Charitable Sector: Food Provision
Debate between Viscount Younger of Leckie and Baroness Barker(1 year, 1 month ago)
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Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)
First, I welcome the noble Baroness back. It is good to see her in her place. To pick up on what she was saying, our newly published statistics on food bank use, alongside the broad suite of poverty data, will indeed help us to shape future policy considerations. There is much in these statistics—some good, some less good—and I assure the noble Baroness that we will look very carefully at them and use them to help us inform and impact on our policies.
Baroness Barker (LD)
My Lords, will the Government commit to the full sharing of full universal credit datasets with local authorities so that they can better co-ordinate their poverty relief programmes with the Government?
Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)
Yes, I can certainly follow that up. The noble Baroness will be aware that there is a very strong link with the housing support that I say that “we” but in fact local authorities are giving through the DHPs. There is certainly more that we can do to work even more closely with the local authorities in this respect.
Abortion Regulations: Northern Ireland
Debate between Viscount Younger of Leckie and Baroness Barker
Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con) [V]
My Lords, I totally agree with the noble Baroness that this is a very emotional subject. There have been debates in Parliament over the last few months, if not years. As the noble Baroness said, the regulations are being brought forward and there was a vote in the Commons today. The Government were placed under a statutory duty to deliver abortion law for Northern Ireland by implementing the recommendations of the CEDAW report.
Baroness Barker (LD) [V]
My Lords, looking forward, not backwards, will the Minister commit to working with the Department of Health in Northern Ireland to ensure the full implementation of services, as set out in the legal framework, to fulfil the UK’s international human rights obligations?
Viscount Younger of Leckie [V]
Indeed, the noble Baroness is correct. Although health is devolved, the UK Government are giving every help they can to the health service in Northern Ireland. Once the regulations are passed by this House next Monday, as I hope that they will be, there is a lot of work to do to make sure that there is a full service operational for those women and girls who wish to have abortions.