Oral Answers to Questions
Damien Moore Excerpts(9 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Johnny Mercer
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his kind invitation. I would love to come, and I was in Northern Ireland a couple of weeks ago. Health is clearly devolved, but I made it very clear that I want the same standard in Northern Ireland that we have achieved with Op Courage in England: a single, dedicated mental healthcare pathway for veterans, with 19,000 referrals in its first year. Where were all these people going before that? It is an incredible story. I want to see that standard achieved in Northern Ireland, and we will keep working at it until we do.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
May I ask my hon. Friend what work is being done to ensure that the Government give value for money for the taxpayer when it comes to the Government estate?
Alex Burghart
I am pleased to say that one of our major Government functions, the Government Property Agency, is constantly looking at how we can refresh the Government estate to make sure not just that our offices are fit for purpose and are wonderful working spaces for our excellent civil servants, but that we are not hanging on to outdated buildings that are expensive to run. We are very mindful of achieving value for money in this area.
Oral Answers to Questions
Damien Moore Excerpts(1 year, 6 months ago)
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The Deputy Prime Minister
This Government will take whatever action is necessary both to clear the backlog and to stop the boats. Actually, as the hon. Member may have heard from my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, small boat arrivals to the UK are down 20% this year, our French deal has prevented 33,000 illegal crossings this year, Albanian arrivals are down 90%, we have removed 1,800 Albanians, we have increased the number of illegal working raids and the legacy asylum backlog is now down 20%.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
The Deputy Prime Minister
I congratulate my hon. Friend on raising what I am sure Members on both sides of this House will agree is a heartbreaking case, and I know that all our thoughts will be with Semina’s family and her friends. All children of course have the right to be safe and protected. I understand that the Department for Education will shortly begin consulting on strengthening statutory guidance to ensure that health agencies, police forces and councils work together more collaboratively and end decisions that prevent putting children’s needs at the heart of their work. Of course, I am very happy to meet my hon. Friend and for Health Department Ministers to meet him also.
Infected Blood Inquiry Update
Damien Moore Excerpts(1 year, 8 months ago)
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Jeremy Quin
The hon. Gentleman is right that, alas, the victims continue to die. Sir Brian makes a comment in his second interim report that we do not know the full scale of the medical impact of what went on in the ’70s and ’80s. Conditions are, in some cases, worsening. The point is well made. The hon. Gentleman says that we must respond fully—we must and we will do so when we have done the work required.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
On behalf of my constituents affected, I welcome the sensitivity with which the Government have been dealing with this situation. However, the lack of urgency is undermining the good will of victims and their families, and it is letting them down every single day. How long will it be between accepting one of these points and implementing them? Would it not be easier to implement them now? Listening to Members today, I think that the best thing to do would be to implement them and work on getting the support to families as soon as possible.
Jeremy Quin
I can assure my hon. Friend that there is urgency in our response. The report was produced eight working days ago; we are working at pace to go through it and we will continue to do so. We need to determine our view on all the recommendations, but that does not necessarily preclude us taking individual steps between now and the conclusion of the inquiry, and we will continue to work.
Infected Blood Inquiry and Compensation Framework
Damien Moore Excerpts(2 years ago)
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Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
I congratulate the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson) and my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) on securing this important debate. The breadth of representation here today shows that this scandal affects all corners of the United Kingdom and continues to damage many innocent lives.
I know from conversations with my affected constituents the truly devastating impact the scandal has had on their lives. I am glad that while we wait for the publication of the infected blood inquiry’s findings, scheduled for summer 2023, we have started to pay interim compensation payments to those directly affected. The publication in June of Sir Robert Francis’s recommendations for a framework for the compensation and redress for victims laid out the benefit of such payments, and it was backed up by Sir Brian Langstaff’s report on interim payments the next month. It is welcome that, following those reports, the Government rightly announced in August that an interim compensation payment of £100,000 will be made to registered infected individuals and bereaved partners. Those are all steps in the right direction. Many of us in this Chamber have been pushing for them on behalf of our constituents for many years.
I echo other Members’ sentiments: there is still so much more that we can do. Sir Robert Francis published 19 recommendations, yet so far the Government have adopted just one, on interim compensation payments. An issue of primary importance that is directly affecting some of my constituents in Southport is eligibility for the payments. One particularly heartrending case involves a constituent of mine who lost both his boys when they were young. No amount of money can ever right the loss of one’s child. We must remember that, at best, the payments can seek to right in a legal sense the wrong done. The moral argument for making such a payment is clear, yet no payment has been made. My constituent has been through unimaginable grief.
Charlotte Nichols
I want to support the hon. Gentleman’s point by raising a case from my constituency. I too know from conversations with those affected the profound and lasting consequences for the children of those affected, who had to deal not only with their bereavement but with being bullied at school during the most brutal period of AIDS stigma. It is appalling to me and any right-minded person looking at the interim payments that have been made so far that the children of those affected are not yet eligible for financial support. Will the hon. Gentleman join me and others in ensuring that the Government include the children of those infected as a matter of urgency?
Damien Moore
I agree with the hon. Lady. Many years later, my constituent is still going through a terrible time with the trauma. The psychological effects do not leave people. He is still ineligible for compensation for the death of his children. It is unacceptable.
Why are the Government yet to adopt Sir Robert’s fifth recommendation, which would extend eligibility and would include my constituent and many others? They are yet to give an emphatic statement in support of the recommendation, and have merely stated in a written answer that they fully expect Sir Robert’s wider recommendations to inform the inquiry’s final report. They need not wait for the final report; they could simply adopt Sir Robert’s first recommendation. Regardless of the inquiry’s findings, there is a strong moral case for a publicly funded scheme to compensate the victims.
It is good news that the first payments for those who are eligible have landed in their bank accounts. The Government are making good progress on redress, but there is still more that we can do. I support all 19 of the recommendations and I urge the Government to adopt them at the earliest opportunity. We all continue to stand up for payments for our constituents, because they have suffered in this scandal and they need to be justly compensated. We will continue to fight until we feel that justice has been done. These are real people who are suffering across all our constituencies, and we have a moral duty to do all we can to right these wrongs.
Oral Answers to Questions
Damien Moore Excerpts(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Mrs Wheeler
I am afraid the hon. Lady is out of step with reality. Many MPs have gone to the hub in Portcullis House and have got turnarounds for their constituents’ passports. Many people have got their passports within nine days. [Interruption.] She is asking about technology: improvements in artificial intelligence mean that if there is no issue with someone’s passport, it is returned within nine days flat.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
The Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office (Mrs Heather Wheeler)
What an exciting time we are having this morning. The Government will provide a range of entry routes and a renewed focus on driving the movement of skills, experience and knowledge within the civil service, and between the civil service and other sectors, through loans, secondments and intergovernmental placements and fellowships. We have strengthened the external by default recruitment requirement for all senior civil servant roles, so all Departments will be able to recruit the people best placed to lead and work in Government.
Damien Moore
The civil service fast stream ensures that the best and brightest in our society, no matter their background, rise to the top. Does my hon. Friend agree that restoring the fast stream would ensure that the top ranks of the civil service continue to be world leading in their breadth and depth of knowledge?
Mrs Wheeler
Fast stream places for autumn 2022 will be honoured and our direct entry apprenticeship and internship schemes will continue to bring new and diverse talent to the civil service. While we pause the fast stream for the 2023 intake, we will take the opportunity to further improve the fast stream offer. That reform will ensure that when the scheme reopens, it is focused on driving up specialist skills in the civil service, as well as improving the regional representation of the fast stream.
I know that my hon. Friend works hard with Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office officials on their international agenda in his capacity as chair of the all-party parliamentary groups on Belgium, Luxembourg and Tunisia. I take the opportunity to update him that, as part of our global Britain agenda and the establishment of the new College for National Security, we are launching international strategy and security fellowships, which are secondments, and where possible—
Oral Answers to Questions
Damien Moore Excerpts(2 years, 8 months ago)
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Dr Ben Spencer (Runnymede and Weybridge) (Con)
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
Mr John Whittingdale (Maldon) (Con)
Dominic Raab
We are doing two things in particular. First, I have convened a cross-Whitehall group, which we have done in the past, to ensure that we can provide whatever support may be needed for everything from witness protection services to the gathering of evidence and information co-operation. Secondly, I have been to The Hague and I will be going back this week. I am working with a coalition of countries that also have unique expertise in that area to provide the support that the Court needs.
Damien Moore
Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that our recently passed Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act 2022 will ensure that this Conservative Government will take every step to deprive those found guilty of war crimes in Ukraine of their illegally gotten gains?
Dominic Raab
My hon. Friend will know that, because of the Sergei Magnitsky regime for asset freezes and visa bans for anyone who has committed serious human rights abuses, we already have that capacity in place. That is on top of the further co-operation that we will provide with the ICC and, I should mention, that the Attorney General will provide with the prosecutor general of Ukraine.
Oral Answers to Questions
Damien Moore Excerpts(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
Conor Burns
My hon. Friend is absolutely right: this is an occasion that should unite the whole of the United Kingdom—all regions and all nations of the United Kingdom. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I are working closely with local authorities and the Government in Northern Ireland to make sure that this is something that brings communities together. We will want to remember some of the 25 occasions that the Queen has visited Northern Ireland: three of them as Princess Elizabeth and 22 of them as Queen. We want to involve young people and we want to use the opportunity of the jubilee to celebrate the best of Northern Ireland.
Damien Moore
I recently was proud to join colleagues from across the House in setting up the all-party group for the Queen’s platinum jubilee. Can the Minister tell us what steps he is taking to ensure that the celebration extends across the United Kingdom and that it is used to showcase the benefits of our UK, with Northern Ireland as an integral part of it?
Conor Burns
This occasion should bring us all together. In that light and specifically with reference to Northern Ireland, I would like to welcome the comments of the Leader of Sinn Fein who said that she wanted to
“extend to the British Queen a word of congratulations because 70 years is quite some achievement.”
She said:
“That is what you call a lifetime of service.”
Those comments have made it easier for us in Northern Ireland to celebrate this in all communities across the whole of Northern Ireland.
Oral Answers to Questions
Damien Moore Excerpts(2 years, 10 months ago)
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Dominic Raab
May I thank the hon. Lady and express my solidarity in the awful and harrowing case that she refers to? If she writes to me, I will be happy to look at her specific proposal.
The overall level of funding for victims this year is three times the level in 2010. Through the victims Bill consultation, we are ensuring that victims are at the very heart of the criminal justice system. Our local as well as national justice scorecards will help to monitor where there is best practice within the justice system and where we are falling short, right across the country.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
James Cartlidge
My hon. Friend, who put in a great shift on the Committee, makes an excellent point. The Judicial Review and Courts Bill will introduce a new procedure for certain low-level offences such as travelling on a train without a ticket, enabling defendants who wish to plead guilty to make a plea and accept a conviction and standard penalty entirely online, without the involvement of the court. Given that it is a new type of procedure for dealing with certain minor offences, we are proceeding with caution and limiting its scope initially to three offences. However, new offences could be added in future. My hon. Friend is absolutely right that through precisely such steps and through the single justice procedure, we will reduce in-person pressure on magistrates so that we can move more business from the Crown court to magistrates and bear down on the backlog.
Elections Bill
Damien Moore ExcerptsTuesday 7th September 2021
(3 years, 3 months ago)
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Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
It is a pleasure to speak in this debate to express my support for the new legislation to strengthen the integrity of UK elections and protect our democracy, but I want to begin by thanking the many people inside and outside Parliament who worked so hard, particularly over the last year, to preserve and protect our democratic process despite the ensuing chaos caused by the pandemic. We owe a debt of gratitude to the workers and volunteers who administer our elections, and we owe special thanks to Lord Pickles because without his work and dedication to tackle electoral fraud in our voting system, I doubt this Bill would have come before us so soon.
I also thank my hon. Friend the Minister for the Constitution and Devolution for getting this done despite the competing priorities of Government and her own personal battle. At a time when Government could be forgiven for prioritising other incentives, the refreshing display of focus and determination we are seeing today from the Government reflects a belief in the need to strengthen the integrity of our elections and protect our democracy.
Many Members will recall that only in the last Parliament I put forward my own private Member’s Bill on this topic, and I am glad to say that many of the changes I proposed around postal voting then have found their way into this Bill.
Many Members on the Opposition Benches have argued strongly that this Bill unnecessarily introduces measures that will make it more difficult to vote in future elections, that the UK has relatively low levels of proven electoral fraud, and that voters should feel confident about their vote, or that this might disenfranchise voters. In truth, the opposite is the case. This Bill will strengthen the security of our voting process by introducing a requirement for voters to show an approved form of photographic identification before collecting their ballot paper to vote in a polling station. There are already checks in place to confirm a voter’s identity when they register to vote and to vote by post. However, there are no similar checks in place at polling stations in Great Britain to prevent someone from claiming to be someone else and voting in their name.
This Bill will bring the rest of the UK in line with Northern Ireland, where photographic identification has been used successfully since 2003. For those concerned that any eligible voter who does not have one of a broad range of accepted identification documents will be precluded from taking part in the democratic process, the Bill and the Minister have made it clear that a proposed voter card will be available from their local authority free of charge. Furthermore, the Elections Bill places British citizens’ participation at the heart of our democracy, supporting voters to make their choices freely, securely and in an informed way without fear of interference.
Stealing someone’s vote is stealing their voice, so I welcome the Government’s attempts to stamp out any potential for voter fraud by including sensible safeguards for postal and proxy voting, which will see party campaigners banned from handling postal votes, put a stop to postal vote harvesting, and make it an offence for a person to attempt to find out or reveal who an absent voter has chosen to vote for.
I also welcome the steps taken by this Government to introduce a new electoral sanction to protect campaigners and those standing for or holding elected office from inexcusable intimidatory or abusive behaviour both in person and online, something many Members on both sides of this House have experienced and feel strongly about. As my hon. Friend the Minister has said:
“Robust debate has always been a fundamental part of our democracy, and freedom of expression is part of its appeal—but a line is crossed when disagreement mutates into intimidation and abuse that shuts down free debate.”
Finally, I welcome the steps taken in the Bill to better support voters with disabilities to exercise their democratic right by removing restrictions on who can act as a companion to a disabled voter at the polling station and requiring local returning officers to provide support for a wider range of needs. In my constituency of Southport, this is not only appropriate but necessary to strengthen the integrity of our voting system and ensure voters, irrespective of their age or disability, can participate. Too often during elections, I am contacted by residents—they have an above average age demographic—who are dissuaded from taking part in the democratic process not because of their apathy, but because of a lack of confidence in a system that makes it too difficult to vote in person with a disability.
The Bill builds on the good progress that the Government have made defending democracy. The changes that it will deliver will work alongside the measures in the online safety Bill and the counter-state threats Bill, which were announced in the most recent Queen’s Speech, to protect our globally respected UK democracy from evolving threats and ensure the systems that underpin it are fit for purpose in society today. It will introduce a number of important changes that the Electoral Commission and others have previously argued will bring benefits for voters, including extending imprint rules to digital campaign material, allowing more flexible support for disabled people, and improving transparency. I will be supporting the Bill, and I encourage hon. and right hon. Members across the House to do the same.
Oral Answers to Questions
Damien Moore Excerpts(3 years, 6 months ago)
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Alok Sharma
I would point out to the hon. Member that the UK is the country in the G20 that has decarbonised its economy fastest since the year 2000. He will know that the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is working on a heat and housing decarbonisation strategy as well. That will come forward, and of course we will set out our net zero strategy ahead of COP26.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
The COP26 President (Alok Sharma)
First, can I thank my hon. Friend for the work that he does as a trade envoy in north Africa? Of course, I and fellow Ministers speak to—and, indeed, our whole diplomatic network speaks to and engages with—Governments across the world, including in north Africa. In recent months, I have spoken to Ministers in a range of countries, including Morocco, Sudan and Egypt, which I visited in February.
Damien Moore
What plans are there to sustain engagement in this region in the forthcoming months?
Alok Sharma
We are working proactively with countries in the region through our COP26 energy transition council. We co-chair the adaptation action coalition with Egypt and we will continue to engage in north Africa, one of the regions most vulnerable to climate change.