Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Yvette Cooper

Thursday 28th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Lynne Featherstone]

My hon. Friend highlights exactly the right point. Work programme providers are encouraged by payment by results, which means that when a young black man comes in, the providers will not get paid unless they remove the barriers that are prohibiting him from getting work, whether through education, training, skills or whatever else.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Is not the fact that young black men are still being hit hardest of all by the Government’s economic failure? Should not the Equalities Minister commit to publishing a full audit of what is happening to young men from different BME backgrounds and the impact that that is having? The latest figures show that unemployment among young white men has gone up by three percentage points since the election, and among young black men by 14 percentage points. There is currently no targeted support for young black men in getting apprenticeships, and the Work programme clearly is not working. Faced with this growing crisis, will Ministers now take serious action to provide the support for jobs and opportunities that young people from all backgrounds need, and consider a bankers’ bonus tax so that they can do so?

[Lynne Featherstone]

The Work programme introduces the conditions that will get young black men into work. That is something that never happened under the Labour Government. The number of people from ethnic minorities who are in work is up by 179,000 compared with 2010. Moreover, on the issue of BME apprenticeships, which the right hon. Lady raised, 2010-11 saw the highest ever percentage of BME apprentices start their training. The labour market trend for the number of people starting apprenticeships has gone up significantly in recent years, from 167,000 in 2003 to 457,200 in 2010-11. We are doing what Labour failed to do.

International Women’s Day

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Yvette Cooper

Thursday 8th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Equalities (Lynne Featherstone)]

May I say first that the Home Secretary is very sorry not to be here to celebrate international women’s day? She is just back from Jordan and has to attend the JHA—justice and home affairs—meeting.

I thank my hon. Friends and hon. Members for all their contributions; I hope they will forgive me if I do not enumerate them one by one. International women’s day is a day for celebration, and I want to set out and celebrate what the Government are doing. We have heard many good contributions today and, sadly, some negative ones from Labour Members. Indeed, they have chosen to be very negative about the impacts of decisions that this Government have been forced to take to reduce the record deficit left to us by them. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Amber Rudd) pointed out, if we do not take action, it will be our daughters who have to pay for it.

Let me say that we are lifting 1.1 million of the lowest paid workers, more than half of whom are women, out of income tax altogether—and with more to come. We are increasing overall NHS spending by £11.5 billion in real terms. As part of that, we are recruiting over 4,000 new health visitors and doubling the number of places on the family nurse partnership programme by 2015. We are protecting key support for older women—with winter fuel payments, free eye tests, free prescriptions, free bus passes and free TV licences for the over-75s—and permanently increasing cold weather payments to £25.

Furthermore, we have re-linked earnings with pensions —something called for for years, which did not happen under the Labour Government. We are providing an extra £300 million for child care support under universal credit. Labour Members mentioned child care, yet against this terrible economic background we have maintained the entitlement to 15 hours a week of free education and care for three and four-year-olds. We are also extending the entitlement to 15 hours a week of free education and care for 260,000 of the most disadvantaged two-year-olds. We are funding online and telephone support services for families, and are providing over £28 million for specialist local, domestic and sexual violence support services. [Interruption.] As the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) said—[Hon. Members: “Give way.”] I will not give way; I have very little time. I am sorry, but everyone else has had their say and I am going to have mine.

We are spending £900,000 on helplines and providing £10.5 million over the next three years for rape support centres. Today, my right hon. and learned. Friend the Justice Secretary announced the locations of five new centres. As the shadow Minister mentioned, we are also creating two new specific criminal offences of stalking. We are tabling amendments to the Protection of Freedoms Bill for Lords Third Reading so that those new offences can be enacted as soon as possible.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Lady confirm that there will be two separate offences, and that the first offence will have a maximum sentence of only six months, and that in order for the second offence to carry a sentence of more than six months the police will be required to prove that someone is in fear of violence—which was objected to by the all-party parliamentary group, which said that that approach would not work?

[Lynne Featherstone]

This measure will be effective. It was welcomed by women and women’s groups across the board at No. 10 Downing street this morning. There will be two offences. One will carry a sentence of up to six months, and the other a maximum sentence of five years. This is good news—and it is a great shame that the Opposition do not have the grace to welcome it.

We are also working on gangs and girls, teenage abuse and forced marriage. We are putting women at the heart of the economy, too, through the Work programme, the new universal credit and the new national careers service, in order to give women the help and support they need.

The hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) is no longer in her place, but I take issue with her statement that there has been an increase in women’s unemployment. There are 50,000 more women in work now than a year ago.

In November, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary announced that the Government will provide resources for 5,000 volunteer mentors.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Yvette Cooper

Thursday 23rd June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am trying to help the House and to facilitate Back Benchers, but we must have short questions and short answers.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I am sorry that the Home Secretary chose not to answer that question, because it was raised in Prime Minister’s questions and it is a serious issue. The answer from the Minister for Equalities to my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) was deeply unsatisfactory. She is keeping on the database the DNA of people who have been charged but not convicted. However, she is refusing to keep the DNA of those who are arrested but not charged. In those 5,000 cases, the police have decided that there is enough evidence to pass a case to the Crown Prosecution Service, but the CPS has decided not to charge.

We know that, for a series of reasons, rape is notoriously difficult to charge and convict, and we know that there is evidence among those 5,000 cases of people who have committed serious offences and who will go on to offend again. Under the Minister’s rules, the DNA of John Warboys would not have been kept. Will the Minister now think again and do something serious to increase rape prosecutions?

[Lynne Featherstone]

What the right hon. Lady has said is not accurate. When someone is arrested, there are circumstances under which the DNA can be retained. I shall run through those very briefly. DNA can be retained if the victim of the alleged offence is under 18; if the victim of the alleged offence is a vulnerable adult; if the victim of the alleged offence is in a close relationship with the subject; and, to answer her point precisely, if the police consider that retention is necessary to safeguard the public.

Women (Government Policies)

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Yvette Cooper

Wednesday 8th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

Does the Minister think that public spending should have been cut in the middle of a recession—and if it had been, will she tell us whether she thinks that we would have had growth by the time of the election?

[Lynne Featherstone]

The point is that we are dealing with the structural deficit. If we do not get our house in order now we never will, and it will be future generations who suffer because of Labour’s failure to address it—[Interruption.] Chuntering away at me will not help the right hon. Lady.

Fairness is the reason why in April we lifted 880,000 of the lowest-paid workers out of income tax—and it does not stop there, because more will be added to their number every year of this Parliament. It is why we are protecting the lowest-paid public sector workers—the majority of whom are women—from the public sector pay freeze, and they will get pay rises. It is why we are increasing child tax credits for the poorest families by more than the level promised by the last Government. And it is precisely why we are getting to grips with the deficit so that we do not fritter away more and more on debt interest, and destroy the crucial public services that so many women need and depend on.

Cuts—and the impact that Opposition Members say they have—are not all that we care about for women. We care about being ambitious and about taking them out of poverty. We care about giving them the tools to lift themselves out, not just continuing what went on before. If fairness were simply a matter of benefits, taxes and snapshot comparisons of income, it would be easy to achieve—

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Yvette Cooper

Monday 7th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Equalities (Lynne Featherstone)]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. Central Government have sent a clear message about the importance and vulnerability of the sector. To send that message and set an example, we have ring-fenced £28 million of funding for violence against women services. We hope and expect that councils will follow suit.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Last week, the Home Secretary confirmed to the House that under her new arrangements, someone who is barred from working with children could still get a job as a voluntary teaching assistant without the school or the parents knowing that they were barred. Now that she has had a few days to think about it and about how concerned parents will be, has she changed her mind?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Yvette Cooper

Thursday 2nd December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Lynne Featherstone]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. He is right to say that certain forms of hate crime do not have the same aggravated status as others. That is being reviewed as we speak by the Ministry of Justice.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Reform of the EHRC must not be carried out because the Government are running scared of the action that the EHRC is rightly taking against the Government on the spending review. The House of Commons Library has now assessed the tax and benefit measures in the spending review and previous Budgets, and its figures show that Labour’s last two Budgets gave more help to women, whereas the spending review and the emergency Budget after the election are hitting women more than twice as hard as men. When women still earn less and own less than men, why have the Government decided that women should pay more?

[Lynne Featherstone]

The right hon. Lady has raised this issue before, and she rightly says that the EHRC is doing what it is meant to do as an independent body. It is currently on the information trail, asking for information appertaining to the comprehensive spending review. All Departments are assessing the impact on equality and this Government have acted to protect the lowest-paid public sector workers, most of whom are women, from the public sector pay freeze. We have taken the lowest earners—800,000 people, most of whom are women—out of taxation. This Government have acted to protect women.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Yvette Cooper

Thursday 17th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Lynne Featherstone]

Obviously, the conviction rate in this country is not good enough and needs to be improved, and the last thing that we want is for fewer victims to come forward, but we have not yet seen compelling evidence that offering anonymity to defendants would reduce those reporting rates. The attitude that the victim is somehow responsible is prevalent in this country, and that is something that we will be looking at. I assure the right hon. Lady that we will be looking at all the options in terms of addressing this issue and debating it in the House.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Lynne Featherstone) on her appointment as the Minister for Equalities, and I congratulate the Home Secretary on hers as the Minister for Women and Equalities. The Opposition will be very keen to work with them on areas in which we can help to support women and to promote equalities.

I am sorry that the Home Secretary did not answer this question, as she will be aware of the extent of concern about the Government’s proposals on rape. Will she therefore write to me in reply, in addition to her hon. Friend’s response? I wrote to the Home Secretary on 27 May, in her capacity as the Minister for Women and Equalities, about the Government’s proposal to introduce anonymity for rape defendants. I received a reply from her officials making it clear that this was not seen as her responsibility and that it was being sent instead to the Ministry of Justice. I urge her to rethink that approach because she will know, as the Minister for Women and Equalities and as Home Secretary, that according to the British crime survey, 93% of rape victims are women. Singling out rape uniquely as a crime for which defendants need greater protection against false allegations sends strong and troubling signals about the way that women should be treated in the justice system. I urge her to reconsider this issue and to say whether she thinks it is right for defendants in rape trials to be treated uniquely differently from defendants in other serious crimes.

[Lynne Featherstone]

I assure the right hon. Lady that we definitely see this as an issue for women and equalities, albeit that it resides ultimately in the Ministry of Justice legislatively, and that the Home Secretary will contact her directly regarding her questions.