Points of Order
Debate between Baroness Winterton of Doncaster and Kate Green
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. On Monday, in a point of order, I queried the apparent discrepancy between the Secretary of State’s insistence to the House on 21 June that 6 million children will benefit from tutoring, and information given by his officials to Schools Week that the Government had pledged to provide 6 million courses. In yesterday’s estimates day debate, the Minister for School Standards again referred to 6 million courses. We now have two Ministers saying two different things. However, despite Mr Deputy Speaker’s response to my point of order on Monday, no ministerial correction has so far been issued. Can you assist me by inviting the Secretary of State to clarify the matter?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I thank the hon. Lady for giving notice of her point of order. It is of course essential that ministerial statements to the House are accurate, but the content of a speech, as she knows, is a matter for the Member or Minister themselves. I do not know whether anyone wishes to make a further point. The Secretary of State and his Ministers are here and will have heard the hon. Lady’s point of order, so I am sure that she will find some clarity forthcoming.
A Brighter Future for the Next Generation
Debate between Baroness Winterton of Doncaster and Kate Green(3 years, 7 months ago)
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Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I am sure that the hon. Lady would say “inadvertently misled the House”.
Kate Green
Let me read a transcript of the broadcast yesterday. The Universities Minister says:
“What this bill is designed to do is to protect and promote free speech which is lawful so any free speech which is lawful”.
The interviewer, Evan Davis, says:
“It is lawful isn’t it? Holocaust denial in this country is lawful isn’t it?”
The Minister says:
“So what I’m saying, yeah, so that’s”
Evan Davis asks:
“So holocaust denial is okay, you’d defend a holocaust denier being invited to campus because that is part of the free speech argument?”
The Minister responds:
“Obviously it would depend on exactly what they were saying”.
Madam Deputy Speaker, it never depends on what a holocaust denier is saying.
Kate Green
I am grateful for that assurance on the Floor of the House from the Secretary of State. I hope when we are able to debate the Bill again on the Floor of the House and in Committee that we can work together to make sure that we have absolutely watertight provisions to ensure that there is no place for antisemitism anywhere on campus.
I also say very gently to Government Members, many of whom have a proud record of defending free speech, that handing over the power to determine whether free speech complaints on campus are justified to the Office for Students—a Government regulator, with an unqualified former Conservative MP appointed as its chair—smacks of the kind of thought control that we would rightly condemn in authoritarian Governments around the world. But it is not the way we do things in this country. I hope the Secretary of State will also think better of those proposals.
Perhaps the most surprising thing about the Queen’s Speech was the absence of anything meaningful for one of our most precious assets—our children—and their learning and wellbeing in school. Although we know that the Secretary of State is determined to send more schools down the path of academisation, he says that there will be a “try before you buy” model for schools contemplating this route. I have no idea how that will work, so perhaps the Secretary of State will be able to enlighten us.
Most parents do not care that much about the structure of their children’s school, and they are quite right. It is not structure that determines a school’s performance, but high-quality teaching and excellent school leadership, and we see that in both the maintained and academy sectors. Prioritising favoured structures at a time when the role of schools in helping children to bounce back from the pandemic could not be more important once again shows that the Secretary of State has the wrong priorities, especially when schools are struggling with a stealth cut to their budgets because of changes to the pupil premium, while it is rumoured that the national tutoring programme is being taken out of the hands of experts and given to Randstad, a multinational outsourcing company. Can the Secretary of State confirm the media reports that Randstad will be running the national tutoring programme next year, and if so, can he tell the House what expertise in education, teaching and learning it will bring? In fact, can he tell us why it was able to win this tender at all? Was it because his Department decided to lower the quality of provision required to cut corners on price?
Those are questions that the Secretary of State should answer, but let me conclude by addressing the perfectly reasonable question: what would Labour do to guarantee a bright future for children and young people? Let me tell the House what would have been in a Labour Queen’s Speech this week. We would have started with a credible, radical plan to enable children and young people to bounce back from the pandemic—a plan that created time for children to play, learn and develop, that gave the teaching profession the recognition and support it needs to guarantee a world-class education for every child and that ensured the national tutoring programme reached all children who need it. We would have detailed proposals for children’s wellbeing, catch-up breakfast clubs guaranteeing every child a healthy breakfast and creating more time in the school day for children to recover lost learning and time lost with their friends and teachers.
We would have delivered a credible plan to support young people into work. We would have implemented policies outlined earlier this year by my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) that would have guaranteed every young person not in education or employment a job or training opportunity to end long-term youth unemployment. We would have ensured the apprenticeship levy was used to create opportunities for our young people, as we suggested with our proposal to use the underspend from the apprenticeship levy last year to create 85,000 youth apprenticeship opportunities. Most importantly, we would be working right across a Labour Cabinet to end the scourge of rising child poverty, which is scarring the lives of millions of children. Tackling child poverty will always be a priority for Labour, and I am proud that my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) will be leading our programme of work on this within the shadow Cabinet.
Before I came into Parliament, I spent a decade of my life working for and championing a brighter future for young people, because while children make up 20% of the population of this country, they are 100% of our future. They are ambitious, optimistic, imaginative, creative and excited about the world they will grow up to. They have so much to offer, and our job as adults is to give them every opportunity to make the most of their childhoods and their future, so let us not let them down with empty rhetoric and hollow promises. Today, let us commit to truly deliver a programme of change that transforms children’s lives, fulfils the promise that this will be best place to grow up and, in creating a brighter future for young people, gives the promise of a better future for every one of us.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I am now going to put a six-minute time limit on Back-Bench contributions, which will be on the screens and on the clock in the Chamber. We now go to the Chair of the Education Committee, Robert Halfon.
Points of Order
Debate between Baroness Winterton of Doncaster and Kate Green
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Have you received any indication from the Secretary of State for Education on when his statement regarding pupils’ return to school in January and the roll-out of mass testing in schools will be put before this House? Last night we saw contradictory briefings to the media. Today, the Health Secretary in this Chamber and the permanent secretary to the Department for Education at her appearance before the Public Accounts Committee said there would be an announcement, but there is still no clarity.
Pupils are due to break up for the Christmas holidays tonight, if they have not already done so. Tomorrow is to be an inset day. Parents, teachers and school staff need to know what is going to happen in January and what support they will receive to make it happen. They deserve better from this incompetent Government. Do you know, Madam Deputy Speaker, when and whether we may expect a statement on the matter from the Secretary of State for Education?
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her point of order and for giving me advance notice of her intention to raise the matter. If a Minister wished to make a statement, had notified Mr Speaker accordingly and a statement was to be made, the House would have been informed. As she knows, Mr Speaker is very anxious that statements are made first to the House and not to the media. I am sure that those on the Treasury Bench will have noted her concerns and will convey them back to the relevant Department.
Protection for New Home Buyers
Debate between Baroness Winterton of Doncaster and Kate Green(4 years, 11 months ago)
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Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
I applied for this debate in anticipation of the Government’s plans to bring forward measures in this Parliament relating to building standards and safety. In recent years, I have seen numerous examples in my constituency—[Interruption.]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
Order. Could Members who are leaving the Chamber do so quietly, because the hon. Lady is trying to make her speech?
Kate Green
In recent years, I have seen numerous examples in my constituency of shoddy and sometimes downright dangerous workmanship, and a lack of redress for homeowners. The all-party parliamentary group for excellence in the built environment highlighted similar issues in reports in 2016 and 2018. I therefore welcome the announcement in the Queen’s Speech of the Government’s intention to act. I hope that, by sharing some of my constituents’ experiences and concerns, I can urge speedy progress, and help to inform the Minister’s thinking as policy is developed. I also hope that he will carefully consider the issues relating to the regulatory regime, enforcement and the operation of warranties that I will raise tonight.
May I start by placing on record my thanks to Martin Scott and Paul Hargreaves of solicitors Walker Morris, and Geoff Peter of New Build Guru, who have all been generous with their expertise in helping me to prepare for this debate? I also thank my constituents for bringing their concerns to my attention. They have shown great fortitude, and a determination that the problems that they have endured should not be suffered by other homeowners in years to come.
Let me give the House some idea of the defects experienced by my constituents. At a development in Stretford—undertaken by Mr Selcuk Pinarbasi through his family companies Pino Design and Build, and Talbot Gate Developments—homeowners showed me numerous defects that they found when they moved into their new homes, including unfinished and damaged bathrooms and fittings; floors, skirting boards, bannisters, windows and doors out of true; the measurements of a downstairs WC not complying with statutory requirements to enable wheelchair access; breaches of electrical safety regulations; and an incorrectly fitted gas sleeve.
In another development, in Old Trafford, buyers found that there had been failure by the developer to comply with conditions relating to external works including boundary treatments, security, lighting, landscaping and waste disposal. That developer, Mr Jason Alexander, was also behind the development of Aura Court, an apartment block on the border of my constituency and Manchester city centre that has been the subject of a “Granada Reports” programme highlighting the dangerous and incomplete state of the block, such that Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue has put a number of enforcement notices in place. Issues there include damaged fire doors; cladding not installed on external walls and walkways; decking not installed on walkways; unauthorised window installation, affecting fire safety standards; waterlogging on escape routes; and dangerous staircase treads. Even so, the block remains occupied, despite its shoddy state.
Points of Order
Debate between Baroness Winterton of Doncaster and Kate Green
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Earlier this morning, I raised a point of order in business questions, which the Leader of the House responded to. In her response, she suggested that in our earlier correspondence I had chosen to misunderstand what she had said in the Chamber on 21 June. I was very careful in my point of order this morning to report what she had said to me by way of explanation of her remarks to the House, and I want to place on the record that I had no intention of deliberately reporting to the House a misunderstanding of her remarks and that it was Traveller groups that asked me to raise the issue because of their concern about the language used in the Chamber on 21 June. I am grateful for the opportunity to place that on the record.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I thank the hon. Lady for giving me notice of her point of order. I understand that she also gave notice to the Leader of the House. Obviously, each of us is responsible individually for what we say in this place, and the principle of parliamentary free speech is very important, but that has to be exercised with care and sensitivity. The hon. Lady has clearly put her view on the record. I suggest we leave it at that.