Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Grant Shapps and Clive Efford

Tuesday 17th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

I absolutely share the hon. Gentleman’s concern and will offer him a meeting with the Energy and Climate Minister specifically on this matter.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

I wonder what discussions the Secretary of State has had with the energy companies following the report last week from Citizens Advice showing that hundreds of thousands of customers are being forcibly moved on to prepayment meters. Has he had discussions with his colleagues in the Ministry of Justice? Forcible entry to make hundreds of these changes is being approved on an industrial scale in minutes flat in magistrates courts. It is a real scandal. What is he doing about it?

[Grant Shapps]

The hon. Gentleman is right on that point. My right hon. Friend the Energy and Climate Minister and I have instructed our officials to draw up measures that could be helpful. We also have a letter to go to Ofgem once we have that advice. I am very concerned about this happening through an enforced process. We are on the public’s side and trying to fix it.

Post Office: GLO Compensation Scheme

Debate between Grant Shapps and Clive Efford

Wednesday 7th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. As the right hon. Member for North Durham has also said, we do not want to see a complex and expensive legal process that costs a fortune for those who should have been compensated long ago. That is why this is going through an alternative dispute resolution process. We will also provide assistance in pulling the papers together so that people can make their applications as easily as possible.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

I also pay tribute to Lord Arbuthnot, my right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) and the former Minister, the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully), for their tireless work on this issue.

May I press the Secretary of State a little further on getting justice for those who used the state to defend an indefensible position, which ended up putting people in prison and wrecking people’s lives, with some committing suicide? His Department was clearly involved in this. Will he guarantee full disclosure of any documents required for any future legal proceedings?

The problem is that the postmasters lack the means, and those who have been defending their position have untold means, because they are using taxpayers’ money. The Secretary of State says justice has to be done, but how does he see that being pursued? Will these people have to fund legal action again, or will the state fund criminal proceedings?

Energy Security

Debate between Grant Shapps and Clive Efford

Tuesday 29th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend will be pleased to hear that when I was at Sizewell yesterday, I was with leaders from EDF and the French Government—indeed, the French ambassador was there. Later in the day I spoke to my opposite number about ensuring that we can speed up co-operation on nuclear, as well as on things such as wind, and even on our interconnectors. I was going to say that the point of Great British Nuclear is to really put the acid under this, but I am sure that there is a much better nuclear comparison. It is really about ensuring that we get on with producing our new nuclear fleet a lot faster than has happened in the last few decades.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State confirm that, even with the additional money made available for home insulation, his officials have told him that the money falls short by tens of billions?

[Grant Shapps]

It is worth the House knowing that we have already put in £6.6 billion. We have announced another £6 billion, which will be spent in the period from 2025 to 2028. The £1 billion that I announced yesterday will cover hundreds of thousands of homes. Of course, it is typical of the Labour party to think that the only way in which this can ever be funded is by the taxpayer and that there are no other routes to market. Lots of homes will be improved by, for example, regulations on build, ensuring that the overall increase in improvements in EPCs comes not just through spending taxpayers’ cash.

Industrial Action on the Railway

Debate between Grant Shapps and Clive Efford

Monday 20th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. She and the whole House will have noticed that while the Opposition were singing the praises of other parts of the Union, including what they call Labour Wales—I do not think it is Labour at all, but Labour runs the Administration—for not striking, they failed to mention that their own Mayor of London has had 53 days of strikes. The truth is that we need to move ahead with automated trains on parts of the London underground; the metro in Paris has them and it is time we got on with it here.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

Earlier, the Secretary of State waved around a document relating to 28 areas of reform that he thinks need to be implemented to modernise our railway. Has he stipulated that they must be agreed before rail operators can negotiate pay?

[Grant Shapps]

I will recount, but I think it was 20 areas, and no, I have not done that, but it is the kind of modernisation we would expect. For example, I was just looking at the list, and one working practice means that paysheets have to be done on paper, whereas it would clearly make sense to do them electronically. It would save a lot of time and a lot of money, and I cannot really see why anyone would be against it, but it is a working practice that is not allowed. I mentioned being able to move between different very similar roles but only where somebody is fully qualified, and those kinds of flexibilities in rostering do not exist.

It is pretty much like trying to run an orchestra for Network Rail, but it does not know who is going to turn up or which instruments they will bring, and it has no ability to tell them where to sit—and then it is supposed to make the railway run. We have to modernise our railways.

P&O Ferries and Employment Rights

Debate between Grant Shapps and Clive Efford

Monday 21st March 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Grant Shapps)]

I thank the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Louise Haigh) for bringing this debate forward. It is important that this should be fully discussed, although we have already had an urgent statement on the subject. The way in which those 800 loyal and experienced workers were treated by P&O Ferries last week was shameful and utterly unacceptable, after two years during which maritime staff faced significant demands and worked tirelessly to keep the country open and supplied us with vital goods, without which this country would not have been able to function. In my view—I am sure it is the view of the whole House—this is about having respect for employees, about employers having the common decency to engage with their workforce, particularly when times are tough, and about having standards that we would expect every single company in this country and every single employer to uphold.

Of course we understand the financial pressures that many businesses are facing right now. Regrettably, redundancies are sometimes inescapable, but there is no excuse for what we saw last Thursday. There was no consultation with the workforce and no consultation with the unions. To answer the hon. Lady’s question, the first I heard about it was at 8.30 in the evening, not through the memo, which I did not see, but instead through communication with my private office to indicate that P&O would be making redundancies the next day. The House may or may not be aware that, in 2020 during coronavirus and again in 2021, redundancies took place at P&O. In 2020, the numbers were larger than those we saw last Thursday. However, the company consulted properly about those redundancies, and they were made voluntary. So it was on that understanding that I had a conversation with the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) the next morning, in which he provided some on-the-ground information. Then, as colleagues will recall, I was standing at this Dispatch Box when I was passed a note about redundancies taking place. It was with considerable concern that I saw that the company was deploying those redundancies via a pre-recorded Zoom call, as the hon. Lady has said.

[Clive Efford]

The Secretary of State said that he did not know of P&O’s plans until 8.30 in the evening, but the shadow Secretary of State has indicated that the Government were aware of P&O’s plans before their public announcement. Can he confirm that that is the case, when that was, who had access to that information and what action they took on it?