enable and empower them to pass the ISA test? I beg to move.
Lord Lilley (Con)
My Lords, I did not speak on the previous group of amendments, but I endorse everything that my noble friend Lord Forsyth and the consensus of speakers said on that issue. I also strongly support what my noble friend Lord Holmes has spelled out, in not only proposing his amendment but providing an overview of this whole group.
We all agree that regulators must meet the objectives set by Parliament, but should do so in a cost-effective way, without erring, as regulators can, on the side of overburdensome regulation that makes life simpler for them without consideration of the costs to others. As drafted, the Bill requires both the FCA and the PRA to have two panels that undertake cost-benefit analysis. That is excellent but, as with much else in the Bill, it allows the regulators to mark their own homework or, at least, to appoint most of the panel of examiners who will mark their homework for them.
My Amendments 124 to 128 and 133 to 137 do, in essence, three things. They ensure, first, that all the members, not just the chair, are appointed by the Treasury rather than by the regulators; secondly, that they are independent; and, thirdly, more specifically, that they are not employees of the FCA or the PRA. I hope they find acceptance from the Government and this Committee. They are not contentious and are quite simple. They are within the spirit of the Bill, but simply tighten it up and make sure that what the Government appear to want is achieved without allowing the regulators to take over the process and run it in their own interest.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, I have added my name to the amendments in this group in the name of my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond, and I endorse everything that he said in introducing them. I should also have added my name to my noble friend Lord Lilley’s amendments, because I agree with everything that he said in respect of them.
I congratulate the Government on embedding cost-benefit analysis panels into the architecture of the PRA and FCA. That is a very good thing. These amendments, which focus on transparency and independence, are intended to be helpful and to make the implementation of cost-benefit analysis panels more effective so that we can properly rely on their contribution to regulation. I hope that my noble friend the Minister will welcome these amendments.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
My Lords, again, I have a few niche amendments in this group. I have never been entirely comfortable with statutory panels. I understand their origins as wise men—undoubtedly, they were supposed to be men then—and that they formalise and take into the structures the voices of experienced people, but I am concerned that either they become about favoured sons or daughters or there is a potential to capture the people on the panels. Neither am I necessarily convinced that having them fragmented is all that sensible, because if you discuss things that may be relevant to big business in isolation from the public interest and smaller business, the big picture that is then put together is left to the regulator.
Those are the issues in my mind as I propose my amendments. I was not going to unpick the panels, but I suggest that every panel should have to have on it some representation of the public interest. That is probably already there on the Consumer Panel, but it is not on some of the others. Amendments 141 and 142 are to make sure that, even when you are dealing in a more specialised context, somebody is there putting the pieces together with regard to the bigger picture. I am not saying that they are supposed to keep intervening and doing the consumer bit when you are on the big business bit, but this is part of making sure that you are not too compartmentalised.
For a similar reason I have, in Amendment 143, proposed empowering Parliament to nominate one person to panels. This is part of Parliament representing the public interest. I am not saying that a parliamentarian should be on that panel, but it could choose to do that. In its wisdom, the European Parliament once chose to do that to me, and to some extent I wish that it had not, because it was a lot of work. When we started having these positions through appointment from the ECON committee, the Commission initially did not like it, then eventually it decided that it did rather like it because it helped to join up the processes and open up transparency and communication channels.
That is the point of suggesting that there be a parliamentary nominee. Again, it is just to make sure that we do not have sameness all the time, with the nominations coming from the same place. That is one way that it could be addressed. If others have other ideas to address the same problem, I am quite happy that those be incorporated, but those were the points of my Amendments 141 to 143. I think I am in common cause with the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, who does not want the panels to be the plaything, if you like, of the regulator, and with the noble Lord, Lord Lilley, who thinks that they are appointing their own examiners. I am trying to address the same problem. Whoever’s amendments we work with, the message again is that we need some change in this area.
Lord Flight (Con)
My Lords, the big change over the last decade has been the explosion in the number of people and the costs of those working in the regulatory context. I would have hoped that this debate and further consideration would look at what really adds very little to this Bill but costs a fortune in terms of people.
Lord Ashcombe (Con)
My Lords, before I start, I declare my interest an employee of Marsh Ltd, the insurance broker.
I again find myself supporting my noble friend Lord Holmes. These amendments would ensure that the cost-benefit analysis panels are better equipped to undertake the necessary scrutiny of the regulators’ work by ensuring their independence from the regulators. As the Bill stands, all the powers are given to the regulators in controlling the membership, agendas and outputs of these panels, thus allowing the regulators to set and mark their own homework, as people have said.
These amendments would ensure that the CBA panels have the necessary independence from the regulators by giving them powers to set their own agendas and work programmes. Where appropriate, the work of the panels should be made public. The amendments would ensure that the panels have the powers and authority to gain access to the data and impact assessments on which the regulators propose to make their decisions, including a cumulative cost-benefit analysis to understand the cumulative impact of regulation. The panels would have powers to have two existing representatives—or a number that noble Lords so suggest—in order for the views of the prevailing market to be heard. Importantly, the CBA panels would be given the freedom to offer a view on the overall economic impact and effect on UK competitiveness of regulatory changes, including scrutiny over the regulators’ reporting on the competitiveness objective. Finally, the panels should have the ability to undertake pre-regulatory scrutiny of rules, with the ability to challenge the regulators and seek a response to new regulations coming into force.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, I think I want to commend the Government on actually bringing in the concept of cost-benefit analysis panels. Generally speaking, the amendments in this group elaborate on that and probably make them better balanced. I will certainly be interested to hear the Government’s reaction to them.
We have Amendments 131 and 140 here, which would require the FCA and the PRA respectively to put on their CBA panels
“at least three individuals with experience and expertise in the field of economic crime, with one drawn from the public, private and third sectors”
and to consider
“any economic crime risks posed”
by any new rules they propose. These amendments have come from thinking at the other end and from the organisation Spotlight on Corruption. I thank it for contributing its expertise, and Emma Hardy MP for pursuing the amendments in the Commons.
These amendments are part of our overarching push to highlight the Government’s weaknesses on economic crime, mainly fraud. There are serious concerns from consumers and stakeholders across the board about the slowness of regulators in preventing and tackling the vast amount of economic crime in the system. The size of the prize is vast. Money laundering is estimated to cost the UK £100 billion a year and fraud costs us £137 billion a year. The regulators need to do much more. I hope the Minister will agree that having panel members with specific expertise in economic crime is one way to ensure this, given the perverse ingenuity of the criminals they are up against.
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, perhaps it would be helpful to start with a bit of context behind the Government’s approach to the statutory panels and the new cost-benefit analysis panel established in the Bill. I will then turn to the specific amendments.
The FCA and the PRA are required by FSMA to maintain statutory panels as part of their general duty to consult. As noble Lords have noted, these panels play a vital role in supporting the PRA and the FCA in developing regulatory proposals. As noble Lords have also noted, robust cost-benefit analysis—CBA—is an important part of the regulators’ policy-making process. It helps the regulators to understand the likely impacts of a policy and determine whether a proposed intervention is proportionate.
Respondents to the October 2020 future regulatory framework review consultation recognised the value of cost-benefit analysis but expressed some concern about the rigour and scope of the regulators’ analysis. Several respondents also supported enhanced external challenge as an effective way to improve the quality of the regulators’ cost-benefit analyses. Clause 41 addresses these concerns by introducing requirements for the FCA and the PRA each to establish and maintain a new statutory panel to support the development of their CBAs. Clause 47 includes a requirement for the Bank to consult the PRA cost-benefit analysis panel in relation to its FMI functions, while Schedule 7 includes a requirement for the Payment Systems Regulator to consult the FCA cost-benefit analysis panel. The new CBA panels will have a crucial role to play in providing challenge to regulatory proposals and ensuring sufficient scrutiny of the regulators.
I turn first to Amendments 123, 129, 130, 132, 138 and 139, tabled by my noble friend Lord Holmes, and Amendments 125, 126, 134 and 135, tabled by my noble friend Lord Lilley. The Government agree that the composition of the regulators’ panels is important for ensuring that they can effectively fulfil their role as a critical friend to the regulators. In particular, the Government consider that the CBA panel should benefit from those with experience of working in authorised firms.
During the debate in the Commons, the importance of ensuring that the regulators’ statutory panels, including the new CBA panels, are made up of a diverse range of independent experts was highlighted. In response, the Government introduced Clause 44, which requires the FCA, the PRA and the PSR, when appointing persons to their statutory panels, to ensure that all members are external to the FCA, the PRA, the Treasury, the PSR and the Bank of England. The regulators’ existing panels are currently made up of external members so this requirement will ensure that the approach is standardised and maintained on a long-term basis. In addition, the Government expect the FCA and the PRA to publish responses to the CBA panel’s representations at appropriate intervals, although it would not be appropriate to fix in legislation specific deadlines for independent regulators that may not be deliverable in practice.
Turning to Amendments 131 and 140 from the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, I assure the Committee that the Government are committed to tackling economic crime, as we have discussed in previous debates. This is also a priority for the regulators. For example, since 2015, the FCA has prioritised its strategy to ensure that firms take adequate steps to prevent them being used for financial crime.
Section 1D of FSMA sets out the FCA’s market integrity objective while subsection (2)(b) makes it clear that, in advancing that objective, the FCA must ensure that the financial system is
“not being used for a purpose connected with financial crime”.
The Government therefore expect that consideration of economic crime will feature in the regulators’ considerations when conducting a CBA. This is reflected in the FCA’s existing published guidance for CBA, which sets out that, when considering the rationale for a regulatory proposal, it should be clear what type of market failure or harm it seeks to address—including, for example, economic crime.
Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, I thank everyone who has spoken in this group; indeed, I thank my noble friend the Minister for her response. At the beginning of that response, she set out very clearly the role and purpose of these panels—a role and purpose that could only benefit from much that is in the amendments in this group.
This is an area to which we will return. To pick one example, if good people, even independent people, come through such an approach—as I am sure they will—as currently drafted, they will not be independent appointments; that is clear, and that is just one example. We will need to return to a number of these issues for the sole purpose of making the panels as effective as they can be; this will lead to better regulation, help the regulator and benefit the wider sector. For the time being, however, I beg leave to withdraw Amendment 123.
“Recommendations to FCA and PRA: systemic risk
In section 9Q of the Bank of England Act 1998 (recommendations to FCA and PRA), after subsection (2) insert—“(2A) The Financial Policy Committee may make recommendations to the Pensions Regulator, FCA and PRA about financial stability and systemic risk from investment strategies in Pension Funds, including concentration, risk modelling, margin, collateral and stress testing.(2B) The Financial Policy Committee may request a joint annual report from the Pensions Regulator, PRA and FCA about investment strategies in Pension Funds, and the outcomes of any risk modelling and stress testing, and to highlight aspects of investment or otherwise that may present a risk to financial stability or systemic risk.(2C) The report must be sent to relevant Parliamentary Committees.””
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
My Lords, this is probably an appropriate time to remind the Committee that I am a member of the international Systemic Risk Council and a director of the London Stock Exchange. My three amendments in this group are inspired by the events of last September, when it became necessary for the Bank of England to intervene in the gilt markets, and by the subsequent inquiries into and analysis of liability-driven investment, especially leveraged liability-driven investment.
The Lords Industry and Regulators Committee recently published a 22-page letter to Ministers—it is more like a mini-report—following its investigations into LDI. Among its suggestions was that, like the PRA and the FCA, the Pensions Regulator should come under the “comply or explain” category for recommendations made by the Financial Policy Committee; I am aware that this suggestion was also floated in the Economic Affairs Committee’s session with Sir Paul Tucker. This is exactly what my Amendment 149 would do, together with the necessary context—in this case, regarding
“systemic risk from investment strategies in Pension Funds, including concentration, risk modelling, margin, collateral and stress testing.”
I have also included specific mention of the FCA and the PRA, both to clarify their roles in relation to systemic risk from pension funds and to emphasise that pension funds need to be considered in that context because it is inevitable that there will be far more correlation and groupthink than there would be among other groups of funds. The collective size of pension funds and their substantial role in gilt investment is not going away; the specifics of the Pensions Regulator’s rules and accounting standards relating to pension scheme valuation have driven and will drive that correlation, even if adjustments are made. It would take too long to cover all the things that have come to light but one reason why such an amendment is necessary is to clarify that it is an ongoing source of systemic risk that must be routinely monitored.
It is true that, in 2018, the Financial Policy Committee noted the fact that leverage in pension funds was greater than in hedge funds. It also noted the substantial concentration—indeed, almost a cornering of the market—in index-linked gilts. The claim is that the FPC then worked with TPR, the FCA and the PRA on stress tests. Further analysis by TPR in 2019 highlighted again that there was significant borrowing and leverage in large defined benefit pension funds but, again, it left out analysing the smaller end of the market, where operational challenges were greatest. TPR said that it could not impose on the small schemes, while we heard from L&G in the Industry and Regulators Committee that it got the okay for its pre-existing buffer of 100 basis points.
Frankly, nothing got changed. Nothing was done on leverage. The Bank sat happily by as sponsor companies effectively ran off-balance sheet hedge funds in their pension schemes. Nothing was done about the concentration in index-linked gilts and—guess what?—when the glitch came due, to the mini-Budget, the part of the market that was cornered found it had nobody else to sell to. So, it was a pretty bad job all round. Meanwhile, many are patting themselves on the back because the mark-to-market valuations, following accounting standards based on gilt discount rates, make it look as if liabilities have dropped more than the drop in asset valuations, so they say that the losses do not matter. It is, of course, an illusion: the pensioners are paid out of real assets and the losses will be paid for, down the line, by the sponsor companies and the taxpayer via tax relief. That will be measured in very many billions.
To put in some real figures, pension schemes had assets of £1.8 trillion. Losses are put at £400 billion by the Pension Protection Fund; others reckon it may be £500 billion. The ONS will tell us the actual figure next month. That £400 billion or £500 billion has to be replaced, whether through sponsor contributions or growth. All that will be tax advantaged in some way, thus a loss of maybe some £100 billion to the public purse, without any increase in pensions from which tax would be recouped. None of this is escaped through buyout.
Whether you are a back-patter or a sharper analyst, we cannot afford a repeat and routine reliance on Bank of England intervention. There has to be increased diligence. As part of that, the specific need for the Financial Policy Committee more thoroughly to consider pension funds should be up there in lights and in legislation. That is the basis for the proposal in my Amendment 149.
It will be noticed that I have then amended my own amendment with Amendment 149A, which would also bring accounting standards and the endorsement board under the auspices of the Financial Policy Committee. This is not a totally off-the-wall suggestion because the Bank of England used to have a role in accounting standards back in the day, before Basel standards took over for banks. Nowadays, the Bank is not interested in accounting standards because it does its own calculations. That is, in fact, a quote from an important person at the Bank, who I will not embarrass today because it was made privately, but Andrew Bailey also told the Treasury Select Committee that he did not understand arcane pension fund accounting.
However, accounting standards can substantially affect the economy, financial stability and systemic risk, and there is no systemic oversight. After the financial crisis in the US, Bob Herz, then chair of the Financial Accounting Standards Board, asked to be given accountability to Congress. In the UK, we accept international standards created by the IASB, a private body, after review by the unaccountable endorsement board, which has no financial stability or systemic risk remit or experience.
Liability-driven investment and concentration in gilt investment was driven by the predominant use of gilt discount rates in accounting standards for valuing pension scheme liabilities on corporate balance sheets. The volatility that gave to corporate balance sheets drove towards investments that would match and counteract that volatility—that is, towards gilts and, in particular, away from equities. Indeed, as given in evidence to the Work and Pensions Select Committee, the extent of this is such that the London Stock Exchange listings are the most foreign-owned and most subject to foreign takeovers of any major exchange.
Matching accounting standard valuations has dominated thinking to the extent that the FTSE group of 100 CFOs has written to the Work and Pensions Select Committee, essentially saying, “We’d rather invest in gilts than in ourselves.” Meanwhile, as I have said, the “nothing to see here” illusion in the attitude to pension scheme funding—despite asset losses and because the gilt-linked discount rates on liabilities has made them look smaller—prevails even at the Bank of England over its own pension scheme.
Lord Davies of Brixton (Lab)
I broadly support the proposals in these amendments, although I have doubts and I do not think this is the final answer—I suppose that is what I am struggling to say—in part because I have yet to be convinced that the Bank of England is the appropriate holder of the knowledge on these issues. It is a highly contested area; there are strong views and a range of views.
It is not clearly understood, except perhaps by the noble Baroness who moved this amendment, that there is total confusion between different standards involved in assessing a pension fund. There are the technical provisions under the solvency legislation; the accounting standards set by the accounting bodies so that the sponsor has some idea of the ongoing liabilities to the pension fund; and the standards set by the Pension Protection Fund. They are all important, but they are not the funding standards. The funding standard is the assessment of what money is required to be paid into the scheme to fund future benefits, and none of those other three funding standards is designed to produce that result.
The technical provisions are not a funding standard, just a way of assessing whether further contributions to the scheme are required; they do not tell you what those contributions should be. Similarly, the accounting standard does not tell you how to fund the scheme; it is purely for the purposes of the sponsor, so it has some idea of its financial standing. The standards set by the Pension Protection Fund, which are a specific insurance-type approach, are certainly not a funding standard.
The problem is that there is total confusion, and I am not sure that we can look to the Bank of England in its present state of knowledge, or the financial responsibility committee, to make that assessment. The issue is: who is going to promote this debate and arrive at a conclusion?
Another point that needs to be clearly understood is that pension funds are distinct from insurance offices. They are two financial institutions of a completely different nature. Over the last 20 years we have edged to a situation in which pension funds are expected to behave as though they are insurance companies.
I support the amendments, but I raise some doubts as to whether we can really look to the Bank of England and its committee to provide the clarity that is so sorely needed on these issues.
Baroness Noakes (Con)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, because he knows rather a lot about this area—far more than I and perhaps many other members of this Committee.
I added my name to Amendment 149 in this group from the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, and have little to add to what she said on it. It was genuinely shocking to find out about the risks to financial stability that existed through the use of LDI strategies last September. Even more shocking was the fact that the Financial Policy Committee knew about them but had done very little about it. These amendments would not solve the problem but at least remind the FPC what its job is supposed to be: to identify areas of risk to financial stability and do something about it.
I did not add my name to the noble Baroness’s Amendment 159 because giving wide-ranging responsibilities around financial stability and systemic risk to three separate bodies is just a recipe for confusion and inefficiency. It is perfectly true that none of the three covered itself in glory during the LDI episode, but I do not think the answer is in this amendment.
I am also deeply sceptical about giving the FPC any role in relation to accounting standards, as proposed in the noble Baroness’s Amendment 149A. While individual accounting standards are often flawed, the underlying concept behind accounting standards is sound, because it is trying to ensure that financial statements are prepared in accordance with a consistent and coherent set of principles, and not driven by non-relevant preferences or by events. In a sense, the amendment is trying to shoot the messenger of what accounting standards are bringing in terms of the message.
Accounting standards can have real-world consequences—for example, when what is now IAS 19, which has already been referred to, was introduced, it was almost certainly one of the factors that led to the demise of defined benefit schemes in private sector companies. But that is not a reason for not applying the accounting standard. So, too, if any accounting happens to amplify financial stability risks, the problem is with risk management, not with the accounting. That should be the focus of the FPC, risk management, not the formulation or approval of accounting standards. But as I said, I firmly support Amendment 149.
Lord Sharkey (LD)
My Lords, I add briefly to my noble friend’s comments on the need for a proper and joint assessment of systemic risk in pension funds and their management strategies. I think the need is urgent, as the LDI debacle has shown. Indeed, there is continued turmoil and unrest in the sector. I notice that Risk.net reported last Friday that UK pension funds are exploring legal claims against LDI managers, their fiduciaries who they tasked with running the LDI strategies. Five law firms have told Risk.net that they have been approached by pension schemes invested in both pooled and segregated funds to investigate whether legal action can be taken against the relevant managers.
There are apparently also questions being asked, not surprisingly, about whether fund managers had fully explained to trustees the risks associated with LDI, a point raised by the chair of our Industry and Regulators Committee in his brief letter of 7 February to Andrew Griffiths. It is a point that has a direct bearing on the generation of systemic risk.
Lord Davies of Brixton (Lab)
I intended to make a second point about risk. Everyone tends to think about risk in terms of systemic risk—the finances of the country come under some pressure—but there is another risk that is not given sufficient attention, which is the risk that pension funds will fail to deliver the benefits that people expect to receive. That risk is given insufficient attention, but I hope it will be covered if there is a system where someone is given responsibility to look at risk. There is the risk of not getting out the benefits expected, as well as the risk to the financial system.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
My Lords, I do not particularly understand the technicalities that have been alluded to in this debate. I will just say a word or two about the bigger issue here, which is the problem that human beings as individuals and institutions have with handling low-probability, high-consequence risk. We know that younger human beings, particularly, gamble their lives on it in how they behave.
Of course, I was very close to this because, in 1988, I took over London Underground, which had just killed 31 people. In a sense, the syndrome that led to that was, “Well, it won’t happen”. The defence was that it was unforeseen—that is, the circumstances that led to that catastrophe were unforeseen. Yes, it was unforeseen because it was not looked for. It was not unforeseeable. That is the issue.
Anybody or any organisation—public bodies, in particular—that is responsible for big risks has a duty to pursue the low-probability, high-consequence risks. I think it was the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, who said that this is about risk management. It is much deeper than individual bits and bobs. We have had centuries of knowing just how high the consequences of systemic risk can be. If these amendments can address this problem in the financial world, I hope that the Government will give them a fair wind.
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, as the Chancellor has set out previously, it is vital that lessons are learned from both the recent disruption in the gilt market and the vulnerabilities in leveraged funds that this exposed. Pensions and, more specifically, liability-driven investment—LDI—funds are regulated by a number of different bodies. In the UK, the Pensions Regulator oversees pension schemes and the FCA supervises fund managers that manage LDI funds. Many LDI funds are based overseas; authorities in these jurisdictions are responsible for supervising the funds themselves.
In accountancy, the Financial Reporting Council is responsible for regulating auditors, accountants and actuaries, whereas the UK Endorsement Board works internationally to agree accounting standards and adopts these for use by UK companies. More broadly, considering the financial system as a whole, the Bank of England’s Financial Policy Committee—the FPC—is responsible for monitoring and addressing systemic risks to promote financial stability in the UK.
It is therefore right that the FPC has played and will continue to play an important role in ensuring that vulnerabilities in LDI funds are monitored and tackled. The Government welcome the FPC’s Financial Stability Report from December as an important milestone in the “lessons learned” process. The Government and the Bank of England agree that the FPC’s existing powers and duties remain appropriate and are sufficient to monitor and address the systemic risks associated with pension funds and their investment strategies.
Regarding Amendments 149 and 149A, the FPC already has broad powers of recommendation, as set out in the Bank of England Act 1998. It can make recommendations to the PRA and the FCA on a “comply or explain” basis and can make recommendations to any other persons it deems necessary to fulfil its objectives, including the Pensions Regulator, the Financial Reporting Council or the UK Endorsement Board. The FPC is also able to make recommendations to the Treasury, including in relation to the regulatory perimeter. These powers are used by the FPC to ensure that it can effectively monitor and/or address systemic risks, including those that may arise from pension funds and their investment strategies or accounting standards.
Additionally, the FPC must keep its recommendations under review and publish an assessment of the effectiveness of the committee’s actions in its financial stability reports. These must be published twice per year and laid in Parliament, allowing for further public scrutiny with regard to the impact of any recommendation made by the FPC, including whether it was complied with.
The FPC’s proactive approach to reviewing and addressing systemic risks was demonstrated in December when the FPC recommended that regulatory action be taken as an interim measure by the Pensions Regulator in co-ordination with the FCA and overseas regulators to ensure that LDI funds remain resilient to the higher level of interest rates that they can now withstand, and defined benefit pension scheme trustees and advisers ensure these levels are met in their LDI arrangements. The FPC has welcomed, as a first step, the recent guidance published by the Pensions Regulator in this regard. The FPC can also make recommendations in relation to reporting and monitoring requirements for LDI funds and pension schemes. The FPC’s financial stability reports then provide a public assessment of risks to UK financial stability.
With respect to Amendment 159, the Government agree it is essential that appropriate risk oversight and mitigation systems are in place, including for non-bank financial institutions. Sections 9C and 9G of the Bank of England Act 1998 stipulate that the FPC is responsible for identifying, monitoring and taking action to remove or reduce systemic risks, with a view to protecting and enhancing the resilience of the UK financial system. This responsibility includes risks emanating from all parts of the financial system, including the broader system of non-bank finance such as defined benefit schemes. It is right that this responsibility sits with the FPC which is able to prioritise its work as necessary to improve financial stability. The FPC has well-established processes for achieving this task, working closely with the FCA and the PRA.
Lord Vaux of Harrowden (CB)
The Minister seems to be telling us that it has all the powers it needs and that everything is fine, and yet it happened. What went wrong and how do we fix it, if not this way?
Baroness Penn (Con)
There is ongoing work to look at that question. There has been an interim finding, as it were, setting out a number of recommendations. At the moment what they do not do, in my understanding, is set out the need for increased or different powers. But the noble Lord makes the correct point that we then need to understand whether those powers were used in the most effective way to prevent something like this from happening in the first place. The point I was seeking to make was that, so far in its work in reviewing what went wrong and why, it was not a question of a lack of powers or the inability in its remit to make certain recommendations. That is not to say that that work has concluded or that all the action that we need to take after reflecting on what happened has concluded either.
I was talking about the FPC’s powers and responsibilities to look at risks emanating from all parts of the financial system, including non-bank finance. It has the powers to recommend and, under Section 9H of the 1998 Act, also to direct the FCA and PRA to implement certain measures as specified by Parliament in order to further its objectives. Furthermore, as the IMF noted last year, UK authorities have often taken the lead in international efforts to improve the surveillance of risks beyond the banking sector.
In dealing with Amendment 159, looking at the risk from the non-banking sector in terms of financial stability and echoing my words to the noble Lord, Lord Vaux, the Government’s position is not that those risks are all fine, managed and under control. It is that the FPC has the powers it needs to deal with those risks where it can at a domestic level. In the Chancellor’s annual remit letter to the FPC, he reiterated the importance of prioritising work with international partners to address the vulnerabilities associated with non-banks. The FPC welcomed this recommendation. I say to the Committee that we agree that this area has been identified for more work at an international level but, alongside this co-ordinated international work, the Bank will continue to take unilateral action to reduce domestic vulnerabilities where it is effective and practical to do so.
Lord Tunnicliffe (Lab)
Will the FPC go out of its way to seek out risks—not risks known at the moment or even evolving risks, but the possible risks that could lead to a catastrophic effect?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My understanding is that that is what the FPC does. One of the mechanisms by which it does it is through its stress tests; it operates regular stress testing of the banking system and has also undertaken stress tests of the non-bank system. For example, in the latest Financial Stability Report in December 2022, it included a specific chapter on market-based finance. In 2023 it will run for the first time an exploratory exercise to test the resilience of the financial system against a scenario focused on the risks associated with market-based finance. This is one route by which it seeks to explore and seek out what those risks could be, to help inform understanding of those risks and future policy approaches that should be taken to mitigate them.
As I have said, much of the work needs to take place at an international level, but I accept the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Bowles, that we also need to take unilateral action at home to reduce domestic vulnerabilities where it is effective and practical to do so. That work is ongoing.
I hope I have dealt with the noble Baroness’s amendments and reassured noble Lords that the Government are conscious of the risks—including systemic risks—that can be posed by the non-banking financial sector. With the FPC, we are undertaking further work to ensure that we can better understand and explore those risks, and take domestic action where possible to mitigate them, but also lead the work internationally to ensure a co-ordinated response.
Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)
I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. I will reply to some of the points, but I will start with the Minister’s response. I am a little disappointed in two things. The main point of these amendments is to draw attention to the fact that, while the Bank of England and the FPC maybe had the powers to do things, they did not do them. As the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, and I said, they did not do them after having spotted that the problems were there.
They did something pretty de minimis—some stress tests that basically followed what the industry was already doing—and left out the smaller end of the market. Had they put their thinking caps on, they might have realised that that is exactly where you would have problems with providing collateral. They did not do it because the Pensions Regulator said, “We can’t put this onus on the small schemes”. Maybe that was a comply or explain type of answer, but they just took it as given.
The fact is that, once again, they are shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. I am saying that they need to be more proactive. They have to stop being scared. This was not an issue where, by doing something first, we would have put ourselves at a competitive disadvantage with industry in other countries; that is why you do “hug a mugger” or “let’s do international rules”. I understand it for insurance companies, where there is big competition and if we do something and they do not do it in Europe, there will be issues.
By the same token, if you think you are ever going to get something agreed about insurance companies globally, you will hear some rude expressions. For starters, in the United States it is state-based, and they do not do Solvency II, so it will be very difficult to get that agreement on non-bank financial institutions, which basically means insurance companies. There is absolutely no reason to prevaricate and hide behind NBFI when you are taking about our specific defined benefit pension schemes. It is just an excuse, and I do not buy it. I do not buy it from the Minister, the Chancellor, the regulators or the Bank of England.
Baroness Penn
“(b) demonstrate that the Regulator has had regard to the regulatory principles in section 53 when preparing the proposals,”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that the notification provisions align with the duty in section 49(3) of the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Act 2013 for the Payment Systems Regulator to have regard to the regulatory principles set out in section 53 of that Act.
House of Lords
Introduction: The Lord Bishop of Lichfield
Adult Social Care
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Lord Laming
To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to meet the needs of the 10 million people in England affected by the adult social care system.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord Markham) (Con)
My Lords, 10 million people in England are affected by the adult social care system, including those drawing on care and support, unpaid carers and the workforce. We have made up to £7.5 billion available over two years to put the sector on a stronger financial footing, improve access to social care and address workforce pressures. We will publish further details this spring, setting out how we intend to make improvements to the system.
Lord Laming (CB)
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister. He will know that, at any time, any one of us could suddenly become responsible for the care of another person who has experienced a life-changing condition—indeed, any one of us might need to be cared for in those circumstances. The evidence to the Adult Social Care Committee was extremely compelling, indicating that unpaid carers feel that they carry a huge burden but are largely unappreciated and ignored. One wrote only last week, saying that, “after years and years of nursing experience, I now feel completely worn out and very lonely”. Could the Minister assure the House that the Government will take note of the recommendations of the report?
Lord Markham (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his Question and for the work he has done around this report. As an unpaid carer for a number of years myself, I am familiar with the circumstances and the fact that unpaid carers are the backbone of the social care sector. I like to think that we are making moves in the right direction. The weekly allowance, the ability to have a one-week break and the ability to go to your local authority for extra support where needed are all steps in the right direction. But there is definitely more we will be announcing that we are doing in this space.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, if the Government are moving in the right direction, why have they yet again delayed the implementation of the Dilnot report? Why have they taken no notice of the report from the Select Committee chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth, in 2019, which clearly gave the Government the route forward to deal with this perennial problem?
Lord Markham (Con)
It is lovely to have noble friends.
Given the conversations I am sure we will come to shortly about improving hospital flow and the 13% of beds that are blocked, we felt that the focus needed to be very much on providing beds for short-term care. That is where we wanted to put the £7.5 billion of extra funding. We thought that was the immediate priority because we knew the flow issues were impacting A&E, ambulance wait times and everything else. That is not to say that we do not intend to implement all the Dilnot reforms, but the priorities were very much around improving flow and discharge.
Baroness Barker (LD)
My Lords, when Sajid Javid was Minister for Health and Social Care, he stated publicly what some of us had long suspected: namely, that we have a health and social care system that is predicated on the assumption that people will be looked after primarily by their families. One million people are ageing without children; they do not have close family to look after them. When will his department acknowledge the existence of this group of people, and when will it be a requirement for planners of health and social care to take them into consideration?
Lord Markham (Con)
Again, I would like to say that the big increases in funding—the 20% increase that we are talking about in two years’ time—are very much an acknowledgement that there is a demographic issue here, where more and more people are going to be coming into this situation. That is why we are putting those plans in place and working on the workforce; we are already seeing thousands of people being recruited every month to assist with capacity in the system. So we are putting in place the plans to address that.
Baroness Fraser of Craigmaddie (Con)
My Lords, one of the issues identified in the report of the Adult Social Care Committee, on which I had the privilege to serve with the noble Lord, Lord Laming, was the invisibility of unpaid carers. What are the Government doing to support services to identify unpaid carers, and what more targeted support can we give this vital population—more than just one week of carer’s leave?
Lord Markham (Con)
Again, as I said before, they are the backbone of the system; some of my personal experience attests to that. So I hope that what we were talking about will be seen as the start, rather than the end, of what we are trying to do. But we recognise that it is a decent start, because this issue has been out there for many years and we are starting to address it. Obviously, forums such as these make sure that it is something that more people are aware of. I accept at the same time that a week a year is a start in terms of a break; it is not the end of the situation.
Baroness Meacher (CB)
My Lords, I recognise that the Government are understandably very concerned about public expenditure, but I wonder whether they have recently undertaken a cost-benefit analysis of spending on social care. For £1 million of additional spending on social care, what would be the savings to the health budget? I have a feeling that it could be at least £1 million, and possibly rather more.
Lord Markham (Con)
Absolutely, and that is the whole intention behind the ICSs: the ability in their areas to know local needs and invest in the right places—that is, in social care rather than having people in beds in hospitals, because it is a much more effective use of resources, and also in primary care. We all know that a lot of people go to A&E because they have not got primary care services, so the whole point of the ICSs is that they start to invest where demand is in the area, rather than using hospitals as the place of last resort to go to.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, there is plenty of time for both.
Lord Bradley (Lab)
My Lords, I too was a member of the Select Committee. One of the other key recommendations of our report was the establishment of a commissioner for care and support, to act as a champion for older adults, disabled people and, crucially, for unpaid carers, and that we should prioritise to ensure a review, update and implementation of the Care Act. Do the Government support these proposals?
Lord Markham (Con)
Again, we welcome the report and many aspects of it. What I and my ministerial colleagues care most about is having the results and the impact. I think—and hope that noble Lords will agree when they see the work that she is doing in this space—that Minister Whately is gripping it and providing results. Let us see how that progresses first, because I think that that will have the impact that we need.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)
My Lords, given that the Government promised that they would fix social care, and given that in the Answer to this Question the Minister said that there were 10 million people affected, is it wise to go into a general election without having done so?
Lord Markham (Con)
As ever, I thank my noble friend for his friendly questions. No; we know that this is an area that needs to be addressed, and I think that it is an area that we are addressing. I have been up here for about five months now, and in the time that I have been here, we have announced a £7.5 billion increase in spending over two years, a £700 million discharge fund over this year, and the recruitment of thousands of people every month from overseas. Yes, there is a lot more to be done, but there have been some very solid results in the meantime.
Baroness Wheeler (Lab)
My Lords, on that theme, the Minister makes much of the Government’s historic £7.5 billion social care funding settlement, but he knows that it has been and remains seriously underfunded—the Health Foundation’s estimate is a £12 billion a year shortfall. As the excellent Lords committee underlines, it is no good attempting to resolve the social care crisis by providing short-term funding for more care packages while still depending on local authority council tax flexibility to raise the extra funds. Is the Minister concerned that three-quarters of the largest councils in England with responsibility for social care have been left with no choice but to raise their council tax by the full 4.99% increase, just to keep current inadequate levels of service going?
Lord Markham (Con)
I am aware of some of the challenges raised by funding through the local authority system—and I say that as a former deputy leader of a local authority, so I am very familiar with the situations at play there. At the same time, we have put a lot of the central funding in place to make sure the security is there. As I said, we will see more measures as Minister Whately announces them in the spring, not far from here; there will be further progress in this area.
Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)
My Lords, one group of carers is made up of children. What are the Government doing to help local authorities to identify and to give extra help to children?
Lord Markham (Con)
I am aware of the many circumstances where it suddenly falls to children, who obviously have their own demanding situation with education and are suddenly expected to provide a lot of care. We have tried putting steps in place with the local authorities so they can provide further support to children. We know that childhood is a critical part of their own development, so expecting them to look after a parent is not the right way around, if I can put it that way. So we have done work there, but there is more to be done.
Emergency Planning
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Baroness Neville-Rolfe) (Con)
The Civil Contingencies Act sets out the framework for emergency planning in the UK, which the Government have a legal obligation to review every five years. The most recent review was published in March 2022, which concluded that the Act continues to achieve its stated objectives, but it also set out recommendations to strengthen the system and its planning. The resilience framework published in December sets out the Government’s wider approach to strengthening our resilience to all risks.
Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
Considering the crisis in local government finance and the ongoing spectre of ambulances queuing at hospitals, how many emergency planning bodies have raised major concerns about our resilience in the event of a major disaster?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
As the noble Lord suggests, we have a well-developed system of local resilience through the 38 local resilience forums. I have received no reports myself of particular concerns they have raised on this matter. It is more a matter for DLUHC than for the Cabinet Office, but I will look into it and get back to the noble Lord.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, what lessons have the Government learned from the failure to anticipate a major pandemic of the sort we have now faced with Covid? Have the Government initiated any new proposals for contingency planning ahead of major predictable crises of that sort?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
The Government had the advantage—or disadvantage—of the lessons from Covid, when they were conducting the review I mentioned. Since then, they have published the UK Government Resilience Framework, which shows a lot of frameworks. A completely independent review is also going on, the Covid inquiry, which I am sure will teach us more lessons on what to do in serious emergencies in the future.
Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)
My Lords, I refer to my interests in the register. Can the Minister tell us the Government’s assessment of the efficacy of the Serco contract delivering the Emergency Planning College? Can she comment on the future of the Emergency Planning College, given the suggestions that the site is likely to be sold?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
This is not a contract that I have had anything to do with. The noble Lord always asks very good questions on contingency planning. I will look into it and get back to him.
Lord Stirrup (CB)
My Lords, the response to any serious emergency hinges a very great deal upon the emergency services. What impact does the Minister think the incorporation of Chinese technology and components into police force equipment is likely to have on our own resilience?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
The noble and gallant Lord will be aware that we made a Statement before Christmas about the use of Chinese technology in cameras and so on. Obviously, we are putting a lot more resources into security. This is one of the issues that is under careful consideration, and it has of course been discussed during the passage of the Procurement Bill in recent times. I draw noble Lords’ attention to the steps that we have already taken and the way we keep a careful eye on these matters.
Lord Cormack (Con)
Does my noble friend agree that what is needed is not “careful consideration” but real action?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I have already described some of the real action that we have taken. I also draw my noble friend’s attention to some of the provisions in Schedules 6 and 7 to the Procurement Bill that is now going through the other House, the debates that we have had here, the debates we will no doubt have again and the careful steps that we are taking in relation to these important issues.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, the ongoing emergency of sewage despoliation and the death of our rivers and coastlines is something the Government do not seem to be acting on at all. Last year, on 8 September, the then Secretary of State for the Environment—I cannot even remember which one it was—told water companies to produce a plan within 14 days. It is 165 days later and there is no plan. I gather water companies have been told again. When are the Government going to deal with this ongoing emergency?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I share the noble Baroness’s concern about our rivers and, of course, we worked together to amend the Environment Bill on this issue. Now, she is rightly asking about the follow-up. This is not a matter for me but for Defra. However, I can assure her that our national security risk assessment looks at these issues and makes sure that, going forward, plans are right and proper.
Baroness Twycross (Lab)
My Lords, I declare an interest as London’s Deputy Mayor for Fire and Resilience and chair of the London Resilience Forum. The focus on skills in the recently published resilience framework on training and exercising is welcome, but it is vital that this provides the skills needed and it is properly resourced. Can the Minister provide further detail on how her plans for the proposed UK resilience academy are progressing and how this will contribute to both prevention and preparedness? Also, have the Government ear-marked funding for a major exercise along the lines of Exercise Unified Response that took place seven years ago? This would provide responders from across all sectors represented on local resilience forums the opportunity to gain valuable skills in advance of needing them.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I agree on the importance of the local resilience and the testing and trialling that the noble Baroness talks about. On actual funding, I will come back to her, but the new approach that has been taken in the resilience reform and in the UK Resilience Forum meeting, that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster presided over himself recently, is on the importance of emergency preparedness. The focus on skills is also a focus in cabinet committee work on these issues. So I hope I have given her some assurance that this is work we are pushing ahead with
Baroness Berridge (Con)
My Lords, recently in your Lordships’ House we have had cause to talk about the strategic risk, in various departments, of certain building materials—particularly of certain concrete in schools but which also potentially affects our hospitals. Is that something that is caught by this resilience framework: a risk such as that, which could materialise, that covers more than one government department? If it is not within the framework, is the Minister’s department co-ordinating what the response would have to be across government if that failure of building material unfortunately materialises?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
We certainly have a co-ordination role, especially where risks affect more than one department. The work that we have done on the national security risk assessment outlines, each time that it is done, the biggest risks that we see. Having dealt a lot with buildings, I can understand exactly what my noble friend’s concern might be, particularly in relation to schools. We are looking at the risk assessment at the moment, and we will be publishing a new national risk register this year. I will take away the point about schools that she has so helpfully raised today.
Lord West of Spithead (Lab)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that we should be more proactive in terms of the advice given to households for when there is a major crisis or emergency? We used to very clearly tell households about having batteries, torches, water purifiers and a wind-up radio and the frequencies to listen in on when these emergencies happened. We now have a website, but people are not told. Does the Minister believe that we should actually tell people what it would be useful to have? They do not have to have it but, my goodness me, if anything goes wrong, it is very useful to have those things.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
DLUHC is working with the local resilience forums to work out what we should be doing in the light of the latest developments. I agree that the focus on the website is not always great, particularly when websites go down during emergencies, which has been my own experience. I have dealt locally with people who deal with emergencies, notably on Covid. The voluntary effort that comes forth when emergencies take place and all the good things that are done are really impressive. We have to learn from that and put that into the system, as it were, for the future. I take the point about making sure that people know, by leaflets and so on as well as by websites, what they need to do in the case of an emergency.
Lord Kamall (Con)
The noble Lord opposite talked about the website for resilience. For the benefit of noble Lords who are not yet aware of this website, can my noble friend the Minister share the URL for that website so that we can evangelise about it on her behalf?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I will certainly take forward my noble friend’s idea. I have also been impressed by the system that the mobile phone operators have that you can ring if your electricity goes down. These things exist, but the point—as expressed so powerfully on the other Benches—is that we need to make sure that people know what to do when flooding comes or there are other local difficulties. That is why we have put in a new head of resilience within the Cabinet Office and have published the risk framework. We are open to new ideas, both on substance and on communication, as I hope that I have shown.
Civil Service: Digital Skills
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Lord Clement-Jones
To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they intend to take in response to the Global Government Forum report UK civil service digital skills, published on 29 November 2022.
The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Baroness Neville-Rolfe) (Con)
My Lords, the Government are already taking action to build digital skills at scale and have a clear road map, set out in the Transforming for a Digital Future strategy, which we published in June 2022. The road map has set a target to upskill at least 90% of senior civil servants in digital and data by 2025 and to strengthen the attraction and retention of digital talent by bolstering the Government’s recruitment brand and pay offer for specialist skills.
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
My Lords, the Government claim that their 2022-25 digital and data road map will usher in a
“new era of digital transformation”
for public service improvement, yet Civil Service skills are clearly inadequate to deliver it. As the NAO has pointed out, there has been
“a consistent pattern of underperformance”
in public services for many years. What will be different this time? Is not the road map another example of this Government’s wishful thinking?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
It is important to have an ambition and a road map if you are going to move things forward. We have a Prime Minister who regards the digital and data area as very important. We have set out our digital future strategy, which includes, on the point that the noble Lord is concerned about, that 90% of senior civil servants will be upskilled in digital and data through that programme. Digital professionals will also have top-up training every year. We are moving to recruit a lot more civil servants in the digital and data area; we have 4,000 vacancies, which is too many, but we are doing everything that we can to attract more people. This includes a capability-based pay scheme and much more focus on the regions, where we believe that we can get more digital talent out of the universities, often working away from London in centres such as Cardiff and Darlington.
Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, to pick up that last point, the Government’s own digital tsar—the head of digital services—does not underestimate the difficulty of attracting those professional staff because of the salary issue. Does the Minister think that this road map will properly address that? Is it not about time we spent less on consultants, who we are paying millions for, and more on the wages of our digital experts in the Civil Service?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I believe that is actually the direction of travel. We are bringing in more of a capability-based pay scheme, which will allow us to track and keep these people who are in hot demand in a competitive market—as I know only too well. The Civil Service jobs are very interesting; if we could sort out a route for people to come in and work on digital data, and perhaps even go out again, and so improve our skills and work on these important projects, that would make a huge difference. The establishment of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology—DSIT—is going to make a difference as well, in setting the tone and encouraging people to come and work on the very real data and skills challenges that we now have in the Civil Service.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for the Question about skills but values are just as important as skills in the digital space. Could the Minister tell your Lordships’ House what the Government intend by way of promoting fundamental rights and freedoms in that space—whether it is the right not to be degraded, the right to personal digital privacy, the right not to be discriminated against or, crucially, the right to decisions on things that matter being made by a human being and not an algorithm?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
The noble Baroness raises important points, and these are going to be debated a lot in the Online Safety Bill. In the Civil Service, we have a clear set of values—public service values. The Central Digital and Data Office is set up to look at how best to transform public services, but in a way that is appropriately balanced between using things such as AI and making sure that people’s rights and responsibilities are protected. We have the Data Protection Act and the Information Commissioner’s Office to help us in that process.
Lord Boswell of Aynho (Non-Afl)
My Lords, having been at one stage a civil servant colleague of the current Minister, and declaring my interest as someone who went on to become a Minister and who has a daughter who has taken the same path from one to the other, I ask if we could have a gentle assurance that the Minister will use her best endeavours to ensure that these healthy disciplines are extended to Members of His Majesty’s Government as well. If they understand what civil servants are talking about, they can challenge it and produce a better overall conclusion.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
It is a pleasure to see the noble Lord in his place; I congratulate him on his return and on his daughter’s eminence. The answer is that of course Ministers need to be educated in digital and data matters as well. We are doing our own small part in the Cabinet Office by ensuring that the induction that Ministers are given on security, for example, has a suitable data element. There is the broader point of what data can bring to growth and science. I earlier referenced the new department, DSIT, which is symptomatic of the change that we are trying to make in government to think more of AI, the cloud and data. To go back to the noble Baroness’s point, we are also trying to make sure that we are thinking about people and values at the same time.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, the British Government are lagging behind several of their European counterparts in digital transformation. Can the Minister say what she regards as the other obstacles, apart from lack of skills? Are there still legal obstacles, in that the way data is handled by different departments is different under existing Acts, or are there other obstacles that we need to tackle in order to catch up with the Baltic states and others that have gone a great deal further in moving towards efficient digital government?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I used to sit on the Competitiveness Council in Brussels, in the days when we were in the EU, and learned a lot from the Estonians—but of course they have a much smaller country and they were able to start everything digitally. I think people have admired us for the step we took, now 10 years ago, with GOV.UK, hosting all government paperwork and data. That now has 99% recognition across the UK, which I find very surprising. To answer the question, there are of course difficulties. Digital skills, which is the subject of this Question, is probably the biggest difficulty, but data sharing is also very important. We are finding this with all the various data initiatives we are doing—for example, I am working on borders—where being able to share data between companies, or to share individuals’ data between departments, is extremely important. We are gradually making sure that we are getting the right powers to do that in different areas as Bills come before your Lordships’ House.
Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
My Lords, what targets have been set to upskill Peers of the realm?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I think that is a matter for the House authorities, but I will happily pursue it for the noble Lord.
Lord Kamall (Con)
My noble friend the Minister is absolutely right to say that countries such as Estonia and Latvia were able to leap-frog—they did not have the encumbrance of legacy technologies. Can she tell us the thinking around how legacy technology—not only the technology itself but the processes around that technology—can often hold back progress?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I can tell my noble friend a lot about what we did at Tesco on this matter. We had a spaghetti junction of old technology and what we did—I am sure noble Lords will be interested in this—was bring in systems that were compatible with one another. We gradually got rid of the spaghetti junction of technology and moved to new technology across the board. It is about those sorts of principles. Alex Burghart, the very energetic Minister concerned, heads at ministerial level the Central Digital and Data Office. It is these sorts of issues that we are looking at, so as to make sure that the transformation to digital that we need is efficient, smooth and speedy, and does not cause lots of legacy problems. I think we all know of experiences in different government departments where these already exist.
Lord Howell of Guildford (Con)
My Lords, just to balance the argument on efficient digital government, we need to be quite careful, do we not, that we do not all end up, in communicating with officialdom, talking to artificial intelligence systems or to robots?
Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)
I share my noble friend’s concern. I will say that artificial intelligence and robotics are actually improving efficiency in some of the services that one uses, such as banking, so that we move through the telephone options and find a person, but they are absolutely no substitute, to my mind, for having proper customer care where that is needed. There is sometimes a risk that we can get exclusion and other problems if we go too far over the top. That is why I emphasised the importance of this new department and the ability it will have to devote more attention to these sorts of incredibly important issues. AI can be a plus but it can also be a risk. We really need to look internationally and do everything that we can.
Leasehold Charges
(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Lord Kennedy of Southwark
To ask His Majesty’s Government what plans they have to ensure managing agents and freeholders (1) are more transparent with leaseholders on the makeup of the charges they levy, and (2) ring fence the money raised by such charges.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lord Kennedy of Southwark, and with his permission, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in his name on the Order Paper and draw the attention of the House to his relevant interest as a leaseholder.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)
Service charges must be reasonable and where costs relate to work or services, they must be of a reasonable standard. Such moneys must be held in trust unless specifically exempt and used for their intended purposes. We are committed to ensuring that residents have more information on what their costs pay for, and this will help them more effectively to challenge their landlord if they consider their fees to be unreasonable. We will bring further reforms later in this Parliament.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, there seems to be some confusion regarding statements made in the other place and in the media by the Secretary of State, the Member for Surrey Heath. In the other place, he talks of the reform of leasehold as a tenure of housing, yet in the media he talks about the abolition of leasehold tenure. Can the Minister tell the House which it is: reform or abolition? It cannot be both. Leaseholders deserve absolute clarity on the intentions of government.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
The Government would absolutely agree with that. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State set out in the Commons his intention to bring the outdated and feudal leasehold system to an end.
Lord Young of Cookham (Con)
My Lords, last month I asked my noble friend if she would publish the promised leasehold reform Bill in draft. She said she would love to, if only to stop the question being repeatedly asked; but she then declined. We now know that the next Session is not going to start until the autumn. Is there not now adequate time to publish the Bill in draft and knock it into shape before the last Session of this Parliament, which may be foreshortened?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I thank my noble friend, who perhaps knows more than I do about when that Bill will come to the other place and then to this House. Seriously, publishing a draft at this stage would slow the process down and I do not think any of us wants to do that. But I do welcome the engagement we are already regularly having on leasehold and commonhold reform. I am very happy to work continually with MPs, noble Lords and wider stakeholders until the Bill comes to the House.
The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)
My Lords, there will now be a remote contribution from the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours.
Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab) [V]
My Lords, as part of a question I asked last June on the levying of escalating service charges, I asked whether the Government might consider a scheme for rolling up service charges in a debenture against property title—effectively, a rising legal charge. The debenture holder would pay the resident’s service charge, interest-serviced or otherwise, clawing back payments on death or prior. The Minister promised to consider the idea. Will the Minister check on developments in the department and let the House know where we stand?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I thank the noble Lord. I do remember his question and I am sorry I have not checked up on this recently. I will do so and will respond to the noble Lord.
Lord Naseby (Con)
My Lords, can we not acknowledge that the debenture issue is not new but has been going on for years? In this section of the housing market, both tenants and landlords do not know their mutual responsibilities. Is it not time for a draft Bill, so that there can be proper detailed discussions and action can be taken for the benefit of both parties?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
The Government recognise the strength of feeling in this House in particular, and the other place, on the leasehold issue, but it is complex and needs careful consideration. The Government have said that we will bring a Bill forward in this Parliament and that is what we intend to do.
Lord Best (CB)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that proper consumer protection is particularly important for older people, who may be downsizing or rightsizing to retirement apartments and feel totally confused by the plethora of service charges, exit fees, commission fees and commission on insurance? Is this vulnerable group not particularly important in leasehold reform? Otherwise, who is going to downsize or rightsize ever, knowing the difficulties they may well face?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
The noble Lord is absolutely right. This is an important issue, particularly for older people who may be considering downsizing. It is just too complex at the moment. That is what we will be dealing with as we move forward, and I thank the noble Lord for all his help in doing so.
Baroness Thornhill (LD)
My Lords, the points raised in the Question from the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, are, in fact, all covered by very good codes of practice, advice from government and professional bodies. The problem is that there is no enforcement and no sanctions. Evidence from the First-tier Tribunal chamber and the Leasehold Advisory Service shows that this is happening all too often. When will there be a regulator with teeth, as recommended in the report by the noble Lord, Lord Best, or will the Government at least consider making the First-tier Tribunal’s decisions legally binding?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
We will certainly have a social housing regulator once we get the Social Housing (Regulation) Bill through the other place and back through here, and I hope that will be as soon as possible. Regarding the noble Baroness’s other concerns, we will have to be patient and wait for the Bill to come forward.
Baroness Hayter of Kentish Town (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Best, came up with a recommendation that we thought the Government had accepted: to regulate all property agents, which would cover the managing agents and the questions that have been raised today. I chaired the committee which gave the Government a code of conduct, ready for that regulator to start work. Why cannot we get on and regulate the agents, who are the problem with all the issues that have been raised?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
We are taking very seriously the issue of property agents and are committed to promoting fairness and transparency for tenants and homeowners in this space. The commitment also includes raising professionalisation and standards among property agents—letting estate and managing agents. The Government welcome the ongoing work being undertaken by the industry itself. Interestingly, since the noble Lord, Lord Best’s report, the industry is doing something different and is working better. We will continue to work with the noble Lord and his working group on what more we can do to ensure that property agents are behaving professionally.
The Lord Bishop of Gloucester
My Lords, some of the most vulnerable in society, including prison leavers and refugees, can be heavily penalised by the housing system. In the south-west, there is a joint project with the police and crime commissioner to manufacture low-cost eco-pods which provide not only employment and skills for prisoners on day release but a potential solution to rehousing vulnerable people. What is being done to speed up this sort of housing provision for vulnerable groups?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I thank the right reverend Prelate for that question; I do not know what is being done, but I will certainly get an answer. I know from personal experience that these pods can work very well, particularly for homeless people. In the short term and in bad weather, in local communities—even next door to local authority town halls, et cetera—they can give the shelter that is required during difficult times for very vulnerable people. However, I will get an update.
Lord Hayward (Con)
Many of the freeholders of the leasehold properties are councils, including Southwark Council, where I live. Many of the leaseholders have extreme difficulty in getting information on the nature of the charges. Will any guidance, or stronger, issued to freeholders and managing agents be clearly applicable to local councils as well?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My noble friend is absolutely right, and the department is fully aware of these issues. I cannot talk about an individual case, but we recognise that too many landlords are failing to provide sufficient information to leaseholders, who should have a right to that information, as stated in their lease. The Government do not think that existing requirements go far enough to enable leaseholders to find out about these issues, and we will take action to support and empower them in the future.
Capital Projects: Spending Decisions
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, with local government having lost £15 billion since 2010, communities up and down the country are desperate for investment. Unfortunately, many of the successful bids to the first round of the levelling-up fund are yet to put shovels in the ground because the impact of inflation has made construction unviable. Given that we are now told that the Secretary of State no longer has the authority to sign off spending, does the Minister expect local authorities to fill this funding gap themselves?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)
No, we do not expect local authorities to fill the funding gap. There has been an issue—that of inflation—across many of the programmes. There is no additional funding, but we are working with local authorities to ensure that local priorities can still be delivered. Where requests for rescoping are submitted, we are looking to deal with those flexibly, provided that the changes are still likely to represent good value for money. We are also providing £6.5 million of support for local authorities. We will be evaluating, and those evaluations will be made public.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
My Lords, I remind the House of my relevant interests. The highly respected and independent Institute for Government wrote last month that the levelling-up fund
“is another ineffective competitive funding pot that is neither large enough nor targeted enough to make a dent in regional inequalities.”
Does the Minister agree? If not, what is wrong with that statement?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
No, I do not agree. I think that a £9.9 billion investment into levelling up shows a Government who are putting their money where their mouth is. They are delivering levelling up across the country and will do so in future. They have already done so with the future high streets fund, the towns fund, the UK shared prosperity fund—which is about to come out—and even small funds such as the community renewal fund. These are all delivering things for people in this country.
Lord Young of Cookham (Con)
My Lords, on the issue of capital spending, three local authorities have made disastrous capital investments and are now having to raise their council tax by more than the cap in order to rebuild their balances. Should not they have been obliged to hold a local referendum to explain their imprudence to the local electorate, rather than blaming the Government for the increase?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I think my noble friend is speaking about the significant failures in Thurrock, Croydon and Slough. These authorities have asked the Government for flexibility to increase their council tax by an additional amount. Given the exceptional financial difficulties which, I have to say, were driven by poor decision-making in the past, the Government felt that we should not oppose their request. It is important that the councils remain working to deliver services, but I assure the House that we are working with them, challenging them, and have people in there to make sure that they improve and recover.
Lord Hain (Lab)
My Lords, is not the levelling-up money—whatever pots the noble Baroness mentions that there might be—pitiful compared with the £180 billion of austerity cuts taken mostly out of those local communities that need levelling up? Surely what is needed, rather than prettifying town centres and projects like that, is investment in local skills in the local economy to build the new economies of the future, to make these communities have some hope instead of despair.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, if you look at the missions in the levelling-up Bill, you can see that all those things are important. It is up to local authorities, though, together with the private sector and the voluntary sector, to put forward their ideas in their places, as to how they feel that they can deliver those improvements, such as economic investment in their area. It is up to local authorities—but I agree with the noble Lord that there are many more things that we can do in order to encourage, in those particular areas, a true economic development.
Lord Trefgarne (Con)
My Lords, can the Minister offer any advice to Woking Borough Council, where I live, which is more than £1 billion adrift?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I am very sorry to say to my noble friend that no, I cannot. I am sure that there are people within the department who will be working with that borough council in order to help it through its difficulties.
Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill
Monday 20th February 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 View all Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: HL Bill 84-II Second marshalled list for Committee - (20 Feb 2023)
Baroness Pinnock
Member's explanatory statement
This is a probing amendment to explore the meaning of the phrase “levelling-up” and whether this part is sufficient to support the aims of “levelling-up”.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
My Lords, we have a lot of scrutiny of this Bill before us. Before we start, I want to explore what is meant by levelling up, and whether there is a broad agreement as to its definition and purpose. My amendment proposes to remove the words “levelling up”, as the content of the Bill fails to live up to the aspiration as described in the levelling-up White Paper.
Here is one definition. The purpose of levelling up is,
“to break that link between geography and destiny so that it makes good business sense for the private sector to invest in areas that have, for too long, felt left behind ... A vision for the future that will see public spending on R&D increased in every part of the country; transport connectivity reaching London-like levels within and between all our towns and cities; faster broadband in every community; life expectancies rising; violent crime falling; schools improving; and private sector investment unleashed.”
That is the former Prime Minister’s explanation, set out in the foreword to the levelling-up White Paper.
Does levelling up refer to this? The White Paper says:
“There are stark geographical inequalities between and within our cities, towns and villages … It is about unleashing opportunity, prosperity and pride in places where, for too long, it has been held back.”
These words were those of the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, and Andy Haldane, formerly of the Bank of England, in a further foreword to the White Paper.
The executive summary of the White Paper spells out the purpose very clearly:
“This requires us to end the geographical inequality which is such a striking feature of the UK … This programme has to be broad, deep and long-term. It has to be rooted in evidence demonstrating that a mix of factors is needed to transform places and boost local growth: strong innovation and a climate conducive to private sector investment, better skills, improved transport systems, greater access to culture, stronger pride in place, deeper trust, greater safety and more resilient institutions.”
Therefore, throughout the White Paper, on which presumably the Bill is based, there is a clear focus on geographical disparities and inequalities. These inequalities, it is argued, harm the whole of the country, not only for the lost opportunities of lower incomes and skills but because the consequence is lower growth, which has a negative pull on the country as a whole.
The levelling-up fund is, I assume, a precursor to a wider strategy. If so, it is instructive to analyse which areas have been granted funds in the first two rounds. If levelling up was to be laser-like in addressing the worst of the geographic inequalities, levelling-up grants would be targeted at those parts of the country deemed to be suffering the greatest inequalities as defined by the White Paper. Yet, as the House of Commons Library has shown, those areas categorised by the Government as priority 1 for grant funding had just 59% of the total funding available. Over £1 billion from the levelling-up fund was allocated to areas not deemed in greatest need; those were in priority 2 and even priority 3 areas.
That is not levelling up as defined by the White Paper; it is spreading the government funding jam way too thinly. Of course there will be, within every area, pockets of deprivation. Empowering and enabling local councils to tackle smaller areas of deprivation is probably the most effective way to do so. The levelling-up White Paper, however, is setting out a strategy, not for tackling individual poverty or small areas of deprivation but for finding solutions to economically underperforming places. Will the Minister clarify whether levelling up is to tackle individual poverty or to narrow the gaps as proposed by the metrics in the annexe to the White Paper?
The White Paper—it is a good read—also states:
“The UK has larger geographical differences than many other developed countries on multiple measures, including productivity, pay, educational attainment and health … While London and much of the South East have benefited economically, former industrial centres and many coastal communities have suffered. This has left deep and lasting scars in many of these places, damaging skills, jobs, innovation, pride in place, health and wellbeing.”
In chapter 1 of the White Paper the analysis is most clearly stated:
“The UK’s spatial disparities are also among the largest across advanced economies on a number of measures, including productivity and income per head … When assessed across 28 different measures—using different spatial units of analysis, different measures of prosperity and different indices of inequality—the UK has been found to be one of the most spatially unequal countries among the OECD.”
The Bill offers an opportunity to fulfil the aspirations set out in the White Paper. Currently, it fails to do so. The missions and capitals described in the White Paper must be part of this Bill. The Bill should then establish the legislation to enable those missions to be enacted. It fails to do so.
This is a complex Bill addressing, in part, one element of the White Paper missions, that of wider local devolution. It also has a detailed section on planning reform which may—or may not—add to a mission to narrow spatial gaps. Yet measures to enable the big strategy of levelling up are simply not there. Levelling up is a slogan seeking some substance. For the sake of millions of people, the substance and the financial commitment are desperately needed. I beg to move.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for tabling this amendment because it gives us the opportunity to pinpoint the tension at the heart of the levelling-up agenda. As the impact assessment reminds us, the problem it claims to address concerns unequal shares and opportunities, and levelling up
“is a mission to challenge, and change, that unfairness.”
It means
“giving everyone the opportunity to flourish”
and to have
“longer and more fulfilling lives”,
together with
“sustained rises in living standards and well-being”
for people everywhere. In fact, this is a statement about people, not places, as reflected in some of the missions. Yet the impact assessment states that achieving the aims of levelling up
“requires us to end the geographical inequality which is such a striking feature of the UK.”
The Minister’s levelling-up letter explains that the missions are necessarily spatial—but why are they purely spatial and geographical when inequalities of income and wealth between individuals are also striking features of the UK? A report published by the Social Market Foundation, called Beyond Levelling Up and written by a former senior adviser to recent Conservative Chancellors, argues that this approach to levelling up
“avoids the question of whether we think the gap between rich and poor is acceptable, and whether we are comfortable with the current levels of income and wealth accruing to the richest in society.”
I will leave those in poverty until a later amendment. To make matters worse, ONS data shows that inequality has worsened since he wrote the report, and it is worse still if we use alternative measures on inequality.
I ask the Minister if she thinks the gap between rich and poor is acceptable. How does she think that the levelling-up agenda’s ambitions can be achieved without addressing that gap between rich and poor?
Lord Shipley (LD)
My Lords, I declare, for Committee stage as a whole, that I am a vice-president of the Local Government Association and a vice-president of the National Energy Action advisory board.
I thank my noble friend Lady Pinnock for raising this issue; it is very important that we have a shared understanding of what we mean by levelling up. For me, I think it is the second option she gave, which is narrowing the gap. If we were to compare ourselves with Germany, we would find that there is a constitutional requirement in Germany for the 16 Länder to support each other, and the outcomes are assessed in terms of how well off the Länder are and using the many criteria we will be debating later today—there are so many criteria you can use. However, it is important that we understand the Government’s precise objectives with the Bill.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, on a brilliant opening speech that leaves hardly anything else to be discussed.
I completely agree about the disparity between rich and poor and that that must be addressed. However, there are things that do not depend quite so much on wealth, such as health and happiness, and access to green spaces. All these things are part of what levelling up ought to include. I am quite keen to see this Government understand that health is about not only improving the NHS—which, clearly, they have given up on completely—but how people see themselves and the opportunities that they have locally. So I am looking forward to this Bill. It will be a long slog for the Minister; I am sorry about that.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for bringing forward this probing amendment. When we look at the Bill, we need to consider what the Government mean by “levelling up” and whether the beginning of the Bill is sufficient to support the aims that were laid out in the White Paper. As we heard at Second Reading, much of what was in the White Paper is not here—including, as we have heard, the actual missions, which seems to me quite remarkable.
As we have previously discussed, the Bill does not really look like a levelling-up Bill. It looks more like a planning and devolution Bill, and planning and devolution on their own will not deliver the kinds of levelling up that our country needs. So we support this amendment for doing what needs to be done—probing exactly what the Government are intending. The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, reminded us of the words of our former Prime Minister and of the Secretary of State, and of the ambitions of the White Paper, which we need to be discussing in future amendments that we will have in Committee. That context is very important.
So how do we define levelling up? It can mean an awful lot of different things to different people. It will also take an accumulation of good understanding and good investment if we are to come close to meeting the different agendas laid out by the Government in the White Paper. For example, social infrastructure has to be equally invested in, alongside physical infrastructure, if we are to make a positive and sustainable impact.
Is levelling up a genuine policy or just a catchphrase—which is sometimes what it feels like? As the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, asked, is this just a branding exercise? We need confidence that the Government are serious about this: if it is a genuine policy that they want to make a reality, it will need an awful lot more cash than currently seems to be on offer.
The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, talked about funding. The Centre for Inequality and Levelling Up is based at the University of West London. It calculated that the levelling-up funds total £20 billion, but clearer criteria for defining what constitutes a levelling-up fund are needed. The centre suggests that this should include only funding allocated after 2019, which is four years ago. Of the funds specified in June 2022 by the department, three were allocated before 2019. We really need much more clarity about the new investment that will come in from the Government to support what they are intending to achieve through this Bill.
Another thing I want to talk about is the relationship between funding and the missions. The levelling-up funds have only a tangential relationship with the 12 missions. Out of the 10 funds available, only one, the shared prosperity fund, mentions the missions directly, and the levelling-up fund itself just references the missions’ metrics.
While the Government continue to insist that areas have to bid against each other—with mounting evidence that this is an inefficient way of delivering funding—how can the Government ensure that all areas that need funding for levelling up receive adequate support with the bidding process and subsequently receive adequate funding?
Regional disparities are deeply entrenched, and the Bill seems to see devolution as a way to crack this and solve the problems. But so much needs to be done to tackle inequalities: they will not be solved just by a few missions, some of which are not even in the Bill, and the somewhat confusing devolution proposals.
What about the challenges that our NHS is currently facing, with enormous waiting lists and staff going on strike because they are so desperate? Why are the Government refusing to properly engage with staff over their deep concerns, which are leading to even further strike action? Just today, Professor Farrar has warned that health workers’ morale and resilience are very thin, and of the vulnerabilities facing our health services if we have another crisis like the pandemic.
If the Government are serious about closing one of the worst gaps of inequality—the gap in life expectancy between rich and poor that my noble friend Lady Lister mentioned—they have to properly support and fund not just the NHS but social care. How will the Bill deliver this? How does levelling up properly relate to those huge challenges? This relates to the following mission in the White Paper:
“Narrow the gap of healthy life expectancy between the areas where it is lowest and highest”.
I cannot see how that will be achieved with what we have in front of us.
I will also look very quickly at mission 3:
“Eliminate illiteracy and innumeracy by refocusing education spending on the most disadvantaged parts of the country”.
Will part of this refocusing of education spending deal with the gap between real funding per head in state and private schools? This gap is widening and letting down our state-funded pupils.
We have heard that the Bill fails to meet the aspirations of the White Paper, but the existing missions will not, as currently drafted, properly solve many of the inequalities in our society. We will be debating the existing missions and the new missions in a future group, so I will not say anything further at this stage. At the moment, we feel that the Bill is lacking in many areas and there is much work to be done.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook)
My Lords, levelling up is at the heart of the Government’s agenda to boost economic growth and build back better after the pandemic. It was at the centre of the manifesto on which the Government promised to deliver for the people of the United Kingdom. The levelling-up White Paper was published in February 2022. The United Kingdom is one of the greatest countries in the world but not everyone shares its success. As the levelling-up White Paper set out, we know that where people live unfairly affects their chances of getting on in life. Only through improving social and economic opportunities across the country can we rebalance the economy and achieve maximum growth. Safer streets, pride in place and more empowered communities can help drive local growth, investment and a more innovative economy. The Government are committed to reversing this unfairness and levelling up the UK by boosting growth and spreading opportunity more equally across the country.
The levelling-up White Paper set 12 levelling-up missions to anchor ambition and provide clarity over the objectives of public policy for the next decade. Delivering on these missions will improve people’s lives by improving living standards, spreading opportunities, enhancing local economic growth, restoring local pride, spreading opportunity and empowering local leaders across this country. Missions will also serve as an anchor for the expectations and plans of the private sector and civil society. This stability and consistency of policy aims to unleash innovation, investment and collaboration with the private sector and civil society.
Many of the powers in the Bill are enabling measures to help level up and deliver the missions in a way which reflects the characteristics of different areas. Missions are intended to anchor government policy and the decision-making necessary to level up the United Kingdom. However, missions should not be set in stone. As the economy adapts, so too will the missions to reflect the changing environment and lessons learned from past interventions. The Bill sets out that any changes to missions should be fully and transparently explained and justified when they occur.
We begin our first debate in Committee with Amendment 1, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock. I thank her for making it clear, as I would have made it clear, that this is a complex Bill. Everything she said about levelling up is correct: it will mean a lot of things to a lot of people, and it is about people and places.
I begin by assuring noble Lords that by setting out the missions to level up the United Kingdom the Government are identifying their priorities for reducing significant geographical disparities within the United Kingdom. As I have said, the White Paper explicitly sets out parameters for the agenda through the six capitals, four pillars and 12 missions. There is no denying that levelling up encompasses a broad and ambitious set of objectives. The Government’s focus now is on making levelling up a reality for people and places across the United Kingdom through funding, place-based policy and devolution to local leaders. We recognise that there is much more to do, but we are making progress.
The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, asked whether it is about bridging the gap between the rich and the poor. It is; when you talk about education, skills, good jobs and the provision of those things, that is about addressing the gap. If children live in homes where their carers or parents have good jobs, they will not be as poor as children who live in homes with no jobs. It is about addressing all those gaps.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
I thank the Minister for her response to the question I posed, which was to try to establish greater clarity on what we mean by levelling up before we start debating the 500-plus amendments to this Bill. Unfortunately, I do not think any of us are much the wiser.
On the one hand, the Minister was quite rightly able to agree what is in her Government’s White Paper, but equally she then talked about spreading the benefits or investment of levelling up away from those areas which the White Paper defined as spatial disparities or geographical inequalities. We ought to have a laser-like focus on dealing with those places, be they coastal towns, rural areas, or areas where old industries have gone and new industries have not replaced them. That is what I wanted to achieve from this short debate. Unfortunately, I really do not think that we are any nearer to knowing what the Government’s intentions are.
What I do know, from long experience and involvement in local government—I should mention, and apologise for not having done so, my interests in the register as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and as a councillor in Kirklees in West Yorkshire—is that, if we just have relatively short-term funding and investment packages, that will not work. The City Challenge; Single Regeneration Budget 1; Single Regeneration Budget 2; the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund; the whole panoply of those investment packages came and went and some of those places are still identified by the Government’s own White Paper as being priority one, in need of—in their terms—levelling up. The Government say in the levelling up White Paper that levelling up should be “broad, deep and long-term.” The Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill in front of us does none of those things, and although I beg to withdraw the amendment, I will be pursuing the aspirations and intentions of the Government in this levelling-up Bill throughout its proceeding.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock
Member's explanatory statement
This amendment means that the Levelling-Up missions must be published within 10 days of Royal Assent.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, I would like to speak to my Amendment 2 and also a number of other amendments in my name and in that of my noble friend Lady Taylor of Stevenage. This second group of amendments really looks at scrutiny and oversight of the Bill, on which we are concerned that there is not enough independence as it is currently set up. Amendment 2 would require that the levelling-up missions would need to be published within 10 days of Royal Assent. Obviously, as we have made quite clear previously, we would prefer that the 12 levelling-up missions were actually published within the Bill itself, but we will come to debate that later.
On the understanding that the Government are saying that they will not do that, we think that it is important that they are published as quickly as possible once the Bill has received Royal Assent and become an Act, because if it is going to achieve what the Government say that they intend to achieve, then we need to know what that is. We need the detail of those missions as soon as possible so that the Government can crack on and start actually doing something to achieve them. Our amendment suggests this should be within 10 days of Royal Assent, and I do not really understand why there should be any problem with that. If the Government know what they want to achieve from the Bill and if they say that they will look at the missions in the White Paper already, then it should not take too much work or effort to be able to publish them very quickly once the Bill has Royal Assent.
My Amendment 27 then talks about the fact that the Government need to publish a statement to confirm whether they will be renewing each mission before it ends. There are further amendments in this group from the Liberal Democrats, and also from the noble Lords, Lord Lansley and Lord Lucas; we would support the other amendments in this group.
To require a statement on the Government’s progress towards the levelling-up missions strikes me as an unexceptional ask; for example, on whether the mission has been achieved, and, if not, stating what progress has been made, whether it will be renewed, what further work needs to be done to achieve the desired outcome. We need to be able to monitor and to look at progress effectively, if we are to come close to delivering on the missions, in particular because the proposed deadline is 2030, which is not very far away. We will need to crack on and see pretty quickly what progress has been made. If it is not completed by 2030, as I doubt it will be, we need to know whether it will be renewed and whether we will continue with it.
The Minister said that the Bill cannot solve all problems, when referring to the questions I asked on health and education, during which I referred to two of the missions—mission 3 and mission 8. Surely she intends to solve those missions, so I was slightly surprised that, in answering one of my questions, the answer was, “Well, we can’t do everything.” Does that mean that those missions are not actually intended to be achieved? I was slightly confused by the Minister’s response. Maybe that is why the missions are not in the Bill.
Clause 2 says that annual reports must include the Minister’s opinion on progress, a description of actions taken so far, and plans for the future. But it also allows for the Government to change missions or to decide to abandon missions. Therefore, we believe that there is an ability for them to be adapted, changed and moved on, within the legislation as currently drafted, so, again, why not put them in the Bill? As I said, 2030 is not far away, so if the Government are serious, we need to have more detail about the missions, either in the Bill now or as soon as possible after Royal Assent.
Amendment 38, in the name of my noble friend Lady Taylor of Stevenage, asks the Minister to
“appoint an independent advisory council with representatives from each nation and region of the United Kingdom to monitor progress and report to both Houses of Parliament.”
In the opening debate, we already heard about the issue of geographical disparities; the Minister agrees with us on that issue and supports the need for it to be challenged. Surely, an independent council, which is properly represented from right across the country, can only help to support resolving some of those geographical disparities and inequalities that we all know cause so many problems for so many communities in our country.
The noble Lords, Lord Lucas and Lord Stunell, have tabled similar amendments; the former’s amendment requires an independent body to be appointed to review and report on progress. We believe that independent oversight enables good governance and good government. Clear, trusted and impartial analysis makes for far better policy, delivers far better outcomes, and can only be a good thing for our democracy. An independent body can also ensure that progress and development of the missions is being monitored and then actually achieved. There are already good examples of independent scrutiny; for example, the Office for Budget Responsibility and our own Select Committees sitting in your Lordships’ House. I am aware that the Government’s answer to concerns about scrutiny is the fact that they are establishing a Levelling Up Advisory Council. Indeed, I appreciate that this advisory council itself could provide this scrutiny, but only if the Government can demonstrate proper independence. I ask the Minister: can the Government do that, and, if so, how will they do so?
My noble friend Lady Taylor of Stevenage has tabled a few further amendments. One says that
“a report must be published before every General Election”,
and another that the
“target dates cannot be changed to beyond the next General Election.”
These amendments are intended to prevent a Government from playing with the missions before important general elections come about; they seek to keep things on the straight and narrow. My noble friend Lady Taylor of Stevenage has also tabled an amendment asking the Minister to
“publish relevant academic advice when revising the statement.”
I quoted earlier from the University of West London. Again, some of the analysis done by our universities and academics could be extremely helpful to the Government in trying to achieve their targets.
My Amendment 46 is also important. It asks for a review to be published
“if a Minister deems there has been a significant change in the economic situation.”
Looking at what has happened since the pandemic—inflation, energy bills and the cost of living crisis—we absolutely have to have different approaches if there is a significant change in our economic situation. We talked earlier about how the first round of levelling-up funding is simply not adequate to deliver what it was designed to do because of inflation, so it is important that we keep an active watch on this.
Lord Stunell (LD)
My Lords, I agree with a great deal of what the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, has said about the need for monitoring and evaluating any government process, but particularly one as deep-seated and far-ranging as this is obviously intended to be.
I will speak to Amendments 24, 26, 32 and 49, all of which appear in this group. They are tabled to explore how the outputs from the mechanism that Clause 1 sets up are to be monitored and, even more importantly, evaluated. Noble Lords will know that Governments are notoriously slack at carrying out timely and effective evaluation of their policies. They are very often launched in a blaze of glory, or, on this occasion, in a White Paper, and what follows is often a serious disappointment. My noble friend Lady Pinnock has shaped that argument very well in the debate on the first group. Avoiding monitoring and evaluation is deep-seated in the government machine, which actively avoids formal monitoring as far as it can and definitely seeks to avoid any public evaluation of what that monitoring reveals. That is not specific to this Government: I would be stretching my memory to think of a Government who have eagerly embraced independent evaluation and monitoring of any of their policies.
Interestingly, the Government’s White Paper is very strong on “accountability” and “transparency”, which it describes as key attributes that will be built into the levelling-up programme. Unfortunately, the Bill completely omits to mention these two essential characteristics of levelling up, and for that matter, it also omits any mention of specific missions. These amendments are designed to tackle that gap. No doubt my amendments and those of the noble Baroness could be strengthened, and I hope we will see how best we can do that. I regard these as quite modest, de minimis amendments to establish the principle of what is needed.
The first of the amendments I have tabled with my noble friend Lady Pinnock, Amendment 24, simply inserts another prerequisite for any mission statement coming into force: that there must first be an affirmative resolution by each House of Parliament, not merely having them laid before us. In fact, that is a really basic requirement for any such far-reaching policy package: it should have proper parliamentary scrutiny. Without this amendment or something very like it, not one of the mission statements will have ever received any direct democratic endorsement.
The Minister may say that this was in the Conservative manifesto of 2019. The slogan was certainly in the manifesto, but were the missions? No, they were not. Were the metrics of any of the missions in the manifesto? No, they were not. Importantly, bearing in mind that this is a political process, did the Government even have a settled view on what levelling up was during the passage of three Prime Ministers through Downing Street and four changes of Secretary of State last year? No, they did not have a settled view. In fact, except for an unusually hostile reception of a Budget last autumn, levelling up would now be taking off in a completely different direction, with a completely different Administration and objectives. A 2019 election slogan cannot absolve the mission statements from parliamentary scrutiny. Indeed, the Government’s own White Paper makes it clear that such accountability and transparency in the process itself is important.
On transparency, I admit that my claim that it is all in the White Paper overlooks the fact that that was indeed three Prime Ministers ago, and maybe that has been scrubbed in the nine months since. Perhaps the Minister can confirm whether it is still an important principle in the Government’s thinking about levelling up. I therefore hope that I will get a positive answer from the Minister on Amendment 24, and that she will be very quick and willing to accept it.
Amendment 26 points to a critical weakness in Clause 1: the complete absence of accountability of Ministers of the Crown. Clause 1(8) rushes from dealing with the first iteration of statements of mission—those that are in front of us now via the White Paper—to publishing the second iteration, without ever passing “Go”. There is no mention in Clause 1(8) of independently examined evidence and evaluation of what has happened so far and no accompanying analysis, but simply a straight jump to laying it before Parliament, which will be, as far as I understand it, on a take-it-or-leave-it unamendable basis. Again, the Minister may be able to reassure me that these will be open, debatable and amendable by Parliament. I should be very pleased, and totally astonished, if she were to say that.
Amendment 26 requires that independent evaluations be published to accompany the new draft mission statements when they come before Parliament, and that the draft revised missions themselves are constructed by the process set out in Amendment 29, which we will come to later this evening. That requires that such missions shall, prior to their adoption, have been endorsed by the devolved Administrations and by local government within England in respect of their specific areas.
A central part of levelling up has to be a built-in independent evaluation system providing analysis alongside each round of mission statements. Otherwise, we all know what will happen—it happens all the time: targets will be fudged and stretched and outcomes will not be monitored properly, yet the process will still go blithely on, repeating the same errors and omissions time and again until, in due course, it lapses into history and is replaced by the latest sparkly new slogan. Levelling up will become just another in a long string of non-performing slogans.
That brings me to Amendment 32 in my name and those of my noble friend Lady Pinnock and the noble Baroness, Lady Valentine. I appreciate their support. As it stands, Clause 2(2)(a) only requires that the formal periodic report on levelling up includes the Minister’s own assessment of how well things are going. Our amendment would require that, alongside that ministerial assessment, there should be
“an independent evaluation of the effectiveness of the progress that has been made”.
That is not very challenging, is it? The effectiveness of the progress that has been made should be supported by an independent evaluation.
That is surely the true test of accountability—for the evaluation to be based on objective evidence, not a subjective assessment, least of all a subjective assessment made by the person being held to account. We would not accept in most areas of responsibility that the accountability, assessment and evaluation is done by the person being held to account. I very much hope that the Minister agrees and will accept Amendment 32 in due course.
Finally, Amendment 49, to which my noble friend Lady Pinnock has added her name, which I appreciate, takes these essential reforms forward to apply to all future iterations of statements of mission. This is not just about getting it right now; it is about embedding a process that will continue indefinitely as levelling up rolls out iteration after iteration.
Taken together, these four amendments plug the huge gap between the good intentions and smooth words in the White Paper and the stark, Whitehall-controlled process being set out in the Bill. I look forward to hearing that they find favour with your Lordships and the Minister.
Lord Lansley (Con)
If I may, I wish to speak to Amendment 25 in my name. I begin by drawing attention to my registered interest as chair of the Cambridgeshire Development Forum, which will become more relevant in relation to the later housing, planning and development-related issues than to this first part relating to missions.
In the earlier group, there was a reference to this Bill being more than one Bill. It is in truth three Bills all in one place. When we started out in this, I was reminded of that story about the elephant: “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” Let us take it just one bite at a time and try not to eat it all in one go.
I did want to make a point about missions, and I will add to it a little. Amendment 25, to which I speak, was really about trying to explore, with my noble friends on the Front Bench, the Government’s overall attitude to the process of parliamentary scrutiny of their policy priorities. For example, a number of noble Lords will have participated in our recent scrutiny of the Procurement Bill. In the that Bill, now in the other place, the Government included a provision relating to parliamentary scrutiny of the national procurement policy statement, an important statement of the Government’s priorities. The Government are resisting being told what those priorities should be, but none the less consented in the Bill, in the other place, that it was Parliament’s job, if it did not approve of their priorities, to say so by means of a Motion.
Amendment 25, which is subtly different from Amendment 24 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, and others, which says that Parliament must approve the statements, is in precisely the same form as the Procurement Bill regarding the scrutiny of the national procurement policy statement, in that the statement will be proceeded with unless either House resolves not to approve it within 40 days. It uses exactly the same terminology; I have simply lifted it from the Procurement Bill.
I want to know, what is the difference? Why, in this respect, do the Government not think it appropriate for Parliament to approve—or, indeed, if it objects, not to approve—of the Government’s executive decisions? They are undoubtedly important. The priorities in the Procurement Bill are terribly important. The missions are terribly important. I cannot understand why one should have this form of scrutiny and the other should not. My first question to my noble friend is: why can we not have the same degree of scrutiny in relation to this statement as the Government are giving us in relation to the national procurement policy statement?
Baroness Valentine (CB)
I have added my name to Amendments 32 and 38, both of which deal with the independent evaluation of progress against the levelling-up missions. I begin by apologising that I was unable to be present for Second Reading. Levelling up is a subject I care deeply about and, with Business in the Community, I spend much of my time working in or for the sorts of places the Bill seeks to address. Before commenting on the amendments, I congratulate the Government on their levelling-up missions. While one can argue about whether these are exactly the right ones, I personally value the clarity and long-term commitment that these missions convey.
It is in this vein that I support the independent evaluation of progress. The missions need to work across government departments, across political parties and across Parliaments. I would value a statutory board being created to provide independent insight in exactly the way we have the Independent Commission on Climate. It seems to me that the long-term and challenging aspiration to level up socially has a strong parallel to tackling our environmental challenges and is at least as important.
I will finish by quoting two lessons from the LSE’s report on the effectiveness of the UK’s Committee on Climate Change, where the parallels are, I think, obvious. The first is this:
“An independent expert body can strengthen climate governance by introducing a long-term perspective, enhancing the credibility of climate targets and ensuring more evidence-based policymaking.”
Secondly:
“To be effective, independent advisory bodies must have an appropriate status. This means having a clear statutory mandate, strong leadership, adequate resources, and sufficient powers to hold Government to account.”
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
My Lords, this is an important group of amendments to tease out the Government’s intentions as to the scrutiny of the success or otherwise of their actions in levelling up. While I speak to Amendments 24, 26, 32 and 49, to which I have added my name, I also wish to speak to the other amendments in this group.
The key question is how Parliament will know that progress has genuinely been made in reducing geographical disparities. That, after all, is the question at the heart of the White Paper. The only way to judge whether progress has genuinely been made is by using evidence and independence. All the amendments in this group refer to producing independent accountability of the statement that the Government will be making towards the end of a period of time—what that period is is still to be debated.
What is really positive about the White Paper is that it is absolutely full of evidence. There are around 80 different graphs and datasets to establish the evidence base for the purpose of the White Paper: how it is going to change different parts of the country and narrow the gaps. This set of amendments attempts to say that not only do we need the evidence but we need it to be independently assessed. I agree, obviously, with my noble friend and with the noble Baroness, Lady Valentine, in talking about an independent commission or board—as we have done with climate change—to assess what is going on, and whether change has been made and, if so, how much and in what areas.
I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, about the missions not being in the Bill, because otherwise, the levelling-up Bill is whatever the Executive define it to be. The Government have set out in a lengthy White Paper what the Bill attempts to do: narrow the gaps, reduce geographical inequalities and disparities, and make a big difference not only to the people who live in certain areas but to the country as a whole. If we do not change the country as it is at the moment, the people who live in those areas will be the ones who are low paid, have poor health and low skills—as a generality, of course. If we can change that, we will change their lives and change the country as well; there would not be such a call on the health service and the benefits system if we had people with better paid jobs, higher skills and better health outcomes. It is in the interests of us all, not just those of some areas of the country.
I fundamentally disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, about research and development. I draw his attention to what the White Paper says—and it is a government White Paper, not mine. It says that the Government need to ensure that there is government investment of a significant degree in these geographical areas of disparity—the spatial disparities it talks about—in order to attract matching private sector investment and create better paid jobs, and deal with all the concomitant issues related to low pay, poor health, poor skills and all the rest of it. That is what it says in the White Paper.
Earl Howe (Con)
My Lords, this group of amendments addresses a number of important issues around accountability and scrutiny of the levelling-up missions, including looking at the roles of Parliament, the public and academics. I will begin by addressing Amendment 2, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, which would require the statement of levelling-up missions to be published within 10 days of Royal Assent. The Government have already been clear that the first statement of missions will be based on the levelling-up White Paper. We have committed within the Bill to publish this statement within one month of Part 1 coming into force. I suggest that this is already a prompt timescale and a realistic one, because it includes time to complete internal procedures before publication and the laying of a report. So I think that further shortening that timescale is unnecessary.
Amendment 24, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, would require mission statements to be approved by Parliament. Amendment 49, also in the noble Lord’s name, would similarly require approval from Parliament and the devolved Governments for any revisions to statements of levelling-up missions. Amendment 25, tabled by my noble friend Lord Lansley, requires a Minister to withdraw the statement if either House of Parliament decides not to approve it.
Let me be quite clear. The Government are committed to enabling Parliament, the public and experts to fully scrutinise our progress against our missions. The missions and metrics will be published in a statement of missions laid before Parliament. The proposed initial set of these metrics has already been published in the levelling-up White Paper and is bound to be refined over time. That really does represent a significant step forward. For the first time, the law will require Ministers to set and publish missions that focus on reducing geographical inequalities.
Our approach to the missions is the same as the approach taken, for example, with the fiscal rules, or indeed with the Government’s mandate to NHS England: they are subject to scrutiny in Parliament but are not set out in law. His Majesty’s Treasury publishes its fiscal rules in a non-legislative policy document, but that is laid in Parliament. This does not in any way prevent the Government being held to account in keeping to their fiscal targets. What matters is the transparency of those targets and of the published data. The missions will be published in a policy document laid before, and debated in, Parliament. The first example of this document will be based on the levelling-up White Paper, as I have said.
As my noble friend made clear, the legislation sets out the framework for the missions, not the missions themselves. The Government are committed to laying and publishing statements of levelling-up missions and annual reports to ensure transparency and scrutiny. To my mind, it would be unthinkable that the Government would not take seriously any analysis, challenge or ideas put forward by Parliament or, indeed, by others outside Parliament and government. Again, what matters is that the missions and metrics should receive scrutiny from Parliament and the public. Ultimately, I would say to my noble friend Lord Lansley that we are dealing here with government policy. Parliament can express a view—Parliament can do whatever it likes—and may well influence policy in the future by doing so, but, in the end, it is the Government who need to be accountable and to take responsibility for their own agenda and the progress they make in fulfilling that agenda. My noble friend’s recent letter to all noble Lords—
Lord Lansley (Con)
I think we largely agree on the role of government in determining what the missions and metrics should be, but can my noble friend explain why the principle applied to the national procurement policy statement—that the Government decide what the priorities are and Parliament can debate them and if necessary say that it does not approve of them—is not applied to this important set of policy priorities? Why have the Government put that into legislation currently before the other place but not done the same in relation to this Bill?
Earl Howe (Con)
I think it was a relatively easy concession for the Government to make in the Procurement Bill because Parliament, as I just said, can decide to do whatever it likes. If any Member of either House wants to table a Motion to Regret against anything the Government are doing, they can do so, and the House as a whole can express its view. If that were to happen—I think it is unlikely—
Lord Lansley (Con)
I apologise for pressing my noble friend. I do not think it was a concession by the Government: I think it was written by the Government into the Bill. But, anyway, that is not the point. Is my noble friend saying that, if a statement were to be published and laid before Parliament, and a regret Motion were to be passed against it, the Government would withdraw the statement?
Earl Howe (Con)
As I said, it would be extremely unlikely for any government to ignore the view of either House of Parliament if that view had been expressed in the form of a Motion that had been widely supported. Of course, no Government would ever say that they had a monopoly of wisdom in areas such as this. If there are any good ideas coming forward from any source, it is appropriate to review the proposals on the table.
I think we are dancing on the head of a pin here, if I may say so to my noble friend, because it is very likely that government will receive advice from a number of quarters as they go forward with this agenda. As he said, we are having to deal with an extremely complex set of metrics, and we are keen that those with expertise, among whom your Lordships can be numbered, are able to scrutinise the progress that government is making and express a view if they wish to.
My noble friend Lady Scott’s recent letter to your Lordships stated a number of things that perhaps bear repeating. The statement of levelling-up missions will be based on the 12 missions set out in the White Paper. The statement will include detail about the metrics being used to monitor progress. As I mentioned, those metrics will be identical to the technical annexe in the White Paper as progressed by further work undertaken since then. In particular, it might be helpful for noble Lords to note that well-being and pride of place are still being worked on, but that this work is near completion. I hope that we can provide further detail about that quite soon.
Amendments 26 and 32 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, and Amendment 38 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, put forward an independent body or independent evaluation of the missions and progress. The Government of course recognise that scrutiny and seeking expert advice will be important to ensuring that we deliver on our missions and level up the country. That is why we have already established the Levelling Up Advisory Council, chaired by Andy Haldane, to provide government with expert and independent advice to inform the design and delivery of the levelling-up agenda. The noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, mentioned the desirability of having academic and other outside expertise available to the council, and I absolutely agree. The council draws regularly on wider academic, business and other expertise to inform its advice, and includes voices from different parts of the UK.
Appointments to the Levelling Up Advisory Council are made at the discretion of the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and in accordance with the Cabinet Office processes for public appointments. Among the council’s membership are Sally Mapstone of the University of St Andrews, Cathy Gormley-Heenan of Ulster University, and Katherine Bennett, who chairs the Western Gateway, the UK’s first pan-regional partnership to bring together leaders from Wales and western England. I can tell the Committee that the Government will continue to look at ensuring that membership of the Levelling Up Advisory Council represents all parts of the UK. We are indeed already working with the devolved Administrations and with English local government on the levelling-up challenges and will continue to do so.
I will just add a couple of points for the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, in particular. As set out in the technical annexe to the White Paper, the missions largely rest on metrics published by the Office for National Statistics and others, so performance will be transparent and everyone will be able to judge how the Government are doing. That is right because, as I emphasised earlier, government should be accountable.
Amendment 41 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, would ensure that an annual report was published before a general election. I have to part company with her on that point; the timings for laying the report before Parliament and publishing documents are, in my view, rightly independent of the electoral cycle, as is the case for other key government frameworks such as the Charter for Budget Responsibility. The purpose of laying reports is to allow for Parliament to hold the Government to account on their progress towards the missions, and the Bill requires the Government to publish reports as soon “as is reasonably practicable”. Levelling up is a challenging, long-term agenda which cannot be achieved within a single electoral cycle. The framework for missions which we are establishing here reflects that long-term vision.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, this has been an interesting debate. Clearly, oversight, transparency and evidence of progress—or not, as the case may be—are important to noble Lords and must be strengthened in the Bill.
Regarding information, advice and experts, the Minister said that it was unthinkable not to listen to advice from experts, internal and external. He is a very decent, honourable man, so I am not surprised that it is unthinkable to him. However, looking at the experience of local government in recent years, I gently suggest that not all his colleagues have always felt the same, which is why we feel that we must strengthen this in the Bill.
The Minister also explained that the missions can be changed, abandoned or dropped if required. That is in a number of places in Clauses 1 and 2. Clause 2 talks about the mission period, with new statements of levelling-up missions beginning no later than immediately after the end of the mission period of the old statement and the new statement replacing the old statement when it comes into effect. Clause 2 states that, if the Government consider that it is no longer appropriate to pursue a levelling-up mission, the report can say that the Government are no longer continuing with it.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, that having the missions in the Bill does not necessarily tie any future Government to them doing exactly as they are written down. There is flexibility, which is important in the Bill. I support it being in there. There is probably a fair chance of us wanting to start again and bring in a new Bill ourselves—but in the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Lord Foster of Bath
Member's explanatory statement
This amendment ensures that the objectives the Government intends to pursue to reduce geographical disparities will include the reduction of disparities between predominantly urban and predominantly rural areas.
Lord Foster of Bath (LD)
My Lords, the amendments in this group are about ensuring that the levelling-up agenda addresses the needs of rural and coastal communities, which many of us believe have been left behind—some would say ignored—by the policies of successive Governments, which have focused on the needs of urban communities. In moving Amendment 3 and speaking to Amendments 11, 12 and 35 in my name, I thank other noble Lords who have supported them. I certainly support the other amendments in this group, which complement my own.
At Second Reading, I reminded your Lordships that back in 2019 I chaired the Select Committee on the Rural Economy. Our inquiry found that rural communities and the economies in them have been ignored and underrated for too long, with government policies designed primarily for urban areas. Compared with such areas, we discovered that in rural ones, house prices were higher while wages were lower; council taxes were higher while Governments’ support for their councils was lower; funding per head for services such as healthcare, policing and public transport was lower, despite costing more to provide; and broadband business support, banking and other services lagged way behind those in urban areas. We concluded that we must act now to reverse this trend, and that we can no longer allow the clear inequalities between the urban and rural to continue unchecked. Yet there is no evidence that any serious efforts have been made to address these inequalities since that time.
More recently, writing in the House magazine just last month, the Conservative MP for North Devon, Selaine Saxby, wrote,
“there are far too many left behind rural and coastal communities, often overlooked by government policies.”
This view is echoing the April 2022 report by the APPG for the rural powerhouse, Levelling Up the Rural Economy, which said:
“The overwhelming consensus was that no government in recent memory has had a programme to unlock the economic and social potential of the countryside.”
The Rural Services Network has illustrated this brilliantly by using government headline metrics to show that, if all rural areas together were treated as a single region, their need for levelling up would be greater than that of any other region in the country.
Despite Selaine Saxby’s call for
“more consideration of rurality when considering policies and funding decisions”,
it is clearly not currently happening. As the RSN has shown, current government-funded spending power for predominantly rural areas lags way behind that for predominantly urban areas. Government grants per head for services such as police and public health—and even from the UK shared prosperity fund, excluding Cornwall—are lower in rural areas. A different approach, one that takes account of the very special and varied needs of rural and coastal communities, would be of enormous benefit to not just the individuals living in such communities but to the overall economy of the country.
As the APPG report points out, at present,
“the rural economy is 18% less productive than the national average. Closing this gap would be worth up to £43bn in England alone”,
with
“the creation of hundreds of thousands of good jobs in areas so often blighted by underemployment”.
So it would have been reasonable to assume that, as a major element, the Government’s levelling-up agenda would have had measures designed to close that gap. That is what they actually promised. When the White Paper was published last year, a departmental spokesman said:
“Rural areas are at the heart of our levelling-up agenda. Our White Paper is a plan for everyone, including rural communities who rightly expect and deserve access to better services, quicker transport and quality education.”
I believe that the Government also said this in their second report on rural proofing, an issue to which I will return in a second. They are fine words, but it appears that they are not backed by action. There is nothing in the Bill or the Explanatory Memorandum that refers to rural issues. There is no evidence whatever that the Bill has a focus on the need to level up between urban and rural, as either an objective or part of a mission.
Amendments 3, 12 and 36, together with Amendment 5 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, are needed to ensure that the Government’s stated intention becomes part of the legislation and hence a driver for measures to close the urban-rural gap. They insert the reduction of the disparities between urban and rural as an objective and part of the missions. A similar case can be made—and, no doubt, will be, by the noble Baronesses, Lady Hayman of Ullock and Lady Taylor of Stevenage—for coastal communities, as covered in Amendments 53 and 488.
In addition, two other things are needed. We have to ensure that all the measures taken by government, whether arising from the Bill or any other, take account of the often very different needs of rural communities. That requires ensuring that all go through a process of rural proofing. The Lords Select Committee report that I referred to earlier called for the whole process of rural proofing to be significantly improved. In responding, the Government agreed. They accepted that “more can be done” and promised the development and promotion of a greater understanding across departments of the opportunities and challenges in rural areas, the development of supporting resources and the establishment of a rural affairs board.
The Duke of Montrose (Con)
My Lords, I bring apologies from my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering, who has an unchangeable appointment and has asked me to speak to her amendment. We have heard a great deal in discussing the previous two groups about whether details should or should not be in the Bill, but my noble friend’s amendment addresses a small element of what the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, was talking about: the level of public services in rural areas, which the Government will need to watch very closely.
The countryside throughout the UK is in a state of flux. Going back a bit, it was mainly concerned with production and employment; now, a major part is managing ecosystem services. A novel part is managing it so that the urban population can enjoy it, linger longer and hopefully part with a bit of their cash without impacting too much on the environment they have come to enjoy. At present, it is impossible to tell what public services will be needed. Will the Government encourage people to live in, to retire to the countryside? At the moment, the services people living in the countryside look for are health, post offices, banks and even, I might mention, electricity. Any of these might be superseded or combined. The important thing is that the Government maintain a mission to make sure that the vital services are adequate, without having to drive to the other side of the country.
Lord Carrington (CB)
My Lords, I declare my interests as a farmer and landowner as set out in the register. I would like to apologise at the outset for not speaking at Second Reading, but I was unable to attend the whole debate. However, I spoke at length on this issue during the debate on the Queen’s Speech.
Like others, I was deeply involved in the inquiry undertaken by the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Rural Business and the Rural Powerhouse, Levelling up the rural economy: an inquiry into rural productivity. At the time, this was warmly welcomed by the Government. I have therefore taken this opportunity to table Amendment 33, which would include the principal recommendations of this inquiry in the Bill. I am also most grateful for the support of my noble friend Lord Devon, and I heartily agree with everything that has been said by the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, and the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose.
The conclusion of the APPG inquiry was that no Government have had a programme to unlock the economic and social potential of the countryside:
“The need to ‘level up’ the countryside is as urgent as it is obvious … Rural homes are less affordable than urban homes. Poverty is more dispersed … making it harder to combat, while the depth of rural fuel poverty is more extreme than those facing similar circumstances in towns and cities. Only 46% of rural areas have good 4G coverage, and skills training and public services are harder to access.”
As we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Foster, the result is that the rural economy is 18% less productive. Closing this gap in England alone would produce a gain to the economy of £43 billion. The inquiry concluded that many matters affecting the rural economy
“fell between the cracks of Whitehall”,
as it is commonly assumed that Defra alone is responsible for the rural economy.
I therefore welcome the opportunity this Bill gives to ensure that all Government levelling-up policies take into account rural-proofing principles. To argue that the statement of levelling-up missions covers the main disparities experienced by rural areas is not sufficient, as many of the identified challenges are much greater for rural businesses and communities. Poor transport, restrictive planning, geographic isolation, lack of access to skills training, lack of digital connectivity and lack of affordable housing demonstrate this.
These challenges would be easier to overcome if the Bill recognised the importance of rural economic development. Some 23% of all businesses are based in the countryside, and 85% of these are not in farming or forestry. The amendment would ensure that the Bill makes explicit reference to the rural-proofing of government policy across all departments, so that the impact of decisions on the rural economy is assessed and there is a mechanism to tackle the disparities inherent in rural areas.
For too long, those living in rural communities have been considered an afterthought in policy-making. Rural-proofing is a reactive measure to policy. If the Government retain the view that rural-proofing can be an effective tool in assisting levelling up, then the Bill must provide a legally binding obligation on all government departments to meet their respective rural-proofing obligations and ensure compliance. Can the Minister assure us that the Government will adopt this important amendment, as they have already welcomed the APPG inquiry’s conclusions?
The Earl of Devon (CB)
My Lords, it is an honour to speak to this important group of amendments focused on the rural and coastal implications of the levelling-up strategy. I particularly speak to Amendments 3 and 33, to which I have added my name, and also Amendment 53 from the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, which I support. I apologise for not being present at Second Reading, and note for the purposes of this and future contributions my interests in the register, particularly my interest as a rural business operator near deprived coastal communities; my role at Michelmores with clients in both rural and urban development; the work that I do with Exeter City Council, offering a rural voice to support the city’s sustainability and well-being aspirations; and my self-appointed role as a champion of Devon, which has significant rural and coastal populations.
The opening of the Bill reminds me of the opening provisions of the Agriculture Bill, which listed the public goods that the environmental land management scheme was to deliver. Those public goods were in the Bill, and we spent many happy hours debating what should or should not be included. It was described as a Christmas tree with a bauble for just about everyone. This Bill does not have missions on its face, but the missions listed in the White Paper are a similar set of baubles: shiny objectives intended to offer something to everyone. As just debated, I too am concerned that the Government will be able to change and/or abandon those missions without adequate scrutiny. Also, as I think we will hear in the next group, I am surprised, given this Government’s environmental ambitions, that environmental targets are excluded. Given that the Treasury-commissioned Dasgupta report highlighted the crucial economic importance of ecosystem services and biodiversity—largely delivered through our rural economy—it is remarkable that the environmental mission is absent. Without appropriate focus on the rural and coastal economy, we will not achieve those environmental ambitions.
However, the amendments in this group are aimed not at expanding or amending the levelling-up missions but at making explicit where geographically those levelling-up missions are to be targeted. There is a real fear among residents of deprived rural and coastal communities that the Government’s focus will be upon urban regeneration, particularly in the north of England, and that, the Government having secured their Commons majority by promising levelling up to such communities, the deprived rural and coastal communities in the east, south and west of the country, whose votes did not swing the election, will miss out once more, entrenching deep-rooted disparities.
Your Lordships’ Select Committees provide compelling evidence to support these amendments. As we heard in his excellent speech opening the debate, the noble Lord, Lord Foster, chaired the Select Committee on the Rural Economy, which found that
“successive governments have underrated the contribution rural economies can make to the nation’s prosperity and wellbeing.”
In the years since that report, the rural disparities that the committee identified have only increased, with the pandemic and the cost of living crisis wreaking havoc, alongside insecurities over farming.
The pandemic entrenched the deprivation caused by inadequate digital connectivity. The collapse in local government funding has seen public transport slashed in rural areas. Planning challenges and an influx of wealthy home workers have inflated house prices beyond all reasonable measure, and there is little or no new affordable housing being built. Increased energy prices, as we have just heard, have fallen particularly hard upon the rural economy, given the escalating cost of gas and oil to heat isolated homes and businesses. Government support for farming businesses has been dramatically cut, with the new ELM scheme yet to be delivered. At the same time, the public are demanding ever more access to our rural spaces, which is causing a spike in crime, litter, trespass and tensions. Amendments 3 and 33, along with a number of others in this group, would ensure that rural communities are not missed out once more, and that the principle of rural-proofing is enshrined in the levelling-up agenda.
As to coastal communities, the story is no better. The Select Committee on Regenerating Seaside Towns and Communities reported in 2019 that
“for too long our seaside towns have felt isolated, unsupported and left behind.”
I could not agree more, and therefore strongly support Amendment 53 from the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor.
If the Bill is not specific as to where we need to focus the levelling-up missions and does not provide for an analysis of its impact upon our forgotten and ignored communities, those communities may fall further and further behind. The levelling-up agenda will simply blow in the political wind, allowing successive Governments to offer baubles to the regions they favour, rather than those in most objective need.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Earl, Lord Devon, and to echo his concern about the lack of environmental ambitions expressed in the Bill, which I think we will also discuss in the next group. In my first contribution in Committee, I declare my position as a vice-president of the Local Government Association, to cover my other contributions in Committee.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Foster, for his powerful and expert introduction to this group. I will speak briefly to offer Green group support for the general direction of all these amendments. I will focus in particular on Amendment 5, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, which was ably introduced by the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, and talks about looking at
“the disparities between rural and urban areas”.
The noble Lord, Lord Foster, talked about the different needs of different areas, but it is really important that, when we think about levelling up, we actually see ambitions for equal services for people all across these islands.
I will reflect on some of the experiences I have had in some small communities. Clun is a tiny, picture-perfect postcard village in south-west Shropshire near the Wales border. When I visited a decade ago, the locals believed that it was the smallest place in the UK with a food bank, which was operating out of the church. One of the volunteers working at that food bank told me that, until he got involved in that food bank, he never believed that anyone would need a food bank in Clun. He was absolutely and deeply shocked by the level of need and the experiences he encountered. There is a desperate need for essential support services. While I do not think that we should rest until the last food bank closes because of a lack of demand, we need to put other services in place to help the people who are now reliant on those food banks.
Another issue for so many of these areas is the fact that policies designed for cities and urban areas get imposed on rural areas. This makes me think about the time I visited a school in north Norfolk. The schools in that area had had imposed on them the idea of specialist schools: “Isn’t it great if pupils can choose to go to a sports academy or a language-specialising school?” However, as each village only had one bus service, pupils had no choice about which school they went to; they went only to the school that the bus went to. If you were really good at and fancied sports, but you ended up in the language school, that was just tough luck. That was because of policies imposed on rural areas which are just inappropriate.
I return to the issue of buses, because it is very close to the heart of the Green Party, having announced this week our policy for a fare that would be available to everyone in the country on local buses, “A One Pound Fare to Take You There”. When I talk about local buses in rural areas, I often get reactions such as, “Well, you can’t expect a bus in a rural area; it just won’t work.” However, I have been to Finland, where I caught a bus that went right into the middle of a national park. I went for a walk, I came back and stood at the bus stop, and I waited for the next bus service, which came every half an hour, all day, in the middle of that national park. So, when thinking about levelling up in an absolute and real sense, we should not be saying, “Oh, it’s a rural area; they can’t expect this or that.” In particular, we should not say that they cannot expect the foundation of a bus service so that people can get around. For that reason, I think that Amendment 3, about reducing disparities, is crucial.
My final point is about the little bit of discussion we have had on the Government’s vision for rural areas. Over the decades, the direction of travel in rural areas has been that landholdings and farms will have to get bigger and bigger, with fewer and fewer people working on them. However, I suggest that levelling up for rural areas means restoring small businesses and small farms which employ quite a lot of people. That then means that there are children to go to the local school, that there are people to get on the bus, and that the bus is there for the older people who need it, perhaps because they cannot drive any more. Restoring communities is about a lot more than asking, “Oh, what’s there and what can we support?”; it is about a vision.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Foster of Bath for raising this very important issue and for providing an evidence base and powerful argument in support of rural communities in particular. This short but important debate has cast a focus on the confusion at the heart of levelling up, which the debate on Amendment 1 was trying to resolve: what do we mean by levelling up and spatial disparities? What do we mean by improving the lives of people who live in different parts of the country, where for some there is low pay, low skills and poor health and for others there is a lack of connectivity or a lack of opportunities? Because we have not resolved that confusion, we will, throughout the passage of the Bill, get arguments of different natures in support of communities which need levelling up, whatever we mean by it. I hope that levelling up will not mean, or be defined by the Government as, either “rural levelling up” or “urban levelling up”, or that we will level up coastal, rural or urban areas separately. The levelling-up agenda must have a clear definition—which is in the White Paper, as I keep pointing out, but is not in the Bill—about the geographical disparities across this country, be they rural, coastal or urban, that result in people’s lives and the country being poorer. The levelling-up Bill ought to address that, but it unfortunately fails to do so.
I was struck by a really good phrase used by the noble Earl, Lord Devon, about levelling up: we do not want levelling-up ambitions to “blow in the political wind”. That is one of the reasons why I support having both the broad mission statements and the broad metrics for those mission statements in the Bill, so that we can say to whatever Government we have, “This is what we have agreed to, and this is what we are going to demand that you address.” Otherwise, we will come back again to the debate about the difficulties for people who live in rural areas. While noble Lords might think that West Yorkshire, where I live, is a big urban area, surprisingly, the upper Colne Valley could not be more rural; there are scattered farm settlements across the hillsides going up to the top of the Pennines. Its residents understand what it means to not have access to public transport, mobile networks or broadband connectivity.
Let us not go down the route of it being one or the other. I hope the Government will, even if I have to encourage them again, eventually closely define what they mean by “geographical disparities” and then address them through the missions and metrics that I hope we will put on the face of the Bill.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, for introducing his amendment—this is a really important amendment going forward. I also thank him for mentioning the work of the Rural Services Network; its report is incredibly important in informing the approach that the Government need to take and the work they need to do to reduce the disparities faced by rural areas. The Government would do well to take notice and account of what the Rural Service Network does as they continue to move forward with their levelling-up missions.
I have one amendment in this group, Amendment 488, and my noble friend Lady Taylor of Stevenage has Amendment 53 in this group. I thank the noble Earl, Lord Devon, for his support for my noble friend’s amendment. I very much agree with him that the environmental emissions targets need to be included in this, if we are to have any chance of meeting what is laid out in the Environment Act.
The noble Earl also very clearly laid out many of the concerns that face both our rural and coastal communities, including that they constantly feel missed out and left behind. They will be concerned that this is what will happen to them again. It is really important that we consider this properly. As the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, said, rural poverty is so often missed and underestimated; often it is not as in your face as urban poverty, and we need to ensure we take full account of it.
My noble friend’s Amendment 53
“is to probe whether the metrics are suitable for rural and coastal communities, and whether alternative metrics should be considered.”
Here is an example from the document that was published on the mission and metrics—the technical annexe. I remind noble Lords of the metric that accompanies mission 3:
“By 2030, local public transport connectivity across the country will be significantly closer to the standards of London, with improved services, simpler fares and integrated ticketing.”
The metrics that will be used to assess progress in achieving that mission are
“method of travel to work by region of workplace … The other headline metric is the average journey time to centres of employment, with the data broken down by modes of transport and at lower tier local authority level in England.”
What they do not do is tell us how much public transport exists in the first place.
I live in an area where we have one bus a week—that is not one bus that comes and goes during that day, but one bus that goes to one place on one day of the week—and it gives us a couple of hours in the place it arrives before we have to come home again. I genuinely do not understand how, in the area where I live, these metrics will deliver transport connectivity that is “significantly closer” to the standards of London. I genuinely have no concept of how these metrics will achieve that.
My other concern is that the principal objective is “growing the private sector”. Again, I cannot see how growing the private sector in the area I live, or in the areas that surround it, will suddenly bring me a really good bus service. The one thing that might help is if the Government reintroduced the rural bus grant fund that they took away. That led to dozens and dozens in my area losing their services—I know this because I was a county councillor at the time—because they were simply no longer profitable. Looking at the metrics from a rural perspective is incredibly important, if we are genuinely going to drive change in this area.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, this group of amendments addresses issues impacting rural and coastal communities across the United Kingdom. Amendment 3, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, considers the reduction of disparities between predominantly urban and predominantly rural areas. Amendment 5, tabled by my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering, puts forward a new mission to a similar effect, reducing the disparities between rural and urban areas in the provision of public services.
The framework set out in this Bill provides ample opportunity to scrutinise the substance of missions against a range of government policies, including levelling up in rural areas and improving people’s access to green and blue spaces. I can reassure noble Lords that the Government are committed to spreading the benefits of levelling up to rural communities and that spending by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs helps to support the levelling-up agenda.
The Government are already committed to delivering an annual report on rural-proofing, led by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and examining how government policy considers rural issues. I hope this reassures noble Lords that such work is going on by this Government. I will say more about rural-proofing in a minute.
I agree with the sentiments of Amendments 11 and 12, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Foster. More granular spatial data is crucial to ensure that policy fully recognises the different characteristics, opportunities and challenges of different places, including between large cities, small towns, and rural and coastal areas. Many people have talked about data. It is important to have the data, both historically and moving forward, in order for us to make the metrics correct for what we are trying to deliver.
I will give a little more information, which is a bit technical—well, it seems technical to me; it may not to noble Lords—on what is happening within government to better identify these geographical disparities. To tackle these data gaps and harness the potential of new data visualisation and experimentation techniques in support of levelling up, the UK Government are putting in place a transformative data analysis strategy at subnational level. The strategy has four elements: first, producing and disseminating more timely, granular and harmonised subnational statistics through the Government Statistical Service’s subnational data strategy; secondly, making granular data publicly available through a number of tools, including a new ONS interactive subnational data explorer; thirdly, harnessing data visualisation techniques and building capacity within the ONS to help decision-makers better understand and compare outcomes; and, lastly, increasing incentives to evaluate, monitor and experiment in levelling-up policies and programmes. From that, I think noble Lords can see that we agree that data is important in delivering what we want to deliver in this levelling-up legislation.
To complement the strategy I have just explained, we are establishing a new spatial data unit to drive forward the data transformation required in central government. The spatial data unit will support the delivery of levelling up by transforming the way the UK Government gather, store and manipulate subnational data so that it underpins transparent and open policy-making and delivery decisions. This will include improving how we collate and report on the UK Government’s spend and outcomes, including building strong capabilities on data visualisation and insights. To me, it is really important that, first, we always know what is being delivered and what we want to deliver and that we have all the metrics to do that.
The spatial data unit will also consider the differences between geographical areas, such as regions, counties, councils, and even down to council wards, according to the needs and objectives of specific missions or policy areas. This will be extremely important, particularly when we are talking about small rural areas.
There was a lot of discussion about transport, an area in which it is important to have the data before decisions are made. As a council leader, I had to make some very difficult decisions about bus services. Some of them were never used, so why keep them? You need the data in order to make sound decisions.
The LURB introduces a series of powers to enable the introduction of the infrastructure levy, which will be able to account for the needs of those living in rural as well as urban areas, helping to support the provision of infrastructure that the areas need most. The Bill also requires local authorities to prepare infrastructure delivery strategies. These will set out a strategy for delivering local infrastructure through the spending of levy proceeds. They will create a more transparent process, so that local people know how the funds will be spent and what infrastructure will be delivered to support development. The Government have also just announced £3 billion for local bus and cycle links, because we understand that local transport is important to people. We will work with local leaders to ensure that they can use their powers to improve the services in their area, set the fares and make transport far more accessible for their local communities.
Amendment 33, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Carrington, would require that annual reporting on the levelling-up missions include an assessment of how each mission has met the principles of the rural-proofing policy. Amendment 36, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, states that reporting on missions must include the Minister’s assessment in relation to rural areas. Amendment 53, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, asks for a report assessing whether new legislation should be produced to establish new metrics for rural and coastal communities. Finally, Amendment 488, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, suggests the publication of the assessment of infrastructure levels in coastal and rural communities.
Lord Foster of Bath (LD)
My Lords, I begin by thanking all noble Lords who have spoken in the debate, particularly the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, who referenced the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, which, together with my Amendment 3, focused the debate very clearly on the difference in the current approach between urban and rural.
I was heartened by a couple of things the Minister said. First, I was genuinely pleased by her remarks about the data transformation programme that is taking place. Like her, I might have to put a towel over my head later tonight in order to read the detail and understand it. Talk about timely data, granular data, harmonised data at a subnational level, and then gathering, storing and manipulating it is great—as long as that data is at a very refined subnational level, not just a regional level. However, I think that is what the Minister said we are going to get.
I was also heartened by the Minister’s reference to the need for different solutions in different places—a place-based approach, which I think is fundamental. The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, talked about problems in rural areas, such as with transport and education. I was involved, not very many years ago, in a conversation with a group of people looking at how to deal with FE college students in rural areas being unable to get to work experience placements. The solution arrived at was giving free bus passes to all 16 to 19-year-olds, which sounds great—until there are no buses. A solution was found in some rural areas and it is still operating: “wheels to work”. It is the local solution that is necessary, but if that is going to happen, there needs to be local leadership and a fair funding formula that enables the funds needed.
Notwithstanding the list the Minister just gave us of things she claims the Government are doing to help rural and coastal areas, the RSN analysis clearly shows that they are still losing out. So, while we welcome some moves in the right direction, they do not go far enough. I will of course withdraw the amendment for now, but so far I have been given no justification whatever for why, since the Government claim to believe in what I am saying, they are not prepared to put this on the face of the Bill. For the time being, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
“(2A) The levelling-up missions must include a mission to reduce the numbers and proportion of children in absolute poverty, relative poverty and deep poverty in each local authority and across the United Kingdom.”Member's explanatory statement
This would ensure that the levelling-up missions included a mission to reduce child poverty.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 4 in my name and those of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham and the noble Baronesses, Lady D’Souza and Lady Stroud, whose support I am grateful for, although they could not speak today. The purpose is to ensure there is a levelling-up mission to reduce levels of absolute, relative and deep child poverty in each local authority and across the UK.
On Second Reading, I quoted the response of the Levelling-up Secretary to a Conservative Back-Bencher who had argued that levelling up applies to need, not geography. “Yes, absolutely,” said Mr Gove:
“It is critically important that we … address poverty wherever we find it”.—[Official Report, Commons, 2/2/22; col. 339.
The former Prime Minister Mr Johnson was asked by the Liaison Committee:
“Can you level up the country without reducing the number of children living in poverty?”
He replied, “No.” When he was told that child poverty was not mentioned once in the levelling-up White Paper, he assured the committee that this was a “purely formal accident”. So, while I appreciate the detailed letters sent by the Minister following Second Reading, it was disappointing that nowhere could I find an answer to the question I had posed—
“could the Minister please explain why a mission to reduce the level of child poverty has not been added to the list of missions in the White Paper?”—[Official Report, 17/1/23; col.1766.]
given that its omission was apparently an accident. Indeed, I could not find any mention of child poverty at all in her levelling-up letter. Is that another accident?
Part of my argument on Second Reading was that levelling up has to be about people as well as places if it is to meet its objectives, including giving everyone the opportunity to flourish. Indeed, although the existing missions are framed in terms of inequalities between areas, ultimately, many of them concern people rather than the places in which they live, and earlier, the Minister acknowledged that levelling up is about people and places.
However, apart from the education mission, children are conspicuous by their absence. Yet, to quote Action for Children,
“Levelling up can only succeed if this includes levelling up for children.”
Levelling up for children has to address the child poverty that blights our society, with nearly 4 million children in poverty, or getting on for three in 10, projected by the Resolution Foundation to rise to its highest rate since 1998-99 by 2027-28. Moreover, half of children in families with three or more children are projected to be in poverty by that year. A glimpse of what this means is provided in an open letter from participants in the participatory Changing Realities project:
“Our children are hungry. Schools report ‘short concentration’ and ‘unmanageable moods’. They have lost their childhood ... we are sick with anxiety, drowning in financial doom.”
The report in which this is reproduced, prepared by the APPG Child of the North just last month, noted:
“We know that poverty is the central driver of inequalities between children, leading to worse physical and mental health, poorer educational attainment and life chances and alarming … gaps in life expectancy”.
This underlines the importance of tackling child poverty through existing missions on education, health and well-being. Gaps in healthy life expectancy cannot be closed without tackling child poverty. As the BMA has warned, “poverty kills”. In a recent BMJ interview, the President of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health observed that social deprivation is a far bigger problem for children’s health than it was five to 10 years ago. She warns that poverty
“essentially eats away at what we believe the kinds of key components of a healthy childhood are”
and that this is going to have a generational impact. She calls for long-term thinking and, in the absence of government action, the college is encouraging paediatricians to lobby politicians on their commitment to reduce child poverty and health inequalities. Indeed, the royal college has briefed in support of this amendment, presenting evidence that child poverty is a key driver of health inequalities.
As a recent open letter to the Prime Minister from leading public health bodies and others—signed by many Peers, including myself—makes clear, the impact of child poverty and food insecurity on health has knock-on effects on education and achievement levels in schools. The educational mission looks to level up the numbers of primary schoolchildren achieving the expected standard in reading, writing and maths. Yet there is no acknowledgement of how poverty prevents many children reaching their potential with, as the public health letter spells out, implications for the provision of free school meals and breakfasts.
While I have stressed the importance of the levelling-up agenda explicitly addressing inequalities between people as well as places, as I argued earlier and the Minister accepted, the case for a child poverty mission stands, even if one accepts the Minister’s assertion, in her levelling-up letter, that the missions are “necessarily spatial”. The amendment is thus deliberately framed so as to include a spatial as well as a national, aggregate dimension. The evidence provided in the APPG Child of the North report, and also by Action for Children, shows clearly the spatial dimension to child poverty. According to Action for Children, 60 out of 152 local authorities have child poverty rates above the average. The APPG report underlines how the risk of child poverty is consistently higher in the north than in the rest of the country. However, it should also be noted that, after taking account of housing costs, research by my university, Loughborough, for End Child Poverty found that some of the highest child poverty rates are to be found in London authorities. So, in order to level up all these areas, wherever they are, we need an explicit child poverty mission that addresses both the extent and depth of child poverty.
The Minister’s letter explains that the levelling-up missions aim
“to anchor ambition and provide clarity over the objectives of public policy for the next decade”
and that they will be varied only
“following careful review of all missions”.
Yet we are constantly told that the Government are committed to reducing child poverty, and earlier the Minister said that levelling up is about bridging the gap between rich and poor. So, I ask again: why is there not a child poverty mission which would underpin and complement the existing missions and help to bridge that gap? Such a mission is important, both because children experience childhood only once and because poverty in childhood can have longer-term effects on their education, health and general well-being and their ability to flourish and realise their potential. Thus, this is urgent. Children cannot wait for a review of existing missions some years hence.
If the Minister cannot accept the amendment, will she at least agree to take it away and consider the addition of a child poverty mission to the existing list? If not, we can only conclude that the Government do not care sufficiently about child poverty or children to include them in their levelling-up strategy. I beg to move.
Lord Bird (CB)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, for her very wonderful celebration of children and putting children right at the centre of everything. I have been involved with homelessness and crime for much of my life and I can honestly say that 90% of the people I have worked with started in child poverty. There is a kind of mystic belief going around that anybody can end up homeless—and it is true, if you have mental health problems or problems around drink and drugs. Drink and drugs are the great leveller—they can certainly bring you down—but 90% of the people I work with are suffering from the fact that they came into the world in poverty. They came into a world where many of their parents did not realise that, when their children went to school, this was an enormous opportunity for them to get some social mobility away from poverty.
I give the example of my own family, who looked upon the 10 years, from five to 15, that I spent in school—well, actually they threw me out when I was 14—as a babysitting service. That is all they wanted. There is a real problem around the inheritance that one generation passes on to the next. In my opinion, if this Government were really serious about social mobility and levelling up, which are roughly the same thing, they would put children right at the centre and the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, would not have to put her hand up and say, “Can we not at least include children in this exercise?” There is no exercise if we do not include children in it.
I am not an expert on the figures and facts—I can give some of them—but I can honestly say that there are some very frightening things around social levelling up and all that, around social mobility and poverty. One of the most frightening things I have run into, and I do not know whose figures these are but they have been bandied around, is that only 2% of people from a social housing background actually finish their schooling and get a good job or go to university or college. So, when we talk about levelling up, about breaking poverty, or about people being able to socially move away from poverty, we need at least to look at the fact that there are some things that look good, but do not actually add up at the end of the day.
When it comes to housing, we have to change social housing and move it on, so that it becomes sociable housing; so it becomes a mix and our children who were born into poverty will get support because they are in good housing with a good schooling and all those other supports. We need to have a really joined-up look at how we can dismantle poverty among the poorest of us, and the best way is to start at those very early years. I would like to see the Government put the mission of the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, right at the front of this and say, “Yes, this is levelling up; we are going to start levelling our children and put all the support in as part of the process.”
The Lord Bishop of Gloucester
My Lords, I too will speak in support of Amendment 4. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, for tabling this amendment. I am very aware that my right reverend friend the Bishop of Durham is a co-signatory and is unable to be here today to speak.
Levelling up, as the Government’s White Paper initially outlined, is about equally spreading opportunity across our country. It is about challenging unfairness and allowing people to live more fulfilling lives—I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for his inspiring speech. These are aims that surely all of us welcome, but I cannot see how this will ever be achieved unless the Bill includes reducing child poverty.
This is about the present and the long-term future. As has already been said, the latest statistics are that there are 3.9 million children living in poverty in this country; that is more than one in four. With more and more families turning to food banks and the experience of persistent poverty tripling a child’s likelihood of having mental health problems, this cannot continue.
What does it mean for years to come, when these children and young people are adults? Even if you are lukewarm regarding care and flourishment, none of this makes long-term financial sense, and it certainly will not lead to long-term levelling up. Child poverty has been calculated to be costing the Government £38 billion per year. That does not fully take into account the financial impact of needs and services which can then become necessary in later life, whether that be health costs, various support services or criminal justice services. We know that children who are not invested in to give them the best start in life are more at risk of failing to flourish as young people and adults.
Poverty limits a child’s future opportunities and employment prospects, largely due to the impact it has on education. If levelling up is about equally spreading opportunity across the country, it is essential to ensure that children are receiving quality education. Yet how can we expect them to receive quality education when so many are facing the realities of poverty? The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, has already spoken about the Child of the North APPG report. One youth ambassador expressed how poverty was impacting their life:
“The main impacts are education. No matter where you are, school is difficult … It isn’t just hunger. The worry is still there. That feeling of worry never leaves. How your sister’s trip to the zoo is going to be paid. How you’ve not seen your mam eat. All going through your head in a chemistry lesson.”
The impact of poverty on a child’s life and future should not be underestimated. It impacts education, physical and mental health, relationships and access to opportunities. It is therefore impossible to achieve levelling up without putting the mission of reducing child poverty at its heart.
Furthermore, as has been said, child poverty is an inequality that people face throughout the country. I know that if my right reverend friend the Bishop of Durham was here, he would highlight the stark inequality in the north-east of England. Absolute child poverty may have fallen marginally across the UK since 2015, but it has risen in every local authority area of the north-east since 2017. This makes the gap between the north-east and the UK average poverty rate the greatest it has ever been.
Ending geographical inequality, which this Bill strives to accomplish, means ending the inequality of child poverty equally across the UK. Prioritising a strategy around reducing child poverty will improve not only the well-being of millions of children throughout the country, allowing them to flourish, but employment prospects and earnings, increasing economic growth and benefitting the country overall.
Childhood may not be permanent, but the experiences we have in our childhood shape the rest of our lives. Reducing child poverty in every local authority, and across the country, must be a priority now, because without doing so levelling up will be nothing more than a distant fantasy.
Lord Stunell (LD)
My Lords, I will speak to the amendments in my name, but I could not begin without commenting on the three very powerful speeches which have just been made. I hope very much that the Minister is listening and will be able to give something better than a formulaic response to the pleas that have been made.
In the amendments standing in my name and the name of my noble friend Lady Parminter, there are references to two other missing links in the metrics which are in front of us via these 12 missions—missing in both the Bill, where there are no links at all, and in the White Paper that preceded it. There are 12 missions set out in the White Paper and none of them references the need for future investment to achieve net-zero emissions as the fundamental basis of levelling up. I find that, frankly, astonishing. It is all the more surprising because the White Paper itself takes space in section 1.4.1 to explain that the risks and opportunities that the transition to net zero raises are greatest in exactly those parts of the country that most seriously need levelling up.
The White Paper points out that to achieve a just transition, the most challenging area is in those places where levelling up is most needed:
“Parts of the UK that need to undergo the largest transition”
to net zero
“lie outside the South East, often in some of the least well-performing areas of the UK.”
The White Paper recognises that there is a correlation between the intensity of the impact of the intended transition to net zero and areas that need levelling up. In other words, you need more of it in the places where levelling up is needed the most. It clearly identifies that but then proposes no action to respond to that impact.
Our amendment does not propose an additional mission to remedy this oversight, because, quite apart from the spurious precision of a particular number of missions in the first place, the transition to net zero needs to be at the heart of all of the missions in the White Paper. There is a powerful read-across to living standards, transport, skills, health and well-being—to mention the scope of just five of the missions on the Minister’s list. Amendment 18 is framed in terms of requiring pervasive action within all 12 missions to enhance their success in delivering meaningful and enduring levelling up, and seeks to avoid the temptation of short-term, quick fixes that build in carbon emissions and make matters worse or undermine the UK target of net zero by 2050.
Those risks are real. For instance, for a Minister anxious to achieve a particular mission target by 2030—on, say, living standards, which is mission 1 in the White Paper—it might be very tempting to prioritise investment in an oven-ready, carbon-intensive employment prospect, rather than in a longer-term plan that would aid transition and boost jobs far more, but not until after 2030, when the Minister’s accounting period had ended.
However, an even bigger risk is emerging, which is that new green jobs are not preferentially going to those areas that need levelling up. In fact, they are not even being sprinkled equally across every part of the country. The new green jobs and investment are following the money and not the need, with London and the south-east picking up those jobs much more quickly than the north-east or north-west of England.
Baroness Willis of Summertown (CB)
My Lords I will speak to Amendment 28 in my name and thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Parminter and Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for adding their names to it. This amendment has one simple purpose: to include in the Bill a mission on access to a healthy environment.
I will provide a few statistics to illustrate perfectly why this is necessary. A report by Public Health England in 2020 found that
“the most affluent 20% of wards in England have five times the amount of parks or general green space compared with the most deprived 10% of wards”.
Similarly, a report published by the community charity Groundwork in 2021 found that fewer than half of those with a household income of less than £15,000 reported green space within five minutes’ walk of their home, compared to two-thirds of those whose income was more than £35,000.
A 2020 Ramblers survey found that just 39% of people from ethnic minority backgrounds reported living within five minutes of a local park, field or canal path, compared to the national average of 57%—a really big gap. These and many other studies and similar reports suggest that in England we have massive inequality of access to healthy green and blue environments near to cities.
Why does this inequality in access to healthy environments in cities matter? It matters because there is an ever-increasing body of research from medical practitioners, psychiatrists and other public health authorities across the world that, even when taking into account socioeconomic factors, areas with more blue and green spaces are associated with higher health and mental well-being outcomes. These include things that cost thousands, if not millions, of pounds each year to deal with through the National Health Service, such as reduced levels of obesity, anxiety and stress-related illnesses, and lower incidences of respiratory and cardiovascular diseases.
There is more: green and blue spaces have been shown to play an important role in social cohesion, bringing communities together and reducing loneliness. They have also been shown to improve cognitive performance, especially in schoolchildren. To go back to many of the debates on the Environment Act, green spaces in cities are known to significantly reduce pollution and the effects of overheating and flooding.
If we have inequality in access to healthy environments, we have inequality in all of the benefits that these green and blue spaces provide in cities, and associated with this are really serious economic implications. For example, in a study last year, Natural England estimated that the National Health Service could save well over £2 billion a year through reduced demand if everyone in England had good access to green space. Indeed, the importance of access to green and blue space has been recognised globally. We signed up to that commitment in the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity in December 2022. The target we signed up to is to:
“Significantly increase … access to … green and blue spaces in … densely populated areas”.
Why should this mission be included in the Bill? Why can it not be delivered, as is being suggested, via other legislation such as the Environment Act and associated policies such as net biodiversity gain and the Government’s new target in their environmental improvement plan? Indeed, this target is
“to ensure that anyone can reach green or blue space within 15 minutes from their front door.”
As I hope I have made clear, access to blue and green space is far broader than just a matter for Defra and ensuring that we protect nature in cities. It is about ensuring that, via spatial planning processes, these healthy environments are in the right places for the right people, so that they can then gain the multiple benefits that many of us already have from access to these blue and green spaces. Some of these spaces, of course, may be delivered by net biodiversity gain and the environmental improvement plan, but neither of these have specific mechanisms closely aligned to the planning process which would enable targeted delivery in the areas most in need—in particular, starting with areas with the lowest incomes and the highest percentages of ethnic minorities.
If the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill is really to deliver and reduce inequalities in England, and to achieve its missions and targets in health, well-being and even education, this is exactly the right place to include an additional mission for equality of access to high-quality blue and green space. By including this in the Bill, planners, local councils and others involved in infrastructure and planning decisions will have to properly take into consideration access to blue and green space and all the benefits that we get with that.
In summary, my amendment has the core objective of reducing inequality in access to a healthy environment by maximising the number of people who live within 15 minutes’ walk of a high-quality natural green or blue space.
Lord Young of Cookham (Con)
My Lords, I add a brief contribution from these Benches to the excellent speeches that have been made on Amendments 4 and 8. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, that there will be an opportunity later in the Bill to develop her arguments when we come to the amendments in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, and others about a healthy environment.
I listened to what the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said on the first group and again on the group we are now debating, and there is a powerful case for addressing child poverty—indeed, all forms of poverty—if one is to genuinely level up. Can I say something which I hope will be helpful to the Government? I think there is a way through. If one looks at the levelling-up missions on page xvii of the executive summary of the White Paper, one will see the mission to:
“Boost productivity, pay, jobs and living standards by growing the private sector”.
It seems that if one developed that section of the mission on improving living standards and focused it directly in the way that has been suggested in Amendments 4 and 8 on children living in poverty—or, indeed, all those living in poverty—one could address the arguments that have been made.
Baroness Parminter (LD)
My Lords, I support the three amendments in this group to which I have added my name, which were all very ably introduced by my noble friend Lord Stunell and the noble Baroness, Lady Willis of Summertown. They are all about willing the means for the Government’s environmental and net-zero targets. We have seen a pattern in recent months of this Government not using the many Bills we have, such as the Procurement Bill and others, to actually will the means to deliver the targets. The targets are welcome but on their own they are completely meaningless.
On the first issue of access to green space, it was less than a month ago that the Government made the very welcome commitment for the first time ever to introduce an ambition for people to be able to access green or blue space within 15 minutes of their home. That is a fantastic commitment, and I applaud the Government for it. However, the point is that you then have to deliver the means to address this.
At the launch of the environmental improvement plan, when she made this commitment about green space, the Secretary of State said:
“We will … work across government to fulfil a new and ambitious commitment that everyone should live within 15 minutes walk of a green or blue space”.
I repeat:
“We will … work across government”—
that is what she said less than a month ago. This is the Minister’s chance to prove it. This is her chance to say that the Government believe in that commitment and welcome it, which the whole House would support, and that they will use this levelling-up Bill as the first mechanism to address it. That would give all of us, and indeed the broader country, a sense that this Government are committed to the environmental targets they are producing, and that they are not just a piece of paper about which they can say at hustings, saying, “Oh, we’ve set all these targets”. Let us see a bit about implementation. The amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, is important because it is about finding the mechanisms to deliver this. I applaud her for that.
Secondly, I need to say very little in addition to what my noble friend Lord Stunell has said. He made the case powerfully with regard to why deprived communities are suffering the most burdens from climate change, and about the need for a just transition. A just transition is what levelling up is about in practice, and why all the missions—not only the new ones—should be taking account of the net-zero requirements. He made the point that we now have environmental targets; we have commitments on biodiversity and good-quality air. Again, the communities in the most deprived areas that are suffering the worst air pollution, which is an impact of the environmental degradation that this country has suffered in recent years, and why we need the environmental targets. However, again, we also need the means to deliver them, and this amendment from my noble friend Lord Stunell is a means to deliver them. We are not expecting the Minister to say great things today but we want her to listen, because willing the means is so important. If we are going to level up for people, we have to level up on net zero and the environment too.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. I share the disappointment of the noble Lord, Lord Young, that we will not hear from the noble Lord, Lord Holmes. As someone who also knows that problem of running between the Chamber and the Moses Room all too well, I sympathise.
I do not feel that I need to add anything to the child poverty point made in the three powerful initial speeches. All one can say is that we hope that the Government in both Chambers were listening to those three speeches or will at least read them, because, really, how could they not act on the basis of them?
I want to focus on three amendments: Amendment 8, adding climate emergency as a mission, Amendment 18 on net zero, and Amendment 19, on the Environment Act. I broadly support what the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, said, but I slightly disagree with him because he said that he could not imagine a Government who did not have a net-zero-by-2050 target. I can imagine it: I know that we need a Government who have a target for net zero long before 2050, and indeed, who need to explore very closely that phrase “net zero” and what exactly it means. Perhaps I should add that that is a friendly disagreement,.
I am not quite sure that I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, that net zero should not be sitting there as a target on its own. As he was speaking, I could not help but think about the often-repeated phrase that what is not measured is not prioritised. If it is across all the targets—I very much agree that it applies across all the targets—is there a risk that it just disappears into the “Yes, we’ll put a few nice words in without really putting the counting in there”? We are seeing from local councils, so many of which have declared a climate emergency or, indeed, a nature crisis, that they are desperate to do that—to be able to show their own contribution.
A lot of our discussion about the climate emergency has focused on mitigation and the possibilities of mitigation. It is important to put that in the current global context, where we see both the United States and the European Union—particularly the US leading, with the EU trying to follow—putting massive sums of investment into what is loosely called the green economy. If we think about the Government and their often-expressed desire to be world-leading, there has been a real change in the global context just in the last few months. In that light, I want to pick up a point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. Most of the talk has been on climate mitigation. When we are particularly talking about what are commonly described as “left-behind communities”, such as the rural and coastal communities which we were talking about in the last group, the issues of adaptation and resilience to the climate emergency really need to be highlighted.
Here, we speak in the week when the UN Security Council had its first ever debate on the impacts of sea-level rise, and in just the last day or so we have seen some truly terrifying research coming out about the weakness of ice sheets that have the potential to cause a massive sea-level rise. As I was sitting here thinking about this, I thought about a visit I made to a small rural village called Hemsby in 2014 after it had been hit by a storm and a number of homes had been swept away. I just looked up Hemsby and realised that this year, Hemsby has been hit by serious storms three times again, and the lifeboat has lost its ramp again and again. If we think about places that desperately need support in the climate emergency, communities such as Hemsby have to be at the forefront. We have not really heard much discussion about that in this debate. I am not sure whether this needs to be a separate mission. The issue of resilience needs to be across all of the missions, making sure that everything we are aiming to invest in and build can stand up to climate and other shocks when we live in this age of shocks.
A number of noble Lords made the point about the interaction of human health and well-being and the environment. I do not know whether the Minister is aware—I point this out to her as a constructive suggestion—of a UN project called the Healthy Urban Microbiome Initiative, known as HUMI. It focuses on how human well-being benefits from a healthy environment even in the most concentrated urban settings. A more biodiverse setting, even on the busiest urban street, is better for human well-being. That has to underpin everything the Government are doing and thinking about here.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
My Lords, this has been an important and interesting debate about new missions to be added to the levelling-up agenda. Quite rightly, the Government have been thrown a challenge in four different ways. First, there was an absolutely vital challenge from the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, about reducing child poverty being absolutely at the heart of any levelling-up agenda. As she and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Gloucester said, currently 3.9 million children in our own country—nearly 4 million children—are living in poverty. If we do not use the Bill to address that scar on our country and our communities, we will not level up the lives of those communities in those localities.
The fundamentals that we have raised in this debate of child poverty, net zero, access to green spaces and protecting and enhancing our natural environment, are, for the reasons given, at the very heart of what the levelling-up ambitions ought to be achieving. As all the contributions have indicated, if we reduce those inequalities in those areas of spatial disparities, because we are focusing on those we will focus as a country on all child poverty. If we say that in the north-east people need access to green spaces, we focus on everybody’s access to green spaces. If we focus on reducing child poverty in some of the worst parts of our country, we improve the lives of every child because we are putting a spotlight on reducing those dreadful inequalities.
I thank the speakers, particularly my noble friends Lord Stunell and Lady Parminter, who drew the attention of the Minister and the House to the advantages of putting net zero and the environment at the very heart of all that we do. If we do not, we are missing a trick, as someone said. We have to will the means, said my noble friend Lady Parminter, not just express them. That is why on these Benches we will wholeheartedly support the amendment. If the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, wishes to bring this back on Report, she will have our support, as will those who raised the other issues with regard to the environment.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I draw attention to my interests as a serving councillor on Stevenage Borough Council and Hertfordshire County Council, and as a vice-president of the District Councils’ Network.
At Second Reading, I said that to some extent the Bill fails to meet the aspirations of the White Paper, but even the White Paper has significant omissions in that some of the key challenges which impact on opportunity and aspiration in this country are missing. This cannot be a levelling-up Bill without them, and this group of amendments seeks to address that.
In his contribution, the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, said that the missions were not in the Conservative manifesto, so we cannot absolve the Government from parliamentary scrutiny of those missions. However, neither can that proscribe Parliament from consideration of missions that were not there at all, or prevent those missions being added.
I thank my noble friend Lady Lister of Burtersett for her fantastic speech and amendment on child poverty, along with the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, and I thank the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Gloucester for delivering another powerful speech on that issue. I also thank the noble Baronesses, Lady D’Souza and Lady Stroud, for supporting the amendment.
My noble friend Lady Lister referred to an issue raised at Second Reading—that it was the Government’s stated intent that the Bill address child poverty, and yet it is not explicit in the missions. The powerful intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Bird, addressed, among other things, the contribution that social housing can make to tackling poverty. I completely agree, having grown up in a council house myself and seen how good-quality social housing benefited the people around me. That is very powerful. There is also no excuse for not including child poverty in the missions.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Gloucester spoke about the difficulties in education when you are facing poverty. When I was growing up, providing things as straightforward as school uniform, ingredients for cooking lessons and sports equipment were all great worries for children growing up in poverty.
The statistics are startling, and my noble friend Lady Lister quoted some of them. Some 27% of children—that is, eight in every classroom of 30—live in poverty, and of course the figure is far worse in some areas. In part of the county council division I represent in Hertfordshire—one of the wealthier areas of the UK, let us remember—one in three children lives in poverty. I have seen at first hand the impact on those children’s life opportunities in terms of educational attainment, health, mental health, economic capacity and every aspect of well-being: cultural, physical, social and academic. To imagine that levelling up can happen at all without a real focus on child poverty dooms the whole endeavour to failure.
For those of us who witnessed the huge impact of Sure Start and the comprehensive strategy of investment in children between 1998 and 2010, as a result of which, the number of children living in poverty fell by 600,000, it was dreadfully disappointing to see that project abandoned and the figures start to rise again. This situation has been exacerbated by the further inequalities that Covid inflicted on deprived communities. The Bill has the potential to start the serious work of tackling child poverty again. Let us not miss the opportunity, simply by not including child poverty as a serious and specific mission. My noble friend Lady Lister rightly asked why it was not in the White Paper or the Bill, and the noble Lord, Lord Young, proposed a solution. There may be other ways of doing it, and I hope that the Minister has taken account of what she has heard in the Chamber this afternoon.
I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Holmes of Richmond, for his advocacy for our disability community—I am sorry he could not be in his place this afternoon. As he says, this should be considered through every policy aspect of the Bill. Despite successive Acts of Parliament attempting to drive equalities forward in this respect, one has to spend only a very short period in the company of anyone with a disability to see just how far we still have to go. Access to transport, public buildings, education and the workplace, and the ability to participate in the political process, simply must get better if we are to see real levelling up. These are spatial issues, planning issues, and I hope we will see some progress as a result of the Bill.
I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Hayman for tabling the amendment on increasing cultural infrastructure across the UK. Unfortunately, due to the vicious cuts in local government funding in recent years, we have seen local cultural assets closed or mothballed across the country just at a time when creativity, innovation and celebration of local heritage could be creating jobs, developing skills, supporting mental well-being, giving educational opportunities and underpinning social cohesion and collaboration. In an excellent report from the Local Government Association, Cornerstones of Culture, the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, chair of the Commission on Culture and Local Government, sets out the incredible opportunities that supporting the development of cultural infrastructure can deliver in terms of levelling up. As a resident of Hertfordshire, which is rapidly becoming the Hollywood of Europe, with film, TV and creative studios driving our economy—there is always a commercial in my speeches—and creating huge opportunities for our county, in particular its young people, I can say that the benefits this cultural intervention could bring across the UK are clear to see.
We have amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, and the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, on meeting net zero, which are very welcome. There was a huge discussion on this on Second Reading, and it was notable just how many noble Lords said that without a specific mission to drive the target of reaching net zero across our nations and regions and across all policy areas, the Bill would be significantly deficient and miss a valuable opportunity. It is difficult to understand why amendments tabled the other place that attempted to strengthen the Bill in this respect were not adopted. As far as I am concerned, the situation is quite simple: either the Government mean what they say on net zero and climate change mitigation, in which case, make it the subject of a specific mission, or they do not. The consequences of the latter are enormous and unthinkable. It absolutely must be a target of devolution that every place in the UK fulfil its role in delivering net zero, and that progress be monitored.
The noble Lord, Lord Stunell, pointed out that achieving net zero is most challenging in the areas most in need of levelling up. The south-east is improving in this regard while the north-east is continuing to decline. At COP 27 the Prime Minister made a commitment to honouring promises on climate finance. That must apply equally across our nations and regions, as it does to external funding support. Yet, at the moment we do not even have a commitment to financing, for example, the decarbonisation of public housing. I urge the Minister to take seriously the strongly held concerns of noble Lords across this House about leaving out net zero as a specific mission of this levelling-up Bill. I will be particularly interested to hear the Minister’s thoughts on how green jobs, new biodiversity targets and environmental planning challenges each relate to the levelling-up agenda, and how the Bill can be improved by incorporating these.
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, for her powerful speech on a healthy environment and for pointing out that access to green space is definitely an equalities and levelling-up issue. The link to health and mental health outcomes is clear from all the evidence the noble Baroness cited and that we see elsewhere. Can the Minister say why this cannot be dealt with in the planning frameworks? I was lucky enough to grow up in a new town, where green space such as parks was planned from the very start. It comes under increasing pressure as the cramming of urban areas is seen as a way of solving the housing crisis. That cannot be right, and we need to have a careful look at this from a planning point of view.
We have a group of amendments here that are intended to address serious omissions from the Bill and include missions that will make a significant and important contribution to the levelling-up agenda. I hope that the powerful words of the noble Lords who have contributed to this debate will receive a receptive hearing from both the Minister and the Secretary of State.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, this group of amendments includes those related to new missions and metrics. The missions contained in the levelling-up White Paper are the products of extensive analysis and engagement; this analysis is set out in the White Paper. As I have made clear already, the Bill is designed to establish the framework for missions, not the content of missions themselves. The framework provides ample opportunity to scrutinise the substance of those missions against a range of government policies.
I start by addressing Amendments 4 and 9, tabled by the noble Baronesses, Lady Lister of Burtersett and Lady Hayman of Ullock, which would require the levelling-up missions to include a mission on child poverty. Let me say that everybody in this Government accepts that child poverty is an issue that needs continually to be kept an eye on, managed and acted upon. However, the way we deal with it is perhaps the issue that we need to discuss. We believe that the best and most sustainable way of tackling child poverty is to ensure parents have opportunities to move and progress in the workplace. Setting targets can drive action that focuses primarily on moving the incomes of those just in poverty to above a somewhat arbitrary poverty line, while doing nothing to help those on the very lowest incomes or to improve children’s future prospects. We therefore have no plans to reintroduce an approach to tackling child poverty that focuses primarily on income-based targets. Ministers and officials engage extensively across government to ensure a co-ordinated approach to tackling poverty, and we will continue to do so in the future.
Moving into work is the best way to improve lives. In 2019-2020, children in workless households were over six times more likely to be in absolute poverty than those in households where all adults were in work. Since 2010, there are nearly 1 million fewer workless households; under the Conservatives, 1.7 million more children are living in a home where at least one person is working. However, that is not to be complacent. The issue for me—the noble Lord, Lord Best, brought it up—is good housing, good education, good skills and good jobs. All these things are covered by the missions, and they do not need to be one separate mission.
While I am talking about living standards, my noble friend Lord Young asked about the definition of living standards. The Bill seeks to raise the living standards of people in work and people who are able to work, or whom we can get into work:
“By 2030, pay, employment and productivity will have risen in every area of the UK,”
getting those who are not already in work into work. That is the definition in the White Paper.
The levelling-up White Paper highlights the challenges faced by children from disadvantaged backgrounds, and how these vary between and within places. It takes a systematic approach, through the missions, to address a number of factors which we believe contribute to child poverty. The levelling-up mission on living standards commits to increasing pay and employment in every area of the UK, which would in turn help to reduce child poverty. We are also committed in the White Paper to investing an extra £200 million to expand the Supporting Families programme in England, which will help to improve the life outcomes and resilience of vulnerable children and their families. Additionally, over £300 million in funding for family hubs and Start for Life has been allocated to 55 high-deprivation local authorities, supporting a focus on perinatal mental health and parent-infant relationships, infant feeding and parenting support. These are very important at the beginning of a child’s life, as we heard again from the noble Lord, Lord Bird.
Lord Stunell (LD)
I appreciate what the Minister is saying, and it is not part of my case that investing in green jobs has been a failure. My point was that investing in green jobs has been very successful, but it has been more successful in the more prosperous regions. Consequently, the disparity between the rich region and the poor region is widening. Clearly a major redirection of thinking is needed to ensure that the green investment and the green jobs are channelled in the right way. The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, said that he did not want to see Cambridge levelled down. I do not want to see London levelled down. I want to see the north-east levelled up, up, up. The metrics will have to be adjusted to accommodate that.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
That is exactly what I said. We need to look at where these jobs are. An example of that is the £1 billion funding to support new investment in carbon capture, utilisation and storage in four industrial clusters or super-places across the UK. The net-zero strategy announced the first two clusters, one in the north-west and north Wales and the other in Teesside and Humberside. We are working to take that investment across the country and to places that need it.
This Government are committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions across the country to reach net zero by 2050. There is a statutory duty within the Climate Change Act 2008 on the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to set a carbon budget for successive periods of five years and to ensure that the net UK carbon account for the budgetary period does not exceed the carbon budget that has been set. Section 16 of the Climate Change Act 2008 also requires the Government to publish an annual statement of UK emissions, already in statute.
In addition to all this, the Treasury has mandated the consideration of climate and environmental impacts in spending decisions. Through its updated green book, policies must now be developed and assessed against how well they deliver on the Government’s long-term policy aims, such as net zero.
Lord Stunell (LD)
I apologise to the Minister for intervening again, but can I press her? Of course, that is all worth while, but will that analysis be on a regional basis or simply on a whole-country basis? We need to know, or the Minister needs to know, whether year by year that gap is widening or narrowing because of that extra green investment.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I spoke earlier about data and the processes and policies that we are putting in place for data capture and analysis. These are the things that will come out of that. I expect that to be one of the outcomes that we will see in the reviews of the missions.
I am very sorry that my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond was not here, but I know what he would say because he is a huge voice for disabled people in this country. I thank him for that and for his Amendment 14. If the House agrees, I will respond to it. The objective of improving the lives of disabled people has been considered throughout the levelling-up White Paper. People with disabilities are less likely to be employed, and face additional challenges in workplace progression. The White Paper highlights the in-work progression offered to support better employment opportunities. We need to continue this. The disability employment gap is widest for those who have no qualifications, hence why we will continue to work closely with local authorities to improve their special educational needs and disability services where they are underperforming.
The Government are delivering for disabled people. We have seen 1.3 million more disabled people in work than there were in 2017, delivering a government commitment five years early. We have supported the passage of two landmark pieces of legislation—the British Sign Language Act and the Down Syndrome Act. We have also delivered an additional £1 billion in 2022-23 for the education of children and young people with more complex needs.
Amendment 16 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, would require this Government and future Governments to include a mission to increase cultural infrastructure across the UK within mission statements. I agree with her that people’s lives are shaped by the social and physical fabric of their communities. The local mix of social and physical capital, from universities to good-quality green spaces and from libraries to local football clubs, gives areas their unique character and vibrancy and makes residents proud to live in that place. Recognising that in the levelling-up White Paper, the Government set a “pride in place” mission. The Government’s ambition is that, by 2030, people’s satisfaction in their town centre and engagement in local culture and community will have risen in every area in the United Kingdom, with the gap between top-performing and other areas closing. Increasing cultural infrastructure will be key to achieving this mission.
The Government have taken practical steps to support, protect and expand cultural infrastructure. The £1.5 billion cultural recovery fund rescue packages helped thousands of cultural organisations across a range of sectors to stay afloat during the Covid-19 pandemic, while the community renewal fund, the community ownership fund, the levelling-up fund and the UK prosperity fund have provided opportunities to enhance cultural arts, heritage and sporting infrastructure in places across the country. The mutual importance of cultural and place identity is recognised in the Government’s work with places, such as through the devolution deal and the pilot destination management organisation initiative in the north-east of England.
I hope that the extent of the Government’s action on these priorities, set out elsewhere in the policy, and the approach that has been set out—a clear, uncluttered and long-lasting framework for levelling-up missions—provides Peers with sufficient assurance not to press their amendments.
Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)
The Minister addressed climate mitigation but not climate adaptation and resilience. Can she write to me about the ways in which the Bill addresses those resilience and climate adaptation issues?
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
I will read Hansard, then write to her and put a copy in the Library.
Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, this debate has shown the importance of some of the gaps in the Government’s levelling-up mission. It also shows how social and environmental justice are intertwined in terms of child poverty, the environment and disability, as we have talked about. They gel together well as a set of amendments.
I am very grateful to noble Lords who spoke in support of Amendment 4. Some powerful speeches have enriched the case for adding a child poverty mission to the list of missions. I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, who looked for a way through without an extra mission but looking at how the current missions could be adapted. It was very disappointing that the Minister rather rejected that olive branch—that way out or way through—and has not even agreed to take it away and consider it as an option.
I thank the Minister for engaging with the issues raised, but, needless to say, I found her response very disappointing. I think she said that the Government accept that child poverty is an issue that we must keep an eye on, manage and act on—but where is the Government’s child poverty strategy? There is none. It is simply not good enough to say that it is all about getting parents into paid work, without even acknowledging the growth of in-work poverty and the number of children in families who have someone in paid work and yet are in real, serious poverty.
The Minister said that she did not want to have targets that would just take people above the poverty line. That is one of the reasons why the amendment talked about deep poverty, not simply getting those just below the line over it. It is a shame that the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, could not be here, because her Social Metrics Commission has done a lot to draw attention to the increasingly serious issue of the depths of poverty. We now have organisations such as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation talking about destitution. In our modern-day society, this is really not something to be complacent about.
The Minister said, “we are not complacent”, but she then went on to repeat all the wonderful things that the Government are doing, none of which is reducing child poverty—they may be managing it but are not reducing it. It is irrelevant to this amendment to say that we are doing this and that, because those things are not serving to reduce the level of child poverty. I am afraid that, for me, that smacks of complacency.
I do not want to keep people from their dinner. The Minister said that she hoped that we would be reassured by what we had heard and withdraw the amendment. I will of course withdraw, but do not take that as me being in any way reassured. I am not. We will have to consider whether we want to come back on Report with an amendment on child poverty. But, for now, I beg leave to withdraw.
Subsidy Control (Information-Gathering Powers) (Modification) Regulations 2022
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Randerson
That this House regrets that the Subsidy Control (Information-Gathering Powers) (Modification) Regulations 2022 (SI 2022/1152) remove important requirements to consult the devolved governments in relation to subsidy control policy and undermine a United Kingdom wide approach to the regulation of subsidies.
Relevant document: 19th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee
Baroness Randerson (LD)
My Lords, I put down this regret Motion because the purpose of this SI runs directly contrary to the points of principle that we on these Benches argued for during the passage of the Subsidy Control Bill. We argued for more consultation with devolved Administrations; instead, this SI reduces it.
In explanation, this instrument removes an obligation for the CMA to consult with the devolved Administrations when preparing or revising the policy statement in relation to information-gathering powers, which are used by the Competition and Markets Authority’s Subsidy Advice Unit under the terms of the Subsidy Control Act 2022. It also removes the requirement for the Secretary of State to consult the devolved Administrations when making regulations about penalties in relation to these powers.
The Act established a new subsidy control regime to replace the EU’s well-established state aid. The Government’s aim was to enable local authorities and devolved Administrations to deliver subsidies more tailored to local needs. The CMA, via its SAU, has a monitoring role, and there are penalties for not complying with its information-gathering powers.
The Act touches on a sensitive area of overlap between reserved and devolved powers: subsidy regulation is reserved but economic development is devolved, and, clearly, subsidies are an important economic development policy tool. When the subsidy control powers operated under the EU umbrella, DAs worked to a pretty clear and non-party-political framework of rules. On paper, the Government’s aims in making the new framework more sensitive to local needs should make economic development easier for devolved Administrations and local authorities. However, these regulations undermine the whole principle of sensitivity to local needs by removing the obligation to consult.
There are additional aggravating features to this situation. First is the lack of any previous notification that this was the Government’s intention. I can find no specific announcement during the passage of the Bill that this was how the Government intended to use their power. The Welsh Government inform me that they were first informed on 21 July, when shown a draft of these regulations. At official-level meetings prior to this date, there had apparently been none of the usual courtesies of giving advance information on the Government’s direction of travel, which would have enabled Welsh Government officials to have some input into the drafting.
Secondly, there is the opaque way in which this legislation is drafted. Although these regulations flow from the Subsidy Control Act, they implement an implied amendment to the internal market Act. Noble Lords will recollect that that Act was controversial from a devolution perspective: the DAs did not grant legislative consent, and attempts were made to amend the Bill to take greater account of the economic development responsibilities of devolved Administrations. These regulations mean that the internal market Act remains drafted as is from the textual standpoint but with an implied textual amendment which will have the effect of removing the requirement to consult with devolved Administrations. It will give the Secretary of State more discretion on penalties and give the CMA more discretion on policy relating to subsidy control. The CMA Subsidy Advice Unit already has no obligation to give due regard to DA opinions, and this is another blow to the possibility of positive relationships between devolved Administrations and the UK Government. This is a pity, as I am told that relationships between the SAU and officials in devolved bodies have been very positive, so there is no good reason to change the balance of powers. As well as removing the obligation to consult, this also removes any possibility of challenge if devolved opinions are ignored. I suspect that this is the Government’s intention here: governing always seems easier if you shut yourself away and do not listen.
These regulations will bring the duties placed upon the SAU out of line with the duties placed on the CMA’s Office for the Internal Market, suggesting that a similar retrenchment of devolved powers may be likely for the latter. Do the Government have such plans?
Further aggravating features were brought to our attention by the diligent work of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. It expressed concern that the Government’s explanation or defence of the removal of this obligation to consult is that the CMA and the Secretary of State will still have to consult the devolved Administrations if their interests are “sufficiently affected”. The SLSC stated that, in the absence of any definition of this term, it is worried about how it will be interpreted. I hope the Minister can be very explicit on how the new rules will be interpreted.
The SLSC also drew our attention to a serious error in the Explanatory Memorandum, which said that the DAs had not objected, when in fact they had done so unequivocally. The EM has now been corrected, but this is a serious error—much worse than the usual omissions. If the views of the DAs on the regulations governing consultations are misrepresented, it is hard for us to have confidence in the good faith of the consultations that flow from them.
In summary, these regulations will impact adversely on economic development opportunities in the devolved nations and hinder the ability of the DAs to shape the subsidy regime of the future. They reinforce the view that this centralising Government are determined to take every opportunity, however small, to undermine devolution. I realise that the Government want to hold all the reins of power, not least because, in this case, carefully placed subsidies are an easy way to bolster support in chosen parts of the country. The same principle underpinned the Government’s decision to centralise the shared prosperity fund and to cut the Welsh and Scottish Governments out of decision-making. The outcome of the first round of that funding makes my point for me.
I urge the Minister to think long term. Every time the Government chip away at devolution, they persuade a few more voters living in the devolved nations to give up on devolution and move to support independence. The Government should instead be bolstering good relations with the devolved Administrations, and that means respecting their powers and opinions. The Government are in danger of making enemies out of friends. The Welsh Government are not the Scottish Government; they are not predisposed to object to everything. I am sure the Minister will seek to reassure me that consultation with the devolved Administrations will in fact continue, but unfortunately the evidence is already there that it is pretty sketchy and corners are cut on existing obligations. I thank the Minister for his prior interest in my concerns on this, and I assure him that I will listen carefully to his response.
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, for her clear and explicit exposition of the concern here. I have read the Welsh Government’s report, and significant concerns are raised in it. As we have heard, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which we have to take very seriously indeed, expresses concerns.
Misrepresentation has to be taken extremely seriously. My experience is of working at a regional level, having responsibility for money coming in through the form of subsidies and navigating the area of state aid. That is significant and important in building relationships and establishing trust and transparency in an area where there are competing interests. Every subsidy will be scrutinised, and there will be questions about why one area has got one as opposed to other areas.
Lord Dodds of Duncairn (DUP)
My Lords, I wish briefly to raise a couple of issues. First, the report of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee refers to the responses from the Scottish and Welsh Governments. I am keen to understand what type of engagement there was with the Northern Ireland departments. We recognise, of course, that there is no Northern Ireland Executive or Assembly, but the Select Committee on the protocol, of which I am a member, has received many regulations and explanatory memorandums. This indicates that, while there is the absence of devolved government, officials are engaging on a departmental level and seeking responses and input on behalf of Northern Ireland. I would be interested to know what consultation took place with departments in Northern Ireland. If there was such consultation, what was the response?
The second issue I would like clarified is how the statutory instrument interacts with Article 10 of the Northern Ireland protocol. Article 10 puts Northern Ireland outside the UK subsidy control regime and means that we are subject to EU state aid rules. The territorial application of this instrument appears to extend to Northern Ireland. I would like clarity for those in Northern Ireland, who are always seeking to understand the interaction between our own domestic UK legislation and the laws that now govern us from the European Union. We are unique in that respect, so I would like some clarity on the interaction between this instrument and the fact that we are under EU state aid rules.
Lord Fox (LD)
My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, and the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, who, alongside the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and my noble friend Lady Randerson, have the scars of the Subsidy Control Bill on our backs. We all worked on its passage, and my noble friend Lady Randerson also worked on the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill, to which she referred.
The wheels of ministerial responsibility have turned, and we have a different Minister answering some of the questions which, as my noble friend pointed out, were previously raised. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Dodds, for raising Northern Ireland, because the ambiguity of the Northern Ireland regime was something we discussed many times with the Minister’s predecessor. That issue was never properly resolved from the Dispatch Box; perhaps a new Minister can provide some more clarity.
It is difficult to look at this, having been through the passage of the Subsidy Control Act, and feel that the Government were operating in good faith during that process. This is exactly what we said would happen, and it was essentially denied from the Dispatch Box, so here we are. I would dispute a little with the noble Baroness, Lady Blake: I do not think this is the thin end of the wedge. We have seen the thin end, and we are moving up the wedge as far as the Government’s attitude towards the devolved Administrations and devolved power is concerned. This is just another example, and it clearly shows that the Conservative model for taking back power is to remove power from the devolved Administrations, as well as assuming power from Brussels.
My noble friend pointed out that this comes at that difficult nexus between devolved and reserved powers. That is what the common frameworks process was established to deal with. Can the Minister tell your Lordships’ House why the common frameworks process was not considered the right way to resolve this issue, which, as my noble friend rightly said, sits on the border between devolved and reserved issues? That is exactly the reason why the common frameworks were put in place.
My noble friend illustrated the non-political system that was practised between the EU and the devolved Administrations. There were strict legalistic rules which set up how the money was distributed. But now, all the evidence suggests that His Majesty’s Government are departing from what I would call a legalistic framework and working to political grace and favour. Political allocation of subsidies is clearly what is happening. We only have to look at what has happened to date. Under the cover of bidding processes, money is being allocated where it suits this Government best for their electoral prospects. This is a big departure from the legalistic approach the European Union established. We could set that aside and say that this is clumsy, which it is. We could perhaps understand if the Government rushed into this in haste without proper consultation with the devolved Administrations. I would like to think that was true. It would be easier to illustrate that if the Minister could tell us whether the CMA requested these powers, why it requested them and when.
It is clear that this has again upset the relationship with the Welsh Government and, I am sure, with the other devolved Administrations, as we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Dodds. Why are the Government being so clumsy on this? What, in the long run, are they seeking by cutting themselves off from the information supply? The noble Baroness, Lady Blake, said that the Government are cutting themselves off from valuable information which should be available. I can only take the gloomy view of this. This instrument makes the process of what I will call “subsidy gerrymandering” easier. For that reason, we find it unacceptable.
The Minister of State, Department for Business and Trade (Lord Johnson of Lainston) (Con)
I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, for tabling this Motion and the noble Lords, Lord Dodds and Lord Fox, and the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, for their incredibly valuable contributions. I am also well aware of the nature of this debate and how it relates to devolution and the important sense of respect between the UK Government, the devolved Administrations and public authorities. I stress my own personal sensitivity to this matter. I note the comment of the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, about the timeliness of the responses sought by devolved Administrations; I will ensure that I relay that to my colleagues. I also want to stress the importance we place on interlocution with the Welsh Government.
This is a technical debate. The specific matter of the subsidy advice unit, which I am going to cover this evening, involves a number of technical aspects. I am extremely comfortable with having further conversations with any noble Lords about any of the specifics we are discussing, as I did over the weekend with the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson.
The noble Lord, Lord Dodds, mentioned consultations relating to article 10 and the subsidy advice unit, and I am happy to provide the noble Lord with a fuller answer on that. It would not cover subsidies that would come under the EU state aid rules because clearly, the subsidy advice unit is for UK-based subsidies. There are some services it will be relevant for, which I am happy to talk about in further detail later.
I also reassure the noble Baroness and other contributors to this very important debate that in this instance there is no lack of respect. There has been no abdication by central government of responsibilities and duties to devolved nations. We are not shutting ourselves away, as may have been suggested. This is not a forerunner of a roll-back of devolution. It is not a power grab, as has been mentioned. I would not suggest that, relating to this specific issue, this is even the tip of the thinnest end of the wedge; I do not think the wedge comes into it. Hopefully, I will now explain why.
The measures contained in this and various other pieces of legislation relating to it actually give devolved nations more flexibility—as has been said by the noble Baroness—to design their subsidies so that they can rightly ensure that all such support is directed to local priorities, better serving their citizens and enabling, frankly, a far better series of targeted outcomes. This is, if noble Lords will allow me a reference, what we talk about when we use the phrase “Brexit dividend”.
Lord Fox (LD)
Before moving off the point, to take what the Minister has said, I still do not quite understand why, if the CMA still had to consult the devolved Administrations in the way that it would have to without this measure, how that consultation would stop it doing anything that the Minister has just described that it will be doing. In other words, what is the purpose of removing that obligation to consult?
Lord Johnson of Lainston (Con)
There are a number of useful procedural and technical reasons for doing that. The point is that the Subsidy Advice Unit is exactly that; it is an advisory unit which the devolved Administrations or local authorities will call in themselves in order to review whether their subsidies conform to our international agreements. There are some specific areas where these might be reviewed—I think that if it is above £5 million, that would automatically trigger some of them to review—but these are reserved powers and this relates to an advisory unit, so this is effectively tidying up the process. That allows the Secretary of State to have more control over the framework. I think we agree that setting levels of fines for non-provision of information, which is very important; it would not be helpful if devolved nations or local authorities were not providing the information we need in order to ensure that we are running an effective subsidy regime, and to ensure that each of the other devolved nations were able to view what each of the others were up to. Therefore it is absolutely right that the Secretary of State can set those rates, and it would not be appropriate for that to go to consultation, because it is a reserved matter and specifically relates back to the devolved nations. I hope I have explained myself; I am very happy to have further meetings on this at a later date. I have a few more comments to make, and then I will come to the end.
It is important to note that the Government have engaged regularly with the devolved Administrations on the design of a UK-wide subsidy control regime. Clearly, the whole point is to make this regime a positive factor of the post-Brexit vision of Britain. This is both at official and ministerial level, including through a regular policy forum. It is in all our interests to ensure that the regime works for the whole of the UK and enables the UK’s domestic markets to function properly. I note that as part of its outreach programme for public authorities, the Department for Business and Trade delivered in-person events in Belfast, Cardiff and Glasgow, and dedicated online sessions for public authorities in Wales and Northern Ireland. The series, attended by 1,500 people in total, also helped build awareness and understanding of the new regime among public authorities.
Therefore, while it is right and proper for debates in this House and for legislation to reflect important points of principle, such as the difference between reserved and devolved competencies, I hope noble Lords will be reassured that the actual delivery of specific polices, such as the administration of the UK’s subsidy control regime, is much more practical and pragmatic in nature. The Subsidy Advice Unit and Department for Business and Trade have had a productive and positive working relationship with counterparts in the devolved Administrations throughout the development of the new subsidy control regime. His Majesty’s Government are absolutely committed to maintaining that working relationship and looking for further opportunities to collaborate with devolved Administrations as we look to the future of the regime as well. We are not trying to make enemies of friends. For those reasons, I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her Motion.
Baroness Randerson (LD)
I thank the Minister for his response and thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this short debate. In particular, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Dodds. With the many months that have passed without the Northern Ireland Assembly, we here speak only too infrequently of Northern Ireland in terms of devolution. It is important that we very much keep the situation at the front of our minds, because it is very complex.
I remind the Minister that I was in the Wales Office for three years and that I have spoken here on Northern Ireland as well. I know that consultations and relationships with the devolved Administrations need time, hard work, patience and respect, and I am pleased that he repeated the importance of respect. However, I also know that it helps to have a formal structure for consultation; that makes certain that corners are not cut. The error in the Explanatory Memorandum exemplifies that this is the sort of situation which would not have occurred if there had been proper consultation on the long-term implications, as there should be on this. The important thing here is not whether the SAU is advisory but the fact that the process overall, including the role of the Secretary of State, includes penalties for non-compliance for information gathering. When a penalty is involved, there are bound to be concerns about a lack of consultation. If this had been properly flagged up during the passage of the Bill, there would almost certainly be far weaker grounds for objection by the devolved Administrations. In effect, this is an SI to amend primary legislation, which is why they are concerned.
I repeat the meaning of the final words of my opening speech: how can a system established to cater for local needs seek to do so by centralising decision-making and ruling out consultation? If it is going to be sensitive to local needs, it should increase consultation. I will look very closely at the Minister’s detailed response, for which I thank him. I do not intend to push this to a vote, but I think it will be of interest to the devolved Administrations and to noble Lords across this House who are interested in devolution. I beg leave to withdraw my Motion.
Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill
Monday 20th February 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 View all Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 Debates Read Hansard Text Amendment Paper: HL Bill 84-II Second marshalled list for Committee - (20 Feb 2023)
“(2A) A statement may apply to one or more region or nation of the United Kingdom.”Member's explanatory statement
This probing amendment means that a statement can be directed at a specific region or nation.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I shall move Amendment 6, in the name of my noble friend Lady Hayman of Ullock, and speak to Amendment 17, to which she has added her name, Amendments 22 and 23, which are in her name, and Amendments 35 and 40, which are in my own name. I am grateful to noble Lords who have submitted amendments in this group, relating to the very important question of how the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill is treated in relation to the nations and regions of the UK.
In the excellent debate in your Lordships’ House on the scrutiny of common frameworks between the nations of the UK, my noble friend Lady Andrews set out the view of the committee that we could face an unfulfilled opportunity to build a more resilient, innovative and equal union. When I spoke for the Opposition at the introduction of the Second Reading of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill, I referred to this and the committee’s work and said there was a huge opportunity in the Bill to ensure that we now build on the work of the noble Baroness’s committee, the work of the Dunlop review and the review carried out by the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and ensure that levelling up across the nations and regions of the UK becomes an absolute of the Bill. It must not be something that needs to be worked on for years after the Bill has passed to make sure its reach is wide enough geographically, ambitious enough to reach every part of the UK equally, and flexible enough to allow for the diversity of economies, geography and demographics that make up our union.
The Minister set out that this legislation is intended to be enabling legislation but, unless there are mechanisms to enable the legislation to take effect, how can we sure that it will be effective across the nations and regions of the UK? Unfortunately, what appear to have been noble aims towards devolution in the White Paper have not been realised in the Bill, which leans towards centralising, controlling the nations and regions from Whitehall, with little real commitment to fiscal or actual devolution. I am sure that that is not what was intended, but it may happen as a result of what is in the Bill. We simply cannot carry on with a model which sees the UK being the most centralised state in western Europe; nor can we see that exacerbated by this Bill and expect that the feelings of communities across our nations and regions that they are ignored, invisible and treated as second-class citizens will get better.
I have been a passionate advocate of devolution for many years because, in local government, we see the strength and energy when local innovation and energy are harnessed to drive economic, environmental and social development. Too often, however, the powers and funding needed to support this are lacking. There is no better example of this than the experience of local government funding over the last 13 years, which has seen £15 billion stripped out of funding in our communities to be replaced by £2.8 billion of funding from the notorious levelling-up fund. It does not take a mathematical genius to see that this is anything but levelling up.
While some in this House may find parts of Gordon Brown’s report challenging—even on this side of the House—the evidence that he cites from Professor Philip McCann, that half the UK population live in areas no better off than the poorer parts of the former East Germany and are poorer than parts of central and eastern Europe and the poorest states of the USA, is irrefutable nationally recognised evidence. The amendments submitted in relation to ensuring inclusivity of the nations and regions of the UK are a vital part of ensuring that we stop developing the potential of just some of the country and make a real irreversible shift in prosperity. As former Prime Minister Brown says in his report, we want Britain to be
“an equal opportunity economy – where, with the right powers in the right places, every community can play their full part in delivering national prosperity.”
Later this week, we will be considering progress on the recommendations of the Dunlop report. In 2019, the noble Lord, Lord Dunlop, made recommendations about how to develop relationships, build trust and improve democratic accountability by
“encouraging a better understanding of the respective roles of the UK and devolved governments, and in particular the UK Government’s role in serving people across the country.”
He urged government towards
“a more predictable and robust process for managing intergovernmental relations”.
Of course, there are many elements to delivering this but to completely leave out of this Bill any reference to how levelling up is to be achieved across our nations and regions seems a huge missed opportunity. I hope that the Minister will consider these amendments with favour as the Bill goes through its Committee stage in your Lordships’ House.
All the amendments in this group relate to that. They talk about the statement of levelling-up missions being referred to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland where the whole or greater part of the responsibility lies with Scottish Ministers or Welsh Ministers or the Northern Ireland Executive. The amendments also talk about consulting with representatives of each devolved Administration as the statement comes into effect—indeed, that the statement would only come into effect once that has been done—and that the statement should be approved by Parliament, in consultation with the devolved Administrations. All these amendments are there to make sure that, across Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, as well as the regions of England, there is proper consultation on any element within the Bill as well as the way that the missions are formed or changed and on whether there is a mission statement that is required by a devolved Administration or a local authority where it relates to a devolved function.
As I say, I hope that the Minister is taking account of these discussions, and I look forward to hearing the debate.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
My Lords, I will speak to the amendment tabled in my name and those of the noble Baronesses, Lady Finlay of Llandaff and Lady Hayman of Ullock. I am most grateful for their support.
The point raised by the amendment goes to a very important constitutional issue. We are not discussing what the levelling-up mission should be but the allocation of responsibilities. It takes us to the heart of the devolution settlements. I have used the word “devolution”, and part of the problem arises from the fact that this Bill deals with devolution—there is a whole section on it—meaning devolution to English councils. Maybe the person who started to think about this Bill forgot that devolution in relation to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is something completely different. I think they failed to recall, first of all, that primary legislative powers in respect of many areas to be covered were passed to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and the Governments of those countries. I use the word “Governments”, because I think this Government have now got away from the Johnsonian phrase of “Administrations”—no doubt an attempt to belittle them. These Governments have responsibility in very important areas.
I wonder if it might be sensible, for the future, to distinguish between the two senses of the word devolution that this Bill has introduced. Maybe we should talk about “home rule” as part of the union for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, or maybe we should talk about it as “national devolution”. We need to distinguish it from English devolution, because that is where the muddle has occurred.
The Minister helpfully sent us the list of subject matters that are to be covered by the mission statements taken from the White Paper. It is quite interesting to look down them and see how they deal with the problem that arises in relation to areas where policy has been partially or completely devolved to the nations of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. One feels that someone, at some stage, should have understood this.
On education, the White Paper says:
“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.”
But what of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland? Plainly, at that stage, the person who drafted this had their thinking cap on, because they realised they could not do it. But then one goes on to look at well-being:
“By 2030, well-being will have improved in every area of the UK, with the gap between top performing and other areas closing.”
As a statement of motherhood and apple pie, I cannot think of anything better, but the draftsman has plainly forgotten that Wales has its own primary legislation on well-being.
One could go through all aspects of the White Paper and pull out the details, but I raise these points because there is here the issue of how you deal with wishing to make statements that are applicable across the UK while taking into account that the UK Government have no power over certain areas—they are completely or substantially devolved.
As I understand it, the authors of the White Paper—here I think the problem may have arisen—did not understand devolution. They make the statement, at page 121 of the White Paper, that:
“Unless otherwise specified, the missions apply across the whole of the UK.
But then they go on to say that:
“Devolution settlements mean the policy levers”—
extraordinary words to describe the devolution of substantial areas of government—
“for achieving aspects of these missions are devolved to administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Because levelling up outcomes for citizens needs close collaboration between all levels of government, a period of consultation on the missions will be undertaken with devolved administrations. The best way forward on sharing learning and comparing progress in these areas will be agreed with devolved administrations.”
Lord Stunell (LD)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas. They have laid some very important foundations for my Amendment 29 which, I think, will take noble Lords into territory they have not explored before.
I want to make it clear that we strongly support the principle of levelling up. We welcome the analysis in last year’s White Paper as it strongly supports the case that many of us have been pressing for over decades: when policies and state investment are shackled to rigid short-term cost-benefit analysis, the rich will routinely get the investment and the poor will automatically lose out. I illustrated that by reference to investment in green jobs in the last debate. The White Paper identifies the situation in this way:
“In the UK, the depletion of civic institutions, including local government, has gone hand-in-hand with deteriorating economic and social performance.”
I agree with the authors of the White Paper’s analysis of what institutional and government changes are needed, which is to strengthen the civic institutions—including local government—as an important step to reversing the deterioration in economic and social performance.
We also support what the White Paper says about the setting of time-bound targets and long-term missions to achieve them. We strongly believe that those missions must be properly established, monitored and held in common democratic ownership—a point that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, was expressing in slightly different language. That, I believe, is exactly in tune with the spirit and the words of the White Paper but, sadly, it is completely missing from the Bill itself. This amendment is designed to improve the Bill and, in turn, make levelling up a reality, not just a slogan. The focus of Amendment 29 is, therefore, on the missions and how they are to be established and by what process they should, over time, evolve. We heard from the Minister earlier on—for that matter, it was reinforced by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley—that the view in Whitehall is that it should be controlled, managed, described, evaluated and monitored by Whitehall. The way we are proceeding rather tends to suggest that this is the prevailing consensus, though I hope not.
People are frequently heard to say that the missions are set out in the Bill. In fact, the Minister—in what was, no doubt, a slip of the tongue—said exactly that in the previous debate, though she did subsequently refer to the White Paper. The Bill and the White Paper are not the same documents. This House can change the Bill; whether we do remains to be seen but we can, in principle. We cannot change the White Paper and the missions are set out in the White Paper, not the Bill. There are six capitals set out, and the missions enhance the six capitals; then there are five pillars which are what the 12 missions stand on. I have not actually seen the drawing that shows how this all goes together. Anyway, neither the missions, the capitals nor the pillars are in this Bill.
It has also often been said, sometimes by the Front Bench opposite, that the missions will powerfully hold this and future Governments to account. No, they will not; the Bill says that Ministers can chop and change the missions when they see fit. So far, not one of the 12 missions in the White Paper has been approved by Parliament. Indeed, come the autumn, changed circumstances—it might be poll ratings, it might be a new Prime Minister, it might be almost anything these days—might dictate that additional missions should be promulgated, or existing ones cut or modified.
At that time, noble Lords may or may not be allowed to debate the statement when it comes forward, but we certainly will not be invited to amend it, and nor will any of the democratic institutions around the four nations be invited to do so either, notwithstanding what the White Paper has to say. On page 100 it says:
“Local decision making has tended to generate better local economic performance, as local policies are tailored to local needs. There is an empirical correlation between the degree of decentralisation of decision making and … disparities in economic performance”.
I am sure that noble Lords fully understand what that quotation means, but it says in plain words that if you give the decisions to local people, you will get better economic performance.
Unfortunately, that insight has not yet led anybody in Whitehall to consider asking those local decision-makers what missions might work best in their circumstances. That is despite the White Paper setting out one of the five pillars—we have not heard much about the five pillars until a couple of minutes ago—on which this all stands. One of them, set out on page 105, is,
“greater empowerment of local government decision-making”.
I hope that the abrupt reversal of the approach set out in the White Paper with what is actually provided to us in Clause 1 is more a result of traditional Whitehall hubris than of a traditional bait-and-switch trick, where we are all so longingly looking at the promised land of levelling up that we fall right into the hole of rigid centralisation in front of us. That is what the mechanism in Clause 1 does.
Whether it is pride or trickery, the fact of the matter is that it is absolutely contrary to the spirit of the White Paper and its recognition that local decision-making produces better results. This amendment is designed to get back to the words and the spirit of the White Paper and to embed the missions in a democratic countrywide consensus that can survive rotating chairs around the Cabinet table or the perils of the ballot box.
I was not at all impressed by the argument advanced by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, that an incoming Labour Government would want all the reins in their hands. Of course they would; anybody running the Government in Whitehall would always want to have all the decisions at their command, but this will succeed or fail on whether it has broad democratic countrywide consensus. It will not work if it has autocratic, top-down authoritarian delivery and decision-making.
The White Paper helps me again, because it reports on page 111 that out of 35 OECD countries in 2016, the UK ranked 14th in sub-national share of total government investment. Our main comparator countries have twice to four times larger a share of their total government investment spent through the sub-national Governments and regions of those countries. With apologies to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, I say that, in this phraseology, sub-national includes Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. A direct consequence of that unhealthy small share of investment coming via sub-national decision-makers is that most new initiatives are led by central government, because it has all the money. Of course, that includes how it is intended to be under Clause 1 as drafted, setting all the missions and targets by ministerial diktat and without the opportunity for amendment. They are the missions which everyone else—every other democratic institution in the United Kingdom—is to be beholden to for the next seven years without so much as a by your leave from this Parliament.
Everyone recognises that centralisation of initiatives has not worked out well. Historically, there are many examples. The White Paper says on page 111 that joining up central government policies with the needs of places “has been unusual”. You can say that again. One size does not fit all. The White Paper points out that one size fitting all is not a recipe for success.
The White Paper goes on to say that it is even worse than that:
“In the UK, where policy is … set centrally, silos can hinder coordination.”
There are so many government silos, I have lost count. There are probably 30; it might be more. Of course, those silos fire random policies out at high speed, with very poor guidance systems, and spatter the whole country.
Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (CB)
My Lords, I added my name to Amendment 17, which was so well introduced by my noble and learned friend Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd. I will add a few words to emphasise points he has already made. I should declare an interest here: I co-chair the Bevan Commission, which advises the Welsh Government on health issues.
It is incredibly important to recognise that the Governments of Wales, Scotland and, to a certain extent—one hopes it will be fully restored—Northern Ireland have legislative-making powers. Several Acts of Parliament have given them specific powers that have expanded, and they can write their strategy and the way it will be implemented. That is completely different and goes much further than any regions in England, which are quite separate.
The point of this amendment is to move away from simply consultation, which might sound nice and tokenistic and involve signing off, to actually having proper co-production. It needs to be in the Bill to ensure that whichever Government is in place in future, as this legislation sits on the statute book, the relevant Governments will work together to meet whatever the missions are that are then determined over time.
It is important to look, as has already been referred to, at page 121 of the White Paper, which stresses that
“two of the missions are overarching, outcomes-based measures of success for levelling up”.
These are boosting living standards and pay and improving measures of well-being across every part of the UK. The Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 has been viewed as really ground-breaking and leading the way for Wales—way ahead of other parts of the United Kingdom. It has influenced the way decisions are made in many walks of life, which people living outside Wales are completely unaware of.
The remaining missions are viewed as intermediate outcomes. As has already been said:
“Unless otherwise specified, the missions apply across the whole of the UK. Devolution settlements mean the policy levers for achieving aspects of these missions are devolved to administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.”
I really worry about that wording, because it is not strong enough to recognise the strategic responsibilities and the responsibilities of the devolved Governments in making legislation to fundamentally influence the way that people within their own nations live.
My concern is that, if we do not move completely to co-production of the way these missions are to be interpreted, we will end up with increasing fragmentation across the United Kingdom, rather than increasing coming together. As has already been said, one hopes that there is a glimmer of light, that we might actually be back to consolidating as a United Kingdom: the four nations working together really well, recognising differences, respecting different policies and all wanting the best for the well-being of the whole population of the whole of the United Kingdom. That is what levelling up should be about. It should be about benefiting everybody.
If arguments ensue over the way in which something is perceived to be being directed, or not, there will be dissent, which could be a recipe for a disaster—and it is completely avoidable. I therefore hope that the Government will look favourably on these amendments and table an amendment of their own later to ensure that that co-production is in place.
To illustrate this, a comment that really struck me was at the end of the White Paper, where there are all the ambitions for the different regions and nations—they are there for Scotland and they are there for Wales. However, it struck me as slightly odd that they were all put in together, rather than having the devolved nations separately and then the regions of England stated. This is not to criticise the ambitions—we all need ambitions and things to aim for to improve—but I think that the differentiation between Governments who have primary and secondary legislation responsibilities and the ability of local authorities to move money around in different ways needs to be included in the Bill.
Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)
My Lords, I have put my name to Amendments 22 and 23, with the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock. These deal with the issue of consent, which I think is crucial to the way in which this problem should be addressed.
Living where I do, north of the border, one of the things that I tend to do when confronted with a Bill is to look at the clause near the end which describes its extent. As happened in the case of this Bill, I started at the front and read through Part 1 and then on into the other parts and so on. When I came to the extent provision, I was astonished to find that Part 1 applied to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, because there is not a hint in the wording of Part 1 that these different Administrations exist. They are not mentioned at all; there is no mention whatever of consultation. That is the reason why, when I saw these amendments, I was extremely grateful to the noble Baroness for raising this issue of consent.
I am also a member of the Constitution Committee, which examined the way in which the whole of the United Kingdom is governed. One of the issues we of course looked at was devolution. There were two words at the start of our report which highlighted the message we wished to convey: “respect” and “co-operation”. The Government welcomed our report, and I think they recognised the value of these two words. However, look at Part 1 and ask yourself what it is saying about Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland; I see very little sign of respect and certainly no sign of co-operation at all. That is a matter of extreme concern, which is why I think it is necessary for some reference to be made as to how the relationships between the United Kingdom Government and the devolved Administrations are to be dealt with.
Mention has been made of the nature of devolution to these different parts of the United Kingdom. I should mention one aspect which is special to Scotland: it has tax-raising powers that it exercises. We in Scotland pay our own tax—at a higher rate, I may say—to fund the matters that the Scottish Government deal with. These include health, housing, education and crime, which are all matters listed in the annexe to the White Paper. This raises the question as to how you can possible reconcile the spending aims of the Scottish Government, which are evolved so that they make up their budget for tax-raising, with the United Kingdom spending money in those same areas without consultation. With the prospect of two bodies spending money in the same areas, which they have the power to do, it would be very strange indeed if they did not at least consult with each other to see that they were not duplicating effort. Consultation is not merely a matter of proper governance; it is a matter of common sense.
That having been said, there are aspects of the levelling-up list which I very much welcome. Mention was made at the very beginning of our debate of the extent to which it was hoped that money could be spent in Scotland to level up in that area. There are certainly aspects of the list—well-being, skills, digital connectivity, transport and so on—where money could be spent without, as it were, duplicating effort in areas which are plainly devolved to the Scottish Government. There is at least something here that I welcome, but without the provision of consultation to avoid confusion and duplication of effort, I do not see how the matter can be properly handled. I am very much in support of the two amendments I have mentioned.
Baroness Humphreys (LD)
My Lords, I apologise for not having spoken at Second Reading of this Bill.
I will speak to Amendments 17 and 29, to which I have added my name. I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, for tabling Amendment 17, which is designed to allow us to debate the role of the devolved Administrations when they believe that the UK Government are acting in areas for which they are responsible. I think that we have had that debate this evening. I thank my noble friend Lord Stunell for tabling Amendment 29, which seeks to ensure that the relevant devolved Administration or local authority is consulted where a mission relates to a devolved function, and that the mission can be amended at the request of the devolved authority.
Unfortunately, this Bill is typical of those laid after 2019. There has been very little engagement by the UK Government with the Welsh Government prior to its introduction in the other place. That is a little disappointing, because the more consensual approach of the current Prime Minister cannot be applied retrospectively to the Bill. His phone call to the heads of the devolved Governments on his appointment to the role, and his subsequent attendance at the British-Irish Council, have been welcomed and have set a tone which is an improvement on what has been the case for the last few years.
Had there been more dialogue between the two Governments during the early stages of the production of the Bill, the Welsh Government would certainly have made a strong case against their inclusion in Part 1. As they say in their LCM,
“the purpose of the provisions”
relating to reducing geographical disparities
“do not relate to any reserved matters under the Government of Wales Act 2006”.
In other words, there is no doubt that the issues regarding missions are not reserved matters, and are therefore within the devolved competence of the Welsh Government.
If one looks at the 12 levelling up missions, one sees that almost every one falls within a devolved competence: economic development, transport, education, training, health, the environment, planning—with some exceptions —culture and housing are all devolved. It seems perverse that the UK Government should choose to legislate in these areas, setting targets and standards where the responsibility and duty to do so already rests with the Welsh Government.
It is not as if the Welsh Government do not have the ability or capacity to write their own version of Part 1. As has already been referred to, the Senedd passed the Well-being of Future Generations Act in 2015, designed to improve the well-being of everyone in Wales and addressing inequalities. It already contains some of the elements of Part 1 of the Bill. The Act provides a legislative framework to improve the economic, social, environmental and cultural well-being for the people of Wales through annual reporting, indicators, milestones and the setting of objectives to shape delivery. Crucially, the Welsh Government have appointed a future generations commissioner to ensure that goals are retained and reported on. That is perhaps needed in the Bill, as was referred to in earlier debates this afternoon.
As an aside, I point out that this Welsh Government have nearly 20 years’ experience of designing EU schemes and administering EU funds. The stance taken here by the UK Government ignores their expertise and, quite frankly, could be described as disrespectful. I agree strongly with the Welsh Minister for Climate Change, who said—the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, has already referred to this—
“It is not for UK Government Ministers to set targets for these matters in Wales, nor to report on achieving these to the UK Parliament.”
It is the Welsh Government’s view that the Senedd could pass equivalent provisions to those contained in Part 1. It is therefore unlikely that the Welsh Minister will recommend that the Senedd consents to the provisions in the Bill.
As usual, my noble friend’s amendment is an elegant solution, as it gives the UK Government the opportunity to recognise and respect devolved settlements by agreeing to consult Welsh Ministers and to amend a mission at their request. My preference would obviously be to see both sides around the table, talking about this issue and coming to an agreed position. But, given the distinct lack of engagement by the UK Government with the Welsh Government, I cannot really see this happening. I hope that the Minister will prove me wrong.
The Duke of Montrose (Con)
I rise as a Scot who has followed legislation to do with Scotland for many years. I have followed the recommendation of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead: I have gone to the last paragraph and been astonished at the application of Clause 1 to Scotland.
In particular, I rise because the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, has raised the question of home rule. As I recollect it, my grandfather was one of those who founded a political party calling for home rule in Scotland, which I think we have at the moment. But there is a difference between legislative and locally based government devolution. One is contained in the Scotland Act. If I am not mistaken, something to do with the latter will have a legal basis after the Bill is passed. I remember that some of those promoting the Act on devolution in 1998 were keen to tell us that we were getting a process, not a final destination.
In Scotland, the SNP has set its policy that devolution is just a step to independence. It was determined that it would mean an equivalent to independence in all but name, and it tested that by putting its proposal for a constitutional Bill on independence to the Supreme Court. The judgment has made clear what the Act means and has introduced a less than recent level of expectation in Scotland. I would not like to be in the Government’s shoes because they have to act as the prime legislative originator but need to make every effort not to do it in a way that can be taken as being rude.
Baroness Randerson (LD)
My Lords, I shall start by responding to a couple of the speeches that noble Lords have made this evening. First, I am delighted to hear references to home rule in this Chamber. Secondly, I wish to clarify that the Welsh Government also have tax-raising powers, and that raises all the issues that exist in Scotland.
I want to address Amendments 17 and 29 specifically and to dwell on the fact that there is an astonishing lack of understanding of devolution in the Bill, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, made clear. When I was a Minister in the Wales Office, one of our roles was to go round departments and to remind officials, and occasionally even Ministers, about devolution. Sometimes, we had to gently tell Ministers that their brief was actually Minister for England only. It is some years since then—it is eight years on—and the story of devolution should have permeated more deeply into government. Actually, I do not believe that the people who wrote the Bill did not understand devolution. I think they were probably under instructions not to understand devolution, and that is much more worrying.
Earlier this evening, while many noble Lords here were out grabbing a bite to eat, I had a Motion to Regret before this House. My regret hinged on the fact that the regulations concerned—they were highly technical so I will not go into them—removed the obligation on the Secretary of State and the Competition and Markets Authority to consult the devolved Administrations. That was an obligation taken for granted when we debated the Subsidy Control Act and the United Kingdom Internal Market Act, the Acts from which the regulations stemmed. Both these Acts interrelate closely with devolved powers over economic development.
Tomorrow, we will debate the minimum service levels Bill, and the Welsh Government report a total lack of prior consultation on minimum service levels, even though the services affected are devolved. Most of the services listed in that Bill are devolved: education, health, fire and rescue and most of transport. So, a lack of consultation is already a theme in relationships between this Government and the devolved Administrations, and that is why these amendments are so important. Levelling up relies largely on economic development, transport and education, which are all devolved issues. If it is to work, it is fundamental that the devolved nations are fully integrated as part of the process because, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, explained, the devolved Administrations already have their own primary legislation on many of these topics, and they are obviously not entirely at one with this Bill.
Baroness Pinnock (LD)
My Lords, we have had a really good debate on something as fundamental as the meaning of devolution. Throughout today we have been thinking about definitions of words. Devolution certainly needs to be redefined by the Government in their Bill. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, rightly pointed out, devolution can mean home rule, self-government or something quite different: devolution to the English regions. Throughout the Bill the Government clearly have stepped on the standing of the Governments in Scotland, Wales and on occasion, Northern Ireland, who rightly have legislative rights to determine their own way on many of the missions in the Government’s White Paper. That needs to be resolved on the face of the Bill, otherwise confusion will continue to reign.
The second big issue was raised by my noble friend Lord Stunell: devolution to the lowest possible level. What he said was really important. Obviously Whitehall never knows best, but the evidence shows that greater empowerment of local government and local people leads to better economic outcomes. Local decision-making sorting out local problems and finding local solutions gets better results. As he rightly pointed out, the White Paper is a rich source of evidence to support that proposition. True devolution will mean turning the Bill on its head and making sure that local areas are making changes and responding to the progress made, rather than the top-down approach we always get from this Government and others.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
My Lords, Amendments 6, 17, 22, 23, 29, 35 and 40 in this group relate to our levelling-up work across the entire United Kingdom and how we work with the devolved Governments on the missions, including their delivery and our reporting. They have been tabled by the noble Baronesses, Lady Hayman of Ullock and Lady Taylor of Stevenage, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, and the noble Lord, Lord Stunell.
While I note the concerns of the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, about the centralised nature of the UK, we have been, and remain, very clear that levelling up can succeed only as a shared national project. Evidence tells us that the drivers for reducing disparities span devolved and reserved levers and that all levers need to be deployed for a place to reach its full potential.
As an aside, and because the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, raised the recent debate on the report of the Common Frameworks Scrutiny Committee, to which I responded, I can reassure her that discussions continue to address some of the issues that were raised in that debate. The levelling-up missions are defined in terms of reducing geographical disparities across the whole of the UK, thereby rendering the obligations set out in the Bill indivisible among the different nations. That is why the extent of the Bill is indeed the whole of the UK.
The UK Government and devolved Governments share a common ambition to deliver the best possible outcomes for people across the United Kingdom: to make sure that they can live longer and more fulfilling lives and benefit from a sustained rise in living standards and well-being. We all want to make sure that opportunity is spread more evenly across the whole country. While the ways we articulate and measure these objectives, and our activities to deliver them, may differ sometimes, these ambitions are shared at the highest level.
As the levelling-up White Paper made clear, we respect the devolution settlements and are keen to work together to share learning and evidence with each other about what works across the UK, making the most of the unique opportunities for learning that devolution affords. In this spirit, officials have actively been seeking the views of devolved Administration officials, including discussing how our mission framework relates to their own frameworks for place-based growth. We can ultimately achieve these ambitions only by working together and by recognising that different levels of government hold different levers to drive change. In many cases, these levers are more powerful when they are aligned. Where there are clearly overlaps, we are keen to step up collaborative working to achieve our common aims, learning from each other and ensuring that we draw links between the work we are doing at all levels. On the co-production that the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, hopes for, I can reassure her that we will continue this engagement over the coming months. Minister Davison will be meeting with devolved government Ministers in the coming weeks. In parallel, senior policy officials from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities are meeting with senior officials from the devolved Administrations.
As I have said, our missions set our ambitions for the whole of the country. Delivering against these will require close working with the devolved Governments to ensure that everyone benefits. Current geographical disparities do not respect national boundaries within the UK and need to be tackled as a whole. We recognise that some of the missions cover areas that are devolved. The purpose of the missions is not to alter existing areas of responsibility but to align and co-ordinate how different areas of government can work together towards a common goal. We are committed to working with the devolved Governments to align policy and work towards a goal shared by everyone: to reduce geographical disparities across the whole of the UK. We will work to share evidence and lessons from across the country, learning what works and what does not.
This Government, I can reassure noble Lords, are fully committed to the Sewel convention and will continue to seek legislative consent and work with the devolved Governments on all Bills that engage the legislative consent process. I was encouraged by noble Lords’ comments about Prime Minister Sunak’s reaching out to the devolved Governments so early on in his tenure. I know that there have been issues about engagement with the devolved Governments at an earlier stage in the Bill, and I am disappointed to hear that recent Bills have not had that early engagement, but I will continue to raise this issue in the Secretary of State for Wales’s ministerial meetings. I do take on board the hope of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, that this is a golden opportunity for the UK Government, and I hope he is reassured that we are actively engaged in making devolution work and avoiding the disaster that the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, worries about.
Amendment 29, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, also requires that English principal councils be consulted on any missions relating to their functions. I reiterate that the Bill is designed to establish the framework for missions, not the content of missions themselves. The framework provides ample opportunity to scrutinise the substance of missions against a range of government policies. We agree with the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, that there is no one-size-fits-all approach and that areas will want to choose the right model for them. Local government in England is a vital partner in taking forward the levelling-up missions. Local and combined authorities play a critical role across all the missions, and our mission on local leadership—which sets out our aim for every area of England that wants one to have a devolution deal by 2030—will see further powers, funding and flexibilities devolved to local leaders who are best placed to address the unique opportunities and challenges that exist in their places.
In light of these efforts and commitments, my acknowledgment that this is very much a work in progress, and our conversations with all the devolved Governments, I ask that the noble Baroness withdraws the amendment.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
Before the Minister sits down, I will make a request of her. I have been encouraged by her generous and soothing words, but when we get to this point on Report, does she think that it will be possible for the Welsh, Scottish and UK Governments and the Northern Ireland Executive to write to tell us where they have got to on an agreement, because we need to know? If they have got somewhere, I would say hurrah, but if they have not, maybe we need to think again about some form of amendment. I live in hope, and I hope that the Minister will be able to ensure that these words will be addressed to the other Governments as well, so they can make transparent what we all want: co-operation and agreement.
Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)
As the noble and learned Lord already knows, I travel hopefully, so I will take his comments back to the department.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to what has been a thoughtful and interesting debate on this very key topic on the Bill. I will come back to the words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, from the Constitution Committee, about respect and co-operation, which are absolutely key to making this work across the four nations and the regions of the UK. I add my support to the suggestion from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, who asked the Minister if, when we get to Report, we could have a letter from the nations of the UK discussing what has been done and the level of co-operation on this subject. That is a very helpful suggestion, for which I am grateful.
We have heard a really clear explanation of what brought these amendments forward: our concern about devolution being completely different for nations which have their own law-making powers and, in some cases, tax-raising powers, and how important it is to distinguish between that and what are, in fact, powers of competency offered to local government under the same word, “devolution”. We have to be cautious of that. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, warned us to be cautious about how consent can be achieved, that consultation is always a better option—I agree—and how funding will be allocated for the purpose of areas outside of competencies. On the experience of local government around funding, we need to be very careful about the boundaries we set between funding for areas that are the subject of law-making in our nations and the funding for areas of competency that come under Bill. We would all want to be cautious about that.
I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys, for her explanation of what is happening in Wales. There is a lot to learn from Wales: earlier, we heard a powerful speech about child poverty, the future generations commissioner—about whom we have already heard—and the way that, in Wales, a well-being provision is set in law. These are very good lessons for us to learn from, and I hope that we will not miss that opportunity.
The noble Baroness, Lady Humphreys, also urged the Minister to get around the table. I am encouraged by the Minister’s comments on what has taken place so far, but it has not been very clear, as we have gone through the preparation for the Bill, what has happened. That is why I support the suggestion from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, that we have some indication of how that is being worked on.
We must not miss this opportunity—it has been described as a golden opportunity, and I think it could be—to strengthen the union, and not fragment it, by imbedding the missions in a countrywide and democratic consensus. From what the Minister has said, that seems to be the Government’s intention. I hope that is what will happen because, if it does not, it will be subject to fragmentation.
I spoke about learning from the nations of the UK. I am sure that as well as the specific Welsh examples we have heard here today, there will be examples from Scotland and Northern Ireland that we can learn from, as well as from the English regions. I hope that will be part of the levelling-up experience going forward.
We should not miss the opportunity to instigate a proper debate about the quality of public service delivery, from departments delivering non-devolved services as well as examples of quality where they are delivered in the nations where power is devolved—that will be really important. We do not want to go forward with “one size fits all”. I am still concerned about some of the centralising aspects of the Bill. They come later in the Bill and no doubt we will hear about them in future discussions. However, there is very little in the Bill on funding, which concerned me. We need to know more about the national development plans and how they link in with local plans because, across our nations and regions, that could have the potential to be a centralising factor if we are not careful. Around the models of devolution, I hope they will be flexible to allow areas to have the type of devolution that is wanted and that works for those areas. In addition, there does not seem to be any clear mechanism to draw together the work of government departments in the work of levelling up. I hope that that is set out somewhere clearly, but it did not seem very clear as we went through the stages of preparing for the Bill.
There are some real opportunities here, but there are some real pitfalls that we could fall into—I think they were described that way earlier. As we aim towards levelling up, we fall into the crater of centralisation, making things more centralised in this country, which is the last thing we need. It has been articulated very clearly in this debate that if we really are to level up the country, the best decisions are made at local level. I am a passionate believer in that, and I want to see that work, whether it is in our four nations or in our regions. I hope we can continue to work towards that. There will be more work to do on this, as has been articulated very clearly by the Minister, therefore I beg leave to withdraw my amendment at this stage. However, I am sure there are further discussions to be held on this over the coming weeks and months.
Electronic Trade Documents Bill [HL]
Special Public Bill Committee
Arrangement of Business
The Senior Deputy Speaker (Lord Gardiner of Kimble)
My Lords, before the start of today’s proceedings on the Electronic Trade Documents Bill, it may be helpful if I say a word about the Special Public Bill Committee procedure that we will follow.
In all respects, our proceedings will be identical to those of a Grand Committee. No amendments have been tabled, but I will ask the committee whether each clause should stand part. Any Member of the House may attend and speak. Members should stand when speaking and may speak to each clause more than once. The main difference from Grand Committee is that the committee may vote. When I collect the voices, if it is clear that there is no agreement, I will call a Division, which will take place straightaway. Only members of the committee may vote. The clerk will call out each name in alphabetical order, and members should reply, “Content”, “Not content” or “Abstain”. I will then announce the result and call the next clause. It may be convenient for the committee if certain consequential clauses stand part en bloc. If any member of the committee objects, this must be taken separately, to the extent desired. Do any members of the committee wish to declare any interests that have not already been declared? No? Then we will start.
Electronic Trade Documents Bill [HL]
Monday 20th February 2023
(1 year, 2 months ago)
Other BusinessRead Full debate Electronic Trade Documents Act 2023 View all Electronic Trade Documents Act 2023 Debates Read Hansard Text Amendment Paper: HL Bill 57-I Marshalled list of amendments for Special Public Bill Committee - (16 Feb 2023)
Lord Lansley (Con)
I will say a few words on Clause 1. On a previous occasion, I drew attention to my interest as a vice-chair of the trade and investment all-party group, which is supported by the International Chamber of Commerce. It and many others gave us the benefit of evidence, and we are all most grateful to our witnesses, not least Professor Sarah Green of the Law Commission, for this. I feel that I now understand, in my own limited way, how the Bill achieves its objectives, and the several particular issues that I raised at Second Reading have been thoroughly explored and answered. Members of the committee will want to thank our chair, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, who was instrumental in us achieving that, patiently taking us non-lawyers through the provisions from time to time.
On Clause 1, when I spoke at Second Reading I noticed that the list of documents in subsection (2) was not the same as in paragraph 38 of the Explanatory Notes on the model law on electronic trade records. As the Bill states, the list is not exhaustive but indicative. The Law Commission’s consultation gave an indication of which documents in the list possession may most commonly be relevant to. For example, although air waybills are in the MLETR list, the Law Commission concluded that possession of these documents is never required for them to function as intended. By contrast, possession of mates’ receipts, which we discussed in our earlier sessions, may be relevant if transferring them results in the property transfer of ships’ goods. These differences between the two indicative lists are the result of their relative significance in English and Welsh law, as compared to other jurisdictions. The difference is not in itself of significance.
As the Minister’s helpful letter to the committee on 17 February stated, in practice the list in Clause 1(2) gives examples of documents that
“may satisfy all three requirements of sub-clauses 1(1)(a), (b) and (c).”
However, the Bill states that they are
“examples of documents that are commonly used as mentioned in subsection (1)(b)”.
This difference also should not worry us. The Bill is clear that a “paper trade document” is one that satisfies all three requirements. The indicative list, however composed, includes only documents that are commonly used, so the clause serves its purpose.
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
I am not quite sure about the procedure. Is this a debate on Clause 1 standing part?
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
I see. The only part of the Bill that we received contrary evidence on was mates’ receipts. If that is the only matter that there was an argument on, we have done pretty well on the Bill so far. I thank our chair for his expertise, which helped us enormously as we went through the Bill; we kicked the tires fairly firmly. I congratulate our Minister, who switched hats seamlessly during the Recess and is now the spokesperson in this area; his versatility clearly knows no bounds. I thank him for his letter, which cites case law that makes the status of mates’ receipts very clear. We also owe the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, quite a bit for unpacking, with his trade expertise, the issues in Clause 1 today and throughout the passage of the Bill.
I am personally quite satisfied, although I have some trepidation. Professor Sir Roy Goode is no mean authority, but we must conclude that the Minister is correct in quoting case law, and I think our chair is very satisfied with how Clause 1, and the documents cited in Clause 1(2), are set out. So I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, but it is useful that we have explicitly said that we are satisfied in that respect.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
I feel provoked to speak. I shall not detain the committee long. I entirely echo what the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, said. The letters from all parties have been extremely helpful, and the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, has played a blinder in trying to draw out the detail, which has helped all of us. This is obviously a very necessary Bill, and I am sure that, in the fullness of time, it will ensure that we as a nation are well placed in the world of electronic trade and electronic trade documentation. I do not have any particular misgivings about the Bill, but I shall of course listen very carefully to what is said in the other clause stand part debates.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay) (Con)
I will not detain the committee long on this clause, not least because I will speak in detail on Clause 2 in a moment. I echo my noble friend Lord Lansley’s thanks to all the members of the committee, with whom it has been a pleasure to work, particularly under the chairmanship of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, who has helpfully steered our discussions. I express my gratitude to our clerks and all who gave evidence.
I am glad that my noble friend was satisfied by the letter that I sent on 17 February. I am glad to have this opportunity to put that on record. It will of course be published alongside the other Bill documents, so that the explanation contained in it can be seen. It goes without saying that the Government believe that Clause 1, and all the clauses, should stand part.
Lord Lansley (Con)
I tabled a Motion to facilitate a short debate on this clause, in the spirit of what we just discussed, to show not only that we have been assured about the structure of the Bill but that we can demonstrate to those who care to read our proceedings that we have done so and gone through a process; it is a bit like doing arithmetic and showing one’s workings.
In this particular respect, regarding Clause 2, I want to look at the relationship between the Bill and the UNCITRAL model law on electronic trade records. The Bill enables the possession of electronic trade documents in the same way as paper trade documents. The MLETR is based on the principles of technological neutrality and functional equivalence between a transferable document or instrument—as defined in each legal jurisdiction, as they say—and the resulting electronic trade document, based on a reliable system. The MLETR is clear that functional equivalence standards can be achieved using different approaches in different jurisdictions.
The Bill achieves that required effect, taking advantage of the existing legal concept of possession in English and Welsh law and placing the exclusive control of a paper trade document as the functional equivalent of possession. A particular example I raised was the question of time and place indications. Article 13 of the model law provides for indications of time and place, but the Explanatory Notes state that this is to the extent that these are required in the equivalent transferable document.
Clause 2 sets out what is required to constitute an electronic trade document; it is, in effect, about exclusive control of such a document. Clause 2(1) provides that the information required to establish a paper trade document is to be the same as for the equivalent electronic trade document. The following subsection then sets out what is needed for control and for the singularity of the document, so that one should not have multiple requests for performance of the same obligation. Time and place indications are not always required in a paper trade document; if required, they would be covered by both the equivalence provision in the first subsection I referred to and the operation of the reliable system as provided for in subsection (5).
I am not sure that we discussed Clause 2(1). I think it is really useful. It sets out very well how our structure in the Bill meets the standards set in the MLETR. I support the clause standing part as we have it before us.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
My Lords, I have declared my interests previously in relation to various bodies that deal with maritime law, insurance law and various other aspects of the law.
I thank the Minister for his letter, which was very helpful and clear in summarising all the answers to the various points that have been raised. It has been a pleasure to work in this committee. I think I first saw a bill of lading as a young pupil over 50 years ago. Other members of the committee did not suffer from that disadvantage, so it has been a great pleasure to work with them. I thank them very much for the hard work to which they have been put and for their generosity in the thanks I have received this morning.
I will make one point in the debate on this clause. It is clear that the agreement on UNCITRAL’s model law on electronic trading records marked a significant turning point in the move towards the use of electronic trading documents in shipping and finance. It did so by establishing a common legal regime that will take the place of the common legal regime for paper documents that has evolved through traders, originating in Italy or maybe before then in the Middle Ages. We need to make an immediate change now.
The Bill adopts the MLETR common legal regime for electronic trading documents by adapting the law in the UK so that it is entirely consistent and interoperable with the MLETR regime. Indeed, there would have been no point in bringing forward this Bill if it was not completely consistent and interoperable with the MLETR. Those engaged in international trade will not move to the use of electronic documents unless there is a common legal regime grounded on the MLETR.
In hindsight, it is unfortunate that this was not made clear in the Bill. I hope this point will be noted for future Bills directed to law derived from international bodies that must operate across the world. I hope the Minister can confirm that the sole purpose of the Bill is to make the law in the UK consistent and interoperable with the MLETR.
The evidence that we received was almost unanimous in its strong support for the technical way in which the Bill adapts the law in the United Kingdom. I say that, because we have also looked carefully at Scots law; a project of this kind in future must include the other parts of the United Kingdom. In addition to being entirely consistent with the MLETR, the legal technique employed provides the benefit of building on the existing law developed in international trade largely through the judgments of the English courts, and on this occasion I do mean English. I will say a little more about this when we discuss the issue of possession in the debate on Clause 3.
Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to take part in this Committee stage. I declare my interests, previously declared in the Special Public Bill Committee, as adviser to Circulor, a supply chain traceability business. I also thank the Minister for his extremely helpful letter of 17 February and the clerks and everybody else who helped to make the committee process such a pleasure to be part of, including colleagues on the committee.
The key points on this element, as perfectly set out by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, are these. Through the careful crafting and drafting, not least by Professor Green of the Law Commission, we have the dual benefits and necessity of interoperability with the MLETR and other states that have adopted it, and all the benefits of common law and the judgments, thus far, of English courts and that similar jurisdiction moving forward. In taking this approach to the adoption of the MLETR into English law, we have that benefit and necessity of interoperability and, as has been stated, hundreds of years of English law opining on this subject. It goes to the heart of the Bill. However, as the noble and learned Lord pointed out, it is probably worth saying, as it is not stated in the Bill, that the sole purpose and intention of the Bill, for want of any doubt or any cloud in anyone’s mind, in this country or internationally, is interoperability with the MLETR and with bringing forward the benefits of English law to that end.
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
My Lords, this is probably the most positive clause stand part debate that I have had the privilege of speaking in. We have debated the essence and architecture of Clause 2 extensively during the passage of the Bill so far. I thought that our chair, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, was very tactful in talking about our experience as a committee. The fact is that we had a fairly steep learning curve on trade documents in many respects. He guided us expertly through what we can safely say—interestingly, we had a bit of a history lesson during committee on the Bill—is the biggest change to trade documents since the Venetians ruled the waves.
In particular, these gateway provisions in Clause 2 were examined extremely carefully for their compatibility with the MLETR. One of the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, was about time and place. The Minister’s letter, again, answers that very effectively, so that issue is settled to our satisfaction.
The noble Lord, Lord Holmes, talked about the interoperability aspect. This is crucial, and, again, even though perhaps we do not make enough of that explicitly, it is clearly satisfied by the Bill and needs to be supported on that basis.
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful for the consensus of the committee and the opportunity to set out on the record the reasons for the approach that we have taken.
Clause 2 sets out the criteria that a document in electronic form must satisfy in order to qualify as an electronic trade document for the purposes of the Bill. It defines the subject matter with which the Bill is concerned: namely, electronic trade documents. In my noble friend’s explanatory statement to his Motion that the clause should not stand part, reference is made to the provisions of the MLETR and how they are consistent with the structure of the Bill. One area that we did not reach consensus on was whether to refer to the MLETR as the M, L, E, T, R; to pronounce it “Meleeter”; or to refer to it by its full name. However, I am glad that we have had the opportunity to focus on it again today.
The starting point for the Bill has been the following question: what requirements must trade documents in electronic form satisfy in order to be considered capable of performing the same functions as their paper counterparts? Clause 2 seeks to address this question by setting out the criteria that a document must satisfy in order to qualify as an electronic trade document. These gateway criteria are intended to replicate the salient features of paper trade documents, such as being capable of exclusive control and fully divestible upon transfer. An electronic document that satisfies the criteria in Clause 2 is capable of possession and of performing the same functions as its paper counterpart.
Article 10 of the model law sets out criteria that an electronic record must meet in order to satisfy a requirement for a transferable document or instrument—in other words, a paper trade document. A document that satisfies the criteria in Article 10 is an electronic transferable record for the purposes of the model law. In this sense, the MLETR also contains gateway criteria, many of which are closely comparable to those in the Bill.
As I think the committee fully agrees, Clause 2 is fundamental to the Bill and has been carefully drafted to ensure that electronic trade documents can function in the same way as their paper counterparts. The Bill is not intended to be a comprehensive code in relation to electronic trade documents. Rather, it is intended to ensure that electronic documents that satisfy certain criteria, in a reliable way, are legally and functionally equivalent to their paper versions.
As was made clear throughout the committee’s evidence sessions, the structure and the content of the Bill, and Clause 2 in particular, are compatible with the MLETR and with laws in other jurisdictions that have adopted it. It is, however, drafted to cater for the specificities and nuances of UK law, and to take account of feedback to the Law Commission’s consultation paper and draft Bill. So I agree with my noble friend, the noble and learned Lord and others that the salient point here is the interoperability, and I hope that that and the letter I sent to the committee make that clear.
Lord Lansley (Con)
My Lords, my Motion on this clause is similarly to facilitate a short debate. In particular, I was interested in our discussions about why we did not define exclusive control as equivalent in law to possession.
As I understand it, the effect of the Bill is that the control of an electronic trade document may lead to possession of that document in the same way as for a paper trade document. We do not treat the control of paper trade documents as equivalent to possession, but they are capable of possession. Therefore, removing the legal block on the possession of an electronic trade document in statute simply retains in practice the equivalence of paper and electronic trade documents. Defining exclusive control of an electronic document as possession would, as I have now understood, create a legal difference between paper and electronic trade documents, which is contrary to the intention of the model law and, indeed, confusing and unhelpful to those who are using electronic trade documents.
We had interesting discussions about the intention to possess, but the conclusion that certainly I have reached is that although the intention to possess an electronic document may very rarely be an issue, there is case law on possession that would be helpful in the context of the electronic equivalent of a document being forced into a person’s control or their having control unknowingly or unintentionally.
As the Bill stands, and as my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond rightly said, we benefit from the existing law on possession, and the Bill as it stands introduces no confusing difference in the legal treatment of trade documents in different forms. With that explanation, I continue to support this clause standing part.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
I, too, will add a short word in relation to this point. First, I thank the Minister for making so clear that the purpose of the Bill is consistency and interoperability with the MLETR, and I hope that the message to the Law Commission and to draftsmen in the future is to put that in the Bill.
During our evidence sessions, we spent some time, as the noble lord, Lord Lansley, has so eloquently explained, looking at legal techniques, particularly those employed in Clause 3(1). The technique employed in the Bill enables electronic documents to be possessed, in contradistinction to the legal technique of using exclusive control as the equivalent of possession, as was done in Singapore. It is essential to stress that, for all practical purposes, the result will be the same. Both techniques ensure interoperability under the common legal regime to be established by the MLETR.
We were lucky in both the oral and the written evidence that we received, particularly from the judge in charge of the Commercial Court, Mr Justice Foxton; from Mr Andrew Taylor in his submissions on behalf of the UK branch of the Comité Maritime International, which has done so much to ensure uniformity of maritime law; and from a large body of distinguished academics, including Professor Sir Roy Goode, Professor Louise Gullifer, Professor Miriam Goldby, Professor Alex Mills, Professor David Fox and Professor Andrew Steven, who effectively gave evidence to the same effect: that there was an advantage in the continued use of the concept of possession for electronic trade documents, in contradistinction to simply adopting exclusive control in its place.
Here, trade documents are in a different category from other forms of control over electronic documents and digital assets. The two advantages can be summarised as follows. First, retaining the concept of possession more easily enables the law relating to electronic trade documents to be developed by building on the established law relating to paper documents so carefully developed over the centuries and with worldwide applicability.
Secondly, although in my view this is likely to be of only minimal practical significance, and I certainly hope that it is, there could be an exceptionally rare case in which the requirement of an intention to possess—I would prefer to stick to the English rather than to “animus possidendi”—arising from the continued use of the concept of possession might permit a court to deal in a just way with a case in which something unanticipated has unfortunately gone wrong.
There are those two advantages, but I stress again that the fact that Singapore has chosen a slightly different route to that adopted in the Bill is, for all practical purposes, immaterial to interoperability.
Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, in many ways, this went to the heart of our discussions in the committee—understandably so, because it is so central to the Bill. In many ways, possession is 9/10ths of the Bill. The position of possession in English law is why it is critical to enable full understanding in this country for those who will seek to avail themselves of this new law when it comes into force with all good speed. It is just as important internationally to enable understanding of why the Bill was constructed around the concept of possession.
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
My Lords, I will be brief. As all noble Lords described, this approach was overwhelmingly supported by our witnesses to the committee. All of them emphasised that MLETR is a model law, not a prescription for law. Possession of digital documents is absolutely the essence of the Law Commission’s approach to the Bill, and it has been entirely justified. The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, talked about something being capable of possession, which essentially makes this clause a gateway, like Clause 2, leading it to common law to establish possession. This approach was entirely supported by everything that we heard during our inquiry. We fully support that Law Commission approach.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
My Lords, clearly, the issue of possession and exclusive control was the nearest we came to controversy in our sessions on the Bill. But the convocation of professors arraigned before us was unanimous in the view that this is the way to approach the issue. The seminars on this which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, gave us added to our conviction that this was the right way. No doubt, it will establish the benchmark for other jurisdictions to follow.
I have one question. My eye alighted on the word “indorse” in Clause 3(1). Normally, this would be “endorse”. As I understand it—my English is not the best in the world—the difference is pretty marginal, but one relates specifically to financial terminology. I wanted to understand this better, because it is an unusual word that is not often used. Apart from that, I have nothing to add.
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)
My Lords, I am sure that the Bill team behind me, to whom I add my thanks, will provide the legal thesaurus to answer the noble Lord’s question.
It is helpful to have a debate on Clause 3, as it is at the heart of the Bill. It provides that electronic trade documents are capable of possession and are, in all other ways, capable of having the same effect as paper trade documents. As my noble friend Lord Lansley said on the previous clause, this is an opportunity for us to show our working and reflect our helpful discussions in the committee with those who have kindly given evidence.
At several points during our deliberations, questions have arisen regarding the Bill’s approach to possession and exclusive control, particularly in comparison with the approach taken by the model law and Singapore. The Bill’s approach provides that a document that satisfies certain criteria, including being capable of exclusive control, qualifies as an electronic trade document, and that an electronic trade document can be possessed. The Singapore legislation and the model law provide that, if an electronic trade document can be exclusively controlled by a person, and if that person can be identified as the person in control, the document can satisfy a possession requirement. The main distinction between the two approaches is that the Singaporean and MLETR approach conceptualises exclusive control as a functional equivalent to possession, whereas the Bill provides expressly and directly that a document that can be exclusively controlled can be possessed.
The approach taken in the Bill was consciously chosen as the best solution for UK law for several reasons. Allowing the possession of electronic trade documents unambiguously removes the legal blocker currently preventing their recognition. It ensures that paper and electronic trade documents are subject to the same legal rules and laws, including that possessory concepts, such as pledge and conversion, apply to electronic trade documents in the same way they do to paper trade documents. This approach avoids the need fundamentally to rethink existing concepts of possession in respect of intangible assets, and it achieves equivalence with paper documents in a straightforward manner that is easy to understand for British businesses and global trade.
It is crucial for market certainty that electronic trade documents are able to plug directly into the existing legal framework applicable to paper trade documents. This identical treatment, irrespective of whether a document is in paper or electronic form, is particularly important, given the provisions in the Bill allowing for a change of medium, which are necessary to give parties flexibility as the industry seeks to effect the transition to electronic trade documents that we want to see.
Applying the concept of possession directly also preserves the role of intention in relation to electronic trade documents as it applies to paper. Intention is an important element of possession in UK law, and, as we heard in the oral evidence we received, it is possible to conceive of a situation in which a party has exclusive control of an electronic trade document but not the intention necessary for possession. Intention is relevant to determining who has possession of a paper trade document, and it should be equally relevant to the same documents in electronic form.
Possession is a common law concept with a significant and hugely valuable pedigree. The Bill in general, and Clause 3 in particular, is carefully worded to take advantage of this without risking the integrity of a well-established and foundational common law concept. Taking a different approach would require a fundamental reworking of the Bill.
Furthermore, the Bill deliberately does not define what it means to have possession of an electronic trade document. The Bill is concerned with features that an electronic trade document must exhibit in order to be possessable, and it includes a notion of control for this purpose only, rather than identifying who is in possession of it as a matter of fact or law, or both. Leaving the latter inquiry to the courts and common law is the preferable course of action. The common law has proven itself highly flexible and adaptable in this regard: existing common law has developed a range of tools to assist in determining what is, and who has, possession of a tangible asset at any particular time. This could include the related concept of constructive possession, which was raised in our evidence sessions as an important concept.
Although the common law of possession may need to be adapted in order to accommodate electronic trade documents, this is achievable without an explicit account of its relationship with control. This is largely because control is one of the two elements of possession as a matter of fact of common law.
Anyone with the ability to exercise control over an electronic trade document, such as anyone with knowledge of the private key or other security credentials, could thereby claim to have control and in turn a claim to possession. Where multiple people have competing claims to possession, existing rules on relativity of title will apply to determine the superior interest in any given situation.
The noble Lord asked about indorsement. It means an annotation in writing on the back of a paper trade document instructing that the obligation recorded therein be performed to the order of the person named in the indorsement or simply to order, which is called a blank indorsement. This instruction must be signed, and is usually completed by delivery. If the indorsement is a blank indorsement, the possessor of the document, whoever they may be, may indorse it in their turn. If the indorsement is to a named person, any subsequent indorsement must be by that person. It is an essential part of the transfer of many trade documents and any rights that attach to them. There is a business practice of indorsing paper documents on their reverse, which reflects that “indorsement” comes from the Latin “dorsus”, meaning back. The term is also used in the Bills of Exchange Act. I am glad that we have continued our learning process in this session.
Finally, on the subject of functional equivalence, it is worth noting that although Singapore is a common-law jurisdiction, it has diverged from the UK in the context of electronic communications and electronic commerce, where it has adopted other UNCITRAL model laws and the UK has not. The language of the MLETR might therefore be more compatible with Singapore’s existing law than it is with the UK’s. Its implementation without adaptation may raise fewer difficulties of interpretation there than it would in this jurisdiction. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, said, different countries may take different approaches, but to all intents and purposes we are striving for the same ends.
As English law is the foundation of international trade, this Bill will put us ahead and in the lead not only of the G7 countries but of almost every other country in the world. The UK is setting the approach which all other jurisdictions will seek to follow, not just on the digitalisation of trade documents but on the future digitalisation of all trade, towards which this Bill is an important but merely foundational step.
Lord Lansley (Con)
My Lords, I apologise for delaying the committee again, but I want to reference an issue that concerns me in relation to Clause 4. If a change of form is not carried out correctly, and if the electronic document is a valid document in itself but does not include the statement that the document has been converted from a paper document, the paper trade document to which it relates may not be cancelled and, as paragraph 82 of the Explanatory Notes suggests,
“this could lead to a duplication of the promisor’s obligation.”
Should we exclude this possibility?
In his helpful letter last Friday, the Minister said that the approach in the Bill is better than the alternative. If the alternative was to treat an electronic trade document as invalid if the statement in subsection (1)(a) is not included, and the paper document is none the less withdrawn—as one would expect in most cases, because the paper trade document is withdrawn when the electronic trade document has been created, and the mistake has been made—there may be no valid document at all, which is obviously problematic for a bill of lading, for example, about which we have learned a reasonable amount.
Also, persuasively, the Minister rests his argument on the reliable systems used for the creation of an electronic trade document. As we discussed with a number of witnesses, these are not infallible, but the opportunity to reduce fraud and enhance the integrity of trade documentation, including the reduction of error, using new and reliable electronic systems is now overtaking the reliability of a paper-based system as well as reducing cost, time and resource implications. So although I flag up this issue, I accept that the clause should stand part as is.
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)
I am grateful to my noble friend for flagging this area. Unless the committee wishes, I will not repeat the information that I provided in my letter of 17 February, at the bottom of page 4 and the top of page 5, but I am glad to be able to put it on record as my noble friend has allowed us to do.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
I will first say a word of thanks to the Law Commission, and to Professor Sarah Green in particular, for the excellence of its work. It is also right to thank those who submitted evidence in writing to us and those who gave oral evidence at quite an early hour on a Thursday morning. We were fortunate about the timing, in that we had the opportunity to request written evidence with the hiatus of Christmas. Although that may have made some people spend more time over Christmas on the interesting subject of bills of lading than they would have liked, it enabled us to start our oral evidence with a very firm body of written evidence. Having to compress it all into the usual 28-working day period may not have been to anyone’s advantage. I hope that the opportunity will be taken to think again about the procedure for written evidence; we certainly found the accident of what happened highly beneficial.
However, that benefit would not have been achieved without the great diligence of our clerk, George Webber, and his assistant, Louise Andrews, who laboured mightily to get the evidence in and to make so many phone calls in a very short period to ensure that we had a full book of evidence. I also thank them for organising all the transcripts and other documents. A special thanks is due to them both. I am sure I speak on behalf of everyone in saying how grateful we are.
Having said all that by way of thanks, I ought to temper it by saying that the work of the Law Commission, diligent and hard-working though it was, is the easy part of the process with which this Bill is engaged. Our part in this very agreeable committee has been very easy. As experience always shows, it is easy to change the law. The difficult bit is getting people to use it and move. It is important to stress that the formidable task lies ahead: changing the habit of centuries. However, there is a huge prize here and I am sure that we will get there.
First, I am confident that His Majesty’s Government will do all they can to publicise to other Governments the move that the United Kingdom has made to adapt its law so as to be based on interoperability under the MLETR. I was greatly encouraged by the evidence we received on what other states are setting about doing, and by discussions I had with another major trading state last week on the steps it has taken and the benefit it has had from seeing what we are doing. The UK has set an excellent example of the way forward and we should not be reticent and hide our light under a bushel.
Secondly, banks and others engaged in providing finance need the utmost encouragement to assist in the use of electronic trade documents. I am again encouraged by the position taken by one bank, Barclays, whose letter to us after the evidence session made clear its wish to encourage the use of digitalisation. I should add that that is not the message I have received in respect of all banks, so HMG have a great deal of work to do.
Thirdly, we can be very confident that the ICC will continue to play a prominent role. We have been particularly fortunate in the UK because of the work done by Chris Southworth, but I have also learned that people are hard at work elsewhere. It is also encouraging that moves are under way to establish a trade digitalisation taskforce, involving His Majesty’s Government, the ICC and banks. I wish it well.
However, despite all of these encouraging signs, the task is formidable. The Government must lead with great determination and energy to ensure that the UK’s leadership in getting the Bill enacted is carried through to leadership in getting those engaged in international trade to adopt electronic documents through a common legal system based on the MLETR. The prize is enormous, and it was interesting to see that even net zero is shown to benefit from getting rid of paper in this enterprise. So although the task for the Government is huge, a lot of favourable winds are behind it.
Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, like the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, I thank everyone involved in getting the Bill to this stage, not least Professor Green and her team at the Law Commission, our clerks and team here in the House and everyone who has been involved. As a committee, we benefited hugely from the expert and excellent chairmanship of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, with all his legal experience in this space, not the least of which was an interesting case, which he recounted to the committee, involving a large consignment leaving the port of Bordeaux. All the committee members’ ears pricked up at that point, only to prick down, if ears can do so, when it turned out that the consignment was grain, rather than any product from the right or left bank of the Gironde that may perhaps have been of more interest.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, set out the point absolutely clearly: that the Bill demonstrates what we can do when we combine common law with our new technologies. It is right that we conceive of blockchain, distributed ledger technology, AI, machine learning and all the new technologies as tools. They are incredibly powerful and may be incredibly positive, but they are still tools that we humans have to determine how to deploy.
The Electronic Trade Documents Bill is a trade-enabling, trade-empowering Bill, through the potential of electronic trade documents. In reality, however, it is at its heart a new technologies Bill—new technologies in combination with English common law, brought to bear in the area of international trade in this instance.
As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, pointed out, the most important stage is after Royal Assent, when the hugest sales job must, rightly, be done on the Bill to get traders in this country, banks and other people involved in the international trade business, like insurers, to very much get behind and use electronic trade documents. Rightly, the Bill is permissive rather than mandatory. That is quite correct, but it means that this sales job must be done.
Secondly, this sales job must be done, rightly, through His Majesty’s Government in all the international fora —through bilaterals, trilaterals and all means—to demonstrate to other nation states the benefit of incorporating MLETR into their domestic legislation. To put it plainly, what purpose would the UK passing the Bill have if other nations have not taken MLETR into their legislation and enabled that international trade, which can be done in seconds rather than days?
As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, perfectly pointed out, the benefit to the environment and net zero should not be missed in any sense here. Currently, in trade, it may take seven to 10 days for a bill of lading document to be transferred to enable a shipment to move. This was illustrated so clearly during Covid, when the planes were grounded at London Heathrow with the trade documents on board and the ships queued up outside the Port of Singapore, unable to move for want of that physical document, which is so painfully papery. The Bill perfectly addresses that, enabling not only settlement in seconds but all that carbon, which would have been wasted in flights and timing, being wiped away through the implementation of the Bill.
Can my noble friend the Minister therefore say whether he will ensure that there is real cross-department and cross-Whitehall consideration not just of what we have learned through the Electronic Trade Documents Bill process but of how we can look to every possibility, in every potential context, to combine common law with the new technologies available, for the benefit of citizen and state alike?
Lord Clement-Jones (LD)
My Lords, I was struck by the Minister saying that today’s stand part debates are an opportunity to show our workings. He is admirably qualified to be a Science Minister on that basis.
I add my thanks to the Law Commission, to our witnesses for both their oral and written evidence, to the clerks and staff on the committee in particular and, overwhelmingly, to our chair, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, who has guided us so carefully and successfully through the thickets of the MLETR and the common law. I very much hope that the Minister and the House authorities more generally will take note of our chair’s comments on the procedure and the serendipity of the fact that we had time successfully to get the evidence and so on. If we had not had the intervening period of Christmas, this would have been extremely difficult.
I fully endorse—as opposed to indorse—what the chair said about the hard part being the practical application and adoption of the Bill. He mentioned the letter from Barclays, which is worth a little consideration because it is very encouraging. It came in rather late, but it expresses quite an appetite from its customers for the Bill, which bodes well:
“Our customers want trade to be simpler, faster and more digital, enabling them to complete trade deals in hours and days rather than weeks and months … The security and compliance of trade will also be strengthened through the proposals in the ETD Bill … The proposals in the ETD Bill will also result in a significant reduction of the estimated 25 billion paper documents generated and couriered around the world each year”—
the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, made this point. That net-zero aspect is extremely important in all of this. The letter says,
“Overall, we are confident that the … Bill will be a positive boost to UK trading”.
On implementation, the Barclays letter picks up the point about the new trade digitisation task force. It would be useful if the Minister could give us a little more information about that, if he has any, particularly in relation to some of the points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, on the duty or opportunity for the taskforce to encourage the adoption of new technologies, which will of course be absolutely crucial. The letter, again, stresses the need for UK leadership, so the trade digitisation task force will clearly have an international engagement duty. It would be useful if the Minister could unpack that a little so that we know that the Law Commission’s work, which we carried on, will bear fruit in due course.
We very much hope to see that the Bill has all the advantages set out in that Barclays letter.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
My Lords, I add my thanks to the committee clerks, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, the Minister and other colleagues who have aided the performance of the committee’s duties. They have done a first-rate job and made the subject matter much more accessible to those of us who are simply lay people trying to comprehend it.
I will build on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Holmes. We have all expressed the view that this piece of legislation provides a platform for us to build on as a nation in leading the world in the development of electronic trade documents. This is a question for the Minister, because we need to understand what sort of strategy the Government will put in place to ensure that we reap the benefit of that. If we are there with Singapore and just one or two others, that suggests that the scope for using this legislation is currently rather narrow, yet we understand and regularly hear from Ministers that we are in negotiation with other nation states on trade deals; we have had Australia and New Zealand pretty recently, and there is sometimes discussion about a trade deal with the US.
It seems to me that this activity should be linked to the development of electronic trading. Perhaps we should have a strategy document brought before us at some point; we would certainly benefit from a debate on the whole topic, because there is no point in having good legislation if the world is still indulging in a paper trail. The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, referred to 25 million paper documents, and the Explanatory Notes set out and describe just how vast this assault on the world of paper is. There will be a massive paper saving if we can get this right, which would have a big environmental benefit for the future. Can the Minister give us a couple of ideas about the Government’s thinking on this and maybe at some later stage bring forward the opportunity for us to debate the issue more widely?
Lord Davies of Brixton (Lab)
My Lords, I thank everyone who has helped the committee in its work. It has been an education. I have learned a great deal about electronic trade documents; I suspect it will not be of great assistance in my future career, but there is some value in the context of all our discussions about the internet. Learning about the Special Public Bill Committee process has been of particular value, and I take on board the comments of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, about how the approach could be improved. My thanks to everyone.
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)
My Lords, Clause 7 sets out the territorial extent of the Bill, so this is an opportunity for me to say a little about that, as I touched on in my letter of 17 February.
As we heard during the evidence sessions, timing and resourcing meant that, unfortunately, it was not possible for the Scottish Law Commission to work collaboratively on this project, but the Government have taken every opportunity to ensure that the Bill works across our devolved legislatures. On Scotland specifically, the Government have undertaken significant legal work, including by engaging independent legal counsel, to analyse and ensure the compatibility of the Bill with both English and Scots law, including that related to the Moveable Transactions (Scotland) Bill currently before the Scottish Parliament.
Following one of our evidence sessions, I corresponded with Professor Andrew Steven, who queried whether Clause 3(4) was necessary. In his response, he acknowledged our thinking behind its necessity and agreed with our approach. I will ensure that the Explanatory Notes that support the Bill are updated to provide further information on this matter. The Government are working closely with the Scottish Government to secure legislative consent from the Scottish Parliament. To be clear, this may require minor amendments to the delegated powers in the Bill to ensure that areas of reserved and devolved competence are satisfactorily covered.
The remaining parts of Clause 7 make provision about the coming into force of the Bill and it having prospective effect only. It also sets out the Short Title of the Bill. It will come into force two months after the day on which it is passed. Clause 7(3) ensures that an electronic trade document issued before the Bill comes into force cannot be possessed, indorsed or converted into a paper trade document. It also ensures that it is not possible to effect a change of form or medium under the Bill from paper to electronic if the paper trade document was issued before the Bill came into force.
Following the Bill being passed, many of the precise steps taken to implement and fully harness the benefits of the Bill will be for business and industry to determine. That is consistent with the approach taken throughout the Bill; it does not mandate the use of electronic trade documents but is a facilitative Bill. However, as we heard in our evidence sessions and as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, said again today, there are favourable winds and great enthusiasm from UK businesses for this important change. Businesses stand ready and eager to support the delivery of the Bill, which will benefit businesses of all shapes and sizes.
However, there is certainly a role for government to play here, not just my department but across His Majesty’s Government. For example, a memorandum of understanding has been agreed as part of the Singapore digital economy agreement, through which the Government are working in partnership with the International Chamber of Commerce on a pilot project intended to improve the interoperability between the UK and Singapore’s electronic trade documents framework. I mentioned in our evidence sessions the role that we played through our presidency of the G7 to encourage other jurisdictions to follow in this important area. We will continue to work alongside international bodies such as the ICC to assist that and support businesses to benefit from this UK legislation. We will work across government to ensure that this change is communicated.
The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, asked about the Digitisation Taskforce chaired by Sir Douglas Flint. That was launched by the Chancellor in July 2022 to drive forward the modernisation of the UK’s shareholding framework. In particular, Sir Douglas has been asked to identify immediate and longer-term means of improving the current intermediated system of ownership, eliminate the use of paper share certificates for traded companies, mandate the use of additional options to cheques for cash remittance and consider whether the arrangements for digitisation can be extended to newly formed private companies and as an optional route for existing UK private companies. His Majesty’s Treasury leads on that work, so it may be better for Treasury Ministers to provide further information in the debates which noble Lords rightly say may prove useful.
In closing, I echo the thanks given to the Law Commission, particularly Professor Sarah Green, to George Webber and Louise Andrews, who have supported the committee’s work admirably, and to all those who gave evidence. I acknowledge the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, about the difficulties imposed by the timetable of the Special Public Bill Committee process; we are all the more grateful that they sent us that evidence, which informed our discussions. I am also grateful to the members of the Bill team from across a number of departments who have supported our work.
I underline the point that all members of the committee have made and which has underpinned our discussions from the outset: that this small Bill has enormous potential to place the UK at the forefront of international trade as a thought leader for others to follow, and that it can bring significant benefits to British businesses, making it easier to sell internationally as well as cheaper, faster and more secure. It has been a privilege to work on it with the rest of your Lordships’ committee, and I hope that it will become law very swiftly.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
I caught what the noble Lord said about the Treasury. Am I correct in understanding him to say that the Treasury will be in the lead in developing a post-Bill implementation strategy, rather than the noble Lord’s own department? I can understand why, strategically across Whitehall, it might not be DCMS, but will it be the Treasury rather than the departments that are responsible for business and for trade?
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)
There is important work for both the Treasury and the new Department for Business and Trade. Obviously, throughout the passage of the Bill, the machinery of government changes have meant that many of these responsibilities have moved, but throughout the work on the Bill I have benefited from the support of officials in a number of departments, and His Majesty’s Treasury and the Department for Business and Trade play a key role here. It will not fall to DCMS, as newly constituted, to carry on that work, but, as I say, the work has been a cross-government endeavour hitherto and will remain so.