Integration and Community Cohesion

Baroness Verma Excerpts

Thursday 13th March 2025 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Verma]

That this House takes note of the role of integration in reducing barriers to community cohesion in the United Kingdom.

[Baroness Verma (Con)]

My Lords, today’s debate is about ensuring that we look at why integration is not working or happening in parts of our country, and how this impacts on the ability of our communities to generate an environment of bringing together respect and belonging for shared purposes that bring benefit to all. I look forward to noble Lords’ contributions, but particularly to the maiden speeches of the noble Lords, Lord Raval and Lord Rook.

I wanted to start my contribution by saying a little bit about my family’s experience and contribution to the country I call home, but as I started to write this speech I felt that it was becoming more and more about my family. However, I think it is important that I do this journey just to give a perspective from somebody who has been here all their lives, bar nine months.

My family’s heritage is Indian—a heritage that is a strong and integral part of who I am, as it is for many of the nearly 2 million people of Indian heritage living in our country. My family’s story starts in 1937, when my paternal grandfather, Captain Mall Singh of the British Indian Pioneers regiment, was invited as a guest to the Coronation of His Majesty King George VI. My grandfather’s service, and later my paternal uncle’s service to the Indian army and the Indian police, lay at the heart of the family’s duty to its community and countries.

In 1938, my maternal grandfather arrived in London and after a while made his home first, for a short time, in Coventry. He then established himself and subsequently his extended family in Leicester. As the bombs flattened Coventry and parts of Leicester, he, with fellow Indians, worked to support the rebuilding and do whatever else they could during those years of war. My grandfather was one the community. Of course, he experienced forms of discrimination that we cannot imagine today. For example, when trying to find rooms to rent, he would find signs that said, “No blacks, Irish or dogs”. However, that never deterred him or his colleagues from their commitment to a country they loved and invested in.

After the war, there was a need to rebuild, and the country needed people. He helped house and settle over 40 families. However, as things returned to normality, he recognised that there was also a need to provide a voice for Indian workers. With his friends, he founded the Indian Workers’ Association to be the bridge between the unions and the employers. In 1952, my grandfather became the first Asian to open a hosiery factory in Leicester, providing employment and supporting the local economy.

In 1960, I arrived with my parents from India, just before my first birthday. I grew up in a Great Britain that was challenging for people of colour. The 1960s and 1970s saw a big shift in the expectations from the wider community. During the 1960s there were still relatively few people of colour, and I grew up with Irish and Scottish neighbours—my friends know that I am not a great curry eater; I grew up with broths and stews. The street was my community. My mother, who had arrived not speaking any English, learned, through the support of that street, how to use the transport systems, to get home working, to take me and later my siblings to school, and generally to become part of the wider community.

School life teaches you a lot, but when you are one of two people of colour in a class, it really does teach you a lot more. It teaches you how to survive and how to be strong and resilient. It also taught me how people would stand up for me, just as I stood up for the Ugandan Asians when they arrived in 1971 and 1972, after being expelled from Uganda by Idi Amin. Racism rose heavily in Leicester at that time, but this community did not resile backwards; it moved forward and became one of the strongest communities that Leicester has.

I also grew up, like many of my background, with parallel lives between what it was like at home and what it was like outside. We had to balance the culture—my parents’ expectation—with what my friends expected. They never understood why I could not go out to dances and music halls, but they knew that, while I was at school, I was one of them.

All these things shaped what I did not want a community to look like as I grew up. I wanted my children and my friends’ children to be part of everything, so I became very involved in the regeneration of Leicester. In fact, I was then the young person on the advisory group. I was also the adviser to the Leicestershire Police for recruitment, and I became a college governor to ensure that students from all backgrounds could understand each other’s needs.

However, even today, the left-behind communities are the same communities that were there when I was growing up. They are the same communities that were ignored and totally marginalised by the people in power. Those communities were not migrant communities—they were the white workless or working class—and they still remain those communities. I have previously said, and I have spoken to the Minister about it, that I do not want that divide to get bigger, because those are the divisions that create the intolerances and incohesion that we see in many parts of the country today. I want AI learning and digital inclusion for all communities, particularly those that have been so left behind. I will ask the Minister some questions about that later.

Segregation and inward-looking communities create intolerance and tensions. I want children born and brought up here to be able to engage with everyone. I do not want the mothers of those children excluded from wider debate or decision-making. As I have said every time I have spoken on this type of subject, I want all people to know how to speak, read and write English so they are not excluded from decision-making that impacts on their lives.

A couple of years ago in Leicester, we had riots. These caused deliberate disharmony, but they were not by the people of Leicester. People had come in to deliberately distort what was going on in Leicester. It was only the strength of the women of those communities coming together that stopped the sort of violence that I had not seen for a long time in Leicester. The incorrect reporting of it and the misinformation that was going around on social media flamed up the distrust between communities and I am glad that they are now working harder to make sure that never happens again.

What we say and how we say it matters, especially if you are public facing. Although I certainly do not advocate for censorship around an honest debate about the issues and concerns that impact on the lives of all citizens and the need to feel free to challenge what is negatively affecting our lives, it is also critical that we know that every action has a reaction.

Over the past 64 years of my life, I have been a citizen of a country that has seen so many changes, as you can imagine. When people ask me how British I feel, my response is always, “I am British.” I do not need to demonstrate that. My children do not even think they are British; they think they are English. They were born here. My siblings were born here and see themselves as English. I do not want to constantly have to defend the fact that I am a truly loyal citizen of the country that is my home and is the country I love, but we cannot have this debate if we cannot honestly challenge why people think that we are different.

We have a country that is full of brilliant traditions and norms that we are all a part of, but we are also enriched with the cultural norms that I grew up with. I know that my family and friends share and enjoy Diwali or Holi with us whenever we have them. Tomorrow is Holi and it is the festival of colours. If you are in India, trust me, you cannot walk anywhere without having colour thrown at you. It is a reminder of how colours come together to bring joy.

My mum is 85 years old. She instilled in us the need to be active learners. I will be eternally grateful for her wisdom. I suspect that she raised a few eyebrows in her youth when her beehive hairstyle, ankle grazer slacks and winklepickers were the norm, against Asian ladies who were wearing the salwar kameez. I have tried to wear a sari elegantly, but I cannot; I stride. From all the things that I saw growing up, the one thing I know is that I can love both cultures equally as much. I have resorted to my own personal experiences because, as a child who saw racist attacks but also the incredible solidarity of my neighbours and friends, I fear the debates we are having today are negating all the progress we have made, and we have made a lot. It is easy to lose that progress if we descend back into our groups and feel that we do not belong.

I will end with a couple of questions for the Minister. What measures do his Government have in place to ensure that, where there are large communities from economically deprived backgrounds, digital skills and skills generally are part of the focus of the Government’s drive to be inclusive of everyone, regardless of their faith and ethnicity?

Will the Minister ensure that English is available to everyone and that women, particularly from migrant communities, are able to engage? My biggest fear is that they are not always able to access the services that are rightly theirs to access. Will he and the Government look carefully at how we build our economies around people’s strengths, and not their weaknesses? If we do not, we will go back to the “us and them” situation that I grew up with in the 60s. It was not a nice time to be a child in those days when you were being pitted against each other.

I do not see colour. I cannot see my friends’ colour; I just see them as friends. I want children to grow up seeing children as children. I want adults to treat their children and other people’s faiths and children with respect. The most important thing is that we are all stakeholders in our communities. If we cannot do that, sadly, those that have divisive, loud voices win the argument. I beg to move.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Verma (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions today, particularly the two maiden speeches. They were incredibly informative but humorous as well. At a time when there is so much misery around, a bit of humour goes a long way. I am pretty certain that we will hear much more from the noble Lords in future debates.

Each contribution today has brought a different lens. I feel it demonstrates that we can have an intelligent debate where we can raise the issues without raising the temperature. The difficulty we have is that we raise the temperature so that the mouth and brain do not always work together. If we were to just stop and think that all our words have outcomes and actions, we might speak more wisely.

We should all collectively call it out when we see something that is not right and is causing problems. We should collectively say that this is unacceptable in our country. Whatever faith you come from, if your faith is doing something wrong, we should collectively come out and call it out. That is the strength of a good, strong democracy. If we undermine it, the vacuums are then filled by people who generate hate.

I hope that we can continue working and learning from today’s debate. I hope the other House takes note of it and introduces the policies that we in this House all want to see, but there are many more discussions to be had on this. Unfortunately, we have often allowed ourselves to sleepwalk into crisis. We do that because we do not want to be called out as being politically incorrect. It is time we started to realise that, for the value of others, we have to speak out. I say to my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths, that it is a great joy to be at a university which is so multicultural and actually shares all the values of this country.

Motion agreed.

Solar Panels

Baroness Verma Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for his comments. Of course, it is vital that we get on now and get this moving as quickly as possible. The future buildings standards consultation outlined a number of proposals for new non-domestic buildings and we need to expand that to existing non-domestic buildings. We are ambitious and believe that the standards we set are technically achievable and affordable across all sites. We are working very closely with colleagues in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero to confirm the technical detail of these standards. As soon as we can, we will make sure that we do what is necessary to get this out to as many non-domestic buildings as possible. Your Lordships have my personal commitment to that, as the noble Lord kindly said.

[Baroness Verma (Con)]

My Lords, I refer to my interests in the register. Can the Government look also at all government buildings, because there are a lot of savings we can make? I am pleased to say that Leicester City Council has started to look at how it can issue tenders for solar on its properties in the city.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I thank the noble Baroness and congratulate Leicester on the work it is doing in this space. It is important to say that current standards, introduced in December 2021, already encourage the use of solar panels in non-domestic buildings, and they are expected to produce around 27% lower carbon emissions compared with those built to the previous standards. To meet the 2021 standards, they are expected to be built with very high fabric standards and improved building services, including heat pumps and solar panels. When we make our announcement, we will encourage as many non-domestic building owners as possible to take that on board and to use every technique they can to improve the standards they work to, including on government buildings.

Religious Hate Crime

Baroness Verma Excerpts

Tuesday 15th October 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

My Lords, I acknowledge the point the noble Baroness makes, in particular on the rise of anti-Semitism in our country. We intend to reverse the decision of the previous Government to downgrade the monitoring and recording of anti-Semitic hate incidents. I will pass the noble Baroness’s views across, but I assure her that I am meeting the noble Lord, Lord Mann, who is our independent adviser on anti-Semitism, and I will continue to work with him closely to tackle all forms of anti-Semitism, wherever they may be.

[Baroness Verma (Con)]

My Lords, I know that as a child, growing up when there is a lot of hatred about really impacts on how you grow up. We are seeing every single day the rise of racial and religious hatred; it has been perpetuated by adults, and it feeds back into children. We need to know how we can work across parties to be able to make sure that, as government and opposition, we are producing an environment in which children can grow up safely, not watching the hate that is constantly on the television, which comes from adults who are magnifying the differences.

[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness makes an excellent and interesting point. Today is my 45th birthday; I remember that the first time I suffered racism and religious hatred was on my fourth birthday. The noble Baroness is right: these things stay with you for a long while. Wherever we can work in different departments and different institutions, we have to ensure that we have an integrated and cohesive approach that tackles the problems that, unfortunately, too many people face.