Speeches made during Parliamentary debates are recorded in Hansard. For ease of browsing we have grouped debates into individual, departmental and legislative categories.
These initiatives were driven by Lord Patten, and are more likely to reflect personal policy preferences.
Lord Patten has not introduced any legislation before Parliament
Lord Patten has not co-sponsored any Bills in the current parliamentary sitting
Age discrimination that cannot be objectively justified is unacceptable and unlawful across a range of fields under the Equality Act 2010. It is the strong protections in the 2010 Act that enable older people and their representatives to challenge such unlawful behaviour and ultimately seek redress in the courts or, in the case of older workers, an employment tribunal.
In addition, as regards to the public sector, the Public Sector Equality Duty places a duty on Government Departments, local authorities, the NHS and other bodies to have due regard to meeting equality requirements, including to eliminate unlawful age discrimination, where this is relevant to their policies and activities.
Age discrimination complaints to an Employment Tribunal stood at 2,434 in the year prior to the pandemic (2019/20) and fell slightly to 2080 in the 12 months to June 2023.
Age discrimination that cannot be objectively justified is unacceptable and unlawful across a range of fields under the Equality Act 2010. It is the strong protections in the 2010 Act that enable older people and their representatives to challenge such unlawful behaviour and ultimately seek redress in the courts or, in the case of older workers, an employment tribunal.
In addition, as regards to the public sector, the Public Sector Equality Duty places a duty on Government Departments, local authorities, the NHS and other bodies to have due regard to meeting equality requirements, including to eliminate unlawful age discrimination, where this is relevant to their policies and activities.
Age discrimination complaints to an Employment Tribunal stood at 2,434 in the year prior to the pandemic (2019/20) and fell slightly to 2080 in the 12 months to June 2023.
While the Lords Temporal are unable to vote at general elections to the House of Commons, this legal exclusion does not apply to the Lords Spiritual. In practice, however, it has long been the tradition that the Lords Spiritual do not vote at general elections.
The Environment Agency applies the same methodology for condition assessment and allocation of maintenance funding for all flood assets and does not differentiate between coastal and other assets.
At the last Spending Review in 2021 the government increased funding for maintenance of flood defences by £22 million per year. In 2023/24, £25 million was reallocated from the capital programme to fund maintenance, meaning that the total allocation for last year was over £220 million.
The Environment Agency visually inspects its assets to assess their condition. The results inform their expected performance when operated either on a daily basis or during a flood event. Our target based on available funding for 2024/25 is for 94.5% of high consequence assets to meet the target condition.
The Environment Agency plans to publish an updated national flood risk assessment in December 2024.
The Somerset Levels and Moors is a man-made managed drainage system created over many centuries. The area has always been prone to flooding due to its low-lying nature, much of the land sitting below the highest tide levels, and having riverbanks raised above ground level.
Following one of the wettest winters on record, flood risk assets in the Somerset Levels and Moors have, once again, been significantly tested. The Environment Agency (EA) routinely inspects its flood risk assets and undertakes additional post-incident inspections. It reports that 91% of those assets, in this area of interest, are at or above their specified condition.
As with most winters, there are repairs required after high river levels and the associated overflow. The EA is delivering a programme of repairs to reinstate these damaged flood risk assets, bringing them back to target condition.
Rochester Row was identified for disposal under plans to achieve a more efficient, modern and capability focussed Defence estate. Army Reserve Estate Optimisation are engaging with the Reserve Forces’ and Cadets’ Association (RFCA) to discuss the future plans for the site.
Where sites are disposed of on the Volunteer Estate, receipts are reinvested to enable betterment at other Reserve locations across the country, supporting Homeland Resilience, National Defence and Mobilisation.