Civil Partnerships, Marriages and Deaths (Registration Etc.) Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Gareth Thomas and Andy Slaughter

Committee Debate: House of Commons
Wednesday 18th July 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Gareth Thomas]

As a near neighbour it is a particular privilege for me to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Sharma. It was a weak and vulnerable moment when I agreed to support the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for St Helens North (Conor McGinn), knowing that he would not be here. I say that because, as all hon. Members will be aware, on 28 March he made an impassioned speech promoting his private Member’s Bill to make provision for the marriage of same-sex couples in Northern Ireland and to end an inequality with which we are all familiar and which I suspect, although I do not know for certain, all Committee members want to see an end to as a matter of urgency.

I am, therefore, slightly disappointed by the Minister’s response. She rightly alluded to the very difficult situation in Northern Ireland, but as my hon. Friend asked in March, why should the fact that the Northern Ireland Assembly is suspended mean that same-sex couples in Northern Ireland who want to get married are denied that right? New clause 1, in which the Minister has agreed to ensure that the Secretary of State prepares a report, seems to be an opportunity to make progress.

Most political parties in Northern Ireland already support same-sex marriage, and a broad coalition is already very active in campaigning on this issue. Opinion polls in Northern Ireland continue to demonstrate considerable support for allowing same-sex marriage, so I struggle to see why the Secretary of State cannot seek to advance the case for change in Northern Ireland through the report. Why, for example, cannot the Secretary of State and the Home Secretary not consult political parties in Northern Ireland? Why cannot they ensure that there is a consultation with other civil society organisations to continue the process of building support for change? Why cannot the Government commit to saying what they will do if it becomes clear—although we all hope that this will not be the case—that the Northern Ireland Assembly will not be re-established?

I support the report as it stands, as it will make progress in England and Wales, but it represents a missed opportunity for making progress in Northern Ireland. I hope the Minister will reflect on the opportunity that new clause 1 and the report represent in moving forward the agenda in Northern Ireland for same-sex marriage.

[Andy Slaughter]

I fully support the amendments in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for St Helens North, and I am particularly persuaded by the eloquent speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West.

I will briefly address the new clause. I pay huge tribute to the way in which the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham has pursued this issue through the many avenues available to us. He has put together the pieces of the jigsaw such that we now have very powerful arguments for this substantial change to legislation, which will enable millions of people across the country to enter into legally binding and protected arrangements, and which will be very good for them and the security of their families. On those grounds alone, the Government should support it.

As the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland has said, this anomaly should not have occurred in the first place. We heard from the Minister about the good progress that the Government have made—gradually at first, but now at an accelerated rate. The final piece of the jigsaw should be the Supreme Court judgment. I attended when it was handed down, in part because my constituents Rebecca Steinfeld and Charles Keidan doggedly pursued their case despite the difficulty—and let us not underestimate this—of the four-year process of going through every higher court and getting first of all a knock-back, then a partial encouragement, and then a unanimous decision by the Supreme Court. That decision said to the Government, in judicial language—I have not seen this in a judgment before—“Can you please get a move on here and hurry up?” I think that message has got through to the Minister.

Putting the jigsaw together has been a painstaking process. The pressure is on the Government now, with all the indications given, hopes raised and options ruled out. A consultation is now under way and there must be mechanism—of which the Bill is an important part but not the end—to put the measure into law.

The law will be changed at some point to allow opposite-sex civil partnerships. However long overdue that unfinished business is, we must welcome it. This is an important stage of the process, where the Government have a chance to set out their intentions at length, so it would be helpful if the Minister could set out, as far as possible, the mechanism and timescale involved. Every possible encouragement has been given by the House, the Supreme Court and the public at large, who are hugely supportive. As we have heard, this is a matter of some urgency for some families.

I congratulate all those involved in the process. It has been a good example of successful joint working across many institutions and bodies. We just want the Minister to explain where we go next.

Department for Transport

Debate between Gareth Thomas and Andy Slaughter

1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 27th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) on securing this debate. If my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas) and I were of any assistance, it was, as usual, as her obedient servants in this matter. She made a compelling case for her own region, but I am delighted that she does not argue that we should rob Peter to pay Paul—take resources from my region, for example.

Rather than use my own words to talk about transport spending in London, I shall quote the hon. Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys (Paul Maynard), Transport Minister until last month and not, I suggest, partisan in favour of the Labour London Mayor. He said last October that spend per head was a bad indication when judging the effectiveness of transport spending:

“The calculation for London…doesn’t account for the substantial number of daily commuters and visitors, both domestically and internationally, who will be using and benefitting from the roads and public transport networks but who aren’t London residents…two in every three rail journeys start or end in London and there are eighteen times more passengers arriving into London during a typical morning peak than at Manchester, the busiest northern city. In particular, as the main international gateway into and out of the country, London will be the location for transport investments which look to serve passengers well beyond the local resident population.”

Indeed, there are severe funding problems in London, and my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West mentioned the most pressing: the withdrawal of the entirety of the operational grant—£700 million. What other capital city would that be true of? But that is only where it all begins; we now hear that the money raised from vehicle excise duty in London, some £500 million, will also be spent only on roads outside the capital from 2021.

It feels sometimes as though these decisions are spiteful rather than strategic. The current Transport Secretary is perfectly happy to overspend his budget by £300 million—including, as the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Dame Cheryl Gillan) said, £260 million on VAT for HS2. He said that we could not make adjustments to the system of penalty notices in London, which would have raised £80 million within our own resources. He also refused to allow the suburban rail service to be incorporated. That would have been more efficient and was supported by a number of Conservative MPs in the capital.

[Gareth Thomas]

Does my hon. Friend also think it is regrettable that the Department for Transport has blocked London from accessing the new national clean air fund, given the scale of problems that diesel is causing, particularly in central and outer London?