Drone Users: Registration

Debate between Jim Shannon and Tim Loughton

Wednesday 10th July 2019 Westminster Hall

[Tim Loughton]

I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman. I will come on to precisely that if he hangs around.

As I say, I think most people acknowledge that we need more robust rules. Back in 2018, the Government decided to mandate a drone registration and education scheme in the UK, to strengthen the accountability of drone users and their awareness of how to fly their drones safely and responsibly. Fortunately, it was agreed—after different thinking originally—that the scheme should register the operator, not every individual aircraft or drone, which could have made it a much more bureaucratic exercise. To that end, the Government propose that everyone in the UK operating drones or model aircraft between 250 grams and 20 kg in weight must register by the end of November this year and take an online safety test, or face a fine.

The scheme will be run by the Civil Aviation Authority which, as the hon. Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) said, proposes an annual £16.50 charge per operator, supposedly to cover the cost of running the scheme. That is based on an estimated 170,000 assumed registrations, which would raise something like £2.8 million —not a small sum. The CAA claims that it needs to cover the costs of the IT service hosting the system, IT security packages, a major national drone safety and registration requirement campaign, variable costs linked to user volumes and the ongoing upgrade of drone registration services, although there is not a lot of detail on those ongoing costs and why such a large amount of money is required.

I agree with the hon. Lady. One of my constituents’ main concerns is why the charge is £16.50, and why it is levied every year. Why not just an up-front registration fee, without the need to re-register? The United States scheme costs just $5 for three years, in Ireland it is €5 for three years, and France brought in a free scheme, so £16.50 seems disproportionate, given the experiences of comparable countries. Why is it is as much as £16.50? Why not a one-off fee? What are the ongoing costs? Will it go up from £16.50? These things have a curious habit of going up but never going down when schemes begin. Is it fair to charge a teenager £16.50 for using a drone when Amazon, which in years to come will probably operate fleets of hundreds of drones to deliver goodies to everybody, will also be charged £16.50? Those are my first questions to the Minister.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Tim Loughton]

Of course. It would not be a debate without someone giving way to the hon. Gentleman.

[Jim Shannon]

The hon. Gentleman is most kind. I congratulate him on introducing the debate. He, I and others in the Chamber recognise that drone use has led to contraband being taken into prisons; it comes up in Justice Questions nearly every month. Does he recognise the real need to register and approve all drone users to stop contraband going into prisons? It is important that we deal with criminality and those who use drones for criminal purposes.

[Tim Loughton]

I completely agree, which is why I said I think we all agree that we need more robust regulations and a registration scheme. I think most users do not dispute that but they do dispute the proportionality and cost. The scheme needs to be effective, because there is criminal activity in prisons—terrorism and other things, as I mentioned. How it will do anything to deter people who use drones to drop drugs and other illicit goods into prisons is not clear. A small minority misuse drone technology, and if we are going to operate a scheme it should not penalise the vast majority who operate legitimately but should be quite clear about how it will clamp down on criminals using drones for completely illegitimate activities.

What does registration actually offer to the operator, other than a confirmation of compliance? Membership of the British Model Flying Association, through the various recognised clubs, usually includes public liability insurance cover and proper training and oversight from qualified instructors, and clubs tend to police their own members because they want everybody to operate responsibly and within the law. Why is the CAA effectively trying to reinvent the wheel when the current membership scheme works well in the existing clubs? It could just oblige all operators to register through a club, rather than through the CAA-run scheme.

The scheme could also be operated by the police, who could choose to contract it out to local clubs, when clubs prepared to take that on are available. Where they are not available, the police could operate it themselves, or through somebody else. That is how they do driving awareness classes and similar schemes in various parts of the country. The model is already there.

Children’s Social Care

Debate between Jim Shannon and Tim Loughton

Thursday 17th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

I am giving way to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon).

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on bringing this issue forward. From my research on the matter, it seems that there are an additional 15,000 children in need in England since 2017, so it is clear that there is pressure on the system. Does the hon. Gentleman agree—perhaps the Minister could also respond to this point later—that the fact that Northern Ireland has the fewest children in care per capita in the United Kingdom indicates that a dialogue should take place with the devolved Administrations, particularly the Northern Ireland Assembly, to see just how those numbers have been achieved?

[Tim Loughton]

First, I am very grateful for your flexibility on timings, Mr Deputy Speaker.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tim Loughton]

I will come on to that. Obviously funding is a factor in this. I remember that in my time Bromley was always an exceptional council. I learned many interesting things about volunteering with children in Bromley. There was a pioneering service where volunteers worked alongside social workers helping children who were the subject of safeguarding plans, child protection plans—or whatever they were at that stage—to stay out of the care system. There has also been some very good work in Bromley by former employers in the Department for Education to help to bring that about. There is a combination of factors, but as I have clearly said and will restate in a minute, there is a problem with resources.

The Education Policy Institute also estimated that at least 55,800 children were turned away for treatment in 2017-18, but that is probably an understatement due to the shortage of data.

I am particularly disappointed by a report from the Institute of Health Visiting, headed by the excellent Dr Cheryll Adams CBE, which states that

“despite the health visiting mandate having been extended, it is apparent that universal services for children continue to bear the brunt of public health service cuts”

The health visiting workforce continues to experience significant reductions, with NHS posts falling from 10,309 in October 2015 to 7,982 by April 2018. The report —it is absolutely right—states:

“It is both astonishing and extremely worrying that the visionary work of David Cameron’s government to increase the number of health visitors across England by 50% between 2012 and 2015 could have been undone so quickly. Especially as the evidence for the importance of the very early years impacting on individuals’ future health and wellbeing is now so strong.”

Health visitors are experienced frontline early intervention professionals who often get into the houses of new parents at an early stage and gain their trust. They have been an early warning system for safeguarding problems as well as offering parenting support classes and other mechanisms that parents so often need. We have allowed their numbers to decline, and that is a false economy. I hope that the Minister might pick up on that. Obviously it is a dual responsibility along with the Department of Health.

As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on the first 1,001 days, which deals with perinatal mental health and the crucial first three years from conception to age two when a child’s brain is developing exponentially, I know how important it is to get that early support, particularly for parents who are lacking in some parenting skills. There are safeguarding issues, and it is a false economy not to be doing it. As our report, “Building Great Britons”, showed, the cost of getting perinatal mental health wrong is just over £8 billion a year, and the cost of child neglect in this country is over £15 billion a year. So we are spending £23 billion a year getting it wrong for new mothers and early-age children. That is a heck of an amount of money to be going on failure, frankly.

To put into perspective the importance of children’s services and the apparently relentless increase in demand, the County Councils Network recently reported that counties are responsible for 38% of England’s entire spend on children’s services, and that the councils in England alone overspent by £816 million on protecting vulnerable children just in the last financial year. The Local Government Association—I am grateful for the research that it has done—is predicting a £2 billion shortfall in children’s social care funding by 2020, as the hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge (Ellie Reeves) said, and it could be as much as £3.1 billion by 2025.

There is good news. I do not want to be such a doom merchant, because the positive work by councils in helping our children and young people to have the best start in life has been illustrated by the latest Ofsted data on children’s social care. It shows that last year the proportion of council children’s services rated good or outstanding has increased, and that more children’s services departments have come out of special measures. I was delighted to hear in the past 24 hours that Birmingham, which has been problematic for so many years—I spent more of my time there than in any other local authority area—is no longer rated inadequate. There is still a steep hill to climb but there are good signs of progress in that huge authority that has all sorts of challenges.

There is a worrying trend in a recent report from the Nuffield Foundation, “Born into care”. It found that in 2007-08 there were 1,039 babies subject to care proceedings within one week of birth, but by 2016-17 this number had more than doubled to 2,447—an increase of 136%. That suggests to me that we are failing to do enough early to prevent babies from having to be taken into care because their parents are deemed inadequate or a risk to them. If we did more earlier on, those children may be able to stay with their parents.

At this point, I want to pay tribute to the family drug and alcohol courts, which were set up by Nick Crichton, a visionary district judge who did an amazing job of providing support and sensitive intervention services to people—usually single mums—who are at risk of a child or perhaps another child going into the care system and giving them an added chance. It was a tough challenge, but the success of the FDACs more than doubled the likelihood of those children staying with their parents and, more importantly, staying permanently.

That work carries on. There are 10 FDACs around the country, and we hope the Minister will be charitable in extending some funding for the FDAC co-ordination unit at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust. He has been very helpful in discussions there. Nick Crichton sadly died just before Christmas, but his work has affected the lives of hundreds of children, and I want to put on record our tribute to him.

The Children’s Commissioner found in one of her reports that England now spends nearly half its entire children’s services budget on the 75,420 children in the care system in England, leaving the remaining half of spending for the other 11.7 million children, which includes spend on learning disability. The LGA reports that between 2006 and 2016, the number of child protection inquiries undertaken by local authorities rose by no less than 140%, while the number of children subject to a child protection plan almost doubled. More and more children are being taken into care. As I said, there were 75,420 children in care as of March last year, which is up 4% on the previous year.

Barnardo’s found in its report that 16% of the children referred to its fostering services had suffered sexual exploitation. There is increasing evidence—it is what police, teachers and social workers are saying—that there has been an increase in the number of particularly vulnerable children in the last five years. We have more children coming into the care system, often with more complex problems and requiring more intensive support, but we do not have enough going on—we have much less going on—to intervene early to try to keep them out of the care system. I do not think what I said earlier about a potentially impending crisis is an overstatement.

Barnardo’s also found that in 2010, roughly half of children’s services budgets were spent on family support and prevention, while the other half was spent on safeguarding work and children in care. Now, just under a third is spent on family support and prevention, while the remaining two thirds goes on safeguarding and children in care. We are building up problems for the future by not acting earlier.

[Jim Shannon]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Tim Loughton]

Mr Deputy Speaker, you are guiding me to take a further intervention, thereby extending my speech, which I will reluctantly do for the hon. Gentleman.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way again; he is most gracious. Does he agree that more support should be given to families who are prepared to intervene, to help a child remain cared for by family members and prevent children being taken away from their home and support networks? Does he also agree that foster carers should not have less support and financial help simply because they are not related?

[Tim Loughton]

Again, the hon. Gentleman, who knows this subject well, makes some good points. We need to support foster carers better. We have overhauled the fostering regulations to ensure that foster carers get a better and fairer deal, as well as the foster children themselves. We have also tried to get more people to adopt and take on permanent responsibility for children.

There are also many voluntary organisations. Volunteers can work alongside vulnerable families, particularly where there is an absence of extended family members such as grandparents who, in another family, might be there to support parents or single parents through difficult times. To be fair, the Department for Education’s innovation fund and other funds have supported some really good work in the voluntary sector. We all need to work together on this, and it starts at home, but if some of the things that many of us take for granted are not in place at home, there are other ways of providing them before the state has to step in and become the parent. We need to be more flexible and imaginative. I am going to race through my remaining pages before you say I am out of time, Mr Deputy Speaker, but I am delighted by the extent of interest from colleagues here today.

Crucially, there is a good deal of evidence to show that funding pressures are having a disproportionate impact on some of the most deprived areas. I want to pay tribute to Professor Paul Bywaters of the University of Huddersfield, who gave a lot of evidence to our all-party group inquiry, for the work he undertook together with Professor Brid Featherstone of the University of Huddersfield and Professor Kate Morris of the University of Sheffield. If I may quote from some of his notes to the inquiry, Professor Bywaters said:

“Children in the most deprived 20% of neighbourhoods in England…were over 8 times more likely to be either on a Child Protection Plan or be Looked After in the care system…than a child in the least deprived 20%.”

That absolutely concurs with the all-party group’s finding. He also said that he was worried about the paucity of data to provide solid evidence for what we need to do to address this problem. He said:

“The complete absence of any systematic national data about the socio-economic and demographic circumstances of the parents of children in contact with children’s services is a key problem in analysing the factors that influence demand for children’s services. Collecting such data should be an urgent priority to underpin policy, service management and practice.”

That is one of the key recommendations from the all-party group report.

It is a false economy not to be investing in children’s social care as early on as possible. As I have said, that starts at conception, particularly when there are vulnerable parents who have mental health problems or have had poor parenting experiences themselves. This needs to be addressed in the comprehensive spending review. It is a classic example of investing to save—to save financially, but also to save the social consequences of children growing up and not being fully contributing members of society.

Some children are at higher risk, and disproportionately so in certain parts of the country according to deprivation and, indeed, ethnicity. We need to get the data to research those differentials and start applying the proper solution. We cannot do so until we have the proper information. We need to return to a much more preventive approach. That was why we invented the early intervention fund when this Government first came to power, but I am afraid its effects have been dissipated and the amount of funds diluted.

I ask the Minister to do his best to make sure that the troubled families programme, the funding for which comes to an end in 2020, is renewed. I want to see a pre-troubled families programme that deals with the first 1,001 days, before such families get on to the radar of local authorities, because of the problems that come with that.

We need to go back to the Munro report—I am glad to see in the Chamber my hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart), who took part in that report—and to the unfinished business around early help. We need to share better practice and share research data better. We need to work smarter and more collaboratively. We also need to look after children closer to home, in familiar environments and friends groups, and use kinship care much better than we are now.

This is not just about resources, but about changing the mindset and getting this back as a Government priority. That is why I absolutely welcome the initiative launched last night in this place by Children First to have a Cabinet-level Minister for children, bringing together all these factors.

This is not just something invented in this place. I am delighted to say that, at the G20 summit in Buenos Aires last year, there was the declaration of an initiative for early childhood development. It said:

“We therefore launch the G20 Initiative for Early Childhood Development, determined to contribute to ensuring that all children—with an emphasis on their first 1,000 days”—

one day short—

“are well nourished and healthy, receive proper care, stimulation and opportunities for early learning and education, and grow up in nurturing and enabling environments, protected from all kinds of violence, abuse, neglect and conflict.”

This is an international priority. We have a great tradition of looking after the welfare of our children in this country, we just need to get back to making sure that we are doing it sooner and earlier, when we can have the most effect and the maximum benefit. I am sure the Minister will want to take up those challenges.

Improving Air Quality

Debate between Jim Shannon and Tim Loughton

Thursday 28th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

First, I congratulate the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish) on setting the scene for us all as he so often does, and it is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury). We have a clear difference of opinion on Heathrow, but that is by the way; I appreciate her comments, and I appreciate the efforts of all the Members who have made valuable contributions so far and those who will do so later.

As a country sports enthusiast, conservation is a core principle that I adhere to, as do all country sports enthusiasts. How to improve our environment and preserve what we have is a key theme. Some 3 million people per year die due to air pollution worldwide and 40,000 people die early deaths as a result of pollutants such as nitrogen dioxide in the UK every year, with the nitrogen dioxide limit values having been unlawfully breached since 2010, as has been said.

The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee’s “Tenth Special Report” lists many effects of exposure to air pollution, ranging from cardiovascular diseases to premature birth. It also states that it is children and older people who suffer the most, as exposure to air pollution can result in stunted growth or affect the normal growth of lungs or lead to a child being born prematurely and facing the risk of death during the first year of life as a result of respiratory illness. For older people, there can be accelerated decline in lung function and an increased risk of lung cancer. That means that pollution is becoming more dangerous for the population of the UK as we are an ageing society with about 23% of the population aged 60 and above. If there needs to be a reason for doing something and for this report being followed up by Government today, that is it.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I had hoped to be present earlier to contribute to the debate, but may I, in agreeing with the hon. Gentleman, ask if he will acknowledge that many of us face planning applications for large-scale housing and other developments in our constituencies—in my case, there is an application involving 600 houses and a new branch of Ikea which would lead to 2 million customer journeys a year on the busiest road in Sussex—yet air quality factors seem to feature very low in consideration of such planning applications? Does he agree that, for all the reasons he mentioned, these factors should receive a much higher priority in our assessment of whether applications are sustainable for the local population?

[Jim Shannon]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. There is a major development application in my constituency at Comber town for 800 houses. Infrastructure is an important consideration: how the roads will work and whether they can take the increased number of journeys, and whether the schools and hospitals can take it. They are all critical factors, and air quality should be considered in looking at these big questions.

Given the vulnerability of older people to pollution, it is important to improve air quality so that we can reduce the number of deaths and address the issue. There should be Government support for renewable energy, which would limit the use of fossil fuels so that harmful substances such as nitrous oxide, sulphur dioxide and carbon dioxide would not be produced in large amounts and air quality would be improved. That is the very issue that the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) referred to his intervention. I was supportive of the SeaGen initiative in Strangford Lough in my constituency, which would provide clean energy. It was a really good project, and the pilots were successful but unfortunately the funding to take it further did not happen.

The formation of a thriving public transport system is a major way of improving air quality. I hail from a rural constituency in Strangford, where there are no trains or tubes. There are only buses, and they are infrequent owing to the low population in the area. That means that there is a lot of work to be done there. For some of my constituents, taking a five-minute phone call at the end of the day could mean that they return home an hour late. The bus service is obviously not as frequent as it is here in London and elsewhere. There must be greater ring-fenced funding for public transport in rural areas. This would allow public transport to run at a loss for a longer period, to enable people to understand that the public transport system could merge with their working day and work-life balance needs. This is about striking a balance in the rural community. Public transport needs to be financially viable but it also needs to provide a service.

I completely concur with the recommendation that the Government give priority funding to infrastructure that would help us to meet air quality objectives. Examples include the cycling and walking investment strategy, the Transforming Cities fund and the initiatives to support the uptake of ultra-low emission vehicles. The Bus Services Act 2017 includes a range of measures to improve bus services through franchising and better partnership working. It is also great news that £48 million has been supplied for the new ultra-low emission bus scheme to enable local authorities and bus operators to purchase ultra-low emission buses and support infrastructure. I give credit to the Committee and its report, and also to the Government for the initiatives that they have set in place. That is not enough, however.

Infrastructure that aids in improving these programmes would help by reducing idling and journeys, with low-emission buses aiding the fulfilment of the programme and allowing for superior air quality throughout the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. This would improve the quality of life for those who may be vulnerable, and those who are vulnerable, to pollution, but there needs to be a focus on rural areas. With respect to those who have spoken so far in the debate, the majority have talked about urban areas. I am not saying that they should not do so, because that is where the problems are, but we need to look at the bigger picture and see how these problems affect rural areas as well. Comber town, which I mentioned earlier, is a small rural town, and the impact of 800 houses will be quite large. I am not saying that that should not happen; I am saying that we need to prepare for it. In the large metropolitan areas of the UK, the amount of road pollution is substantial. The initiative to introduce low-emission buses will not resolve that issue, but it will lessen its severity.

I agree with the response that indicates that there will be air quality monitoring in key areas of local communities such as schools, care homes and hospitals. In fact, this is already in place in Northern Ireland, where air quality monitoring is carried out by the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, along with district councils. Two monitoring stations, at Lombard Street in Belfast and Brooke Park in Londonderry, are the only stations that measure multiple pollutants, but many other places carry out monitoring, making information widely available for all who need it.

I welcome the £3.5 billion investment that has been provided for the clean air strategy, which aims to cut all forms of air pollution, with recommendations from the World Health Organisation, and introduces primary legislation to grant local government the ability to take decisive action to solve any issues. We cannot ignore what is happening elsewhere in the world. The report focuses on what is happening in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, but there are other partners and countries across the world that need to play their part as well. If we are playing our part here, they need to play their part as well.

The biggest causes of pollution in Northern Ireland are road traffic and domestic emissions. These can be curbed, and many attempts are being made to do that. Less reliance on fossil fuels and more on renewable resources will allow Northern Ireland to decrease the amount of pollution emitted as a result of domestic life. If Northern Ireland adopted a clean bus programme, as I believe it should, and tried to convince as many people as possible to take public transport, the pollution resulting from road traffic would be curbed as well, which would improve the overall air quality of the country.

Furthermore, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs here has recommended the establishment of a new environmental protection agency which would be tasked with holding the Government to account once the UK has left the EU. When that is done, will there be direct contact with regional Governments, Assemblies and Parliaments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland? It has also been recommended that provisions for the agency should be written into legislation, with powers, standards and enforcement mechanisms equivalent to those of such enforcement agencies in the EU.

Given the standstill in the Northern Ireland Assembly, the environment is also losing out. The introduction of renewable energy schemes would help resolve the issue, as less reliance on and usage of fossil fuels will lessen pollution. The money spent on initiatives such as the beautiful Comber Greenway in my constituency, which allows people to ride their bikes safely from Comber into Belfast off the main roads, helps not only the environment but people’s health. That Sustrans project has been immensely successful. The newly improved, widened and lengthened Comber Greenway can now be enjoyed not only in Strangford but in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson)—seven miles of walking, cycling and running.

Recent improvements have widened Comber Greenway to 4 metres along key parts of the route, helping encourage more people to engage in active and sustainable travel—a key aspect of the draft programme for government framework and a result of the recently published “Outcomes Delivery Plan”.

Comber Greenway is a highly used, traffic-free route for many cyclists, walkers and runners, connecting east Belfast with Comber. The investment of almost £600,000 should encourage many more people to consider active travel. There are hopes to further extend Comber Greenway towards Newtownards to allow more people in that commuter town to choose a healthier and more stress-free way of getting to work, so that they help the environment and themselves.

These schemes are funded by infrastructure budgets as well as communities. They are a wonderful way of improving air quality and health. I look forward to the Minister’s response. It is important that we do something to improve air quality not only in towns, but in rural communities.

Family Justice Reform

Debate between Jim Shannon and Tim Loughton

Wednesday 15th November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Fareham (Suella Fernandes) on setting out such an effective case. When researching this subject, I was very conscious of its complexity—she referred to that—and I want to look at a couple of points in particular. The scope of the debate far outweighs the allocation of time that we have to explore, discuss and come to conclusions, but it is an opportunity to put down some markers on constituency cases that need consideration. I am pleased to see the Minister in his place and, as always, I look forward to his comprehensive reply.

I mainly work in my Ards constituency office, with four female members of staff. There is one male and another female staff member in one of my other offices. It is hard to believe that there are so many women in what the media has made out to be a male-dominated world—in my office, they outnumber us by three to one, and that is the way life is. During a recent coffee break conversation, some of my staff highlighted to me a legal issue they had dealt with, which I want to put on record—it is one of two things I want to put on record in Hansard today.

Northern Ireland, and I suspect other parts of the country, has very little legal protection or standing for those who are common-law partners. A lot of people have the perception that common law gives the same protection as a marriage licence, but that is not the case. It was only when that came to my attention through my constituency office that I recognised that this is an anomaly that needs to be addressed, and I want to present that case today. What I found surprised me, but it is certainly the case, and the Northern Ireland Direct website provides further information:

“Most people think that after they’ve been living with their partner for a couple of years, they become ‘common law husband and wife’ with the same rights as married couples. This is not the case. There is no such thing as ‘common law marriage’. In fact, couples who live together, also called co-habitants, have hardly any of the same rights as married couples or civil partners. Legal and financial problems can arise if you decide to separate, or if one of you dies. And while you do have legal protection in some areas, you should take steps to protect yourself and your partner.”

The website is clear and makes people aware of that, but the fact is that people do not look at those things unless the need arises.

In my office, we have had a couple of examples of people who have been together for a long time, and I would like to give an example without mentioning any names or circumstances. Let us take a couple who have lived together for 10 years. The lady moves into the man’s home and begins to pay into the house. Her name is not on the deed, and therefore there is little protection. I put it to the Minister that that should not be the case. I can understand that when there is a short-term relationship that does not work out, but not in cases where partners are co-habiting for years. They have no legal protection whatever. It is up to us to step up and put in place those protections.

[Tim Loughton]

The hon. Gentleman is making a very good point, which I make in my forthcoming private Member’s Bill about extending civil partnerships to opposite-sex couples. There are 3 million couples in this country living in the circumstances he describes, more than half of whom have children, who have no rights—financial, tax or inheritance, and so on. I hope he will support my Bill, which would extend the rights that married couples have to couples who do not want to enter a formal marriage. That relationship could be recognised by the state and they could be given all those rights through extending civil partnerships.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention and explanation. There is no reason why we cannot support that—indeed, I am going to say those things right now. I fully support what he has put forward.

In the example of the lady who moved in and paid into a mortgage, everything in her relationship was in the name of her partner—their house, their car and every other loan they took out. At the end of the relationship, which ended through no fault of her own, she ended up with absolutely nothing. I find that quite annoying, and I want to put that on record. There should be no young woman or man who has paid off someone else’s mortgage, only to receive marching orders because the grass is greener on the other side.

I ask the Minister to consider working with all the devolved Assemblies—as long as we have a Northern Ireland Assembly, of course—to tighten up protection and responsibilities for long-term co-habiting partners. At the very least, people should be made aware that the common-law principle is a myth. When they chose to move in with someone rather than to formalise their choice, they are left open, and legal redress is a long and drawn-out process. There is a process, but it is laborious, convoluted and difficult to see through. In my introduction, I said how complex the situation is; the stories of the people who come to tell me what they have had to go through to try to get to the end of the road are quite unbelievable.

People can prove they have lived in a house through direct debits and other bills that they pay, but that process should not be difficult or open to badness—if I can use that terminology—from one partner, leaving the other partner homeless and hopeless.