Conversion Therapy Prohibition (Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity) Bill [HL]

Baroness Buscombe Excerpts

Friday 9th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe (Con)]

My Lords, 20 years ago, on 18 December 2003, I spoke for Her Majesty’s Opposition at the Second Reading of the Gender Recognition Bill. It was a government Bill that, strangely, had not been referenced in the gracious Speech, though it had been scrutinised as a draft by the Joint Committee on Human Rights. I spoke in support of the Bill in principle, with the blessing of the then leader of the Opposition, my noble friend Lord Howard of Lympne.

I and others on these Benches asked numerous questions and raised concerns, some echoing the ECHR. The Bill lacked clarity and detail regarding important practical issues, but I was proud to speak in support. We believed, and I believe now, that we were totally right then to support legislation that recognised an extremely small cohort of people, estimated then to be a maximum of 5,000 people, who suffer greatly through gender dysphoria. The key point that we sense-checked then was: what harm could it do? Surely it could not hurt others. Indeed, I had in mind the wonderful Jan Morris, formerly James, a brilliant historian and writer who was brave enough to write openly about his experience.

I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, is not in his seat today, as he took the Bill through for the Government Benches. We worked well together, I feel, given the potential pitfalls and the uncharted waters. Indeed, from listening today to the noble Lord, Lord Winston, we are still in uncharted waters, from both a legal and a scientific standpoint. In a sense, we are in a dangerous place. I fear that I am listening to a lot of misunderstanding on the part of some noble Lords, as they listen to others, as to what they are really trying to say. But so far I have not heard one noble Lord speak against full support for these people who suffer from gender dysphoria.

It is interesting to note, because times have changed, that the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, had been advised by his then Government not to accept a recommendation from the JCHR, and supported by us in opposition, to remove discrimination against transsexuals in the fields of education, housing and supply of goods and services. We have moved on.

We questioned numerous issues that remain controversial today, such as the role of sport and the sharing of private spaces such as prison cells and public lavatories, as well as the implications for an already married couple. After all, the minimum age for starting any form of process for transition was then 18. Twenty years on, I stress that I never imagined what is happening now. Twenty years on, we are in a terrible mess. Twenty years on, we are presented with a Bill that risks criminalising parents who try to dissuade their confused adolescent children who are bombarded with unbelievable, appalling and, frankly, evil social media and peer pressure from having irreversible medical treatment that can cause lasting harm, including lifelong sterility. Twenty years on, I have parents begging me to stop the nightmare of teachers and others asking young children, aged as young as seven, to question their sexuality. Twenty years on, we are witnessing the hijacking of a rare and unbelievably tough condition for a trend that is out of control and undermines the real sufferers. This is abhorrent, both for those with genuine gender dysphoria, who deserve our wholehearted support and protection, and for a whole generation of very young children who have been robbed of their innocence and their childhood.

It seems that we need a legislative way forward out of this nightmare, one that protects the interests of vulnerable young people rather than seeing them signposted in a direction, often at a ridiculously young age, that is irreversibly harmful. This Bill is not it, for all the reasons that we have already heard expressed today, not least by the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, and my noble friends Lady Noakes and Lord Sandhurst.

I get quite emotional about this, because it goes back a long way. It was extraordinary listening to the noble Baroness, Lady Featherstone, talking as if nothing had happened before. History is an important thing.

The legislation that we must try to create must find a way forward but must also clarify, with all professional and regulatory bodies that touch on this issue, that existing laws already protect victims from all forms of verbal and physical abuse. We should not legislate merely to send messages. As a mother, a grandmother and a Peer, I urge noble Lords to reject this Bill.

Spending Review 2020

Baroness Buscombe Excerpts

Thursday 3rd December 2020 Grand Committee

[Baroness Buscombe (Con) [V]]

My Lords, finally we have recognised the critical need to increase, in real terms, our defence spending. The key point was the Prime Minister’s reference to a unit that will be set up to monitor procurement. Five years’ ago, industry personnel told me—lawyer speaking to lawyer—that they would welcome much more rigour in the procurement system. This is critical to counter equipment that arrives too often substandard with long lead-times for spare parts. We also need a strong focus on what inexpensive measures would significantly improve the capabilities of our armed forces personnel—such as much healthier food and natural light replacements in our modern warships—as well as the expensive hardware.

In addition, it is right to reduce to our development spend to 0.5% of GNI in the light of our economic emergency. This crisis also presents a real opportunity to fully review the DAC rules on which we classify our ODA spending.

I have just one thought regarding our spending at home: when I left the DWP, pre Covid, our welfare system was already unsustainable. Although 1,000 additional people were working each day and there were around 700,000 job vacancies, still 13.9% of all working-age households in the UK were entirely workless. This is not sustainable post Covid.

Separately, our reliance on the private sector to create the wealth to pay for all this is fundamental. However, we are now at risk of making the UK the least attractive shopping destination in Europe through changes to tax-free shopping rules that will trigger real and negative behavioural change in high-spending visitors. Post Brexit, we must showcase the very best of the British-made, high-quality and often bespoke for export goods that we manufacture right across the UK. How will these tax changes help with so-called levelling up when some of those highly skilled jobs could now be at risk? Will my noble friend the Minister agree to keep a close watch on this?

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Barker) (LD)]

I remind noble Lords that the speaking limit for today’s debate is two minutes.

Economy

Baroness Buscombe Excerpts

Monday 28th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe (Con)]

My Lords, I congratulate the Chancellor on his Statement, which injects an important degree of realism into all this. I pay tribute to my noble friend the Minister who, I know, with his considerable expertise and experience, is an invaluable person at the Treasury.

The Chancellor talked about living without fear. Many of us do not fear Covid. What we fear is how on earth we are going to pay for it. The Chancellor referred to collective responsibility, costs paid by all of us and truths, so I shall suggest to my noble friend just two of a number of changes that are needed to demonstrate collective responsibility and truth before we have to pay, as we will, more tax. I am not expecting answers today. Will the Treasury lean on the Department for Work and Pensions to use mechanisms already in place with the banks to tackle tax evasion and to expose benefit claimants who do not declare their true assets, because we have to be sure to target welfare where it is needed? Secondly, will the Chancellor once and for all deal with and end the crazy truth that the United Kingdom is a tax haven for people living here who were born beyond our shores? There has to be equality and fairness for all in the tax system.

[Lord Agnew of Oulton (Con)]

I thank my noble friend for her questions. In short, I will write to her on the DWP’s policy on fraud checks for newly registered universal credit claimants. It suspended a number of the checks at the height of the crisis, but I am aware that it is going to reintroduce them. I do not have the date, so I will write to her. On us being a tax haven for dubious people, I share her concern. It perhaps takes a crisis such as the Covid crisis to focus minds, and I hope very much that we will taking much more assertive action.

Covid-19: Economy

Baroness Buscombe Excerpts

Thursday 4th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, for securing this debate. A key lesson to be learned is that we cannot just focus on “the science”. Our gateway to economic recovery is immediately to reduce the 2-metre distancing rule to 1 metre. We have just given the WHO another £75 million, while ignoring its 1-metre guideline. This is economic and cultural suicide. Nothing is viable unless we change this rule and take a proportionate, sensible and informed approach to risk.

The public sector has of course been largely untouched, with few job losses, pay cuts or furloughing. It is the private sector that has suffered, and it will take us to recovery through sheer hard work and taking risks. Luckily, many have found smart ways of continuing to function. Each day, people are turning to common sense. This is vital if we are to increase productivity and retain jobs. We must incentivise the private sector.

In that regard, I wholeheartedly support our Prime Minister’s pledge that, if China imposes its national security law upon Hong Kong, we shall change our immigration rules for the people of Hong Kong. We want the best and the brightest to come here, not least to help us to recover. However, this must be conditional. If we change our immigration rules, then as a matter of principle and respect for the private sector, which will probably bear the greatest fiscal burden going forward, we must also ensure that all those coming to reside in the UK pay the same levels of tax as the rest of us.

Will my noble friend the Minister therefore seek to clarify HMRC rules going forward to provide for equal treatment of UK taxpayers with all coming to reside here from Hong Kong and elsewhere in the world, so that they are treated as domiciled in the UK for inheritance tax, and as UK residents for income tax and capital gains tax? With respect, to fail in this now would be crass in the extreme.