Education (Careers Guidance in Schools) Bill

Debate between Anthony Mangnall and Simon Baynes

2nd reading
Friday 10th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Anthony Mangnall]

I could not have said it better, and it is also essential that universities do not try to charge the same tuition fees if they are going to do courses via Zoom.

[Simon Baynes]

I strongly support my hon. Friend’s intervention. This is something that has been brewing in my mind as I see the fractured form of education that is being provided by the universities attended not only by my children but by the children of many of my friends.

My hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby (Lia Nici) spoke about the integration of training and paid work within the further education system, and that process will shake up the universities by making them realise that it is not just about academic courses or the odd lecture. It has to be a much more structured and much more concentrated form of education for our young people.

In conclusion, I add my voice to those of other hon. Members here today in supporting my hon. Friend’s Bill, which does a great deal of good for pupils across our country and will no doubt have a tangible and positive impact on our young people at a time when they are making some of the most exciting and important decisions of their entire lives.

Botulinum Toxin and Cosmetic Fillers (Children) Bill

Debate between Anthony Mangnall and Simon Baynes

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 16th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Simon Baynes]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. That is an extremely important point. As he rightly says, the body image consciousness of young men is also an area that leads to great vulnerability. Of course, it is an area where people would expect there not to be the same degree of vulnerability, because they are young men and strong and everything else, but it is an area of great importance. It goes back to my original point, which was about setting discussion of the Bill within a broader context of cosmetic interventions and other aspects that I think are dangerous for people.

[Anthony Mangnall]

It has always struck me as particularly worrying when adverts say that 50% or 80% of people say that something is successful, but with only a very small dataset. That is happening across adverts on daytime television and in a whole load of other situations. I know that it is also happening in this sector. I am interested in whether my hon. Friend has any further thoughts on how we might be able to combat that. If datasets are to be used in persuading people to take up a product or to have a surgical procedure, those datasets must be comprehensive.

[Simon Baynes]

I strongly agree with my hon. Friend on that score. One of the aspects of this discussion that has been extremely pertinent is the need for consultation. It really seems to me extraordinary that people can undergo such procedures without proper consultation—a point made very eloquently by my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East. If someone has proper consultation, they have to refer to the data, as my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes says, and then the procedures start to take place within a structured, controlled environment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anthony Mangnall]

I thank the hon. Lady for making that very important point, and I take her guidance incredibly sincerely. That brings me to the point made by my hon. Friends the Members for East Surrey and for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart), which is that every child is beautiful and that body positivity as we grow up is incredibly important. We are not asking anybody to change their image. I thank the hon. Lady for her point; I am always happy to take guidance on how to perform in the Chamber.

The impact of social media is long lasting, and our newspapers and media have become more and more emboldened about it.

[Simon Baynes]

We should also consider the fact that social media can be put to good use in all this. We have talked at length about the difficulties of social media, but social media is also an extremely good method of putting a message across. When the Bill hopefully becomes law, social media will be a way to communicate the benefits of this legislation.

[Anthony Mangnall]

My hon. Friend is curiously prescient in his intervention. As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on the preventing sexual violence in conflict initiative, I have discussed with all the social media companies how we might engage them in helping to collate and document crimes against women and children across the world and to ensure that that leads to prosecutions. The response from Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and many other social media platforms has been universally positive. We need to build on that, because if we can do it on that issue, we can do it on this one. I hope that this legislation will be used as an effective tool, learning from the different areas in which this has been done already.