Windrush Generation: 75th Anniversary

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Wednesday 24th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right that we should celebrate the whole generation and that group of communities. Looking at what is happening in London and Birmingham, I am sure that all those communities will be represented and celebrated.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

My Lords, is my noble friend aware of the beautiful statue in Waterloo station commemorating the Windrush generation? It shows a father looking forward with ambition and determination, accompanied by a mother and a young daughter looking around with expectation and trepidation. They are standing on a pile of suitcases, which mark all their possessions in the world. There is an accompanying poem called “You Called … We Came”.

I hear the Minister’s reflections on the amount that has already been paid out, but there are still some outstanding claims. One wonders whether it is bureaucratic difficulties, rather than genuine will, driving that. Could not all those outstanding claims be settled almost in an afternoon, with people—including Ministers, with all their genuine determination to get this fixed—sat around a table, rather than having the ongoing questions that the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, has asked about when this will finally be settled?

Inclusive Society

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Wednesday 14th April 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

My Lords, on inclusion, I want to start with the Sewell report, which was long in preparation and deep in analysis. It concluded that, although of course there is still much we need to do, we are more tolerant and inclusive than some pretend. Yet even before the ink was dry, let alone read, the professional intolerants—the muck-spreaders—piled in to demean and diminish both the report and its excellent authors.

Everywhere that decent democratic people gather, the extremists try to infiltrate: into the Black Lives Matter movement; into Extinction Rebellion; into our schools and universities; even into our vaccination programme. The militants and wreckers—for that is what they are— are the real racists. They are the ones who try to divide, not include. They do not care about the facts. They simply insist on their truth, supported by nothing but their ignorance and opportunism. How long before our vaccination programme is accused of being institutionally racist? Forgive me: of course, it already is.

This country is changing. It is getting better. It is growing more tolerant and more inclusive. Anyone with a memory that goes back further than yesterday’s breakfast has seen the evidence with their own eyes. Is there more to do? Always, but work is in progress—and what progress since the days when ignorant racial commentary was used wholesale in our pubs, playgrounds and places of work. We were not being wicked; we simply did not know any better. Now we do.

Today, the biggest exploiters of racism are those who accuse everything in Britain of being institutionally racist—even the Royal Family, even though Her Majesty the Queen is the hugely successful head of the multiracial Commonwealth. Britain is one of the most generous nations on the planet in terms of foreign aid and charitable giving, yet apparently—allegedly—we are institutionally racist. It is a very strange way of showing it. This is a tolerant country. This is a compassionate country. During the past 15 years, 9 million immigrants have come here. They did not come here because they believed that they would be attacked, abused and tormented; that is what they were fleeing from.

The biggest threat to inclusion in this country is good men and women remaining silent and passing by on the other side. That is why I am so grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett, for facilitating this debate. We will not remain silent while zealots try to pull our country to pieces. We will succeed. They will fail. To lean on the words of a very great man, I look forward to the day when our children and grandchildren can look into the eyes of their neighbours and judge them not by the colour of their skin but by their character and conduct. I believe that that day is closer than we think and I welcome it.

Covid-19 Secure Marshals

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, I think I have already pointed out that training will be developed in consultation with local authorities and worked through locally. Under the new burdens doctrine, we will always look to deal with funding pressures, and more will be announced in due course.

[Lord Dobbs (Con) [V]]

I hope my noble friend will forgive me, but this sounds like a most un-Conservative policy that is potentially a really terrible idea. “Marshals” is a terrible name, to start with. Last Wednesday, the Prime Minister said that these marshals will be appointed to “ensure”—not advise, assist or support—social distancing in our communities. He made it sound like Dodge City. Could my noble friend please calm my racing heart by telling the House what training the marshals will have to ensure that they enforce the regulations? Perhaps most important of all, what is to prevent too many of these largely self-appointed law enforcers becoming busybodies, score-settlers and simply social gunslingers?

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, it is fair to say that in many of the areas where marshals have been used, they have not been called marshals but stewards, wardens or ambassadors, and they welcome people to the local area. This is about improving compliance, as opposed to the existing enforcement arm of the state. We are seeing great successes in a number of diverse places, and we will build on that.