Easter Recess: Government Update

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Tuesday 19th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am not going to comment on the investigation until it is complete.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Truth and honesty matter, and the Prime Minister has repeatedly told the House that all guidance and all rules were observed. That is not true. He also told the House that there were no parties; indeed, his Chancellor also said that he had not attended a party. Neither of those things are true. So, for once in his privileged, entitled life, will he do the decent thing, come to the Dispatch Box, and correct the record? There isn’t anybody who is fooled by this, but he continues to take the British people for fools, and they will not put up with it.

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the hon. Gentleman very much. I want to repeat what I have said about the event in question, for which I have received an FPN. I apologise heartily for that. It was my mistake entirely. I thought it was within the rules and it has turned out not to be the case. As for other events, I’m afraid I am going to have to stick by what I have said previously and await—I hope he will allow me—the conclusion of the investigation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab)]

4. What steps his Department is taking to tackle violence against women and girls.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

21. What steps his Department is taking to tackle violence against women and girls.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Victoria Atkins)]

May I take a moment, Mr Speaker, to place on record my sincere thanks to Her Majesty the Queen, as we celebrate the seven decades of peerless public service that she has provided to our great country? May she long reign over us.

This Government set out its ambitious tackling violence against women and girls strategy in the summer to change attitudes, support women and girls who are victims of crime, and pursue perpetrators relentlessly. This focus includes rolling out section 28 video-recorded evidence in sexual and modern slavery cases nationally and helping victims of domestic abuse to have more time to report common assaults, through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. Last week we also launched the tender for the first ever national 24/7 support service for victims of rape and sexual assault.

[Victoria Atkins]

We are. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising this important subject, because female genital mutilation is one of the most hidden crimes. Those poor victims, who are often very young, face the most terrible pressure to explain to others what has been done to them, often by their loved ones. We are really supporting victims not just through the tackling violence against women and girls strategy that I have already discussed, but through our work over the last decade to tackle those terrible crimes, so that they can, if they feel able, seek help. Importantly, we are also educating people that it is not a fit practice for the 21st century.

[Andy McDonald]

A woman has approached me for help. She tells me that as a teenager, she was raped and has lived with the trauma for over 30 years. She has no confidence or trust in the police or the criminal justice system. She feels intimidated and frightened by her attacker to this day and fears that she will not be listened to, taken seriously or protected. What can I say to her?

[Victoria Atkins]

May I thank the hon. Gentleman for gravely articulating the many effects that such terrible crimes have on victims, not just in the immediate aftermath but for many years, often decades? We have a programme of work to address the failings in the criminal justice system in terms of prosecuting sexual assault and rape cases. We have already been publishing our national scorecards, which aim to bring transparency to every corner of the criminal justice system to give victims and the public the confidence that they need in it.

On the hon. Gentleman’s point, I commend to him the current Ministry of Justice campaign #ItStillMatters. I very much hope that the lady he speaks about can seek support through that campaign or through the sexual violence helpline that I outlined in my previous answer, which I hope will be up and running very soon.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Wednesday 5th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend has drawn attention to a very important consideration as we try to abate the increases in the costs of gas and of energy. For people in rural constituencies such as her own, it will be important that we have frozen fuel duty for the 12th year in a row, that the energy price cap itself remains in place, and that we are doing everything we can to help people with the energy efficiency of their homes. We are also taking all the other measures that I have explained to the House, but the most important thing that we can do to help people in her constituency and across the country is to have sustainable, clean, cheaper forms of energy, and that is what this Government are investing in now. We are taking the tough decisions necessary.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

8. Statutory sick pay is worth £3 a week less in real terms compared with the start of the pandemic, and millions of workers are being forced to choose between isolating and putting food on their table. In Germany, 100% of workers’ salaries is covered by sick pay, whereas in the UK, the figure is a pitiful 19%. If the Prime Minister thought earning £250,000 from his second job was “chicken feed”, how on earth does he expect working people to survive on £96 a week when they get sick? If he agrees that many lives and livelihoods could be saved by increasing sick pay, will he commit here and now to raising it to the level of the real living wage?

[The Prime Minister]

Of course, as the hon. Gentleman knows, one of the first things we did when covid struck was make sure that statutory sick pay was payable from day one, so it is up to 75% more generous if a person needs to self-isolate. The current statutory sick pay is, of course, a minimum—more than half of employees get contractual sick pay from their employer—but the most important thing we can do is ensure that we continue to keep people in work and in higher-wage, higher-skilled jobs, and that is what we are doing.

Committee on Standards: Decision of the House

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Monday 8th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

I have been very clear that we will listen to the House and listen to the debate. [Interruption.] Will the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) just let me address the point made by the Chair of the Committee on Standards? Mr Paterson has now resigned, so it would not be possible for the House to endorse a sanction of suspension. I simply remind the House that he has suffered a serious personal tragedy. He has now resigned. In his statement, he said that he wants to continue his politics outside public life, and we should respect that. I hope, through your office, Mr Speaker, that there will be a way for us to engage on a cross-party basis, and that is what the Government will now redouble their efforts to engage on in the days ahead.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. There is not anybody in this House who does not have the utmost sympathy for Mr Paterson’s plight, but we do have to remember that he said he would do exactly the same if the opportunity presented itself. I am grateful that the Minister has rendered his apology, but does he not think it more appropriate that the Prime Minister attends and gives his apology rather than being in the north-east of England defending the conduct of his police and crime commissioners, one of whom has had to resign over inappropriate remarks and another of whom is under investigation?

[Steve Barclay]

With respect, Mr Speaker dealt with that at the opening of this debate and made it clear that both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the SNP had discussed with him the debate today.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

I am always over-tempted to give way to interventions, and I am deeply conscious that on the last two occasions that I came to this Dispatch Box I spoke for over an hour in total because of the number of interventions I permitted, so I will try to make some progress as I am sure many Members in all parts of the House want to catch your eye, Mr Speaker, and contribute to the debate.

Whatever options are put forward—this starts to address the issue raised by the right hon. Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry)—will need to be negotiable with the EU, and in particular any deal will require the withdrawal agreement that not only we but the 27 other Governments of the EU member states have negotiated. The conclusions of the European Council last week could not have been clearer: EU member states are not prepared to consider any reopening of the terms of the withdrawal agreement which for them, as well as for us, represented the outcome of a lengthy period of negotiation and compromise on both sides. And this is one of the reasons why my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister was clear earlier this afternoon that the Government cannot simply pre-commit to accepting whatever might come out of this process. It is entirely possible that this House votes for something that is neither realistic nor negotiable; for example, it could vote to seek further changes to the withdrawal agreement, which the EU has been clear is simply not possible. Equally, the House could vote to maintain all the benefits of the single market without agreeing to the obligations, such as alignment with state aid rules or the free movement of people, but the EU has been clear that the four freedoms are indivisible.

Of course we will engage constructively with Members across the House on whatever the outcome of this process is, but we continue to believe that the amendment tabled in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset would be an unwelcome precedent to set, in that it would overturn the balance between Parliament and the Government. In the event that his amendment were carried tonight, we would obviously want to have a dialogue with him and his co-sponsors about how he proposed to take those measures forward.

I want to add a few words to what the Prime Minister said about the statutory instrument that has been published today on the extension of article 50. Now that the United Kingdom and the European Union have agreed an extension to article 50 and it has been embodied in a legal decision of the European Council, the date needs to be amended to reflect in our domestic law the new point at which the EU treaties will cease to apply in the United Kingdom. The Government have therefore tabled today a draft statutory instrument under the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 that provides for both of the possible extensions: 12 March and 22 May.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

It is 12 April.

[Mr Lidington]

Did I misspeak? I meant 12 April. This will be subject to the draft affirmative procedure so that it will be debated in each House, and it must come into force by 11 pm on 29 March. The purpose of this is to ensure that our statute book reflects the extension of article 50, which is legally binding in international law. Without this instrument, there would be a clash in domestic law because contrary provisions would apply both EU rules and new domestic rules simultaneously.

ISIL in Syria

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Abuse has no part in responsible democratic political dialogue, and I believe that very strongly. That is the way I wish to conduct myself, and I wish others to conduct themselves in that way.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that if the Prime Minister came to the Dispatch Box and made a clear apology with a simple “I’m sorry”, he would clear the air immediately and we could move on with this debate?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

As he often does on these occasions, the Prime Minister appears to be taking advice from the Chancellor of the Exchequer on this matter. If he wants to apologise now that is fine. If he does not, well, the whole world can note that he is not apologising.

Since the Prime Minister first made his case for extending British bombing to Syria in the House last week, the doubts and unanswered questions expressed on both sides of the House have only grown and multiplied. That is why it is a matter of such concern that the Government have decided to push this vote through Parliament today. It would have been far better to allow a full two-day debate that would have given all Members the chance to make a proper contribution—you informed us, Mr Speaker, that 157 Members have applied to speak in this debate.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Tuesday 24th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I certainly agree that in the same way as it would be very ill-advised to put the UK Independence party in charge of Europe, it would be very ill-advised to put the SNP in charge of a country it wishes to pull apart.

On property taxation, as the hon. Gentleman knows we have a property tax system, the council tax, which rather eccentrically ends at a certain level. My party therefore believes it is logical to extend the principle of banded taxation for properties higher up the value chain, both here in the south-east and elsewhere.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

T3. Given the overwhelming dominance of London and the south-east in the unelected second Chamber, does the Deputy Prime Minister agree that an elected senate of the nations and regions would be a good way to give the regions of England a stronger say in how the country is run?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Yes, that would be an excellent idea. I only wish the hon. Gentleman’s party had actually abided by his wisdom when we had the chance to vote for an elected second Chamber. For specious procedural reasons, the Labour party turned its back on its long-held traditional view in favour of democracy in the second Chamber. I agree that one of the virtues of an elected second Chamber is precisely that it would provide an accurate reflection of the regions and nations of the United Kingdom at the other end of the building.

Food Banks

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

My last visit to one of the six Trussell Trust food banks in my constituency left me shocked and horrified. I heard about a single mum—working as a lunch time school supervisor while training to become a classroom assistant—who must, being employed part time, attend jobcentre interviews. On the day her father died, she forgot her appointment. She rang the next day to apologise and explain, but the death of her father was not accepted as a valid reason for missing her appointment. She was sanctioned for one month, and had no choice but to turn to the food bank. I heard about the 14 men sacked with no pay after four weeks’ work when their food-packing employer went bust. The jobcentre told them they could not claim, but had to pursue the company for their wages. Being penniless, they turned to the food bank.

These stories and thousands like them typify the impact of this Government’s welfare reforms, which, through a cocktail of callousness and ministerial incompetence, are condemning hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens to modern-day penury. These people are doing all that we ask of them: they are in work or training, and they are trying their hardest under difficult circumstances to better themselves and provide for their families. They are exactly the type of people that our welfare system was created to support, but this Government are punishing them, and leaving them destitute and reliant on charity to stop them and their children going hungry.

Ministers refuse even to acknowledge the explosion in the use of food banks. The Secretary of State boasts that we have fewer people using food banks than in Germany, but having 1 million people having to depend on hand-outs to prevent them from going hungry—870,000 more than when the Government came to office—is nothing to be proud of.

The reasons that the Government have given for the rise in the number of food banks have ranged from the ignorant to the outright scurrilous. There is not the time to recite all the dreadful things that Ministers have said, but now infamous ones have included sentiments from “Let them eat porridge” to “People use food banks because more people know they’re there”, or, “There’s more food waste being recycled”. It is either that or “The lower orders simply can’t cook”. There is no limit to how offensive Ministers can be. Condescending and out of touch does not begin to describe it.

What our country needs is a lower cost of living, higher wages and a fair benefits system that is fit for purpose. We must end the scandal of in-work poverty by raising the minimum wage, spreading the living wage, keeping household bills down and putting an end to exploitative employment practices. The Government would have it that poverty is the personal and moral failure of the poor, to which there is an all-stick-and-no-carrot solution of plunging the poor further into destitution.

We have to ask what type of society we want to be. Having witnessed the tremendous kindness and generosity of ordinary people who donate to and run food banks, I do not think the British people believe that those who have fallen on hard times through no fault of their own should be thrown on to the scrap heap as the Government are doing. Any future Government ought to count achieving a hunger-free UK as a priority, but for that Government this nation’s hungry will sadly have to wait.

EU Council, Security and Middle East

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Monday 1st September 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I think it is important that we meet the 2% figure. Greece is the only other European member state to meet that figure. What matters even more than that is the capability of what we are buying. We have made some very difficult decisions, including the reduction in the size of the regular Army, but that is so that we can invest in the modern equipment and modern capabilities that our armed forces need. When we consider that it is one of the top five military budgets anywhere in the world, with some staggeringly good equipment being produced even as we speak, I think that we get very good value for money.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Over and above the Prime Minister’s very welcome words of condemnation regarding the annexation of yet more lands around Bethlehem, what practical steps does he intend to take so that Israel reverses this latest, and counter-productive, land grab and commits properly to a two-state solution?

[The Prime Minister]

We will continue to work with our allies to condemn this action and to make that clear in international forums. We will continue with our action to support and fund the Palestinian Authority. But at the end of the day, we need talks between the Palestinians and the Israelis. We cannot decide these issues for them; they need to sit down and talk with each other.

Cost of Living: Energy and Housing

Andy McDonald Excerpts

Thursday 5th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Sir Edward Garnier]

I got married on the strength of the case, thank you very much. Indeed, I bought my first house on the strength of it. However, I want to make a serious point.

The sting of the libel in the case was that the Moonies brainwashed children and extracted money from them for the purposes of the Moonie organisation. Of course, a lot of those activities took place overseas, particularly in America. However, if the modern slavery Bill can criminalise the suborning of vulnerable adults and children for the purpose of encouraging them to join such sects and to give up their independence and what money they have for the benefit of the leaders of such groups, it is much to be encouraged. If my constituent, Laura Palmer, is right about the Picard law in France, I hope that the modern slavery Bill that we are about to introduce into this House will take account of that law and learn from it.

[Andy McDonald (Middlesbrough) (Lab)]

Given the excellent points that the hon. and learned Gentleman is making about trafficking, does he share my disappointment at the lack of any mention of female genital mutilation in yesterday’s Queen’s Speech?

[Sir Edward Garnier]

That matter was certainly mentioned in yesterday’s debate. Of course, female genital mutilation is a crime under our law. I share the hon. Gentleman’s disappointment at the lack of prosecutions so far, if that is what he is driving at, but I think he will understand that one difficulty that the prosecuting authorities and the police have had is in the gathering of evidence.

This is too obvious a point, but I will make it anyway: FGM does not take place in public. It is difficult for independent witnesses to come across evidence, although there will be children who are examined in hospital or seen by schoolteachers or general practitioners. Now that the subject is increasingly coming into the public arena, I am sure that such people will be on their guard to ensure that those who are already victims of FGM find at least some protection under the law, despite what has already happened to them, and that children who may be vulnerable to FGM are also protected. The hon. Gentleman’s point is not one of controversy—he and I generally agree that the more we can do to protect those young women, the better and more civilised our country will be.

It is a tradition in this House to have at least four or five criminal justice Bills every Session, most of which do exactly what previous Bills did in earlier Sessions and no doubt repeat what was done in earlier Parliaments. By and large that comes under the heading of too much legislation—often too much ill-thought-through legislation. The previous Labour Government passed something like 65 pieces of legislation on criminal justice. That was utterly wasteful of parliamentary time and most of it achieved very little. However, it makes Ministers feel good.

I think that the serious crime Bill will be better than that, although it concerns me—I say this gently—that there may be some rough edges to the proposed legislation. In parenthesis, I say to the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) that as I understand it, the Bill will strengthen this country’s ability to protect vulnerable children and women and extend the reach of powers to tackle FGM, and it will also make it an offence to possess paedophile manuals. There is plenty of good stuff in the Bill, but I am concerned that in dealing with the protection of vulnerable children, the Government may adjust section 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 in a way that will have unintended consequences. I urge the House, and the Government, to be sure before they amend the 1933 Act that that does not do something that they should not or do not intend.

At the risk of being excessively prissy and overly legalistic—a very rare thing for me—let me tell the House what the Act currently states. It is an offence if someone wilfully assaults, ill-treats, neglects, abandons, or exposes a child

“or causes or procures him to be assaulted, ill-treated, neglected, abandoned, or exposed, in a manner likely to cause him unnecessary suffering or injury to health (including injury to or loss of sight, or hearing, or limb, or organ of the body, and—”

I stress—

“any mental derangement),”.

As I understand it, the new Bill follows a campaign from 2012-13 that wishes to extend that part of the Act to cover emotional distress. That seems to me a difficult area to move into when the Bill is already being interpreted in a constructive and protective way.

Some of my constituents, particularly those who are strongly religious, have written to me because they are concerned that the teaching of particular religious tenets—not just Christian or Muslim—would or could stray into the area of emotional distress. I have no view on that because I am not aware of the factual basis on which such things might be established. However, we need to be careful when wishing to send out these messages and signals—I am afraid that such phrases are used by the Government in their surrounding material for this Bill and others—because we are in danger of passing legislation that amounts to just a collection of early-day motions, rather than producing coherent, well argued and well constructed law.

Earlier this week, Libby Purves, the Times journalist, wrote an interesting article—which I recommend—headlined, “You can’t always bring ugly sisters to trial”, towards the end of which she said,

“is it not potentially damaging to ‘intellectual development’ to bring up a child in a strict religious belief that daily contradicts the evolutionary science they learn at school? Is it not detrimental to ‘social development’ to raise a girl—or boy—in the firm expectation that she or he will only marry by parental arrangement?”

She continued:

“Think how many things you could potentially include. Suppose a family has a baby by donor insemination, or indeed another father, and never tells that child…Is it cruel and diminishing to deny someone knowledge of their origins? Come to that, the emotional damage wrought by divorce is well-attested and divorce is a deliberate act by at least one partner: criminal?”

I place these suggestions before the House to encourage us to be careful, as we move forward with enthusiasm in the last Session of this Parliament, about passing laws that are eye-catching. They must have some utility as well. This also applies to the social action, responsibility and heroism Bill. I cannot think of a more wonderful title for an Act of Parliament.

[Sir Edward Garnier]

The hon. Gentleman, perhaps unwittingly, illustrates my point. If we were to criminalise advertising sugar-filled cereals, we would be stepping down a path that I have no intention of going down. I do not know enough about the Picard law to comment intelligently about it, but I understand from my constituent, Laura Palmer, that it outlaws the manipulation of people under a mental incapacity, or who are temporarily mentally disturbed, to extract money from them—this goes back to my Moonies example. That is not the same as extending section 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933, under which it is already an offence to do terrible things to children, including causing them mental derangement.

The better answer to the question posed by the 2012 campaign—and to what I fear may be the consequence of the relevant part of the serious crime Bill—is to reflect emotional or intellectual damage in the sentencing under section 1 of the 1933 Act, not to create a whole new category of offence based on intellectual or emotional damage or impairment.

I am just placing the arguments before the House—I do not want to be nailed to the cross on this point—but I am always cautious about this House’s being too ready to pass spuriously attractive pieces of legislation for the purposes of sending out a message or giving a signal without thinking about the consequences of doing so. The purpose of the various stages of a Bill—Second Reading, Committee and Report stages, and then its going through the House of Lords, where it is examined again—is to deal with rough edges or unintended consequences. However, there is no harm in pointing them out now, so that the Government are aware of at least some people’s concerns.

To my mind, those concerns also apply to the social action, responsibility and heroism Bill. I am sure there is much good intention behind the Bill. The Government say:

“All too often people who are doing the right thing in our society feel constrained by the fear that they are the ones who will end up facing a lawsuit for negligence”

and that they want to

“change the law to reassure the public that they can participate in good causes or intervene in an emergency. In the unlikely event that something goes wrong and they are sued, the courts will take full and sympathetic account of the context of their actions.”

They also tell me that the proposed law is

“designed to bring some common sense back to Britain’s health and safety culture. We will put the law on the side of people who are doing the right thing and building better communities.”

That is all well and good, but if one descends into the potential detail of the legislation a number of concerns arise. They are illustrated by an article written by the Secretary of State for Justice headlined, “Our Bill to Curb the Elf and Safety Culture”. I am as great an admirer of the advocates of the saloon bar as anybody else, but I think we need to be a little careful when we are framing laws that affect the way in which our courts treat litigation between citizens.

My right hon. Friend is perfectly right that there have been a number of cases where people have felt constrained—for example, from taking children on school adventure trips and so on—for fear that they, or the school they are employed by, will be sued if somebody breaks their leg or falls into a river and comes to harm through no fault of the school or the individual supervisor, be they a schoolmaster or schoolmistress. As I understand the law of negligence, if it is just an accident, then by and large the courts will recognise that it is just an accident and liability will not be attached to the supervisor.

[Andy McDonald]

Is it not the case that all that is ever expected when people take children on a school trip is that they take reasonable care? They need to have some forethought as to the risks they run, but nobody is expecting a counsel of perfection. If an accident happens that could not have been foreseen, and there has been no carelessness or negligence, then no liability will ever attach.

[Sir Edward Garnier]

I agree. I hope that common sense already exists not only for those contemplating taking children away on trips. That is to say, we do not have to worry about this. If we set in place proper arrangements—we make sure there are lifejackets if people are going out in canoes and all that sort of stuff—then it strikes me that common sense is already in play.

What I am concerned about, however, is the concept of heroic negligence. I would be very interested to hear from a Minister from the Ministry of Justice the definition of heroic negligence. [Interruption.] The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my right hon. Friend the Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr Pickles), is the embodiment of political heroism—that is easy to understand—but I think even he would be pushed to find a cogent definition of heroic negligence. When he goes to the next Cabinet meeting and discusses the important things they discuss in Cabinet, I wonder if he could encourage the Attorney-General and the Secretary of State for Justice to think carefully about the concept of heroic negligence, because it will lead to derision, if not amusement, if it is pushed forward.

I accept fully that this is not a courtroom and that the people who draft or think about legislation are not always thinking entirely legalistically. I plead guilty to occasionally being rather prissy about that, as I said a moment ago. However, I am a politician and in the Chamber there are other politicians, so we all understand the need for the political backdrop to the things we do. Governments will of course send out their messages and their signals. At some stage, however, somebody has to apply this law. At some stage, a judge in a county court or in the High Court is going to be faced with a case in which a fireman has been sued by someone he has rescued. He will not just personally be sued—the fire authority will also be sued.

One will have the most complicated litigation. Perhaps expert witnesses on heroism will be called, who will say, “Well, this was heroism that strayed into the area of negligence. It was foolhardy. On the other hand, this chap up the other ladder was heroic in a common-sense way.” One needs to go through these slightly absurd examples in order to demonstrate that somebody needs to think a little more carefully before this aspect of this very important Bill goes forward.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

It gives me great pleasure to speak in the debate, and I seek to clarify some of Labour’s policies if we were to get into government next year. Some have actually been borrowed by the coalition Government, who have thought, “Yes, there is something in that. The public are interested in that.” However, they have produced a pale imitation of these things in their Queen’s Speech. Let me give some examples. Labour wants to tackle how people on low and middle incomes cope with rising costs. This year, for the first time, we have seen a reasonable rise in the national minimum wage, but that comes after three years of starving it and of costs going up by a far higher amount. We certainly welcome the measures to be tougher on employers who try to dodge paying the minimum wage, who try to make people work more hours than they were intending to or who try to make deductions from people’s pay. We would like more of such measures, but we have not seen many prosecutions. Time and again during questions Labour Members have asked what is happening about prosecuting people who are dodging the national minimum wage regulations. So, yes, let us get that legislation, but let us also get enforcement of it.

[Andy McDonald]

Does my hon. Friend agree that some of the delays we are experiencing in securing prosecutions are totally unacceptable? A case in my constituency has been rumbling on now for nearly a year and Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs tells us that it will be a further two months before it is even looked at.

[Nia Griffith]

That is precisely the point: there is not much point having the legislation if it is not properly enforced and if people get the idea that they can get away with things.

There is no suggestion from those on the Government Benches of anything as strong as our idea that, to be effective, the national minimum wage needs to be linked to median earnings. We would like it to be gradually raised to 60% of median earnings. We are also keen to see people incentivised to pay the living wage. One of our proposals is to give employers a tax break if they bring all their employees’ pay up to the living wage. That proposal is affordable because of the savings we would make on tax credits and housing benefit. We should make it possible for people in full-time work to pay their way without an enormous number of top-ups from the state.

Again, the issue of zero-hours contracts is one that the coalition has picked up. We urgently need to deal with it and we need legislation on it. I am pleased that the Government are introducing a provision on exclusivity, which will deal with people who have to be available to work for only one employer. They do not know whether that employer will give them even an hour or two of work, but they cannot take up any other offer of work. However, a lot more could be done and we would like people to be offered proper contracts if they are working regularly over six months. Let us look at what the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers has done in some of the big supermarkets. The need for flexibility has been recognised, but things such as annualised contracts and averaging out hours are looked at so that people at least know that they will have a reasonable income over a number of weeks, rather than not knowing the situation from one minute to the next. Such contracts work both for the employee and the employer, as they give a sense of flexibility and of security. The real problem with zero-hours contracts is that not only are they unpredictable in terms of what someone gets from week to week, but they do not allow people any employment rights. I am sure that is one reason why some employers try to avoid issuing proper contracts. We would like people who are working regularly to be put on proper contracts.

Let me now turn my attention to the energy companies. Our suggestion of a price freeze has been well documented and we are seeing some ruffled feathers in the energy companies, but why can this coalition Government not help people by introducing that idea of a freeze much sooner? As we have clearly said, it is not just about having the freeze; it is about then breaking up the market so that it works properly for people, and there is proper competition and a proper opportunity to beat down prices. People are very angry about the profits. Yet again, we see high salaries and very high profits, but people’s energy bills are going up. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) mentioned, the only reason people managed to cope this winter was because it was so mild. If we have the sort of winters that we saw in the previous two years, people would find their bills astronomically higher, even given the coalition Government’s promise to take £50 off—although that amount has proved slightly elusive, in that it does not actually apply to everybody; the figure is up to £50. The more annoying thing is that we are paying for it through other means; in other words, other schemes that would have been financed by the Government have been scrapped, particularly the one to help with hard-to-heat homes. That is a double tragedy, because fuel bills will remain high and it is difficult to lower them in homes that are difficult to adapt. Ending that scheme, which means that more than 400,000 properties will not benefit from it, is a disaster both environmentally and, for the families concerned, economically.

With regard to the energy companies, we would like to have seen stiffer action much sooner. We have also said clearly that we would like much stronger powers for the regulator. We would also like to see powers extended to people suffering from off-grid issues, which are particularly acute in semi-rural areas, such as parts of Wales, as my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen) mentioned. People there are reliant on the vagaries of oil deliveries or liquefied petroleum gas. They also have difficulty bargaining over price. Although some good work is being done, for example by oil clubs in my area, it is still very difficult to get the best possible deal. We would also like to have seen pensioners given the opportunity to receive their winter fuel allowance earlier in order to pay in advance and benefit from lower summer prices, rather than finding out halfway through the winter that they have bought only half of what they need and then having difficulties, both with price and delivery.

On fracking, there seems to be a bit of stampede, as if it is the be-all and end-all and the answer to all our energy needs. I am worried that there has been an overestimation of how easy fracking might be and how great the profits might be. I think that fracking will prove considerably more difficult in our country than it has been in the United States. When the Welsh Affairs Committee visited Lancashire to see what is happening there, I was struck by just how little we get from one well. It is like squeezing a tiny drop of something out of a stone. The hundreds of thousands of wells that would have to be sunk seem absolutely disproportionate to the amounts we would get.

The real question is this: why are we making such a huge effort to try to get something that we know is difficult to get—otherwise, we would have got it years ago—when really we should be trying to wean ourselves off fossil fuels altogether? We should be moving towards much greater investment in renewables. I am greatly disappointed that the Queen’s Speech included no mention of climate change or meeting our renewables targets. The renewables industry seems to have been left in limbo, whether it is wind energy being attacked or the Solar Trade Association, which is very worried about the current consultation. Will subsidies be reduced in the same way that feed-in tariffs have been? What is the situation with solar panels on rooftops? There is a lack of certainty, understanding and commitment to getting it right to ensure that we have the best possible uptake in the right places for solar energy.

Marine renewables also seem to have been pushed to one side and sadly neglected. Again, much more could be done to look at how subsidies work and to consider the opportunities to promote technologies that are more expensive and more difficult to develop, such as marine technologies, but that have such huge potential for our island.

As for the latest confusion about who can go on to whose land to undertake exploration for fracking sites, we need urgent clarification, because there seem to be conflicting stories. The Prime Minister has said, “No, nobody will be able to do that”, but that follows a letter to MPs from the Minister concerned stating that that is precisely what they are proposing. The situation is not clear and people have major concerns as a result.

Lastly, I want to deal with the major issue of housing. We all know how difficult it is, particularly for young people, to purchase a house or to afford rents. It is a struggle even in the less expensive parts of the country, where the ratios between what people earn and what houses cost are not good, but in London the disparity is enormous. London has very significant problems, and we need to look at them in a much wider context. Over the past few years, and particularly the past couple of months, we have seen the housing market in London grow away from the housing market in the rest of the UK, and at an even faster pace than it did before. That is leading to immense disparities in the cost of property, but it is also making London almost impossible to live in. If we add to that the fact that, because a huge amount of foreign direct investment—some 40%—tends to centre on London, we see that London seems to be growing in a way that is completely unsustainable. That is leading to huge problems with transport and housing, and people having to live further away and commute for even longer.

The question we must ask ourselves in the long run is this: do we need some far-reaching policies to redress the balance across the United Kingdom with regard to growth? I do not want to stop any regeneration programmes in London, which I think are vital for less well-off and more run-down areas, and I do not want to stop the people who are furthest from the work opportunities being given as much help as possible to access them, but we need to ask whether too many jobs are being created in London and not enough are being created elsewhere. When people think of the UK as a place to invest, they almost invariably think of London. Whereas if they think of Italy, they might think of Milan as much as Rome; if they think of Spain, they might think of Barcelona as much as Madrid; and if they think of Germany, they might think of Munich as much as Berlin. We have a huge concentration on London, and it is becoming absolutely unsustainable.

We need a strategy not only because it would help other areas of the United Kingdom, such as Wales, the north-west and the north-east, but because it would also help London and the south-east. We did that with public sector jobs a few years ago, when the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency was moved to Swansea and the passport office was moved to Newport, but we need to go further. I am sure that there are still some public sector jobs that could be moved out of London. But then we would have to consider whether we might create an imbalance between the public and private sectors, as we have seen in Northern Ireland.

We should also think about what motivates the private sector companies to base themselves in London so much of the time. We need proper studies of that and a real understanding of how we can ensure that in future London can be lived in. This is about not just helping other parts of the country but making London a place in which ordinary people can live and, at the moment, that is becoming more and more difficult. We must look at the pattern around the whole country, because we cannot make changes in a piecemeal way. Currently, we are seeing the development of a city region approach, especially in Manchester.

Like London, some places are experiencing a slight overheating compared with their surrounding areas. We need to find ways of linking in those towns that feel they have been left behind, because, as we saw in the recent elections, they are the areas that are the most disaffected and the most likely to turn away from the main political parties. We need to look at the way in which they are linked in to their regional capitals, or to the wealth-generating parts of their areas.

Our plan for the UK should be about creating the right transport links that take people from the places in which they live to the places in which there is work, and putting the work in the places in which people live. We need to think globally. We should think not just about what we will do this year and next, but about what we will do in the next 30 to 40 years. If we do not do that, we will be playing catch-up all the time.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Margaret Hodge) talked about needing 800,000 houses in the capital. That is a huge quantity. The Government are putting forward proposals for one new town, when in fact we need several new towns. We need to think about not only using every opportunity to improve the situation for people now and to build more affordable homes, but what we are going to do in the long term. How do we want the UK to look? We need to create a balance between where the work is, where the wealth is and where the transport is so that we get a much better balance across the country.

We should help those areas that have seen a decline in the more traditional industries and are struggling to attract some of the new industries as well as those areas that are over-heating, especially those in which young people and people on low incomes are struggling to live. Everyone would benefit from a much more strategic overview, and we should not be afraid of combining that with localism. That does not mean that we are against devolving funds to regions—we have announced that we would do that—or against promoting a municipal force, as was outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) when talking about Joseph Chamberlain. It is not about decrying that; that is extremely important. It is about linking a local strategy into an overall vision for the UK. In that way, we can begin to tackle as one the issues of housing, work and transport, and making that a strategy that we want to follow for the future. I will not suggest exactly what that strategy should be, because that needs to come from all the regions and the countries of the UK working together. They should look at how the strategy works as a whole, and not just at how it works for their region, country or part of the UK.