Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Committee stage
Monday 22nd May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, raised some of the problems that mean that pavements cannot be pavements. My particular bugbear is cyclists on pavements; they drive me mad. The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, raised some of the tensions when deciding how we regulate public spaces, drawing attention to residents who live on streets where maybe there are pavement cafés.

Those things are worth considering but I want to return to the points made at the start of this group, so well explained by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, and to reference the earlier group on reviving the high street. One of the very few positive outcomes of the dreadful lockdown period was the emergence of imaginative ways of creating social engagement outdoors. When lockdown was such an antisocial action that kept us apart from each other, we found ways of connecting.

Café society is indeed a positive innovation, and regardless of the differences between the weather and climate in the UK and, for example, continental Europe, Brits have taken to this way of enjoying hospitality services. It is a great boost to that industry, which suffered so badly under lockdown.

One of the advantages of this spilling out of café society on to pavements is that it has allowed smokers and vapers to have a coffee or a drink alongside a cigarette, which I consider—shock, horror—to be all very civilised. It is certainly better than huddling outside in doorways in between sips of a drink.

I find it rather galling that Amendments 458, 459 and 461—all of which, one way or another, involve restricting smoking outdoors and making those restrictions a precondition of the licence—have been added to this group. Amendments 458 and 461 emphasise that where there is consumption of food or drink, the licence holder must ensure that smoking or vaping does not affect others. This seems an impossible duty. How could it ever be monitored? It is a degree of micromanagement of the life of communities. It seems the licensee is being threatened—they must prevent smoke drift affecting those in the vicinity, or they will not get a licence.

Tobacco smoke in outdoor areas is highly diluted and dissipates quickly in atmospheric conditions. I worry about moves towards such punitive restrictions on people smoking outside, when all they are doing is indulging in a legal, personal activity. Do we need to overregulate in such a fashion? Smokers, a minority no doubt, are perfectly respectable and considerate citizens and it would be wrong in any way to imply that in some or most cases they wilfully blow smoke into people’s faces or are not mindful of others in the vicinity.

As to involving vaping in this, targeting an anti-smoking device seems just wrong-headed. So many people I know who have stopped smoking did so by taking up vaping, and they improved their health in the process. If the proposers of the amendments are worried about any exposure to tobacco smoke outdoors, this would require that a proper scientific study be brought before the House, or at the very least a national consultation. Amendment 459 goes the full hog and states:

“Pavement licences may only be granted by a local authority subject to the condition that smoking is prohibited”.


It seems that an attempt is being made to use this Bill as a backdoor route to banning smoking in public places per se.

This Bill has been packaged as empowering local decision-making. Can we note that local authorities already have the powers at their discretion to regulate smoking in licensed premises and on pavements outside pubs, bars and restaurants with exterior tables and seating? It is up to them. How can we justify using this Bill to bring in central government legislation that threatens that if pubs and cafés do not ban smoking outside, no licence will be given to them? This seems wholly disproportionate.

We should note that such prescriptive rules could well lead to fewer customers, more high street closures and, certainly for many citizens who as adults choose to smoke, less freedom. It goes against the spirit of a levelling-up Bill when you have an imposition from the top of a kind of “we know best approach” to local matters and individual matters such as smoking, and it will grate with many people.

I appreciate that some people do not like people smoking. Some people find it loathsome. One noble Baroness has boasted about not tolerating smoke drift. There are a lot of things that I do not like and that I would rather not tolerate. I am not keen on people chewing gum or putting on make-up in public or eating with their mouth open or talking loudly or on babies crying when I want to sit quietly with my latte and read my book outside a café, but—my goodness—this is society. We tolerate each other; we rub along. There is something really positive about a café society. We should not use it as an excuse to bring in unnecessary regulations that set us at odds with one another as a means of policing and supervising personal, legal behaviour.

To finish, I do not know whether this will encourage or discourage, but I have noticed that smoking on the Terrace outside the Lords has been banned but somehow smoking on the Terrace of the other place is perfectly okay, and guess what? It is packed with people who work in the House of Lords or sit as Peers in the House of Lords because it is the only place to go—not to damage people but just to relax and have a cigarette with a coffee. They are not breaking the law.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

Before my noble friend gets up to respond to this debate and at the risk of upsetting the mood of the Committee, I remind noble Lords that we have done three groups. We have another 19 to go and we are going to finish tonight, so unless anybody does not wish to have any sleep, I suggest we perhaps cut our speeches down just a little bit if we can.

Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Report stage
Wednesday 17th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

“Shut up”?—well done. I am just saying: let us get on with the Bill seriously rather than keeping on blaming each other. That was my point in the first place. Drop the smug tone.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

Perhaps I can remind the House that we have been incredibly patient but noble Lords should stick to debating the amendments rather than general points. Perhaps we can get on and make some progress.

Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

2nd reading
Monday 6th February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have a lot of sympathy with the furious frustration expressed today at being asked to grant an Executive a licence to legislate on thousands of legal instruments, all without accountability to Parliament or the public. I empathise because that anger at a democratic deficit was exactly what prompted me to vote to leave the EU. These very EU retained laws started life as secondary legislation impositions on the UK Parliament: they were directions from and obligations to the EU Executive. They were products of a supranational institution whose very design is to ring-fence swathes of lawmaking from national electorates and to delegate sovereign powers to unaccountable European Commissioners, the European bank, et cetera.

Do not get me wrong: there are problems with this Bill. The Government may have missed an opportunity to use the retained law issue as a spur for democratic renewal. They could have launched nationwide town-hall meetings and debates to guide decisions on what laws to keep or delete. But, to note, whatever the anti-democratic dangers of this skeleton Bill, there is a popular mandate behind the Bill’s intent: to fulfil a promise of taking back control of our legal system by abolishing EU supremacy. We do indeed need to give domestic courts more discretion to depart from retained EU case law—they can take it into account but should not be required to follow it. Also, the real constitutional outrage before us is not the Bill so much as the fact that some domestic primary legislation remains subordinate to EU law. I am not sure that complaints that the sunset clause means changes are rushed will cut it with the public. For many millions who voted to leave in the largest democratic vote in UK history, the impression is of sloth, prevarication and obstruction. They deserve a sense of urgency to finish what voters started in 2016.

Many of the core objections we have heard today seem to be driven by a failure of imagination. Many noble Lords have cited professional bodies, NGOs, employers organisations, trade union leaders and lawyers—all who appear unable to imagine social and economic progress happening without retained EU laws. Nowhere is this more gallingly illustrated than in accusations that the Bill will create a bonfire of workers’ rights. Surely this legalistic presumption is insulting to decades of self-organisation by working-class people who fought tooth and nail to win those gains. Maybe tell the RMT rank and file members—many of whom I campaigned alongside for Brexit—that their rights are safer in EU retained law than on their picket lines. Do I trust the Tory Government with workers’ rights? Of course not. But I do not trust EU law either. The first time I heard of the model strike-breaking legislation in the form of minimum service requirements was when it was being eulogised in the European Parliament. And, yes, I will be opposing it when it comes to this House.

The TUC briefing warns that this Bill jeopardises the agency workers directive, but we might note that this very directive is a device used to avoid paying agency staff at the same rate as employed staff. It has been used by the ECJ to break collective bargaining agreements via the 2007 rulings in the Viking Line and Laval cases. Other briefings warn us this Bill will drive a wrecking ball through women’s employment rights and equality legislation. Actually, a far greater threat to equality law in 2023 is not this Bill but the Scottish Government’s Gender Recognition Act. How disappointing that all those condemning this so-called dodgy legislation today have not been clamouring to oppose this material assault on women’s sex-based rights that threatens the UK-wide Equality Act.

The 4,000 retained EU laws were put on the UK statute books without Members of this unelected House crying democracy. Earlier, we were assured that it was all okay because, as one noble Lord explained, there were special behind-closed-door committees that scrutinised them. There was no mind that, no matter how many British voters might object to any one of those laws, there was nothing—zilch—they could do. The lack of outrage at that democratic deficit—

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The noble Baroness has exceeded her time limit. Perhaps she could bring her comments to an end.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

Well, noble Lords get the gist.

UK Asylum and Refugee Policy

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Friday 9th December 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I thank the most reverend Primate for encouraging us to consider the question of asylum from a moral position, but I warn those who made such interesting maiden speeches—I warmly welcome them—that debates in this House are not always so erudite or ethical.

One concern when we discuss this topic is how we are regularly urged to deploy our moral sentiments in feeling compassion for refugees. Is it emotionally manipulative to suggest that policy should be decided by such one-sided emotional concerns? There are millions of people who could have their lives enhanced by living in the UK. When I watch the news and see the plight and suffering of those around the world, I am tearful and want to do something desperately, but, as the most reverend Primate admits, we cannot take all the world’s suffering as refugees here. We have to prioritise, and that does not make us immoral. I therefore feel uncomfortable when some accuse those who raise concerns about the numbers arriving in small boats of lacking a disposition of generosity or not caring. Is not that demonising and dehumanising language too?

Let us not pretend that this is an easy moral question. For all the moral righteousness expressed here, I ask what the moral difference is between a man fleeing a war-torn country, which is considered legal, and a man fleeing grinding poverty, which is not. This highlights a moral problem thrown up by the asylum system: it treats the cause of someone fleeing a country as the basis for creating deserving and undeserving migrants. It implies somehow that a refugee is a victim worthy of our generosity, unlike economic migrants.

I am not sure the fashion for emphasising that Jesus was a refugee helps, if I am honest. It feels like a bit of a cheap shot. Did not Christ allegedly die for us all? This sanctifying narrative and the present system definitely incentivise anyone arriving to follow the script and claim they are refugees, but, as explained so well by the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, people arrive without papers or with letters from tyrants as evidence. There is a problem: the system is open to abuse.

If the host authorities say they will give asylum to Syrians, those from the Middle East will inevitably claim to be Syrians. If the rules say asylum will be given to under-18s, young-looking 20-somethings will understandably claim to be younger. In 2016, the Church of England clerics warned about fake conversions from Islam to Christianity. In Nick Timothy’s major report published this week, he notes that modern slavery laws are being “abused”. It is now standard advice, especially for those coming from Albania, to claim they are victims of trafficking.

Noting those truths is not about blame. I do not blame people for trying their luck—they want a better life—so there are no accusations of “scroungers” or “invaders” from me. But it is simply disingenuous to suggest that the objectivity of the law is not being strained when determining asylum status is so difficult. I am especially worried when we gaslight the British public, who feel that some are gaming the system—and they are right to think that. They also believe that, no matter how many times they vote for control of our borders, they are being ignored at the expense of asylum seekers.

When people considered the original 1951 convention on refugees, the spectre of those fleeing the Holocaust death camps informed the spirit of “never again”. Many Jewish refugees were, shamefully, turned away. British citizens understand that, and they understand those fleeing the bombs and terror of Putin’s barbaric war in Ukraine and our obligation to those escaping the Taliban in Afghanistan, and so on. They are more than welcoming, but they are also understandably upset about the 40,000 currently crossing the channel, who they know are not fleeing from the terror of the Nazis or the Taliban, but who are leaving peaceful France.

They are right as well to ask British politicians about their priorities. Did your Lordships see the film of the recent public meeting in Skegness, called by the mayor in response to the local seaside hotels? There was a lot of hostility in that meeting, but it was aimed not at refugees but at the local MP. It was frustration at a system where, without consultation, asylum seekers in their midst were being given free accommodation, utilities and three meals a day, while local people face desperate times and the brutal reality of austerity. Homelessness is on the rise in the town, and the veterans sleeping rough in Skegness also deserves our compassion; the interviews with them were heart-breaking. Of course refugees are not living in five-star hotels, and I am not suggesting that, but can we also empathise with citizens who cannot get to see a GP, get into A&E or get medical treatment for chronic pain when they are told that medical services are being made available to refugees in local hotels?

Dismissing the plight and aspirations of our own citizens, so well-articulated by the noble Baronesses, Lady Stowell and Lady Stroud, is just as divisive and mean-spirited as using the language of invasion. This issue requires that we deploy a full range of moral principles. Our duties stretch beyond compassion for migrants. If we flaunt the democratic duty to uphold the integrity of national borders and treat the social cohesion of settled communities as a distasteful, inconvenient obstacle, we indeed risk a backlash against all refugees and migration schemes, which would be terrible. In my view, we need a complete overhaul of the laws on the issue. At present, who is in control?

In his foreword to the recent pamphlet From the Channel to Rwanda: Three Essays on the Morality of Asylum, Doctor Michael Nazir-Ali, the former Bishop of Rochester, wrote:

“if people smugglers can simply nullify carefully thought-through and debated legislation and policy by landing people in small craft on the beaches in Kent, this cannot indefinitely be acceptable in a democratic and law respecting nation.”

I think Nick Timothy is right that, if human rights laws or the 1951 refugee convention prevent us democratically deciding our priorities, we must be prepared to leave both if necessary. Those who disagree, who think there should be more refugees, should argue for that democratically and push that up the next election’s list of things to be debated.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The noble Baroness has run out of time.

Leaseholders: Service Charges

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist

Wednesday 20th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

It does indeed concern the Government, which is why we have renewed our guidance on insurance. We are aware that some buildings are currently unable to secure adequate and affordable building insurance. The department has called on the Financial Conduct Authority and the CMA to review buildings insurance premiums. The FCA published an interim report on the buildings insurance review on 10 May, and we are exploring all possible interventions to resolve the crisis in the building insurance sector which is affecting a large number of leaseholders.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the Minister has said several times that service charges must be governed by law and must not be unreasonable, but they are unreasonable. They are going up exponentially and leaseholders are tearing their hair out. To give the Government credit, some real progress was made under the noble Lord, Lord Greenhalgh, and Michael Gove when he was the Secretary of State, but leaseholders now feel abandoned. At the very least, could the Minister assure leaseholders from the Dispatch Box that they have not been forgotten? Platitudes saying that service charges are reasonable and within the law do not work. Leaseholders are now having to pay far beyond their means.