Hate Crimes

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Deech

Wednesday 21st February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I know of many efforts across the country, locally and nationally, to bring leaders of different faiths together and make statements of unity. That is something the Government continue to support.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Mann, issued a report on anti-Semitism not long ago which made very useful recommendations, including teaching about anti-Semitism and Jewish history in school. Would that not be a far better approach than focusing entirely on Holocaust education, which places everything in the past, far away, nothing to do with us today?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, one of the most recent announcements from the Government in this area is indeed additional funding through the Department for Education to schools to increase education around this area. That is something the DfE is taking forward.

Green Spaces

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Deech

Thursday 1st February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

It will depend on the particular arrangements for each park or playground, but local authorities are responsible for around 85% of urban parks in England. On which department is responsible, it is my department, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

My Lords, why are the Government intent on wrecking the only available green space near Parliament, Victoria Tower Gardens, which serves an underprivileged population? They are doing it contrary to the 1900 Act, which preserved it as an open space, in order to build an ugly memorial and an inadequate learning centre that is too small and not wanted by Holocaust survivors.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, on the legal point, I believe the department is bringing forward legislation to address that. I am sure there will be further discussion of the points the noble Baroness makes when we discuss that Bill.

Bank Accounts

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Deech

Wednesday 19th July 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

Well, I can reassure the noble Baroness that that is exactly what the amendment to the Financial Services and Markets Act requires the FCA to do. It should look not just at the appropriateness of the guidance but at firms’ adherence to that guidance. We have asked it to get feedback from those who are affected by this guidance and take particular account of the impact on family members, which is an issue that many noble Lords have raised with me. We expect the FCA to follow that rigorously. The FCA is required to provide an update to this House on the progress of that work within a few months of it starting, and I am sure noble Lords will pay close attention to that.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

My Lords, I know it is customary for children to blame their parents for everything, but will the Minister extend her concern to credit cards? My daughter, who is a very modest earner and has had the same credit card provider for 20 years, is being investigated in depth, with every piece of financial information needing to be produced, and we can think of no reason other than that I am her mother.

Inheritance Tax: Cohabiting Siblings

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Deech

Tuesday 20th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I was disappointed that the party opposite did not support our changes to pensions, which were key for many public sector workers in respect of recruitment and retention for their posts. The primary purpose of a pension is to provide income or funds that individuals can draw on in retirement. If an individual dies before they get to use it for that purpose, we believe their beneficiaries should be able to have those funds, and that is why unspent pension pots do not normally form part of an individual’s estate. As the Chancellor said to the TSC after the Budget 2023, we will keep any changes to the lifetime and annual allowances under consideration and look at the impact.

[Baroness Deech (CB)]

My Lords, I think the Minister is avoiding the issue of principle. Ever since I took an interest some 15 years ago in the case of the Burden sisters, referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, I have wondered why the financial inheritance benefits of coupling up are confined to sexual relationships, whether it is husband and wife, civil partners or even a deceased person and the person they lived with. What is so special about the sexual relationship, when you might have two sisters who have been committed for much longer, are unable to marry and have undertaken freely to take care of each other? The Government would not even lose in the end, because the inheritance tax is rolled over. Will the Minister please address the issue of principle?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I do not think that I am not addressing the issue of principle; I am just disagreeing with some noble Lords on the conclusions of that question. The Government’s view is that marriage and civil partnership relationships necessarily entail particular legal and financial obligations to one another for the parties concerned. We think it is right that those obligations are reflected in our inheritance tax system. When it comes to the impact of inheritance tax, however, on people in the circumstances to which the noble Baroness referred, there are several measures in place to ensure that those impacts are minimised. Those include the existence of the nil-rate band, which means that the vast majority of people in this country—fewer than 6% of estates this year are due to fall subject to inheritance tax—do not pay inheritance tax. For those who are affected, there are measures in place to ensure the smoothing of those obligations when they find themselves in circumstances that we have heard about today.

Inheritance Tax: Cohabiting Siblings

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Deech

Wednesday 10th February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Deech (CB) [V]]

Does the Minister agree that life can be very unfair to single people and elderly people? This law is discriminatory. Siblings and family carers may have struggled on for years looking after each other, and they are saving the state a fortune in social care. Why should they not enjoy a tax deferral when one of them dies, especially since the state will recover on the death of the second survivor?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I remind noble Lords of the context that each individual can pass on at least £325,000 without any inheritance tax charge. That is well above the average house price in the UK. For those who are affected, there are also provisions where it is possible to have 10 years to pay off inheritance tax in instalments if the estate contains a house that is unsold.

Cross-Government Policy to Strengthen Families

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Deech

Wednesday 18th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I take the opportunity to agree wholeheartedly with the sentiments expressed by my noble friend and indeed with those written by Lord Sacks. Indeed, as he said in another of his works:

“If we care about the common good, the cohesion of society and the support it gives to individuals, the family must be at the very heart of our concern.”

[Baroness Deech (CB) [V]]

I associate myself with those remarks. If the late and much-missed Lord Sacks were here, he would have spoken out about the huge financial and emotional costs of family breakdown and the rising divorce rate reported this morning. We have a real crisis now of children and money amid fears that the system will collapse under the huge weight of cases and lack of legal aid. Will the Minister heed the recommendations of the Family Solutions Group report What About Me? It highlighted the need to reduce aggressive litigation over money after divorce, which it said harms children’s welfare, by progressing the reform of our financial provision law to make it focus on support for children, less expensive and in line with nearly every other European country.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I will certainly go away and look at the findings of that report. Of course, the Government have introduced no-fault divorces to try to reduce conflict through that process and make it more constructive, particularly with regard to the position of children in those circumstances.