Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Thursday 18th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[John Glen]

A large number of payments were made available quickly in the last quarter of 2022. I fully recognise the absolute tragedy that this is. Every death is a tragedy. This is the biggest scandal in the NHS’s history. I recognise and acknowledge that. The victims’ organisations said that there were 141 deaths last year, and I am doing everything I can to find solutions as quickly as possible.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Arm’s length bodies across Government spend more than £200 billion a year, and my Committee has been looking at that issue. The Government launched the public bodies review programme as part of their latest drive to look at quangos, but there is little in the public domain. Will the Minister commit to publishing the review of individual quangos as it goes through? What will the final publication date be for the outcome of the review?

[John Glen]

In the spring statement in March 2022, the review of public bodies was announced, as the hon. Lady knows. That will give us significant savings. There are 125 arm’s length body reviews, covering 90% of arm’s length body expenditure. Honestly, I am not familiar with the exact protocols around publication, but I am happy to look into it, and I will come back to her.

Debate on the Address

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 7th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Before I start, I must declare an interest—I am a leaseholder and, as per my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, I am a landlord—since I want to comment on both those issues.

First, however, I congratulate the right hon. Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Sir Robert Goodwill) and the hon. Member for Stroud (Siobhan Baillie) on proposing and seconding the Humble Address. Both were entertaining, and it is one of the pleasures of the parliamentary year to sit back, relax and have a few laughs. I thank them both for giving us that as we move on to the serious business.

It is always a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May). I think she needs to join me on my campaign for slow politics, because clearly we have the same agenda here. Some of the best political decisions are those where we are looking 10, 20 or even 30 years ahead, and she is right that we need to be looking at net zero now and planning ahead. Unfortunately, though, this King’s Speech, and indeed the record of this Government led by the party of which she is a member, are thin gruel in that respect.

We have in this King’s Speech the offerings of what has really now become a zombie Government. I do not use that word lightly—I am not just a soundbite woman—but in a Parliament, where we too often break early because there is not enough business to carry on, there are many things that could have been in this King’s Speech to deliver for the people of Hackney South and Shoreditch and for those up and down the country.

It has to be acknowledged that this King’s Speech is not landing out of the blue in a new parliamentary term; it comes on the back of 13 years of this Government, who have led through chaos and created chaos. Austerity has left a long shadow and a lack of resilience in our public sector, and it is telling now. The wage freezes brought in by the former Chancellor George Osborne are now hitting and have, with the cost of living, created a perfect storm for our constituents up and down the country.

On the handling of Brexit, which the right hon. Member for Maidenhead knows about only too painfully, it was poorly delivered in the end, in the hands of her successor, and none of the promises of the early days of that campaign was delivered. We on the Public Accounts Committee see that through our work. We have produced 12 reports on the delivery of Brexit, all of which found the Government wanting. We have seen gimmicks at Budgets. Again, the former Chancellor was one of the worst for that—or best, depending on our point of view. The lifetime ISA, for example, has withered on the vine as a novel financial product that was not kept up, either by that Chancellor or by subsequent Chancellors. I will touch on that in a moment.

Of course, we cannot look at the King’s Speech without mentioning the premiership of the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), who crashed the economy and has caused havoc in the lives of our constituents. In this Chamber, on these green Benches, it can sometimes seem that we are remote, but week in, week out I am on doorsteps in Hackney South and Shoreditch seeing the reality of people struggling to pay for the food that they need, living without food, going to the food bank when they can, and living in massively overcrowded conditions.

It is not long covid that is leading to a lot of those issues; it is long austerity—that lack of resilience in public services and the public sector; that lack of investment in schools, hospitals and other areas such as defence. Basically, most capital spending was frozen or reduced, and that has led to a growing problem. Whichever party is in power after the next general election, which cannot come soon enough, will have—to borrow the words of Laurel and Hardy—another fine mess to deal with in so many areas of the public sector. The Public Accounts Committee, which I have the privilege of chairing, regularly examines capital spending, as well as day-to-day spending, and we see the problems. Report after report highlights that issues were missed or not dealt with, and that we are now reaping the problems.

This King’s Speech and this Prime Minister promise change, but we see nothing of that in what has been announced. There is no real hope here for renters or those who want to buy their own home, and no plans to tackle poverty and to really level up. In Hackney South and Shoreditch—in fact, across the whole borough of Hackney—one in two children lives in poverty. In London in 2023, we have that level of poverty. In the borough of Hackney as a whole, which comprises two constituencies, 28% of people are private renters, 28% are owner-occupiers and 44% are social renters, while 77% of properties—nearly four in five—were leasehold properties, which means that leasehold reform is of particular interest to me and my constituents. The median house price in Hackney South and Shoreditch is £600,000. That is more than 16 times the median Hackney household income, so home ownership is out of reach for generation rent and for the people living in social housing, which is massively overcrowded, often with four children to a bedroom and many teenagers sharing bedrooms with their mothers because there is nowhere else to sleep. They have no opportunity to get on the housing ladder or to rent privately.

That brings me to the lifetime ISA. I have not seen the detail of the King’s Speech because I came here to talk about it, but the lifetime ISA cap for first-time buyers is still £450,000. The average first-time buyer in Hackney paid £595,000 in August this year, so that cap does not reach anywhere near what is needed. Even the Government’s proposed solutions do not keep up with demand, and their complete detachment from the reality of the choices that people have to make is a real issue.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

I have two brief points. First, will the hon. Lady join me in commending Martin Lewis for spelling this out on MoneySavingExpert.com? Ministers ought to pay attention to it. Secondly, through her, may I say that I too am a leaseholder? I do not think I am affected by the Government’s proposals, but I should have put it on the record.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

The Father of the House and I obviously share support for the work that Martin Lewis does in bringing these consumer finance issues to the mainstream and managing to explain things that people think are complicated in an incredibly simple way.

No Chancellor should make these policies up at the Dispatch Box, because they wither. The Chancellor themself loses interest, as do subsequent Chancellors and the Treasury. The child trust fund has not kept up since the Government withdrew it, and there are many other examples like that.

I have a lot of constituents who are trapped in the private rented sector, with no security. The average two-bed rent in Hackney was just £2 shy of £2,000 a month this year. We have a huge challenge in that there is no security for those residents, including the security that is needed to bring a family up, because they get moved on far too quickly, yet we have seen the lack of the promised abolition of section 21 evictions in the Renters (Reform) Bill, which was introduced just before the King’s Speech and is expected to continue in this Session of Parliament.

The reason is that the courts are backed up. That is a valid reason, but whose fault is it that the courts are backed up? It is due to a lack of investment by this Government over the years. It is not just covid, because as we have highlighted on the Public Accounts Committee, the delays in the courts were there before covid hit; covid had an impact, but the delays were there. We will not be back to pre-covid court delay times until 2025. It is no wonder that private renters are living in despair. The promise of this measure being delivered has been dangled repeatedly, and once again we see it whisked away, leaving tenants with no security and no knowledge of whether they can make a house a home.

We have a big shortage of social housing in Hackney. We have 8,351 households on the wait list for council housing in Hackney. That is after stringent rules were brought in to reduce it, so that people had some hope. The current waiting time for social housing in Hackney is about 12 years for a three-bedroom property. It is simply unacceptable.

Renting is out of reach, home ownership is out of reach and there is not enough house building, which is why I welcome my party’s proposal to build significantly more homes. The Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley) is on the Front Bench. He knows, because he does the maths and he has been a member of the Public Accounts Committee, that even the Government’s downward revised targets for affordable housing have not been met. They set a target and had to reduce it, and even that reduced target has not been met. That is happening while people are living in overcrowded and difficult conditions.

Leasehold reform is oft promised, but nothing has yet been delivered, and I would like to see it voted through. As a Labour and Co-op MP, I would like to see a move towards commonhold. There is work being done on that in other countries that we can build on. It is not a quick path—it is slow to deliver this—but that is another reason we need to get moving and start on it now. I commend the Father of the House for his pioneering work to champion the issues of leaseholders in this place.

The King’s Speech talks about delivering on the NHS workforce plan. Of course, the Public Accounts Committee took an interest in that as well. I welcome the NHS workforce plan, because it is a good start, but it is only funding the training of people listed in the NHS workforce plan for the first five years. There is no plan or long-term strategy for how we fund those health professionals who are working in frontline healthcare and hospitals, delivering for patients, which will cause a problem down the line. It is another fine mess waiting for any future Government.

I welcome discussion about how artificial intelligence is handled. I agree with the right hon. Member for Maidenhead about making sure that we keep the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 up to date with how the modern digital world is working. We need to do that in a calm, professional, cross-party way, because this should not be a political football. There will be difficult choices at the margins about—rightly—protecting civil liberties, rights and access to data and about protecting the most vulnerable in our society. We need to make sure that, in the heat of an election year, that discussion is had sensibly.

I also welcome the Prime Minister’s personal commitment to reduce smoking, which I think will be a game changer in public health for our children’s generation. I was pleased with the proposal on safeguarding of the future of football. It sounds like a bold promise, but I would like to see more detail. As a Co-op MP, I am a long-standing champion of Supporters Direct, which enables fans to part-own their club. If we go down that route, I am happy to support the Government, but we will wait to see the exact details. I am pleased that unlicensed pedicabs will finally be dealt with. I have worked with the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Nickie Aiken) to tackle that issue, and it is time that it is dealt with.

We have had too many broken promises from the Government. We now need delivery, but the King’s Speech does not do that. We have chaos in this country. People are struggling with the cost of living and we need change. Frankly, we need a general election. We need opportunity and hope, and the only way we are going to get that is with a Labour Government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Davis]

My right hon. Friend is right: it is a systemic problem. It does not just affect Britain or the health service. Indeed, I think that numbers for those years for the health service were about 25%—so huge, huge numbers. I bring this back to the reality of the individual. If we delay diagnosis and treatment, we sentence people to death. It is as harsh as that.

I would like us dramatically to increase the amount of diagnostic capacity we have. If we look at OECD numbers on CT scans, I think we are third from worst. This is why I say it is not a single Government problem—we do not get to be third from worst in one term; it happened over the course of the whole 30 years. On MRI scans, we are the worst in the OECD. How on earth a country such as ours gets to that position is astonishing.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

rose—

[Mr Davis]

I give way to the PAC Chairman.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

The right hon. Gentleman is making some interesting points, and the total amount of Whitehall day-to-day spending on health is phenomenal. On the point about scanners, I am afraid that lies directly at the door of his Government—well, I am not afraid; it does. The lack of capital investment in the big bits of kit has led to deterioration and lack of availability. Such investment would have saved money, and been better for the patient and better generally for the health of the nation.

[Mr Davis]

I agree with the hon. Lady on the saving money element, and I will come back to that in a second. The truth is that this Government have poured more money into the health service than anybody ever predicted, and more money than they intended over time, but decisions within the health service—I come back to management rather than money—led to some of those decisions. The hon. Lady is dead right that it is a waste of money not to do the diagnosis. I am talking about MRI and CT scans, blood tests, and all the other things that help us get ahead of the disease.

I talked to Randox, one of the diagnostic companies, which is based in Northern Ireland, and asked about this issue. It has technology that it says will reduce a seven-day analysis of blood samples, for example, to 30 minutes. My view is that we should break clear of the ideology and look dramatically to increase the amount of scans and diagnostic procedures—when I say “dramatically”, I mean a multiple of what we currently do—and we should use the private sector to do it. I know that causes a bridling and a backing off, but the only way we can do this fast enough is to do that. That would save about £3 billion and reduce waiting lists for millions of people. Most importantly of all, it would save thousands of lives. If there were one thing I would do within healthcare, that would be it; there would be other things, but that would be that.

Procurement Bill [Lords]

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 13th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

I do not wish to alarm my hon. Friend, but I am afraid that what we have heard is alarming. The trouble is that it is true. It is based on evidence and the sources that I have given.

We have to achieve a balance here, but we need to show greater urgency to dispel the current installations that we have. We need to ensure that they are replaced with reliable equipment from trusted sources as a matter of urgency. It is that urgency that we are not seeing. My hon. Friend the Minister said that within six months the Government would produce this list—a limited list of action that they are going to take. They could come up with a timeline that is still several years away. That is not realistic or sending out the right messages, and we can and need to do far better.

The widespread use of Hikvision equipment by those different agencies risks providing malign states with a back entrance into UK security and imposing an unwanted reliance on those countries. By contrast, the White House has taken a strong stance on those companies by refusing to support Chinese companies that undermine the security or values of the United States and its allies. Embracing and reasoning would allow the UK Government to be consistent with their commitment to protecting core national security interests and democratic values. That is why this new clause is so important. I hope that the Minister will respond positively to that and give us a reassurance and an offer, if we are not taking the new clause to a vote today. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green has rather let the cat out of the bag by saying that he will not press his new clause to a vote. If that is the case, more has to be done in the other place. We need much tougher measures than we have seen so far, because I am afraid that the Chinese are laughing at our failure to treat this with the seriousness and urgency that it requires.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I rise to speak to a number of amendments. It is worth highlighting that the bread and butter of the work of the Public Accounts Committee, which I have the privilege of chairing, is looking at procurement—failed procurement in particular—and making sure that we get on the record and into the brain of Whitehall the lessons learned from those failures. We have also been at the forefront of looking at procurement during covid, and we did our first inquiries into that as early as June 2020. I want to place on record my thanks for the hard work of the National Audit Office, which immediately pivoted to online working to enable us to continue our scrutiny of the Government as a cross-party parliamentary Committee.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)]

The hon. Lady is being very complimentary about an amendment that I tabled and she kindly signed to show cross-party support. Does she agree not only that the cost of evaluation is a rounding error but that the savings from weeding out dud contracts early would dwarf any possible cost? In any case, we already have a network of so-called what works centres, which are arm’s length, independent bodies that have been doing precisely this for ages. The problem is that they cover only about 8% of all that we buy, but they are already in place, so the additional marginal cost would be even smaller.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. Of course, if evaluation is built in from the beginning, the company that has been contracted to do the work would be required to collect data. They will say that that involves more cost but, over time, it would wash out. We need a better standard of data collection on all sorts of issues.

Take the example of a contractor that was asked to run a prison. The Government provided data on the prison’s maintenance, but the data was not right as it did not count the number of windows and toilets, and so on, that needed to be fixed, so the company had to come in and count them. In that case, the company had not banked on prisoners breaking more windows than the average in other buildings. There is lots of data, and we keep pushing for it to be collected, and that data could be built into evaluations.

The hon. Gentleman is bang on about making sure we do not send good money after bad. If something is not working, we need the evidence and the political courage, sometimes, to end the contract. We need to make sure that the people delivering a contract are clear that they are delivering the contract’s aims. Evaluation should have the impact of tightening procurement, tightening the management of contracts by the civil service and sharpening up those who bid for contracts to do a better job and to be proud of that job, in the knowledge that doing a good job may well mean that the contract is extended, but not if they do not do a good job. We should also reward good behaviour. I am keen to hear what the Minister has to say about that.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) tabled amendments that would ensure that organisations involved in nefarious activities are excluded from public procurement. It is extraordinary that companies that are making money in nefarious ways can bolster their activity and give themselves credibility through public procurement. Others have talked a lot about the issues around China, so I will not go into that much more. My right hon. Friend has a strong reputation in this area, and her amendments speak for themselves.

We do not want to miss this opportunity. I recognise that not everything in procurement is about legislation. It would give me some comfort, as Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, if the Minister showed that that is being thought about a bit more deeply across Whitehall.

[Danny Kruger]

This has been a very interesting debate, veering from grand geopolitics to the sourcing of public services and paperclips. All of this is, in a sense, the responsibility of an independent country, so the debate is one benefit of Brexit, for which I am sure we are all very grateful.

I am pleased with the Bill and the Government amendments. I think of it as the patriotic Procurement Bill, which is exactly what we need. I particularly welcome the explicit commitment to national security that has been added to the Bill, and I pay tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for Rutland and Melton (Alicia Kearns) and for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), and my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith), for their work and their contributions today. I am particularly grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Bob Seely) for his tremendous speech about the dangers we face from a more hostile China.

In the Government amendments, and in Government policy in general, we see a necessary new realism in UK policy. Security is the new watchword of our times, and to me it means much more than defence against hostile states. We face all sorts of other threats to our security, including, as my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight mentioned, our extreme dependence on supply chains around the world, not only but particularly those in hostile states.

Conservative Members tend to regard “protecting” and “subsidising” domestic industry as dirty words and unorthodox policies. Nevertheless, we see around the world a growing tide of tariff barriers and domestic subsidies. Our great friends in the United States have committed to spending $500 billion on domestic manufacturers, particularly to wean themselves off Chinese imports. I welcome the Prime Minister’s commitments this week to a new US-UK economic collaboration arrangement to secure our common interests and to ensure that we have safe supply chains. We will need to rely more on our allies in future.

As we move from a just-in-time procurement model, we need to recognise, particularly on this side of the House, the role of Government in ensuring economic security. The fact is that £300 billion a year makes the Government the biggest player in the UK economy. As we have heard today, and I pay tribute to the speeches made by Opposition Members, the Government are often not very good at procurement and spending public money for public goods. We could go into the sources and origins of that, but we should recognise that since the late 1990s, and under the Blair and Brown Governments in particular, the model of new public management has created a new doctrine of how Government money should be spent on private sector providers. The principle of introducing internal markets—the purchaser-provider split—was an attempt to ensure greater efficiency, greater value for money and greater responsiveness to the users of public services, and it engendered all sorts of difficulties, too. The hon. Members for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum) and for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) listed some of them, and I recognise them from my previous work. Providers have to jump through really bureaucratic processes.

There is a concentration of big suppliers. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green has done a lot of good work, although he did not speak about it today, on the importance of SME procurement. Large charities in particular can game the system, in the way that large companies can, to secure Government contracts. The Government often do not buy the best; they buy the service that gives commissioners the least risk. Those suppliers often run rings around Government. In the way services are designed and delivered, we see cost deferrals, with payment pushed back beyond the budget cycle; cost shunting, with different parts of the public sector having to carry the cost for a bad contract; the creaming of the high-value, low-cost clients or services; and the parking of high-cost, low-value services. So the providers, whether they are charitable or commercial, game the system. We see that all time, so all this needs improvement and this Bill takes important steps towards ensuring that.

Ministerial Code: Investigation of Potential Breach

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Quin]

I thank my right hon. Friend for the question, and I understand what he is saying. “Is this all a storm in a teacup?” is the question being asked by my right hon. Friend. The information will be gathered by the Prime Minister. As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Miriam Cates), whatever that process, I know that the Home Secretary is deeply committed to continuing to deliver on her incredibly important work of delivering for the British people.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Prime Minister promised integrity, professionalism and accountability. I think we can all agree that the first two were shot long ago, even before this latest incident. As for accountability, he has now taken personal responsibility for this, but I am sure the Minister would agree that the real accountability is now down to the British people at the next general election, which needs to come sooner rather than later.

[Jeremy Quin]

The British people will know that the Prime Minister will act in a professional and proper manner. He always does, and he is doing so in these circumstances. I believe that it is not totally unknown for the Labour party to have issues of a disciplinary nature that it needs to look at, and I dare say that it has processes. We too have processes, and the Prime Minister will make certain, having gathered the information, that he does next what he feels is right.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 10th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mike Freer]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments. Reform of all parts of the justice system is a priority, but within the spending envelope that we are operating in, we have to spend the money where we can get the best return for our investment. If he has some serious options for how we could spend the money better, I am all ears.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Like the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous), I have seen extraordinary situations with cases of serious sexual assault where the court case has been listed three years after the attack, in one case, with the victim saying, “I just want to give up and get on with my life.” This is a real challenge. Will the Minister outline what he is doing to get more judges in place, which is one of the brakes on this? When the Public Accounts Committee looked at this, we concluded on the evidence that, even with the interventions he has outlined, the Ministry will only be back on target from where it was with the backlog before covid by about 2024-25.

[Mike Freer]

The hon. Lady raises an important point. There are a variety of reasons why cases can be delayed. It is not just about the availability of the judiciary; sometimes it is the availability of defence and prosecution. There is a particular focus on trying to improve the number of cases that do not come forward because they are incomplete and not ready, and there is a massive campaign to improve the number of available sitting days and courts, but the most important thing is the massive recruitment of 1,000 judges for our criminal justice system.

Illegal Immigration

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 13th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. and learned Friend obviously has expertise on this issue. He is absolutely right about that process and the help that it can provide. He will be pleased to know that the Immigration Minister and the Attorney General met the authorities recently. We will look forward to taking forward his suggestions.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

In 17 years as a Member of this House, I have never known backlogs, in every avenue of Home Office processing, to be so great and so slow. The Prime Minister asked for suggestions. If he really wants to reprocess the Home Office’s procedures, he could take out the ridiculous rule that people have to renew their indefinite leave to remain every 30 months, putting the same people back through the system to come out with the same outcome. He could, in one fell swoop, reduce the backlog. Will he do it?

[The Prime Minister]

I just gently point out to the hon. Lady that the backlog now, difficult though it is, is half as big as it was under the last Labour Government. Unlike then, we will not resort to giving people blanket amnesties, because that is not the right approach.

Papers Relating to the Home Secretary

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That, given the exceptional security concerns raised regarding the Rt Hon Member for Fareham serving as Secretary of State for the Home Department, this House:

(1) orders that there be laid before this House, within ten sitting days, a return of the following papers:

(a) any risk assessment of the Rt Hon Member for Fareham by the Cabinet Office or the Prime Minister’s Office relating to her appointment

(b) any document held by the Cabinet Office, the Home Office or the Prime Minister’s Office containing or related to

(i) any security breaches by the Rt Hon Member for Fareham

(ii) any leak inquiries regarding the Rt Hon Member for Fareham, including during her time as Home Secretary and Attorney General

(c) the minutes of, submissions relevant to and electronic communications relating to, any meeting within the Cabinet Office or the Prime Minister’s Office at which the appointment of the Rt Hon Member for Fareham, or advice relating to that appointment, was discussed in a form which may contain redactions, but such redactions shall be solely for the purposes of national security; and

(2) recommends that where material is laid before the House in a redacted form, the Government should at the same time provide unredacted copies of such material to the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament.

It is 15 days since the Prime Minister appointed his new Cabinet, and 14 days since it was reported that he had been advised not to reappoint certain Ministers, including the Home Secretary and, it was rumoured, the Minister without Portfolio, the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Gavin Williamson), to their posts on the grounds of standards and of security. Fourteen days in which it has been reported that the Home Secretary breached Home Office security arrangements not just once but seven times; that she may have also broken insider trading rules; that as Attorney General she was investigated several times by leak inquiries; that she ignored legal advice on Manston, contrary to her statement to Parliament; and that she failed to take the action needed to solve the dangerous overcrowding at Manston, leaving her successor and predecessor to pick up the pieces, and that she may well have run up a huge legal liability for the taxpayer as a result, breaching the ministerial code again in the process.

It has also been reported that the Minister with Portfolio sent abusive texts to the then Government Chief Whip, that the Prime Minister was told about this and knew the former Chief Whip had put in a formal complaint, and that there are other complaints against the Minister without Portfolio including, most seriously, words used towards a civil servant about slitting his throat or jumping out of windows—words that it is reported the Minister with Portfolio has not denied using.

This is in the space of two weeks. Many people have been appalled by these appointments, and serious doubts have been raised by many Conservative Members who believe standards need to be maintained. The Prime Minister promised us that this would be a break from his predecessors, from the favours-for-mates culture of the right hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) and from the chaos of the right hon. Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss). Instead, the opposite has happened.

People have been appointed to senior jobs in the Cabinet, running the country, not because they can do the job or because they will maintain the high standards and security that the Government need but because of dodgy political deals. Here is what we know: the Home Secretary breached the ministerial code, sent Government documents not only to her private email but to other people outside Government who were not authorised to receive them, including a Back-Bench Member, his spouse, and someone else entirely by accident. She was forced to resign and then, six days later, she was reappointed.

That, in itself, is extremely hard for people outside the Conservative party to understand. For a police officer who breached their code of ethics or who was responsible for security lapses to the point of being forced to resign, or for a civil servant, public appointee or company employee who was found to have broken their employment code or security rules to the point of being required to resign, the idea that they could be reappointed to that same job just six days later is unthinkable—the idea that somehow, because they had apologised in the meantime, six days off is just fine.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I have had letters from upset civil servants who have seen colleagues make lesser misdemeanours and lose their jobs, yet seen the Home Secretary, the woman in charge of national security, hold on to hers. Does my right hon. Friend agree that this shows that there is one rule for the Home Secretary and one rule for everybody else?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is exactly right on that. It is worse, as the Government do believe that standards on ethics and security should be upheld throughout the public sector or across the economy, just not, it would seem, in the Cabinet—not in the post responsible for upholding the law and for maintaining our security. It really is one rule for them and another for everyone else.

--- Later in debate ---

[Yvette Cooper]

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will recall that what happened at Napier was that the Government ended up with a huge outbreak of more than 200 covid cases, at the height of a covid crisis, because they were failing to follow basic public health rules and requirements. To be honest, it was an incident that the Home Office again does not seem to have learned from, as we have had outbreaks of diphtheria, MRSA and scabies at Manston. Frankly, if the Home Office and the Government want to solve this properly, they need to address the total collapse in decision making, with just 14,000 decisions being made a year, which is half the number being decided just five or six years ago. That huge backlog has increased as a result of Government legislation that has added to the bureaucracy and made those delays much worse.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

The backlog is a hugely significant issue. Among my heavy case load, I have a surgeon who cannot move hospitals because he cannot get his visa turned around, families who are separated and spouses who cannot live together. That is the real human impact. We are turning our back on good people who want to work and live in this country because they are caught in the backlog as a result of the Home Secretary’s actions.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Just before the shadow Home Secretary responds, I say to Members on both sides of the House that this is quite a specific motion on the papers relating to the Home Secretary. It is not a general debate on the Home Secretary or other Government Ministers, so please be mindful of that in any interventions from either side of the House, so that we can focus on what this motion is about.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Quin]

I do not know the cases to which the hon. Gentleman refers. Every case must be looked at on a case-by-case basis. What we are dealing with here is a circumstance in which a breach of the ministerial code happened. The Home Secretary accepted that. She acknowledged her error; it will not happen again. The Prime Minister had to take a judgment on that basis, and he did.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

Once again, the Government have put out the man who defends anything, however bad it is, to speak for them. This is not just a matter of a security leak; it is a fundamental matter of the judgment of the woman who is responsible for our national security—the Minister cannot just brush it under the carpet as a six-day matter. The Home Secretary’s judgment is at stake, and there is no evidence that that judgment is any better today than it was when she made these leaks.

[Jeremy Quin]

The Home Secretary does not deny that it was an error of judgment; she made that absolutely clear in her letter to the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North, the Chairman of the Select Committee. It was an error of judgment; she recognised that error of judgment, she apologised for it and it will not be repeated.

However, coming back to the motion for return, it is critical to the functioning of government that conversations that occur around appointments are able to take place in confidence. There is therefore a long-standing practice, implemented by Governments of all political persuasions, of protecting that confidentiality. Without the ability to speak freely ahead of an appointment on matters that will be personal, that can be sensitive and that can even relate to personal security, the ability for meaningful advice to be delivered would be massively undermined. Individuals being considered for appointment need to know that they can speak freely and without reservation to the Prime Minister and officials, and if necessary share concerns, without the prospect of confidential information being placed into the public domain.

I wish to reassure hon. Members that appointments in Government are of course subject to advice on matters of propriety. In the formation of this Government, the usual reshuffle procedures were followed, as is appropriate, but the Government firmly and resolutely believe that any information relating to those procedures is not appropriate for publication, either now or in the future.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd November 2022 Commons Chamber

The Prime Minister was asked—

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q1. If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 2 November.

[The Prime Minister (Rishi Sunak)]

This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

The Prime Minister promised integrity, professionalism and accountability in Government. His Home Secretary has leaked information, is overseeing chaos in the Home Office and has broken the law. What will she actually have to do to get the sack?

[The Prime Minister]

The Home Secretary made an error of judgment, but she recognised her mistake and took accountability for her actions. She has now set out, transparently and in detail, a full sequence of events in a letter to the Labour Chair of the Home Affairs Committee and offered to share relevant documents with the Chair. She is now getting on with the job: cracking down on crime and defending our borders, something that the Labour party has no interest in supporting.

Home Secretary: Resignation and Reappointment

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Quin]

It depends on the circumstances. If someone says that they have made a mistake, it is important that their mistake is looked at in the context of the ministerial code, which has a range of sanctions. We all serve and do our utmost, and admitting a mistake, having it recognised and being sanctioned is in itself a serious matter, as I am sure the hon. Gentleman would agree.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

We all know that mistakes happen, but the Minister talks as if it were a junior member of staff who had made an inadvertent clerical error. This is a Home Secretary who released secret information through a personal email address. This suggests a pattern of behaviour, and that she thinks it is okay to snap on her phone at 4 o’clock in the morning and make this atrocious mistake. This is much more serious than the Minister is trying to paint it. I had the privilege of serving in the Home Office, and it would never have happened under previous Governments. Will the Minister not demean himself any further and honestly recognise to the House that this is of a different scale than he is trying to present it?

[Jeremy Quin]

I am not trying to present it in any way other than the known facts, as contained in the Home Secretary’s resignation letter, which set out that she had made a mistake and she apologised for it. The Prime Minister has clearly taken a view and the Home Secretary has returned to Government, and she has a task ahead of her.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Wednesday 20th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Hopkins (Luton South) (Lab)]

4. What assessment he has made of the potential role of energy efficiency in meeting the UK’s climate targets.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

6. What assessment he has made of the potential role of energy efficiency in meeting the UK’s climate targets.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

8. What assessment he has made of the potential role of energy efficiency in meeting the UK’s climate targets.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alok Sharma]

The Government are making £6.6 billion available over this Parliament to improve energy efficiency, and nearly half the homes in England are now rated band C or above, compared with 14% in 2010. On the wider point, we need an even bigger focus on energy efficiency in homes and buildings, as it will also help our energy security by driving down demand and bringing down people’s bills.

[Dame Meg Hillier]

The Government have had a series of failed programmes on home insulation: the green new deal failed, and the recent green homes grant scheme failed, as the Public Accounts Committee has repeatedly reported. Does the Minister have any confidence that the Government will listen and tackle this major cause of emissions? If it is not tackled, it will put a serious dent in achieving the target of net zero by 2050.

[Alok Sharma]

The Government will, of course, respond to the report on the green homes grant, but I point out that some elements of it—the local authority delivery element and the social housing decarbonisation fund—have provided significant amounts of funding.