Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Andrew Selous and Lord Jackson of Peterborough

Tuesday 3rd November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Selous]

I heard from the hon. Lady in last week’s Westminster Hall debate how highly Askham Grange was performing, and I pay tribute to all its hard-working staff, who are doing extremely well. We have to look at the prison estate as a whole to make sure it is fit for purpose across the country, and all these decisions will be considered, but we will continue to focus on improving education and work opportunities for all prisoners.

[Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)]

The Minister will know how successful the social investment bond at Doncaster and Peterborough prisons has been in tackling recidivism. Indeed, he, the Secretary of State and his predecessors visited the prisons. Will he recapitulate his commitment to social investment bonds as a means of tackling reoffending across the penal estate?

[Andrew Selous]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question, and of course we recently provided additional capacity at Peterborough prison in the form of a new house block. We have studied carefully what happened at Doncaster and Peterborough and will learn lessons from it. The Government are keen that the use of social impact bonds continues across government.

Finance Bill

Debate between Andrew Selous and Lord Jackson of Peterborough

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jackson]

My hon. Friend has a long tradition of concentrating on this issue in his professional work in family law before he came to the House, and he knows what he is talking about. He is right and astute in his observation. The proposal is about ameliorating unfairness, as well as having a progressive tax policy to reward what we think is right. The hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), in her usual decorous way, skipped the key issue, which is that European countries are making such tax changes or have established them, and we have not. It is incumbent on her to make the case why they are all wrong and we are right.

[Andrew Selous]

Does my hon. Friend agree that in this case the United Kingdom is the odd country out? As he so powerfully said, we need to join the mainstream of Europe on this matter.

[Mr Jackson]

My hon. Friend makes an intelligent point, with which I wholeheartedly agree.

Reference was made earlier to the Centre for Social Justice report of May 2011. The hon. Member for North Durham, who is ambling along the Back Benches towards his place, did not refute the causal link and the difference between marriage and cohabitation and some of their negative socio-economic impacts.