Oral Answers to Questions
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(1 year ago)
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The Prime Minister
I join my hon. Friend in his comments. Coincidentally, one of the first gifts that I gave President Zelensky was an old copy of “Henry V”, so my hon. Friend’s comments are well made. We are training and arming the Ukrainian forces with the equipment that they need to push back Russian forces. I know that the whole House will join me in saying that the people of Ukraine’s incredible strength and inspiring bravery will ultimately defeat tyranny.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
No, what I think our focus should now be on doing, while of course understanding our history in all its parts and not running away from it, is making sure that we have a society that is inclusive and tolerant of people from all backgrounds. That is something that we on the Government Benches are committed to doing and will continue to deliver, but trying to unpick our history is not the right way forward and is not something we will focus our energies on.
Oral Answers to Questions
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(1 year, 9 months ago)
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Mr Rees-Mogg
Again, this is a very important point to raise. Central Government—the Cabinet Office’s Crown Commercial Service—is saving into the billions of pounds across Government, which is money that is then available for Departments. That saves those Department’s budgets and ensures more efficient procurement. We are also cracking down on fraud. I am looking forward to the launch of the public sector fraud authority, which hopes to be able to save £180 million in the first year of its operation.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General (Michael Ellis)
The Cabinet Office is conducting its own review of the matter, as the hon. Lady referred to. Any incident of racism is unacceptable anywhere, and every effort will be made to alleviate and extinguish the problem to which she refers. The Cabinet Office makes every concerted effort possible, and Ministers will continue to do that to eliminate the pernicious problem to which she refers. I do not accept the premise of her question that the Cabinet Office has an endemic problem in this area, but any example is serious.
Oral Answers to Questions
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(1 year, 10 months ago)
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The Deputy Prime Minister
I know from working in the Foreign Office just how powerful the Global Fund is; it is a very high-performing international organisation. My hon. Friend will know that since 2002 we have been the third largest donor, so we have stepped up to the plate. The UK has not yet determined our pledge for the seventh replenishment, but the Foreign Secretary will have heard loud and clear my hon. Friend’s advocacy in that regard.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
In its efforts to pursue a hostile environment, the Home Office routinely tears families apart and breaks human rights and equalities legislation. It is reported to be sending another deportation charter flight to Nigeria and Ghana. In Pride month, it will deport LGBT asylum seekers fleeing homophobia as well as grandmothers and mothers of British children who have lived in this country for more than 25 years. Given that the Home Office repeatedly gets it wrong and ends up having to take people off such flights, will the Deputy Prime Minister tell me how many people have been removed from that flight already and when the Home Office will stop these inhumane deportation charter flights?
The Deputy Prime Minister
The hon. Lady is right in one respect at least: of course, people who come here need to be treated decently and humanely. We are absolutely committed to that. We also need to make sure that we cut down illegal routes and that those who are here who have committed serious offences can be returned home. The crucial thing—I am working on this with the Home Secretary—is to ensure that we do both those things. We cannot allow illegal routes into this country to flourish—otherwise, we will just attract more people—and we cannot allow people who commit serious offences in this country to stay and continue to pose a threat to the public.
Oral Answers to Questions
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(2 years, 9 months ago)
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Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
The Minister for Digital and Culture (Caroline Dinenage)
Online abuse and hate towards women is completely unacceptable, and no one should have to experience threats to their safety or abuse online—and even offline. Under our groundbreaking online safety legislation, companies will need to take swift and effective action not only on illegal content, but on legal but harmful content, including abuse and hate speech.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy
Involuntary celibate groups—incel groups, as they are known—are increasingly on the rise. This online community understands society to be hierarchised along the lines of sexual attractiveness, and these misogynists blame women for their own lack of status and for forcing them into involuntary celibacy. The harbouring of hate and resentment towards women has manifested itself in a spate of deadly terrorist attacks across the Atlantic, with at least two cases of terrorism here in the UK motivated by incel ideas. Will the Minister commit to having discussions with the Home Secretary to identify, and proscribe where necessary, any forms of this deadly misogynist hate group? Moreover, as most of this hate occurs online, can the Minister tell us what steps the online harms Bill will take to end this online abuse against women, when it will be introduced and when its measures will take effect?
Caroline Dinenage
I pay tribute to the hon. Lady for the work that she is doing to call out online abuse. She is absolutely right: there is no place for this sort of behaviour online. The online harms Bill will make much clearer the links between what online companies say they do and what they actually do, and women will be better supported to report abuse and should expect to receive appropriate, swift action from the platform. In addition, we have sponsored the Law Commission review on harmful online communications, looking at whether the law needs to be tightened around this issue; that will be reporting back shortly.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
With great respect to the hon. Lady, I do not think that I have ever heard a question that was more inversely related to reality. This is a Government that from the beginning invested the biggest amount in the NHS for a generation. Then, in the last year, we put another £92 billion into frontline care. We have increased nurses’ starting pay by 12.8% over the last three years. Above all, not only are we building 48 more hospitals, but there are another 59,000 people working in the NHS this year than there were this time last year. This is a Government who are putting our NHS first.
Oral Answers to Questions
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(3 years, 2 months ago)
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Michael Gove
I know the hon. Gentleman has dedicated his life, both before he came into this House and in this House, to supporting British manufacturing, so I take seriously the concerns he raises. We meet business representative organisations every week through the Brexit business taskforce in order to deal with any challenges and to explore additional opportunities. I should have welcomed him to his new role in the shadow Cabinet Office team. I look forward to working with him, because I know that he is dedicated to making sure that British manufacturers, the best in the world, have all the opportunities they need. I hope to work pragmatically with him to achieve just that.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office (Michael Gove)
The Government already have robust processes in place for spending public money fairly and achieving value for money for the taxpayer. We recently published detailed proposals for new and improved procurement rules in the Green Paper that I mentioned earlier, and these proposals include specific measures to strengthen transparency through the commercial lifecycle, from planning through to procurement, contract award, performance and completion.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy [V]
Last week, the Government’s own legal representatives admitted that they had breached procurement law by persistently failing to publish details of covid-19 contracts. The Good Law Project could also expose the wholesale failure to comply with obligations of transparency, and questions remain over the £500 million-worth of taxpayers’ money spent on personal protective equipment deals with companies that are Tory donors. Does the Minister agree that this is reflective of the Government’s failed response to the pandemic and that this lack of accountability has completely damaged confidence and trust in the Government?
Michael Gove
I do not quite agree with that. It is fair to say that we do need to be vigilant when it comes to the use of public money and the awarding of contracts, but it is the case that, if we look at, for example, personal protective equipment and other goods that were sourced during the course of the covid pandemic, 99.5% of the goods that were sourced were operational and effective. We were also procuring at speed. There were suggestions from across the House as to some of the companies that we should have contracts with. Not all of those suggestions were necessarily absolutely spot on, but what we did do was to ensure that we prioritised those companies that were capable of meeting the needs of the hour.
Covid-19: NAO Report on Government Procurement
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Eagle. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden) on securing this important debate, because with every new story that emerges, the public are right to be asking questions, as this country goes through one of its most difficult times. They should not be reliant on the media or independent investigations for facts. Transparency and accountability should be coming from our Government.
This Government may have a majority, but that does not give them the right to do whatever they like. The National Audit Office investigation has rightly shone a light on what has been an absurd outsourcing strategy. In opening the debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton outlined all the usual checks and balances that were completely disregarded. The pandemic was unforeseeable, and we will not criticise people for not being able to prepare for something that we could not see coming, but a country of this advancement and with the level of resources that we have, has the ability to act quickly. It should have been able to act quicker to secure PPE and testing kits within the rules. Rather than putting our trust and money in smaller companies in this country and local actors with experience, the Government wasted millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money corner-cutting with private contractors for substandard products and services.
Gareth Davies, the head of the NAO, said:
“While we recognise that these were exceptional circumstances, it remains essential that decisions are properly documented and made transparent if Government is to maintain public trust that taxpayers’ money is being spent appropriately and fairly.”
That is a very fair statement. However, 10% of the suppliers were referred through political channels and, by contrast, only 1% of suppliers with no links had a chance of winning a contract. How fair is that? Some £10 billion-worth of contracts were awarded without competition, and almost 500 suppliers with links to politicians or senior officials were allowed to pitch directly for work.
The hon. Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley) talked about putting protection over process, but how can that be the case when, at the beginning of the pandemic, we had so many people begging for PPE and tests, while PPE and testing kits were being produced in this country? Suppliers did not receive contracts from the Government and so were forced to sell their products to the EU and other countries. The case of PestFix, which is a vermin control company, shows how bad the Government’s outsourcing has been. We really need to get a grip on this.
Public Health
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
I oppose these measures not because I oppose restrictions, but because they are wholly inadequate. How can we still be getting it wrong? Once again, people will die because of the serial failures of this Government. Their record on combating coronavirus is one of abject and deadly failure. We have one of the worst per capita death tolls among advanced industrialised countries and we have one of the worst economic outcomes. There is not, and there never was, a trade-off between public health and the economy, because people are the most important factor in the economy. We cannot force people to go to pubs, bars and restaurants during a pandemic. They will not do it, but we can fully—I stress fully—support the hospitality industry and all those sectors struggling financially. However, this Government will not.
Research from King’s College London shows that 82% of people say they have followed the latest lockdown restrictions as strictly, or even more strictly, than they followed the first lockdown, but our communities are losing patience with the inconsistencies. Children can go to school but people cannot go to church. There are sporting events but not weddings. People can gather to shoot grouse but not for AA meetings. They should stay home and isolate when exposed but they could well be ineligible for support. And we wonder why people are sceptical.
I would say to those hon. Members, however, who are against all measures that they are completely wrong. This is a deadly virus and its growth rate rises if left unchecked. Those areas with low infection rates can easily become tomorrow’s hotspots. The decision to ease restrictions now and over the Christmas period makes infection from all these sources more likely, not less. The science now points to a third wave. Because the Government keep getting it wrong, we are in a cycle of lockdowns. Do the Government even realise how damaging this is for individuals and the economy?
There is an alternative, and that is to follow the example of other countries and aim for a zero covid strategy. There are countries, most in Asia, where new cases and deaths have dwindled towards zero. Melbourne has now returned to work after over 100 days of severe lockdown, but now life is getting back to normal. New Zealand, Thailand, Vietnam and others, amounting to nearly 1.5 billion people, have had some combination of strict lockdown, highly effective tracking and tracing and well-enforced and supported isolation. We have none of these. We have had ineffective and delayed lock- downs, a shambolic private testing and tracing system, woeful isolation measures and a pitiful economic support package from which too many are excluded. The Government cannot pin all their hopes on a vaccine. Everything must be mobilised against the virus, but they continually refuse to do that.
Before I end, I want to say that, as a London MP, I think that it is fundamentally wrong that only the impact of London’s economy was considered. All jobs and the economy of all our regions matter. The treatment of some of the northern constituencies has been an absolute disgrace. Why is there also no increased financial support for those in tier 3? Where is the logic in that?
I am a Back-Bench MP in Opposition with a Government who have an 80-seat majority. I have no real power here, but I do have my conscience and my vote, and I will not be conceding either to this failure of a Government today.
Oral Answers to Questions
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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Kemi Badenoch
Sexual and reproductive health services have remained open during the pandemic. Services are maintaining access during this time through scaling up of online services. Guidance from the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare sets out that local pathways for urgent referral for vulnerable groups, including via young people’s outreach, should be maintained.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
Elizabeth Truss
It is very important that we conduct equality impact assessments, but it is also important that they are kept confidential within the Government to ensure that there is not a chilling effect and we are able to have an honest debate about achieving equality across all Departments.
United Kingdom Internal Market Bill
Bell Ribeiro-Addy ExcerptsMonday 14th September 2020
(3 years, 7 months ago)
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Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
The Bill is a very grave mistake, and there are numerous reasons to oppose it. Any one of them by itself would be enough, but taken together they make this quite possibly the worst piece of legislation brought before this House by this Government, and that is saying something. The legal consequences of passing the Bill are largely negative. It drives a coach and horses through the withdrawal agreement. Ministers should not need reminding that the withdrawal agreement is part of a solemn and binding international treaty, and that breaching a treaty breaches international law.
The passage of this Bill has wider international legal consequences. It undermines the basis of the Good Friday agreement, another solemn, agreed international treaty, which has laid the basis for peace in Ireland. It is absolutely not the case that the withdrawal agreement undermines the Good Friday agreement, as some Ministers now wish to claim. None of the main political parties in Ireland agrees with Ministers on that point.
While I am on the theme of undermining different parts of these isles, I point out that this legislation risks the integrity of our Union by undermining the devolution settlement. Any Government who claim to be truly Unionist would not develop legislation without the co-operation, collaboration and, above all, consent of the devolved Administrations. That is not what this legislation does.
The Bill also calls into question the good faith of this Government in their entire dealings with international partners. Must they now factor the integrity of Her Majesty’s Government into discussions and agreements? Do the Government really want to make us that country, known for reneging on its agreements because we later find them inconvenient?
I will focus my remaining remarks on the wider impact on this country of what the Government propose. It is now clear that the Government are aiming for an enormously damaging no-deal outcome to the Brexit negotiations. Let me be clear: a no-deal outcome will be disastrous for the living standards of people in this country.
As if the shocking revelations of the Operation Yellowhammer leak were not bad enough, forecasts by the Cabinet Office’s EU transition taskforce go considerably further and combine the potential issue of no deal with a second wave of coronavirus. The forecasts include shortages of fresh food, medicine and fuel, and even of chemicals for water purification, as well as price hikes on everyday items. Worst-case scenario, yes, but would a Government who cared even risk it?
I simply cannot get my head around the fact that the Government are attempting to push through a project that the Treasury’s own analysis says will lower GDP by 6.9% and destroy jobs. That analysis was made even before the effects of the pandemic. It is a far cry from the Conservative party posters we saw that said, “We are taking back control to protect jobs and businesses”. The Bill is an enormous act of self-harm. It damages us legally, reputationally and economically and, as Government Ministers admit, it is literally criminal to pass it.
Future Relationship with the EU: Negotiations
Bell Ribeiro-Addy Excerpts(3 years, 11 months ago)
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Michael Gove
My hon. Friend is absolutely right on both areas. We will not be extending the transition period and we will be outlining, very shortly, our approach towards a Northern Ireland protocol to make sure that the UK, as a single customs territory, can take advantage of its new freedoms.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab) [V]
The Minister will be aware that an earlier version of the European Union withdrawal Act contained provisions that ring-fenced workers’ rights, namely a lock on EU-derived workers’ rights. That would have meant that, before the Government changed workers’ rights, they would rightly have had to consult employer bodies and trade unions. Those measures were removed and we were told to expect them in an upcoming employment Bill, the details of which we are yet to see. Given that the decision made in the UK-EU trade talks will have a huge impact on UK workers, what is the Minister doing to ensure that there is no period of time during which workers are left without sufficient rights in law? Very importantly, what discussions is he having with trade unions and the TUC to ensure that workers are protected?
Michael Gove
The hon. Lady raises a very important point. EU law will continue until we choose to alter it, but it has always been the case, as I mentioned briefly earlier, that we have had higher standards of worker protection than some other European countries. I enjoy my discussions with the TUC in order to ensure that this country can continue, as great socialists such as Tony Benn have always proclaimed that we should, leading the world, whether inside or outside the EU, in protecting workers’ rights.