International Trade and Geopolitics

Debate between Richard Fuller and Darren Jones

Thursday 20th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered international trade and geopolitics.

I thank right hon. and hon. Members from across the House, and the Backbench Business Committee for granting the debate today. I declare my interests as set out in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

I applied for this debate because I am concerned about Britain’s standing in a world that is changing more quickly than we appear to be responding. From trade and industrial policy to innovation and skills, we have just sticking-plaster policies and no long-term economic plan. There is no strategy for UK plc that shows the path to prosperity, and I hope this debate may trigger some answers from the Government on their plan to drive economic growth within the UK and through exports abroad.

The era of increasing globalisation that we have come to know over the past decades is coming to an end. We are now in an era of economic retrenchment, higher levels of state subsidy and new forms of partnership between the public and business, but how is the UK responding? Ministers are merely saying to competitor countries, “This is not how you’re supposed to play the game,” but they are not listening, and we are losing. There are several factors underpinning these changes: geopolitical competition between China and the United States; war in Europe and security tensions in Asia; the need for democratic nations to show their people that our system of government can deliver good jobs, good pay and prosperity; the net zero transition; and the technological arms race in both its military and civilian contexts.

Based on current data, our direction of travel as a country is not a good one. Only this morning, the Government announced that the UK fell from being the fifth largest exporter of goods and services in the world in 2020, to seventh in 2021. Our trade deficit has ballooned from £2.3 billion to £23.5 billion, meaning that we are exporting fewer goods and services, while being increasingly dependent on other countries for our own supplies. According to the International Monetary Fund only last week, the UK is set to have one of the worst economic growth projections of the seven most advanced economies. Even Russia, to our shame, is projected to experience better economic growth than we are.

Our drop in exports to the European Union, coupled with the Government’s deeply short-sighted decision to agree a trade deal that blocks the sale of most UK-based services to the EU, while allowing the EU to sell services to us, has been a structural blow to the UK economy. In that context, our high levels of national debt, which have increased year on year since the Conservatives came to power in 2010, have put us in a fiscally precarious position. The Government should be ashamed of their record on UK national debt. We all remember David Cameron and George Osborne telling us that the Conservatives would fix the roof while the sun was shining. But what do we have now, 13 years after those promises to the country? A national debt that is projected to be larger than the entire size of the UK economy. A national debt that has increased year on year—yes, in response to covid and the energy crisis, but it was also increasing year on year before those crises.

[Richard Fuller (North East Bedfordshire) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to be part of this debate and to listen to the hon. Gentleman, and I hope he will not mind me picking him up on this point. He kindly acknowledged that the sizeable increase in UK debt is due to the response to covid, and I do not think he has concerns about the major schemes that comprised that. He also talks about the increase in debt that occurred in the intervening years. Will he accept that for each of those intervening years, the Labour party was calling for more expenditure and more debt?

[Darren Jones]

The hon. Gentleman and I, perhaps surprisingly, share something in common, in that we would like to get the national debt under control. He will recognise that his party was in government for each of those years from 2010 when debt increased, year after year. The Opposition can come forward with policy proposals, but he must take some responsibility for the fact that the Conservative party was in government, taking decisions that resulted in a significant amount of national debt before covid and the energy crisis, due to the mishandling of Brexit, the inadequate trade deal with the EU and to the failure of austerity economics, which cut our public services back to the bone without adequate investment to create opportunities for economic growth in the future.

One might have assumed that in that context, the latest form of Conservative Government would wish to do everything they can to underpin, support and incentivise growth in the UK economy. Their most whizzy recent announcement has been the UK’s entry to the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership for trade in Asia—a trade arrangement that is estimated to grow the national wealth by only 0.08%. It is a trade arrangement with 11 countries, nine of which we already have a trade deal with, and one that will pose due political challenges to the UK as China seeks to join it too.

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[Darren Jones]

I thank the hon. Lady for giving that suggestion to those on the Treasury Bench, and perhaps the Minister can answer when she responds to the debate.

[Richard Fuller]

rose—

[Darren Jones]

I have two examples that are relevant to intervention of the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier), but I will give way one more time, for old times’ sake.

[Richard Fuller]

It’s not that old-time! As the hon. Gentleman will realise, the Benches are not replete with Members for his debate, so I hope he will continue to be generous.

The hon. Gentleman has put his finger on an important issue, and this could be an informative debate on both sides. He has just mentioned one potential conflict between this country’s trade engagements and those of others, regarding our engagement with the European Union and with CPTPP, and different paces of change when dealing with net zero. As Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, will he give the House a little more detail on his thoughts about what this country’s pace should be, and in particular his views on the carbon border tax?

[Darren Jones]

I will do so briefly so that I do not test the patience of the Chair too much, given the number of pages I have left to read before the end of my speech. My initial observations are that it is in the UK’s interest to be a global leader on the net zero transition, both because that is the right thing to do and because it is a significant industrial opportunity, and that we should be partnering with the European Union to do so through our trade deal. In my view—I have not taken evidence on this; it is just my view—that would generate a larger rate of return for the British economy and British people than some of the other opportunities that have been presented.

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[Darren Jones]

Once again, my hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why the European Union has responded to what is happening in America, but what do we have here in the United Kingdom? I tried to be generous to the Government in a collegiate fashion, but the only thing I could find that allowed me to give the Government credit was the recent establishment of the Office for Investment, whose job it is to secure inward investment to the UK. But it has no budget.

As I understand it, when two American businesses looked at the UK as an investment destination, they did not know who to contact. Was it the Department for International Trade, the Department for Business, the Department for Transport, the Treasury, the regional mayor or the local council? The Germans, meanwhile, put together an inward investment package with significant incentives and the Americans presented a map with different options in different states, topped up with significant federal incentives. In the UK, we have an Office for Investment whose job it is to go around Whitehall, cap in hand, trying to put together an offer within existing budgets. The tragedy is that the reason those companies were looking at the UK in the first place was that we have great natural resources: huge potential for low-carbon fuel energy supplies, great industrial clusters, world-leading research and development, and great pools of highly skilled labour. But we just did not compete and we lost out on both investments.

Let me take another example, which we have already talked about: the semiconductor industry. The United States is securing multibillion dollar inward investments, as too are the Europeans. As my Committee concluded in its recent report, while we will never have end-to-end supply chains in the UK, we should be collaborating with our American and European allies to agree that the UK invests in the parts of the supply chain where we excel: chip design and advanced compound semi- conductors. Britain can play a crucial exporting role within a multinational supply chain. So when the Government take decisions to decline or unwind Chinese-linked investments, such as Newport Wafer Fab, they must follow through with finding new investment and new owners. Instead, we have a semiconductor strategy that is now even more delayed than it was already because, as it was reported, Ministers cannot decide who is going to announce it. Meanwhile, other countries are racing ahead of us.

It seems to me that we have Ministers stuck in the headlights of a changing world, convinced that the best thing to do is for the state to get out of the way and let the free market fix our problems, praying that someone, somewhere might find the sunlit uplands of post-Brexit Britain that Conservative Prime Minsters promised to deliver—while our competitors race ahead of us. The question, therefore, is what should we do about it? Beyond the obvious points of having a proper industrial policy, ideally a stable Government, a stable economy and a stable policy framework; beyond the obvious point that we continue to fail to highlight the importance and value of the service economy to our exports—we are the largest exporter of services in the world after the United States—and beyond the obvious point that we must improve our trade deal with the EU, what can we do that is new, global and in Britain’s interests?

We should be leading the debate about a new model of multilateral co-operation between democracies. We clearly already collaborate on defence matters, but what we define as critical supply chains or as critical national infrastructure, what we think resilient supply chains should look like to create economic security for our countries, and how we collaborate as allies and partners to show that democracies will continue to prevail over authoritarian regimes—those issues warrant a new partnership, a new model of multilateral working. It is in Britain’s interest to lead that debate and to play a central role in it.

Some will understandably say that there is a risk of decoupling the existing post-war institutional frameworks. My response is that this is already happening and that Britain can do little to stop it. That does not mean walking away from the UN, the World Trade Organisation or the G7—of course not. And it certainly does not mean Britain should play fast and loose in breach of agreed global rules. But it does mean that we must respond to lead and to influence what happens next.

If this Government had a real mission-led approach to the UK economy, we would see co-ordinated strategic action from No. 10, the Treasury, the Foreign Office, the Department for Business and Trade, the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, and others. But we do not. We do not see that because the Prime Minister does not have an answer. He cannot tell us what our path to prosperity is, what he thinks our unique selling points as a country are, or how Britain will maintain its standing as one of the largest, most advanced economies on the planet.

I have had the good fortune, over the past few years, of being able to represent our Parliament in many countries. From Brussels to Washington, Sydney to Tokyo and elsewhere, I keep being asked, “Are you guys okay? What’s happening to the UK?” It is embarrassing and it must stop.

[Richard Fuller]

Absolute rubbish.

[Darren Jones]

It is a factual statement. The hon. Member is chuntering from a sedentary position, as I think we say in this House, but I can assure him and the House that on many occasions that is the exact conversation people have had with me.

I hope that the Minister, when she responds, will be able to inform the House, on behalf of the Prime Minister, how this latest round of Conservative Ministers are going to clear up the mess of all the former ones over the past 13 years. The Minister and I know that the opportunities for the UK are there to be taken; that the British people have within them the drive, energy and potential; that our islands and our seas give us the potential not just to lead the net zero transition at home, but to export it abroad too; and that our greatest minds, entrepreneurs and universities mean we can ride the wave of the technological revolution in the interests of the British economy and the British people. We can achieve all those things, but only if Britain has a Government with the leadership, the ideas and the energy to start delivering. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

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[Richard Fuller (North East Bedfordshire) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to have listened to the contributions so far, not least the contribution just made by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden). I echo his words about the opportunity to strengthen connections, particularly for our young people, between our country and countries in Latin and South America. The area is often overlooked by Government and it is not high on the list for teachers or in what is learned in schools. His calls on the issue are very welcome. On Monday, at the University of Cambridge, I had the opportunity to talk to a group of Argentinian politicians. From their country’s perspective, I know that is something they would welcome as well.

Madam Deputy Speaker, here is my point: it is an afternoon, we have plenty of time, it is an incredibly interesting and broad debate, and it will not have escaped your attention that the Government Benches are not crowded with participants. Therefore, I beg the indulgence of Opposition Members to make a number of points on a series of areas. [Interruption.] The Minister is asking that they be quality contributions, so I shall therefore make my speech even longer.

I will start by addressing some of the points made by the Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, the hon. Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones), who I think is one of the most talented Members of this Parliament. He and I do have some strong disagreements, sometimes on principle and sometimes on practice. Let me start with two words that encompass the fundamental disagreement we have: industrial strategy.

To the Chair of the Select Committee, industrial strategy is the elixir that somehow unlocks the growth in our economy that proves elusive to all others. Not only that, it is industrial strategy as conceived by the Labour party that somehow has the unique ability to generate growth that perhaps could not be accomplished in other ways. I have always found that intellectual position interesting. When I went to business school and we were given a chance to give three words to describe ourselves to other students, I decided to call myself “arrogant”, because actually at that age—I know it is hard to believe now—I was quite arrogant. But I would never have the arrogance to think that my unique perception of an industrial strategy was the right way to galvanise growth in this country. On that issue, the Chair of the Select Committee and I differ. I would like to hear what he has to say.

[Darren Jones]

The hon. Gentleman is generous in giving way, but as he has put words into my mouth on the record, I ought to correct him, if I may. From our Select Committee’s work on industrial policy and from my comments on that work, it should be clear that I am not somebody who believes that the state is where wealth is created or that the state is in the driving seat of a growing economy. However, when the private sector, which creates wealth, is driving down the road at speed and trying to win the race for workers, customers and shareholders, I recognise that somebody needs to build the public infrastructure for it to succeed if the road runs out.

That opportunity for the state to play an important role in partnership with business is what I refer to as industrial policy. Might I say that it is why so many businesses are talking to the Labour party right now? They are asking for such a partnership with the Government, as opposed to having a Government who stand out of the way and hope the free market will solve all the problems.

[Richard Fuller]

The hon. Gentleman reinforces my point. He is suggesting that if a company chooses to use its shareholders’ money to drive down a road that runs out, somehow taxpayers should pay for the extension of the road. The whole point of capitalist markets is that it is a business’s responsibility if it makes incorrect allocations of capital and its shareholders lose money. It is the job of business and business leadership to have the insight to understand how best to create value for shareholders in the long term.

Businesses are now coming to smart Labour Members—who are desperate to show that after years of hating business the Labour party now thinks prawn cocktails are a nice idea—and saying, “Can you spare us a few bob, mate? We’d like to support your party and we’ve got this really sexy thing we want to do, but frankly we don’t want to use our own capital because we know that the Labour party in government will be suckers enough to use taxpayers’ money to pay for it.”

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[Richard Fuller]

The hon. Lady is right that businesses like certainty—that is absolutely true. Setting a direction, inasmuch as it creates certainty, is useful; more than that, it is a strong part of the foundations. If we go on to talk about climate change in this debate, it may be that questions about national and international strategies and about what our response should be to issues among British businesses, businesses in other countries and multinationals will drive us apart again.

[Darren Jones]

May I invite the hon. Gentleman to reflect, for the benefit of the House, on his recent involvement in the Conservative report on the reform of economic regulators? I was afforded the courtesy of being shown the embargoed report, but I am not sure whether the embargo has now been lifted and I can talk about the report directly.

[Richard Fuller]

indicated assent.

[Darren Jones]

Oh, I can. Very good. The report recognises—I invite the hon. Gentleman to confirm or contest this point—that industrial policy is not just about money, but about policy direction, about regulation by economic regulators and about creating the conditions for business to prosper, for entrepreneurs to create businesses and for innovators to innovate. Industrial policy, as I refer to it, is not about somebody in the Treasury writing a cheque for businesses that should get their money from elsewhere, as the hon. Gentleman suggests; it is about the broader competitive market that needs to be created. Of course the Government and Parliament have a role in creating optimal circumstances for businesses to succeed. Does the hon. Gentleman recognise that?

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[Richard Fuller]

I do. Again, the hon. Gentleman is showing that there are a number of areas in which we can find agreement on the details.

Let me focus on the point about regulatory policy, because it is an important one. A group of Conservative MPs have put together a report calling on the Government to look at how we deal with the stock of regulation, the process of making regulation and my particular area of interest, the accountability of regulators for performance. As Chair of the Select Committee, the hon. Gentleman will be well aware of our interactions with our regulators. Effective regulation, by which I mean regulation that is regularly, systematically and rationally appraised, plays a role in the competitive advantage of the United Kingdom. It is an area that we have locked away, saying, “It’s not nationalisation, it’s not the free market—it’ll do okay.” Those days need to come to an end, because too much of our economic output happens in sectors that are subject to regulators whose performance directly affects the ability of our country to compete.

[Darren Jones]

indicated assent.

[Richard Fuller]

The Chair of the Select Committee nods. It is nice to have an area of agreement.

Let me move on to the second area about which the hon. Gentleman spoke: the Inflation Reduction Act and the associated EU measures. As he well knows, that Act represents a $370 billion commitment of US federal funds, or their equivalent in tax credits. It followed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021, which meant $1 trillion of investment, not only in infrastructure but in green energy. By purchasing power parity, the US economy is approximately six times the size of the UK’s. An equivalent response, which is what the hon. Gentleman says we need, would essentially require writing a cheque for £40 billion, £50 billion or £60 billion. If industrial strategy is not about expenditure, what are we supposed to be doing to compete, other than putting in that amount of money? There seems to be a part missing.

The hon. Gentleman also spoke about inward investment and said that we should be sharpening up our act. He is absolutely right. In countries such as Germany, which he mentioned, the package on offer to those who are interested in investing is not just a financial package, but a coherent one. When someone looks into making an inward investment, there are people to sort out all the Government intricacies for them at a single point on day one. That is how the UK did it when Margaret Thatcher was leading efforts with Lord Young, but over the intervening years we have made things a little too complicated and we have not found our way. I would be interested to hear the Minister address that point; it may not be directly in her remit, but it would be interesting for all hon. Members present to know the Government’s view. What are the Government doing to make sure people know that the UK can take a foreign company from thinking it wants to invest in this country to actually getting going and investing in this country, whether that involves, say, bricks and mortar or servers? What can we do to make that easier?

I know this sounds as though I am picking the hon. Gentleman’s speech apart. I am not picking it apart but asking questions about it, and I trust he is happy with that. He talked about economic security and collaboration. I think the short-term version of that is called friendshoring, which essentially means saying, “Let us conduct a geopolitical review of important strategic supply chains, and then let us be smart and make sure we are doing business with countries that are our allies.” That is a massive change, because there is no clarity about what the extent of friendshoring areas should be. Does this apply only to strategic industries determined by the United Kingdom, or is it imposed on the United Kingdom because other friends think we should be doing business with someone else? Are we prepared as a country to outsource the way in which British companies do business to the Government of the United States?

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[Richard Fuller]

Obviously not with Russia. We have already imposed substantial trade sanctions on Russia, and I think there is consensus in the House about what our response should be when one country invades another. However, to conflate Russia with China, which has not, as far as I know, invaded another country, is to move into a different area. My point is philosophical: the United Kingdom’s history of success has been as an open trading nation, and the current push, in this country and others, for us to engage in friendshoring strikes me as a significant change from the way in which, historically, we have created wealth.

[Darren Jones]

The point I made in my opening remarks was that we should recognise, with some humility, that Britain can have only so much influence on these global trends. The hon. Gentleman is inviting us to conclude that were we to do more deals with our friends and allies, as I have suggested, those arrangements would be dictated by other countries; I think he was alluding to the United States of America. My response to that is that Britain should therefore lead the debate, and be involved in how this is developing across the world. If we just sit back and wait to see what happens, we will end up having no influence over the way these things are being designed, which, by definition, will be dictated by others who are leading the global debate. I am suggesting that we, as a smaller country, have global clout, and should be convening and leading that debate.

[Richard Fuller]

That is a brilliant point well made, and characteristic of the hon. Gentleman’s understanding and grasp of these issues. He has put his finger on it. I, for my part, am merely raising questions and concerns about the perils of doing something that others may see as somehow buttressing our national security and doing what is right by us. This is not a road we can go down without trade-offs, and there will be some significant trade-offs if we take that road. However, I think the suggestion that we should be an active participant while those discussions are going on is very sensible.

Let me return to the question of money, and the current issues involving the so-called Inflation Reduction Act and the EU. A significant proportion of the funds spent by other countries are being spent on what I would term competitive discovery, which means looking at possible solutions when we do not yet have the solution to a problem. I would place that at the higher end of the risk investment spectrum, and would therefore approach it with caution. It is like dotcom for the green era—not in all sectors, and not all the money is being used for that purpose, but a considerable amount of what we need to do if we are to achieve net zero will require money to be spent on the discovery of solutions.

I am leery of the idea that British taxpayers’ money should be stacked up in competition with taxpayers’ money from EU member states and from the United States. Let me use that dotcom analogy again. When there is a big rush of substantial amounts of funds into discovery on a global scale, yes, there are winners, but an enormous amount of capital is wasted on losers. We have heard, in other debates, Members pushing us to do what President Biden is doing, or saying that we should be doing the same as the EU. Politicians need to remember that that means taking taxpayers’ money which could be spent on education or healthcare, and putting it in the casino of winners and losers in the green tech revolution. We need to be very cautious about spending money in that way.

Action on Climate Change and Decarbonisation

Debate between Richard Fuller and Darren Jones

Tuesday 5th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I intend to speak for less than 10 minutes, if that is helpful. I start by thanking the Environmental Audit Committee for securing the debate and for sharing with the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, which I chair, the load of scrutinising net zero delivery across Government. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for granting this time on the Order Paper, and I thank the Clerks who support the work of our Select Committees day to day; without them, we would not be able to scrutinise the Government as effectively as we do. I welcome back to the shadow Front Bench my constituency neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy), in her new role as the shadow Minister for climate change. I look forward to her summing up later.

My focus today is primarily on delivery, because effective delivery ensures value for taxpayers’ money. The Conservative party generally believes that sending policy signals through targets or departmental strategies will be enough to ensure that the market does the heavy lifting as we transition to net zero by 2050. On this subject, it is wrong. Ministers will no doubt point to a long list of targets, strategy documents, incentives—for example, contracts for difference—and research funding allocations, all of which are admirable and welcome. But as the Climate Change Committee concluded last week in its annual report to Parliament, Ministers must think much more about the role of the state in ensuring the delivery of their net zero ambitions, be that from Whitehall or through partnerships of local authorities—and always, in my view, in partnership with the private sector and local communities.

Unfortunately, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is not very good at that. According to the National Audit Office’s review of the delivery of major projects in the Department, 11 of the 15 major projects were deemed to have significant issues that required management attention, or major risks that put the successful delivery of the project in doubt or, at worst, caused it to be deemed unachievable. They include amber warnings for the smart metering implementation programme, costing £20 billion; the social housing decarbonisation fund, costing £4.6 billion; the public sector decarbonisation scheme, costing £1.1 billion; the local authority delivery of the green homes grant, costing £500 million; the heat networks investment project, costing £376 million; and the home upgrade grant for energy efficiency and low-carbon heating work in low-income, off-gas grid homes. There were significant worries about each and every one of those major projects, and, of course, there was a big red warning against the now defunct green homes grant. In fact, the only major programme to receive a green rating from the National Audit Office was the geological disposal facility programme, costing some £12.7 billion, for the long-term management of radioactive waste. For that, I suppose we should be grateful.

In short, there is a delivery problem in Government at a time when the state needs to get more involved in delivery. That is why the Climate Change Committee has called for stronger coordination and delivery, not just in BEIS but through Downing Street and the Cabinet Office, and for contingency planning to be urgently put in place if the current strategies are not delivered as intended. From BEIS, we must see more detailed delivery plans and technology road maps for the delivery of net zero electricity by 2035—something my Committee has started to look at in a new major inquiry—as well for hydrogen production, carbon capture and storage, and industrial decarbonisation.

The No. 1 priority for the Department in relation to our net zero target requirement is, of course, the energy efficiency of our buildings. Buildings account for 20% of emissions in the UK, and the targets the Government have set themselves are very significant in terms of carbon emissions reductions by the mid-2020s. The Government will not hit their net zero target without insulating our buildings and reducing our need for energy, and they will not insulate our buildings without being more directly involved in delivery. This should be a national programme, street by street in every community, co-ordinated nationally in partnership with local councils. That will, of course, cost a lot of money, and public funds should be targeted at households that need it, whether they are on low incomes or require more expensive works to be done because of the nature of their homes.

The current plan from the Government is, unfortunately, to move the same amount of money around again, instead of properly funding a national insulation programme. The money allocated to the failed green homes grant was partly reallocated to the public sector decarbonisation scheme and to the gas boiler replacement voucher scheme. According to the Secretary of State’s evidence to my Committee last week, that is being re-reallocated back to a general energy efficiency programme to be announced in due course.

[Richard Fuller]

I hope the hon. Gentleman will indulge me if I take him back to the street-by-street proposal, which three hon. Members have mentioned. What if an individual does not want that change to their house? What will the public policy be? Will we force people to make the change or will we allow free riders? I wonder what his answers are to those intriguing questions.

[Darren Jones]

There are two points to make. On consumer awareness generally, although there is very significant support for action on climate change, polling shows that most consumers do not realise that that means replacing their gas boiler and insulating their homes. Part of the net zero strategy for Government should be to try to engage with homeowners, tenants and the public about the work that needs to be done, but they have failed to introduce any effective engagement programme with the public. The concern is that when people do not want to do the work, that will cause a lot of anger among the public, and that will undermine our ability to reach net zero.

The use of public funds is also very important, because the disposable income of an average household, once we take away rent or housing costs, is around £9,000 a year. As we have heard, however, we are asking people to spend £10,000 to £20,000 on their home. How on earth can we ask a family with an annual disposable income of £9,000 to spend £20,000, when there is no support from the state or councils and when the banks are not even offering low-cost energy-efficiency financial products to help people who want to make these investments? That is why the Government need to be more involved in thinking about delivery. I suggest having incentives and behaviours that nudge people in the right direction, so that the vast majority of people feel able to do what they want to do and support the national effort to tackle climate change.

Forensic Science Regulator and Biometrics Strategy Bill

Debate between Richard Fuller and Darren Jones

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 25th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

Further to the Minister’s point of order, I am sure I speak for the whole House when I express our condolences following the tragic death of a police officer in Croydon overnight. For most of us, it is impossible to comprehend what the officer’s family, friends and colleagues must be going through this morning, and the thoughts and prayers of everyone in the House are with them.

Like other Members who have had the strange fortune of winning a parliamentary raffle for private Members’ Bills, I spent the first weeks of this strange year being inundated with submissions making the case for the noblest crusades and the worthiest causes, as well as some of the strangest. I realise that, at first blush, the minimal changes proposed in this Bill may seem a little arcane or marginal, but my purpose today—to give the Forensic Science Regulator the statutory powers necessary to do its job—is, in reality, an urgent and necessary one for the functioning of our criminal justice system.

Access to high-quality forensics is vital so that victims and defendants get the justice they deserve, prosecutions are successful and our system commands and justifies the public’s confidence. Poor-quality forensics, as noted by the regulator, has without doubt lead to the failed prosecution of criminals and a failure to secure justice for victims. As it stands, the market for providing forensic services is flawed, with grinding delays, gaps in capacity and skills and a lack of real competitiveness. The first step in fixing it is to enable the regulator to enforce effective standards, which I hope the House will support me in doing today. It will not take a forensic scientist to note that the title of my Bill also anticipates action on the biometrics strategy, which is no less essential but will have to wait for another time, and I will speak more about that later in my speech.

The profusion of acronyms that, of necessity, opens the Forensic Science Regulator’s annual report gives some sense of the range of scientific disciplines and expert processes on which our justice system must rely. It incorporates not only crime scene investigation but digital forensics, drugs and toxicology analysis, firearms and ballistics, the comparison of tool marks and footprints, as well as DNA and fingerprints. For even the most established forensic practices, the maintenance of high standards is vital to the course of justice, but rapid advances in technology continue to reshape the tools with which forensic scientists can collect, store and analyse evidence and data, as well as the nature and complexity of the crimes they are working to combat. We therefore rely on experts to do that work for us and to present it in a way that is intelligible, accurate and reliable. As the regulator’s report observed last year:

“Courts should not have to judge whether this expert or that expert is ‘better’, but rather there should be a clear explanation of the scientific basis and data from which conclusions are drawn, and any relevant limitations. All forensic science must be conducted by competent forensic scientists, according to scientifically valid methods and be transparently reported, making very clear the limits of knowledge and/or methodology.”

Isolated slip-ups in the science threaten to imprison the innocent and exonerate the guilty. The potential for ubiquitous failings—made more likely by shortfalls in skills, expertise and funding—risks not only isolated miscarriages of justice but the integrity of the entire system. The stakes, therefore, are uniquely high. Plainly in such a world we should expect robust, mandatory and enforceable quality standards for the providers of forensic science, matched with an oversight regime with the independence, the teeth and the resources to do its job.

That insight is what inspired the creation of the office of the Forensic Science Regulator in 2007-08. It was tasked with enumerating those standards, ensuring the quality of providers and processes, assessing the soundness of the scientific techniques being used, and monitoring the competence of the individuals carrying them out.

In its inaugural mission, the Forensic Science Regulator was tasked to

“influence the strategic management of UK forensic science to place quality standards at the heart of strategic planning”.

That, among other issues, formed the seeds of the regulator’s present shortcomings. It can encourage police forces and their providers to seek accreditation, but it cannot compel compliance. It can establish assessments but not enforce their results. It can advise the Government of the day, but it does not weald any power on the market.

Virtually since its creation, therefore, the office and the voluntary model of regulation centred on it have been visibly short of the teeth they need. It is operationally independent, but unable to compel the change that is required.

[Richard Fuller (North East Bedfordshire) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve with the hon. Gentleman on the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee, which he chairs. I am interested in his observations about the non-statutory powers since 2007-08. To what extent does he have evidence that the absence of statutory powers has had an impact on particular cases? That may be something he wants to speak about in more detail.

[Darren Jones]

I share the hon. Gentleman’s delight at serving together on the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee. The evidence speaks for itself, to stretch a metaphor when we are talking about evidence. The Science and Technology Committees in the House of Commons and the House of Lords, as well as the Government’s own reviews and the Forensic Science Regulator’s annual reports, have all pretty much concluded the same thing: where standards cannot be enforced by providers and the validity of the forensic process is brought into question in prosecution, miscarriages of justice will have followed. The forensics regulator has been pretty bold in making that case in her annual report to Parliament. That is why, I am pleased to say, there has been broad consensus on the measures brought forward in the Bill to ensure that she can enforce the standards for more providers of forensic services.

That is why successive Governments have been notionally committed to putting the regulator on a statutory footing for nearly eight years. Many right hon. and hon. Members have called for this for a long time. That is what underpinned the conclusions of the reports from the Science and Technology Committees in this House and the other place that I mentioned to the hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller).

Last year the Science and Technology Committee, of which I was a member, concluded in its inquiry on this issue that

“the Regulator—now more than ever—needs statutory powers.”

A couple of months earlier, the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee had said:

“It is hard to understand why…the Forensic Science Regulator still lacks powers they need… The Forensic Science industry is in trouble; such action is now urgent.”

The regulator herself said in the report:

“Legislation is urgently required to give the…statutory enforcement powers”

needed to do the job properly.

I therefore appreciate the Government’s willingness to co-operate in seeking to carry the Bill, and the support of the Minister and his officials in producing the Bill and the explanatory notes, and in helping to secure the Bill’s passage through the House today. It is especially important that the Bill does pass today, because the availability of these services on time and to reliable standards is often patchy.

When the then Government announced the wholesale closure of the loss-making Forensic Science Service in November 2010, the Science and Technology Committee warned that they had failed to give

“enough consideration to the impact on forensic science research and development (R&D), the capacity of private providers to absorb the FSS’s 60% market share and the wider implications for the criminal justice system.”

That warning has proved prescient. Today, many scientific processes are conducted in-house by police forces, but this is piecemeal in its extent.

--- Later in debate ---

[Darren Jones]

It is not for me to conclude on that issue in debate on a private Member’s Bill. My personal view, for what it is worth and to entertain the hon. Member’s intervention, is that one would not want an employee to be dismissed as a consequence, but they might receive further training to meet the accredited standard and be able to continue their duties. However, as I say, it is not for me to judge an employment issue in such a setting.

As a consequence of some of the points that the hon. Member raises, individual services are often outsourced by police forces, but a lack of clear incentives for providers to seek accreditation, given the overriding need to compete on price, has created a vacuum of accountability. Last year’s House of Lords Science and Technology Committee report set out the situation. Their lordships concluded:

“Simultaneous budget cuts and reorganisation, together with exponential growth in the need for new services such as digital evidence, have put forensic science providers under extreme pressure. The result is a forensic science market which is becoming dysfunctional and which, unless it is properly regulated, will soon suffer the shocks of major forensic science providers going out of business and putting justice in jeopardy… This is not just a budget issue: structural and regulatory muddle exacerbates the malaise. There is no consistency in the way in which the 43 Police Authorities commission forensic services. Some Police Authorities have taken forensic investigation predominantly in-house whilst outsourcing some services to unregulated providers. These actions call into question equitable access for defendants and raise issues over the quality of the analysis undertaken and the evaluation of the evidence presented.”

Their lordships therefore recommended that

“the Forensic Science Regulator should urgently be given a number of statutory powers to bolster trust in the quality of forensic science provision.” This is a multi-layered challenge that defies simple political or partisan characterisation, but the enduring message is that consistent standards, consistently applied, must be foundational to the effective provision of a forensic service across the whole country. Although forensic evidence is generally of good quality, the consequences of a market that is failing to perform that function to measurable standards are, of course, serious, specific and widespread.

The Home Office commissioned a joint review of the provision of forensic science, which identified a growing perception about the risk of unsafe forensic evidence and demonstrated the twofold impact of an inadequate enforcement regime. Some judges, the report noted,

“were not specifically aware of accreditation requirements or”

the Forensic Science Regulator’s codes of practice, and defence lawyers expressed concern that

“perceived compromises regarding quality standards meant that challenges to the integrity of forensic evidence presented in court could soon become routine.”

I think that it is of value for us to pause and reflect on that submission to the Government’s review. Defence lawyers had a concern that the forensic science process itself was being used as a mechanism to provide arguments in prosecution cases. Of course, the service itself should not be the basis for such submissions.

[Richard Fuller]

Frequently, regulators fall back on a requirement for statutory enforcement powers, citing that they are not in a position to be effective with the powers that have been given to them, whereas the issue could be that the regulators are not effective in using the powers that they already have. I admit that that is more usual in the economic sphere and there may be particular issues in the legal sphere, but in his research in preparing the Bill, has the hon. Gentleman reached any conclusions about how well the existing powers are being used versus the requirement for statutory underpinning?

[Darren Jones]

Yes, and the repeated conclusion, not just from the regulator but the other officials and bodies I have mentioned, is that the powers that the regulator has been given for some time—since 2007-08, when the office was created—are not sufficient to bring providers up to the accredited standard. There has been strong messaging, encouragement and co-ordination to try to bring providers up to the accredited standard voluntarily, but that has still not happened. After many years of trying, the regulator and others have concluded that statutory enforcement powers are required. On the evidence, that seems a reasonable request.

Corporate Insolvency and Governance Bill

Debate between Richard Fuller and Darren Jones

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 3rd June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Darren Jones (Bristol North West) (Lab)]

I welcome the measures in the Bill, which will support struggling businesses during this difficult economic period, but, as other Members have said, this short-term relief needs to be followed quickly by a comprehensive recovery plan for the British economy.

For British businesses, this is a moment of genuine crisis. More than one in five companies across the economy, and an overwhelming majority of those in the worst affected sectors, have already been forced temporarily to cease trading. Survey after survey and the cases we have all encountered in our constituencies shed light on the depth of the anxiety that businesses and their employees are carrying about the coming months. I think there is an understanding across the House, therefore, that failure to act would have meant hundreds of thousands of fundamentally healthy businesses going under altogether, and that that would have been unacceptable.

In that context, the Bill’s time-limited provisions are a matter of necessity. The measures on wrongful trading, statutory demands, winding-up petitions and greater flexibility on governance constitute meaningful, if in some respects temporary, respite for struggling businesses. However, the urgency of responding to this crisis must not blind us to the deeper challenges that we face.

The measures we are debating will postpone the threat of insolvency, but giving workers and businesses real security about the future will require a more ambitious and better-targeted package of support. A significant majority of businesses that have continued to trade are currently reliant on some form of Government help. The success of that model has been its ability to deliver a one-size-fits-all remedy at pace, but the slowdown so far has been marked not just by its severity but by its unevenness.

The Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee heard last month from the retail sector, for which the challenge is especially stark, with as many as a fifth of independent non-food retailers expecting to close for good and often in no position to take on additional debt. Tomorrow we will hear from the manufacturing and energy sectors, including aerospace, automotive and steel, whose needs are self-evidently of a different order, with a small number of major companies providing a significant percentage of British exports, but often reliant on a vast supply chain of small and medium enterprises, themselves in distress and in need of bespoke support. So as the economy reopens, the key measure of success for preventing insolvencies will be the Government’s ability to get help where it is required, on a sectoral basis, with a whole-supply-chain view.

[Richard Fuller]

It is a pleasure to serve on the Committee of which the hon. Member is Chair. I am interested to hear him talk about the differential impact on different sectors. He mentioned retail. Does he think that the Government’s policy to close retail was wrong?