Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
I know that Members across the House will want to join me in offering our best wishes to Rangers for this evening’s match in Seville. This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others, and in addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Steve McCabe
The latest “State of Ageing” report reveals that last year in this country, 9,000 people over the age of 60 died because their homes were too cold. Will the Prime Minister give a guarantee that that figure will be lower, not higher, this time next year?
The Prime Minister
I think everybody has every sympathy with people who are facing difficulties with the cost of heating. That is why the Government have stepped up with an extra £9.1 billion in addition to what we are doing with the cold weather payments and the warm home allowance, and we will continue to support people throughout the aftershocks of covid, just as we did throughout the pandemic.
Elliot Colburn (Carshalton and Wallington) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed. I thank my hon. Friend very much for his campaign, and he is completely right. That is why we have a SEND review, and we will ensure that SEND children and young people can get access to the right support at the right place and at the right time across the country.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
I, too, send my best wishes to Rangers. It has been quite an extraordinary story for that football club over the last few years.
A one-off tax on huge oil and gas profits would raise billions of pounds and cut energy bills across the country. The Chancellor rightly says there are two camps on this: you are either for it or you are against it. But in which camp does the Chancellor put himself? He says neither. Well, I am in favour of it. This is the question for the Prime Minister: is he for it, is he against it or is he sitting on the fence like his Chancellor?
The Prime Minister
I remind the House that the right hon. and learned Gentleman struggled to define what a woman is. If he cannot make up his mind on that point, heaven help us. This Government are not, in principle, in favour of higher taxation; of course not. Labour loves it. They love putting up taxes. Dogs bark, cats miaow and Labour puts up taxes. What we want to do is take a sensible approach, governed by the impact on investment and jobs. That is the test of a strong economy, and it is by having a strong economy that we will be able to look after people, as we did during covid and as we will in the aftershocks of covid. I am proud to say it was revealed this week that unemployment has come down to the lowest level since 1974. I do not know how old he was, but I was 10 years old.
Keir Starmer
Hang on; last week the Prime Minister said he will have a look at the idea, and yesterday he voted against it. Anyone picking up the papers today would think the Government are for it, and now he says he is against it again. Clear as mud. To be fair, it is not like the rest of the Cabinet know what they think, either. On the same day, the Chancellor said it was something he is looking at and the Justice Secretary said it would be “disastrous.” The Business Secretary called it a “bad idea,” but he also said he would consider a Spanish-style windfall tax. One minute they are ruling it in, and the next they are ruling it out. When will the Prime Minister stop the hokey-cokey and just back Labour’s plan for a windfall tax to cut household bills?
The Prime Minister
Labour’s plan, always and everywhere, is to raise taxes on business. I remember the right hon. and learned Gentleman campaigning in 2019 on the biggest taxes for business that this country has ever seen. That is their instinct. This country and the world face problems with the cost of energy, driven partly by covid and partly by Putin’s war of choice in Ukraine. We always knew there would be a short-term cost in weening ourselves off Putin’s hydrocarbons and in sanctioning the Russian economy. Everybody in this House voted for those sanctions. We knew it would be tough, but giving in and not sticking the course would ultimately be a far greater economic risk. Of course we will look at all the measures we need to take to get people through to the other side, but the only reason we can do that is because we took the tough decisions that were necessary during the pandemic, which would not have been possible if we had listened to the right hon. and learned Gentleman.
Keir Starmer
He just doesn’t get it, does he? He doesn’t actually understand what working families are going through in this country. They are struggling with how they are going to pay their bills. While he dithers, British households are slapped with an extra £53 million on their energy bills every single day. Meanwhile, every single day, North sea oil and gas giants rake in £32 million in unexpected profits. Does he not see that, every single day he delays his inevitable U-turn—he is going to do it—he is choosing to let people struggle when they do not need to?
The Prime Minister
The right hon. and learned Gentleman says that this Government have no sympathy for people who are struggling and working. Let me tell him what we are already doing. We are already spending £22 billion. We are already helping people with the cost of living in any way that we can, but the reason why we can do that is that we took the tough decisions to get this country through covid, to make sure that we came out of lockdown in the way that was necessary, and to have a strong economy with robust employment growth. We will continue—[Interruption.] He talks about cutting taxes. In July, we will have the biggest tax cut for 10 years: £330 in cuts, on average, for 30 million people who are paying national insurance contributions. The reason why we can do that is that we have a strong and robust economy. I am going to look at all measures in future to support our people—of course I am—but the only reason why we can do that, and why our companies are in such robust health, is because of the decisions this Government have taken.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister is still pretending the economy is booming. He still has his head in the sand, in the middle of an economic crisis. He keeps saying that more help is coming, but we have heard it all before. On 13 May, he stood there and said,
“We will do more right now.”
A week has passed, and there has been nothing. On 19 April, he stood there and said:
“we will do more as soon as we can”.—[Official Report, 19 April 2022; Vol. 712, c. 60.]
A month has passed, and still nothing. The Chancellor said, “Wait until the autumn.” At least he is honest that the plan is to do nothing. Does the Prime Minister not realise that working people across the country cannot afford to wait while he vacillates? It is time to make his mind up.
The Prime Minister
I will tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman what has happened in the past month. We have got 300,000 more people off welfare and into work, on our Way to Work programme. It is because we get people into work that those families, those people, are £6,000 a year better off. It is by getting people into work that we fix the long-term problems of this economy. His answer, in addition to putting up taxes, is to borrow more—we heard it from the shadow Chancellor this morning. She says she wants to borrow almost another £30 billion; that is what she says. Do Members know what that means? It means more pressure on interest rates. It means pressure on mortgages. It means pressure on every family—on every man, woman and child—in this country. That is Labour economic policy. That is why there has never been a Labour Government who left office with unemployment lower than when they came in—that is the reality.
Keir Starmer
On the day when inflation went to 9%—the highest rate for 40 years—the least the watching public can expect is a Prime Minister who concentrates on the cost of living crisis. Clearly, he just cannot make his mind up, so let us have a look at who is for this and who is against it. On one side, we have the chair of Tesco; the chair of John Lewis; the Chair of the Treasury Committee; the Chair of the Education Committee; Lord Hague; and Lord Browne, the old chief executive officer of BP. They all support a windfall tax. Even the current boss of BP says a windfall tax would not discourage investment. On the other side, we have the right hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), who, when he is not sticking notes on people’s desks like some overgrown prefect, is dead set against it. When is the Prime Minister finally going to get a grip, stand up for the people of Britain and get on the right side of the argument?
The Prime Minister
Nothing could be more transparent from this exchange than Labour’s lust to raise taxes on business. We do not relish it. We do not want to do it. Of course we do not want to do it; we believe in jobs, in investment and in growth. As it happens, the oil companies concerned are on track to invest about £70 billion into our economy over the next few years, and they are already taxed at a rate of 40%. What we want to see is investment in the long-term energy provision of our country; Labour has signally failed to do this, cancelling our nuclear power investment. The people suffering from high energy prices in this country today have previous Labour Governments to blame for that mistake. Of course we will look at all sensible measures, but we will be driven by considerations of growth, investment and employment. I just remind the House that unemployment has now hit a record low—or for 50 years, I should say—and half a million more people are now in payroll employment than before the pandemic began.
Keir Starmer
So the Prime Minister is on the side of excess profits for oil and gas companies; we are on the side of working people—there you have it. He clearly does not like me pushing him on this, but the reason why I keep coming back to this subject, and why it is so frustrating that he has not acted, is that so many people are living through this nightmare and feel totally abandoned by their Government.
This week, I spoke to Phoenix Halliwell. A rare kidney condition means that Phoenix has to do dialysis from home, from 10 pm to 7 am, five days a week, just so he can take his daughter Rosie to school. His dialysis is life-saving, so he cannot turn it off. Even though his wife, who is a midwife in the NHS, works extra shifts, during the winter they had to turn their central heating off, and Phoenix skips meals to make ends meet, but their energy bill has still doubled. Phoenix says he feels like he is being “priced out of existence.” And it is not just him: millions of our disabled, elderly and vulnerable neighbours are at the sharp end of this crisis. They simply cannot afford to live with dignity.
The decisions we make here matter. The cost of indecision is enormous. People across the country need action now. The plans are already there; Prime Minister, stop the delay and work with us to put them in place. Do it for households that face bills they cannot afford, and do it for Phoenix, who simply cannot afford to wait.
The Prime Minister
I would be grateful if the right hon. and learned Gentleman could send me the details of that sad case. The NHS does cover the costs of those who are on dialysis. By the way, the Opposition voted against the vital investment in the NHS that this country needs.
I remind the right hon. and learned Gentleman, and the House, of the key point: none of this is possible—the investment in the NHS is not possible, the £22 billion that we have already put in is not possible and the further investment we are going to put in is not possible—without the strong economy that this Government have delivered. It is because we took the tough decisions that I have mentioned that we have record low unemployment —or a record low for the last 50 years. The Queen’s Speech that we have been debating is about putting in the infrastructure, skills and technology that will continue to build the platform for growth and jobs in this country. That is what this Government are committed to doing and that is the best way out of economic problems.
By the way, I thought it was fantastic to see Her Majesty the Queen open Crossrail. That has already delivered 72,000 jobs and will produce £90 billion for the whole of the UK economy. Let me ask the right hon. and learned Gentleman: who was the Mayor of London when Crossrail was first starting to be built? And who was the Prime Minister who completed it? We get the big things done. There has never been a Labour Government who left office with unemployment lower than when they began.
Katherine Fletcher (South Ribble) (Con)
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is a fantastic campaigner for her constituency, as I discovered just the other day. We are recruiting more police officers: 300 more in Lancashire and 13,576 more across the whole of the country. I would of course be happy to arrange the relevant meeting so that we can continue to drive neighbourhood crime—which is already down 33%—down even further.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)
I am sure the whole House will want to join me in wishing Glasgow Rangers Football Club all the best in the final tonight. It is always a joy to see Scottish clubs get to the finals of European competitions.
People did not need to see this morning’s official statistics to know that we are experiencing the highest inflation in 40 years. They know it because they are living with it. Families cannot afford food; they cannot pay their bills—and we are only at the beginning. As always, under the Tories, the poorest are punished the most. For months, people have been crying out for support, but, month after month, a distracted Downing Street has failed to lift a finger to help. Does the Prime Minister still support his Chancellor’s insulting statement that acting now in this cost of living emergency would just be “silly”?
The Prime Minister
I support the Chancellor’s work in lifting the living wage by a record amount, in making sure that people on universal credit pay £1,000 less in tax, in putting another £22 billion into supporting people with the cost of living, and in giving £9.1 billion already to help with the cost of energy. Above all, I support what he has done to deliver a strong economic foundation that makes all that possible.
Ian Blackford
My goodness, talk about an Aesop’s fable! Every day that this Prime Minister remains out of touch, people remain out of pocket. By the way, Prime Minister, £20 a week was taken out of people’s universal credit.
The Prime Minister has just confirmed that he does think it would be “silly” to intervene. The Tories’ only response to this cost of living crisis has been insults and inaction. We have the Tory Back Bencher who thinks that poor people just need cooking lessons, the Tory Minister who thinks that people should just get a “better paid job”, and the Chancellor who thinks it would be “silly” to act now. This is the cost of living crisis from Westminster. For weeks, the Prime Minister has been briefing that it is the Treasury that is to blame for blocking financial support for struggling families. Well, Prime Minister, it is time to stop sniping from the sidelines. If this Chancellor will not deliver an emergency budget, it is time for the Prime Minister to sack the Treasury, to sack the Chancellor, and to put somebody else in office who will act.
The Prime Minister
The right hon. Gentleman needs to understand. To get back to the crucial point, we have been through covid, and we are facing a spike in global energy prices which has been greatly exacerbated by what Putin is doing in Ukraine. To deal with that, we are putting billions and billions—already £9.1 billion—into supporting people with the cost of energy, cutting fuel duty by record sums, and helping elderly people in all sorts of ways, not least through local councils, with another £1 billion. Everybody in the country knows, though, that we are not through this yet, and everybody can see that. They all know that the Government are going to do more, but they also know that the only reason that we can do so is that, crucially, we have a strong economy with massively high employment figures. That would not have been possible if we had listened to Opposition Members.
Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for his fantastic campaign. He and I have talked about it at length. Clearly, there is a risk to mental health as young people are given unrealistic expectations about how they should look because of the stuff that they see. His kitemark suggestion is extremely useful, and I will make sure that we follow it up as part of our mental health plan.
Ed Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)
May I join other new fans of Rangers and wish them good luck in Seville tonight?
British farmers are the best in the world. They could play a big part in the answer to how families and pensioners can put food on the table during the cost of living emergency. But from Caithness to Cumbria, from Shropshire to Devon, farmers’ input costs are spiralling upwards: animal feed is up 60% and fertiliser prices have more than doubled. Yet instead of helping Britain’s own food producers the Government are slashing the support payments that farmers rely on, sometimes for up to 50% of their income, even before a new scheme is in place. Will the Prime Minister meet me and farming leaders to understand the extreme challenges they are facing, so that our farmers can do their bit to help families and pensioners to afford to put food on the table during this economic crisis?
The Prime Minister
I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that I do recognise the challenges that farmers are facing with the cost of their inputs in fuel and fertiliser. That is why we are working so hard to abate those costs—not just cutting duty, but doing everything else we can to ensure that we fix the energy crisis. What we are also doing is championing UK food and farming, which has fantastic export markets around the world and now has 73 trade deals to exploit in a world avid, as he rightly says, for delicious, wholesome and nutritious UK food and drink. I would be very happy to organise the relevant meeting with him.
Julie Marson (Hertford and Stortford) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend’s constituents very much for what they are doing to help Ukrainians fleeing war and aggression. I know that Members up and down the country have constituents who are being incredibly generous; I think we can all be proud of the UK’s efforts. Yes, it is true that the UK signed historic declarations the other day with Sweden and Finland to reinforce our mutual security and to fortify Europe’s defences. That has been a massive step change in our co-operation, a thoroughly good thing, and it has been driven in the cases of both Sweden and Finland by the people themselves, who see the logic of NATO membership.
Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I must respectfully disagree with the implication for the civil service that working from home is everywhere as productive as being in the office. I simply do not accept that. I think we will become more productive and more efficient if, on the whole, we find ways to get back to our desks.
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
Mr Speaker
Order. I am sorry, Prime Minister. I have got a real problem. Some people are not going to get in. Have we seen the time now, and we are only on question 16? I want everybody to help each other so that we can speed up and we might get a few more in.
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend, who is a massive champion for his constituency of North West Durham. I am delighted that he has been a supporter of County Durham’s city of culture bid—culture in its widest interpretation. I support him in everything he does.
Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
We intend fully to deliver the dementia moonshot, but never forget that Labour was the party that voted against £13 billion a year extra for the NHS.
Tom Randall (Gedling) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I am told that driving licences are now being issued faster than they were. I am also told that there are no delays in successful online driving licence applications and that customers should receive their licence within a few days. If I am misinformed about that, I trust that my hon. Friend will let me know.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
The Prime Minister
I accept that of course there are economic pressures on our country now caused by the factors that we have mentioned, but that is why we have already increased the minimum wage by £1,000 per year for those who are on it, already increased universal credit by £1,000 a year, and all the other measures—billions and billions of tax that we are putting into supporting incomes. The reason we can do that is that we have strong economic fundamentals, with unemployment—I do not know when the hon. Gentleman was born—at the lowest it has been since 1974. That is giving us the foundation to take our country forward.
Robbie Moore (Keighley) (Con)
The Prime Minister
There is a lot of pressure on me to dish out yet another hospital from this Dispatch Box. But I can tell my hon. Friend that we are reviewing all applications for the next eight hospitals in our new hospital programme, which is the biggest in a generation. That is only possible because we have a strong economy. My hon. Friend is a doughty campaigner for his constituents. We will make a final decision later this year.
Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)
The Prime Minister
I do not know the answer to the hon. Member’s question, but as soon as we can get some information about that, I will make sure that the House is properly informed.
Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Local residents could have no more powerful voice than that of my hon. Friend. The House will have heard him loud and clear. I know that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities will have heard him loud and clear and will make sure that he gets the relevant meeting.
Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)
The Prime Minister
It is 10 out of 10, because we believe in this Government in adhering to the principles of the ministerial code. By the way, and this is an important point, because there are a lot of attacks on MPs and on what goes on in this place, it is always worth stressing that the vast majority of people who work in the House of Commons—Members of Parliament—are doing a very good job and working very hard and are not misbehaving.
Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
Thirsk and Malton has welcomed asylum seekers from all parts of the world, including Syria and Ukraine, but the Government have just announced that, starting from 31 May, up to 1,500 non-detained young, single males from different parts of the world—asylum seekers—will be kept on a base at the centre of a small rural village of 600 people—a village of children all the way through to elderly residents. That is a village without streetlights and without police presence. It will devastate the community. It will devastate house prices, which will plummet, and the residents of that village will not feel safe to leave their homes alone. Will my right hon. Friend please, on behalf of the community, stop these plans?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend very much, and I know that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is engaging with him and others locally about the use of the site. I hear loud and clear what he has had to say. Indeed, I am the recipient of many of his intercessions on this matter, and I understand the strength of feeling in his constituency. I am sure there will be further meetings between him and the Home Office about what we can do.
Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
Before we get under way, I point out that a British Sign Language interpretation of Prime Minister’s questions is available to watch on parliamentlive.tv.
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
Today marks five years since this country voted to leave the European Union. It has allowed us to take back control of the issues that matter to the people of the United Kingdom. It has given us the freedom to establish eight freeports across the country, driving new investment; to develop the fastest vaccine roll-out in Europe; to protect and invest in jobs and renewal across every part of the UK; to control our immigration system, and to sign an historic trade deal with Australia. It will allow us to shape a better future for our people. Over 5.6 million EU citizens have already applied to our EU settlement scheme, and I would encourage anyone who may still be eligible to apply ahead of the deadline next week.
This week is Armed Forces Week, and I am sure that colleagues from across the House will wish to join me in thanking our fantastic armed forces and their families for their service to our country.
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
John Stevenson
Prime Minister, we are to host COP26. Our goal is net zero by 2050. To achieve that target will require innovative policies and a free market approach would help. Therefore, if we were to make solar panels compulsory for all new residential builds, we immediately create a large market. It will lead to innovation, lower prices, job creation and contribute towards our 2050 target. Will the Prime Minister support such a policy initiative?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes a very interesting suggestion which I will certainly look into, though I should caution that some homes do not have enough space on their roof or indeed have their roofs angled in the right way to make solar panels viable. What we are already doing is tightening our standards to ensure that new homes produce at least 75% lower carbon dioxide emissions compared to current standards, on our way to net zero by 2050.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
Why, under this Government, has the number of rape convictions and prosecutions fallen to a record low?
The Prime Minister
One of the first things I said when I came to the Dispatch Box as Prime Minister was that I thought that rape prosecutions and convictions were too low. That is why we have the end-to-end rape review, that is why we have been investing in independent sexual violence advisers and domestic violence advisers—another £27 million—and that is why we have been investing more in the Crown Prosecution Service, with another £85 million. We are also dealing with the misery experienced by rape victims and survivors who have to hand over their mobile phones, which I think has been one of the evidential problems that has arisen in prosecuting rape cases. What we have also been doing is imposing tougher sentences for serious sexual and violent offences. It would have been good to have some support in that from the right hon. and learned Gentleman and from those on the Opposition Benches.
Keir Starmer
We all agree that the figures are appalling. The question is why. The Government’s own review makes it clear that rape convictions and prosecutions have halved since 2016—halved. We know that that is nothing to do with the pandemic, because this is a five-year trend and we know it is not because there are fewer rape cases being reported, because that number has gone up significantly, so let me return to the question that the Prime Minister has not answered: why does the Prime Minister think that rape prosecutions and convictions have plummeted on his watch?
The Prime Minister
Because, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows very well because he has some experience of this matter, there are considerable evidential problems, particularly in recovering data from mobile phones, and that has been an obstacle to the speedy preparation of cases. Too often, let us be frank, cases go from the police to the Crown Prosecution Service not in a fit state. Too often, those cases are not in a fit state when they come to court and there is not a good enough join up across the criminal justice system. That is exactly what we are addressing by our investment and with our end-to-end rape review. What would be good, Mr Speaker, is if we had some support from the Opposition for tougher sentences for rapists and serious sexual offenders. What kind of a signal does it send when they will not even back tougher sentences?
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister knows very well why we voted against his Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill: precisely because it did more to protect statues than women. But since he has brought it up, let us address the central question. Prime Minister, 98.4% of reported rapes do not end up in a charge—98.4%—and therefore the question of sentence never arises in those cases. Since he has brought up the Bill—it is his main defence, it seems—can he point to what provision, what clause, what chapter, what part of that Bill will do anything to change the fact that 98.4% of reported rape cases do not end in charges and do not get to sentence? Which clause, part, chapter or words in that Bill? Point to one thing.
The Prime Minister
Let me point to sections 106 and 107 of that Bill, which Labour voted down, which would have stopped the early release of rapists at the halfway point of their sentences. What kind of signal or message does that send to people who commit crimes of rape? It is very important that the message should go out from this House of Commons that we will not tolerate serious sexual violence. I am afraid that the right hon. and learned Gentleman has not been supporting that message.
What we are doing now is bringing forward measures by investing in independent domestic violence and sexual violence advisers to ensure that victims and survivors of the crime of rape have people in whom they can confide and trust throughout that miserable period when they are in the criminal justice system. Another thing we are doing is recruiting record numbers of police officers, and I am proud to say that 40% of our new recruits are female, which I believe will be of great consolation and use to those who are victims and survivors of rape.
Keir Starmer
What an appalling answer. I asked the Prime Minister why 98.4% of cases are not getting into the system and he talks about sentence. That is the problem. If he thinks that is the answer, that is why we have got these terrible rates of conviction and of prosecution. The answer is: there is nothing in that Bill. The truth is, victims of rape are being failed. Those are not just my words; they are in the Government’s own report:
“Victims of rape are being failed.”
There is no escaping that appalling figure: 98.4% of rape cases ending without anybody being charged, and those that do get into the system take years to go through. Does the Prime Minister accept that cuts to the criminal justice system have contributed to that appalling situation?
The Prime Minister
No, because we have increased the numbers of people in the CPS by at least 200, and they are specifically dedicated to helping to prosecute the crime of rape and sexual violence. We are absolutely determined to stamp it out. This is a problem that has been getting worse because of the evidential difficulties caused by the data recovery process and a lack of unity and joined-up thinking between all parts of the criminal justice system. That is something that the Government are now addressing by more investment, by putting more police out on the street and by having tougher sentences. Finally, it would be good to hear the right hon. and learned Gentleman support it.
Keir Starmer
I spent five years as Director of Public Prosecutions, prosecuting thousands of rape cases. I do not need lectures, but I do know the impact of cuts in our criminal justice service. The Government cannot make significant cuts to the Crown Prosecution Service, 25% cuts to the Ministry of Justice, close half the courts in England and Wales and now pretend that a small budget increase will solve the problem.
This is about more than just cuts. The rape review is welcome, but it is weak. The Government’s Victims’ Commissioner described the review as “underwhelming” and said it could have been “10 times stronger”. That review is littered with pilots and consultations on proposals that have literally been discussed for years and years. It is so unambitious. Is it not the case that despite these shameful figures—they are shameful—the Government are still not showing the urgency needed to tackle the epidemic of violence against women and girls?
The Prime Minister
No, because we have also brought in the landmark domestic violence Bill—again, it would have been good if we had had wholehearted support from the Labour party—and no, because the Government have brought in much tougher sentences for serious sexual and violent offenders. No matter how much the right hon. and learned Gentleman wriggles and squirms, he cannot get away from the simple fact that, on a three-line Whip, he got his party to vote against tougher sentences for serious sexual and violent offenders. That is weak.
Keir Starmer
You can always tell when he is losing, Mr Speaker. [Interruption.]
Keir Starmer
On the Prime Minister’s watch, rape prosecutions and convictions are at a record low, court backlogs are at a record high, victims are waiting longer for justice and criminals are getting away with it. This was not inevitable; it is the cost of a decade of Conservative cuts. Even now, the Government are not showing the urgency and ambition that is needed. The Justice Secretary has done the rarest of things for this Government and apologised, but I note that the Prime Minister has not done that today. It is time that he did—that he took some responsibility and backed it up with action. Will he do so?
The Prime Minister
As I said to the right hon. and learned Gentleman—and I fought to have tougher action against rapists and sexual offenders throughout my time as Mayor of London; and, of course, to all the victims of rape and sexual violence, all the victims and survivors, of course I say sorry for the trauma that they have been through, the frustration that they go through because of the inadequacies of the criminal justice system. We are fixing that. We are fixing that by investing another £1 billion in clearing the court backlogs and ensuring that they have people that they can listen to and trust who will help them through the trials of the criminal justice experience. But above all, we are helping them by getting our courts moving again. The fastest, most efficient way to do that, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, is to get our country moving again, which is what we are doing with the fastest vaccination roll-out anywhere in Europe. We are getting on with the job. They jabber, we jab. They dither, we deliver. They vacillate and we vaccinate.
Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. The levelling-up fund has the potential to do massive good for Calderdale, and indeed the whole country, and I hope that Calderdale Council has listened to his strictures this afternoon and will act.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)
This morning, The Herald newspaper revealed that, in the middle of a pandemic, Tory Ministers secretly directed funds from an emergency covid contract to carry out polling on the Union. This evidence was uncovered in official documents submitted to the High Court, so the Prime Minister would be well advised to be very careful in his answer to this question. And it is a very simple question: did the UK Government use a £560,000 emergency covid contract to conduct constitutional campaigning on the Union?
The Prime Minister
I am afraid I am not aware of the contract to which the right hon. Gentleman refers, but what I can tell him is that I think that the Union, and the benefits of the Union, have been incalculable throughout the covid pandemic, and that for the vaccine roll-out, which I just mentioned to the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), vaccines have been pioneered in Scotland, brewed in Oxford, bottled in Wales and rolled out throughout the UK. I think it is a tribute to the Union that the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) seeks to undermine.
Ian Blackford
The Prime Minister has just demonstrated, not for the first time, that he has not got a clue. The answer to the question is yes. Whether it is redecorating the Downing Street flat or siphoning off covid funds for political campaigning, the pattern is clear: the Tories simply can’t be trusted. Let us be very clear as to what happened here: these emergency covid contracts were supposed to be used for things like personal protective equipment for our brave doctors and for nurses fighting covid. Instead, during the height of this deadly pandemic, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster used these emergency contracts to commission political research on—and I quote—
“attitudes to the UK Union.”
What is worse, he handed these lucrative contracts to long-term friends and former employees. In essence, this was a UK Government contract that sanctioned corrupt campaigning, Prime Minister. If the Prime Minister has even a shred of credibility, will he now commit to a full public inquiry on this gross misuse of public funds?
The Prime Minister
I cannot think of a better use of public funds than making sure that the whole of the UK fights the covid pandemic together, and that is what we are doing. Thanks to the UK Treasury, we were able to spend £407 billion supporting jobs and families in Scotland. We were able to use the British Army to send vaccines throughout the whole of the UK. I believe that the story of this last two years has shown the incalculable value of our Union and the strength of our Union, and that we are better together.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I have fond memories of visiting my hon. Friend’s constituency and using an electric taxi. They thought that was impossible 15 years ago, but we got it done and we will make sure that his constituency and constituencies across the country are in the lead in building new electric vehicles for this country and for the world.
Ed Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)
In Chesham and Amersham, several people told me how they struggle week in, week out to care for family loved ones while trying to hold down a job. They told me that they felt the Prime Minister was not interested in them, that he was not listening to them and that he did not care about them. Such inspiring working family carers are not unique to Chesham and Amersham. There are thousands in every constituency—no doubt in every seat across the so-called Conservative heartlands—with an estimated 7 million people juggling unpaid care and jobs last year. What is the Prime Minister going to do to make these people’s lives a little bit easier? When is he going to stop taking working family carers for granted?
The Prime Minister
I salute working family carers and people who look after loved ones, as they have done throughout the pandemic. What we have tried to do, as I have just said, is to look after families through the last 18 months to the best of this country’s ability, supporting them with furlough and with all sorts of schemes, in addition to putting unprecedented sums into social care. But there is nothing any Government could do, and there are no words that I could express, that would be enough to requite the care and love that is given by family carers to those they look after.
Steve Double (St Austell and Newquay) (Con)
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend raises a point that has been raised repeatedly with me in Cornwall, and we are absolutely determined to address the issue in question and to work with Linda Taylor, the leader of the newly Conservative Cornwall Council, to ensure that we build local homes for local people so that young people growing up in Cornwall have the chance of owning their own home.
Julie Elliott (Sunderland Central) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister
I was shocked and amazed to hear that computers were literally being sent to landfill in the way the hon. Lady describes, and I think the whole House would agree that the practice is bizarre and unacceptable. I am sure Amazon will wish to rectify it as fast as possible, but one thing that we are doing—to get to her second point—is ensuring that tech giants and other companies pay their fair share of tax on their sales within this country, thanks to the agreement that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor struck at the G7.
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, I can confirm to my hon. Friend that the Department for Transport’s review is looking at the design and construction of the Aylesbury spur, but I have to caution that the cost of construction of that spur is currently very high and we need to look at the numbers to ensure that they come down. I hope he may be helpful in that matter.
John Nicolson (Ochil and South Perthshire) (SNP) [V]
The Prime Minister
I do not want to disappoint the hon. Gentleman, but I am seldom away from Scotland and cannot wait to be back there as soon as possible, after the record poll secured by Scottish Conservatives at the recent election. Yet again we hear this abuse of Australia, which has high animal welfare standards, and a negative attitude to the opportunities that free trade offers this country and the people of Scotland. When is the hon. Gentleman going to stop running down Scottish agriculture and the potential of Scottish farming?
Mrs Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con)
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is entirely right to raise the issue of the appalling murder in Swadlincote. We are making sure with our Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that such crimes are dealt with in a more expeditious way, with greater powers for the police. As I say, we are also recruiting 20,000 more police, including, she will be pleased to know, an additional 85 in Derbyshire.
Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP) [V]
The Prime Minister
The EU settlement scheme has been one of the great successes of our recent Brexit negotiations, and it has produced 5.6 million applications already; I seem to remember that we were told there were only 3.2 million or 3 million to begin with. Everybody knows what the deadline is. I hope people will come forward and do what 5.6 million other people have already done.
Dr James Davies (Vale of Clwyd) (Con)
The Prime Minister
BT Openreach recently extended its offer of commercial coverage for gigabit broadband to services in my hon. Friend’s area—in the community that he mentions—and that is partly because of the super deduction in taxation in respect of investment that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor announced recently at the Budget.
Owen Thompson (Midlothian) (SNP)
Mr Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield) (Con)
Has my right hon. Friend had a chance to review the recent Foreign Office announcement that Britain is to cut its support for tackling neglected tropical diseases by a staggering 95%? That will not only write off quite a considerable investment by British taxpayers in this important work, but mean that 280 million drugs, tablets and vaccines will have to be written off and burned or destroyed. Does he know that the World Health Organisation has said that this one act will lead to the maiming, the blinding, the disruption of the lives and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people?
Will my right hon. Friend accept and respect the statement that Mr Speaker made from his Chair on Monday 7 June, when he said that there must be a meaningful vote in this House on this matter? Will my right hon. Friend see whether such a vote can be brought forward before the end of term and the summer recess? If not, will he ensure that the 0.7% commitment is brought back from the start of next year?
The Prime Minister
I am told by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House that there will be an estimates day debate on overseas aid, but I must say that I just do not accept the characterisation that my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell)—for all his expertise and learning in this matter—has just given of this country and our contribution to the fight against disease around the world. In spite of all the difficulties we face, we are contributing £10 billion in official development assistance this year—in spite of the colossal expenditure that the British state has been forced to make to look after jobs and families around the country. In addition to that, we are spending £1.6 billion on supporting COVAX and £458 million on supporting Gavi. Colleagues should remember that one in three of the COVAX vaccines that are, as my right hon. Friend knows, saving lives around the world is the direct result of the actions of the UK Government. The people of this country should be very proud of what we are achieving.
Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I accept the injustice that was done to the Windrush generation and renew the apologies on behalf of the Government for our share of responsibility. Yes, I do want to make sure that the compensation scheme is accelerated; I spoke to the people responsible for distributing it just the other night. I also said—I hope the House would agree—that I hope that in due time the name Windrush will be associated not just with that injustice, though it was appalling, but with the amazing contribution, sacrifice and effort of the Windrush generation to this country, that Windrush is a positive name for the people of this country, and that, indeed, Windrush is regarded as the Mayflower of our country.
Esther McVey (Tatton) (Con)
The Prime Minister
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about the importance of gigabit broadband. That is why the coverage has gone up, just since I have been Prime Minister, I think from 9% of our country to 60% this year. We hope to get up to 100% in the course of the next few years. I cannot agree with her, however, about HS2. The House did vote for it. It has the potential to do a massive amount of good in levelling up across the whole UK. Indeed, I think even the Liberal Democrats voted for it—I see the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Ed Davey) there—although you would not think it to judge from some of their recent campaigns, would you, Mr Speaker? But that is the thing about the Liberal Democrats: they can vote for one thing, then say another when it comes to elections.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab) [V]
When the covid-19 pandemic exploded, scientists warned that with rapid transmission more dangerous variants would emerge and that vaccines could lose efficacy in the face of mutations. Now variant upon variant has sparked surge testing, further lockdowns and the recent delay to the end of restrictions, with 41 people already reported to have the more virulent delta-plus variant. The Prime Minister held his vaccine donation as putting people squarely above profit, but that is lousy in the face of the fact that intellectual property is driving global supply shortages. Does he therefore understand why it is no use for the G7 to promise 1 billion doses at some point in the future when people are dying now, and when the success of our vaccination programme is under threat from emerging variants now? Will he reconsider his negligible vaccine donation policy and join over 100 countries in supporting the vaccine intellectual property waiver?
The Prime Minister
I really think it is satirical to say that the G7’s efforts have so far been negligible. What the G7 agreed at Carbis Bay was another billion, on top of the billion that has already been contributed. The UK is putting in, as the hon. Lady knows, another 100 million up to June next year. As for the points she makes about variants and vaccines, she should know that all the advice we have at present is that the vaccines are effective against all the variants that we can currently see.
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed. What we want to ensure— [Interruption.] Yes, because I will not have this misrepresented by the Liberal Democrats in the way that they do. I will not have it misrepresented by anybody, because what we want to do is ensure that we give young people in this country the chance of home ownership, which the Labour party would ruthlessly deny them. What we want to do, by our levelling-up agenda, is to help young people across the country and to make sure, by the way, that we relieve pressure on the overheating south-east and ensure that we build back better across the whole UK. That is the objective of our planning Bill.
Mr Speaker
I am now suspending the House for three minutes to enable the necessary arrangements to be made for the next business.
Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(3 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
I know that the thoughts of Members across the House are with the people of India. We are supporting India with vital medical equipment and we will continue to work closely with the Indian authorities to determine what further help they may need.
I also welcome last week’s Court of Appeal decision to overturn the convictions of 39 former sub-postmasters in the Horizon dispute—an appalling injustice. Sir Wyn Williams is leading an ongoing independent inquiry that will report this summer.
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I will have further such meetings later today.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
I join the Prime Minister in his remarks about the humanitarian disaster we are witnessing in India. I know the UK has already committed some support, but given the scale and gravity of the disaster, I hope the Foreign Secretary will set out today what more the UK will do to help the Indian people in their hour of need.
I also join the Prime Minister in his remarks about the Post Office case—an ongoing injustice. Of course, today is International Workers Memorial Day. This year, after all the sacrifices our frontline workers have made during the pandemic, it is even more poignant than usual. I join in solidarity with all those mourning loved ones today.
It was reported this week, including in the Daily Mail and by the BBC and ITV, backed up by numerous sources, that at the end of October the Prime Minister said he would rather have “bodies pile high” than implement another lockdown. Can the Prime Minister tell the House categorically, yes or no: did he make those remarks or remarks to that effect?
The Prime Minister
No, Mr Speaker. The right hon. And learned Gentleman is a lawyer, I am given to understand, and I think that if he is going to repeat allegations like that, he should come to this House and substantiate those allegations and say where he heard them and who exactly is supposed to have said those things. What I certainly can tell him—he asks about the October decisions—is that they were very bitter, very difficult decisions, as they would be for any Prime Minister, because no one wants to put this country into a lockdown, with all the consequences that means for loss of education, the damage to people’s life chances, and the huge medical backlog that it entails. But it was thanks to that lockdown—the tough decision that we took—and thanks to the heroic efforts of the British people that we have got through to this stage in the pandemic where we find ourselves rolling out our vaccine, where we have done 50% of the population and 25% of the adult population have now had two doses. Lockdowns are miserable. Lockdowns are appalling things to have to do. But I have to say that I believe that we had absolutely no choice.
Keir Starmer
Well, somebody here is not telling the truth. The House will have heard the Prime Minister’s answer, and I remind him that the ministerial code says:
“Ministers who knowingly mislead Parliament will be expected to offer their resignation”.
I will leave it there for now. [Hon. Members: “Ooh!] There will be further on this, believe you me. Who initially —and “initially” is the key word here—paid for the redecoration of his Downing Street flat?
The Prime Minister
When it comes to misleading Parliament, the right hon. and learned Gentleman may recollect that it was only a few weeks ago that he said that he did not oppose this country leaving the European Medicines Agency—a fact that he was then forced to retract—and that leaving the European Medicines Agency was absolutely invaluable for our vaccine roll-out. Actually, it was just last week that he said that James Dyson was a personal friend of mine—a fact that James Dyson has corrected in the newspaper this morning. As for the latest stuff that he is bringing up, he should know that I paid for Downing Street refurbishment personally. Any further declaration that I have to make—if any—I will be advised upon by Lord Geidt.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman talks about housing costs. The people of this country can make their own decision in just eight days’ time, because on average, Labour councils charge you £93 more in band D than Conservative councils, and Liberal Democrat councils charge you £120 more. That, I think, is the issue upon which the British people would like him to focus.
Keir Starmer
Normally when people do not want to incriminate themselves, they go, “No comment.” Let us explore this a bit further. Let me ask it a different way. This is the initial invoice, Prime Minister. Either the taxpayer paid the initial invoice, or it was the Conservative party, or it was a private donor, or it was the Prime Minister. I am making it easy for the Prime Minister—it is now multiple choice. There are only four options. It should be easier than finding the chatty rat. I ask him again: who paid the initial invoice—the initial invoice, Prime Minister—for the redecoration of the Prime Minister’s flat?
The Prime Minister
I have given the right hon. and learned Gentleman the answer, and the answer is that I have covered the costs. Of course, the Electoral Commission is investigating this, and I can tell him that have I conformed in full with the code of conduct and the ministerial code, and officials have been advising me throughout this whole thing. But I think people will find it absolutely bizarre that he is focusing on this issue, when what people want to know is what plans a Labour Government might have to improve the lives of people in this country.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman talks about housing again. I would rather not spend taxpayers’ money like the last Labour Government, who spent £500,000 of taxpayers’ money on the Downing Street flat. [Interruption.] Yes they did, tarting it up. I would much rather help people get on the property ladder, and it is this Conservative Government who have built 244,000 homes in the last year, which is a record over 30 years. This is a Government who get on with delivering on the people’s priorities, while he continually raises issues that most people would find irrelevant to their concerns.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister talks of priorities. What is he spending his time doing? This is a Prime Minister who, during the pandemic, was nipping out of meetings to choose wallpaper at £840 a roll. Just last week, he spent his time phoning journalists to moan about his old friend Dominic Cummings. He is telling the civil service to find out who paid for the redecoration of his flat—the Cabinet Secretary has been asked to investigate who paid for the refurbishment of the flat. Why doesn’t the Prime Minister just tell him? That would be the end of the investigation.
It has been widely reported that Lord Brownlow, who just happens to have been given a peerage by the Conservative party, was asked to donate £58,000 to help pay for the cost of this refurbishment. Can the Prime Minister, if he is so keen to answer, confirm: did Lord Brownlow make that payment for that purpose?
The Prime Minister
I think I have answered this question several times now, and the answer is that I have covered the costs. I have met the requirements that I have been obliged to meet in full. When it comes to the taxpayer and the costs of No. 10 Downing Street, it was under the previous Labour Government that I think Tony Blair racked up a bill of £350,000. I think what the people of this country want to see is minimising taxpayer expense. They want to see a Government who are focused on their needs and delivering more homes for the people of this country and cutting council tax, which is what we are doing. It is on that basis that I think people are going to judge our parties on 6 May.
Keir Starmer
Answer the question! That is what the public scream at their televisions every PMQs: “Answer the question!” The Prime Minister has not answered the question. He knows he has not answered the question. He never answers the question.
The Prime Minister will be aware that he is required to declare any benefits that relate to his political activities, including loans or credit arrangements, within 28 days—[Interruption.] Twenty-eight days, Prime Minister, yes. He will also know that any donation must be recorded in the register of Ministers’ interests, and that under the law any donation of over £500 to a political party must be registered and declared, so the rules are very clear. The Electoral Commission now thinks that there are reasonable grounds to suspect that an offence or offences may have occurred. That is incredibly serious.
Can the Prime Minister tell the House: does he believe that any rules or laws have been broken in relation to the refurbishment of the Prime Minister’s flat?
The Prime Minister
No, I don’t. What I believe has been strained to breaking point is the credulity of the public. The right hon. and learned Gentleman has half an hour every week to put serious and sensible questions to me about the state of the pandemic, about the vaccine roll-out, about what we are doing to support our NHS, about what we are doing to fight crime, about what we are doing to bounce back from this pandemic, about the economic recovery, about jobs for the people of this country, and he goes on and on about wallpaper when, as I have told him umpteen times now, I paid for it.
Keir Starmer
Can I remind the Prime Minister of the Nolan principles, which are meant to govern the behaviour of those in public office? They are these: selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership. Instead, what do we get from this Prime Minister and this Conservative Government? Dodgy contracts, jobs for their mates and cash for access. And who is at the heart of it? The Prime Minister. Major Sleaze, sitting there.
Meanwhile—the Prime Minister talks about priorities—crime is going up, NHS waiting lists are at record levels and millions of people are worried about their jobs, including at Liberty Steel. Do not the British people deserve a Prime Minister they can trust, not a Government who are mired in sleaze, cronyism and scandal?
The Prime Minister
Last week, the right hon. and learned Gentleman came to this Chamber and he attacked me for talking to James Dyson about ventilators, when we are now sending ventilators to help the people of India, and the following day—the following day—Labour Front Benchers said that any Prime Minister in my position would have done exactly the same thing. It was only a few months ago that they were actually attacking Kate Bingham, saying she was a crony when she helped to set up the vaccine taskforce that delivered millions of vaccines for the people of this country and is helping us to get out of the pandemic.
This is a Government who are getting on with delivering on the people’s priorities. We are rolling out many more nurses, with 10,000 more nurses in the NHS now than there were this time last year, and 8,771 more police officers on our streets now than they were when I was elected, with tougher sentences for serious sexual and violent criminals, which the right hon. and learned Gentleman opposed. And, by the way, I forgot to mention it but last night our friends in the European Union voted to approve our Brexit deal, which he opposed. That enables us not just to take back control of our borders, but to deliver free—[Interruption.] It does, which he fervently opposed, enabling us, among other things, to deal with such threats as the European super league. It enables us to deliver freeports in places like Teesside. Above all, taking back control of our country has allowed us to deliver the fastest vaccine roll-out in Europe, as he well knows, which would not have been possible if we had stayed in the European Medicines Agency, which he voted for.
Week after week, the people of this country can see the difference between a Labour party that twists and turns with the wind and thinks of nothing except playing political games, whereas this party gets on with delivering on the people’s priorities, and I hope the people will vote Conservative on 6 May. [Interruption.]
Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con)
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend should thank everybody involved, and it has been a fantastic national effort, led by the NHS—led overwhelmingly by GPs, but also by many others, including local council officers and officials and the Army, and of course huge numbers of volunteers in her constituency and elsewhere, and I thank Kirsty Griffiths, Guy Hollis and Paul Bass very much for everything they have done.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP) [V]
May I associate myself with the remarks of the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition on the humanitarian crisis in India and the injustice in the Horizon issue at the Post Office?
Over 127,000 people have died from covid in the United Kingdom. People have lost their mothers and fathers, their grandparents and even their children. NHS staff have given their all, fighting to keep people alive. That is why so many people find the Prime Minister’s remark that he would rather let the bodies pile high in their thousands than go into lockdown utterly, utterly sickening. The BBC and ITV have multiple sources confirming that this is what the Prime Minister said. People are willing to go under oath confirming that the Prime Minister said these exact words—under oath, Mr Speaker. Parliamentary rules stop me saying that the Prime Minister has repeatedly lied to the public over the last week, but may I ask the question: are you a liar, Prime Minister?
The Prime Minister
Mr Speaker, I leave it to you to judge whether the right hon. Gentleman’s remarks were in order, but what I will say to him—
Mr Speaker
Order. Unfortunately, they were in order, but were not savoury and not what we would expect.
The Prime Minister
I am grateful, Mr Speaker, but what I would say to the right hon. Gentleman is that if he is going to relay that kind of quotation, it is up to him in a place like Parliament to produce the author—the person who claims to have heard it— because I cannot find them. He says that they are willing to go on oath; perhaps they are sitting somewhere in this building; I rather doubt it, because I did not say those words.
What I do believe is that a lockdown is a miserable, miserable thing, and I did everything I could to try to protect the British public throughout the pandemic—to protect them from lockdowns, but also to protect them from disease. The right hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to the wretched toll that covid has brought, and I know the whole House grieves for every family that has lost a loved one. It has been a horrendous time, but it is thanks to that lockdown combined with the vaccine roll-out that we are making the progress we are, and I may say that we are making progress across the whole of the United Kingdom.
Ian Blackford [V]
Thank you, Mr Speaker, and of course it is the Prime Minister’s behaviour which is not in order. This is a Prime Minister who is up to his neck in a swamp of Tory sleaze. We have seen contracts for cronies, texts for tax breaks and cash for curtains. The Prime Minister has dodged these questions all week, and he has dodged them again today, but these questions simply are not going to go away. When exactly was money funnelled through Tory HQ into his personal bank account, when did he pay back this money, was it an interest-free loan, and who are the donor or donors who originally funded it? Is the Prime Minister aware that if he continues to fail to answer these questions, the Electoral Commission has the powers to prosecute him? Will the Prime Minister publish these details today, or is he going to wait until the police come knocking at his door?
The Prime Minister
As I have said, I look forward to what the Electoral Commission has to say, but I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that, for the rest of it, he is talking complete nonsense. The only thing I will say is that it is thanks to our investment in policing that we are going to have 20,000 more officers on the streets of our country, which is fantastic, and we will be making sure that that gets through to Scotland as well. What we want to see is a Scottish nationalist Government stopping obsessing about breaking up our country, which is all they can think and talk about, and instead talking about tackling crime and using that investment to fight crime, which is what I think the people of Scotland want to see.
Gary Sambrook (Birmingham, Northfield) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I am lost in admiration for what Andy Street is doing. He is a fantastic Mayor of the West Midlands and he has a fantastic vision for transport, jobs, growth and recovery. I hope everybody votes for Andy Street on 6 May.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC) [V]
Diolch yn fawr, Llefarydd. I think it is worth repeating the ministerial code’s seven guiding principles: selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership. The Prime Minister has spent the week ticking them off his “don’t do” list. At the same time, he tries to play down allegations that he said “let the bodies pile high”. Given that the sole judge on questions relating to the conduct of Ministers and the conduct of the Prime Minister is the Prime Minister himself, what happens when a Prime Minister goes rogue?
The Prime Minister
The people of this country have the chance to make up their own minds on 6 May. When they look at what is happening in Wales, they have a chance to make a choice between, I am afraid, a continually failing Welsh Labour Government or a Welsh Conservative Administration in Cardiff who I believe have a fantastic vision: 65,000 high-skilled, high-paid jobs; finally addressing the problems of the A55; 5,000 more teachers; getting 3,000 more nurses into the Welsh NHS; and solving the problems of the M4, which I have spoken about so movingly many times in this Chamber. I hope that people will avoid voting for Plaid Cymru and that they will vote for Welsh Conservatives on 6 May in Wales.
Duncan Baker (North Norfolk) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his expertise in this matter and thank him for what he has just said, because he is totally right. What happened to those Post Office workers—the postmasters and sub-postmasters—was appalling. It was one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in our history, and we are indeed looking at the issues involved. The former High Court judge Sir Wyn Williams will be making recommendations about what further actions—what further apologies—we need to make.
Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC) [V]
The Prime Minister
I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman is completely wrong in what he says about tests, but he is right about one thing, which is that Wales has made an amazing contribution to our national fightback—our UK fightback—against covid. It was incredible again to go to the Wockhardt factory in Wrexham. It is Wockhardt, working together with Oxford Biomedica, that has enabled us to roll out the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine that has made such a difference. I want to say a massive thank you, again, to those Welsh scientists and all those people working in that factory, because they have helped to save countless lives across the UK.
Laura Farris (Newbury) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I would be honoured to take up my hon. Friend’s invitation as soon as I can. In terms of female representation in that sector, she will know that Alison Atkinson became the chief executive officer and managing director of AWE in May 2020, and there are huge numbers of opportunities for women to join our armed services, thanks above all to the biggest uplift in defence spending since the end of the cold war.
Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)
The Prime Minister
The third runway at Heathrow, as the hon. Lady knows, is a private sector venture, and it is up to them to produce the capital to do it. I do not see any immediate sign of that particular project coming off. I think what we should look at instead, and what we are looking at, is the prospect of jet-zero aviation and flying without emissions, or with far lower carbon emissions. It is in that area that the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Department for Transport are working together with manufacturers so that this country leads in guilt-free flying.
Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Absolutely. I do not know why the Leader of the Opposition’s PPS, the hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris), is shaking her head, because surely she would agree with that. We want to work together across the whole of the UK, and I pay tribute, as I have just said, to the incredible work of the Wockhardt factory in Wales, but there is also the Valneva factory in Scotland, and the whole of the United Kingdom coming together, represented by our armed services and, above all, by our NHS helping to deliver that vaccine roll-out to protect the country and take it forward.
Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister
I tell you what, Mr Speaker, I think it is because people are absolutely determined to find anything they can hang on to talk about, except the vaccine roll-out, except our plans to unite and level up across the country, except our plans to fight crime and give people the opportunity to buy their own homes; because they do not want to discuss those issues, because they cannot win on those issues, because they have absolutely nothing to say, and that is what has become clear over the last year.
Nick Fletcher (Don Valley) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. [Interruption.] Hang on. He is right to want to thank all the staff of Doncaster Royal Infirmary for what they did for the emergency services in dealing with the incident last night, and I am glad to take the opportunity to do that. I am also glad to take the opportunity to support him in his campaign for James Hart. I do hope that the people of Doncaster will go out to vote and support him on 6 May.
Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I promised to publish the account of my dealings with James Dyson, which is exactly what I have done. I cannot believe that the Opposition do not learn their lesson. They attacked the Government last week for having any kind of discussions with a potential British ventilator maker, and the following day they did a U-turn and said that any Prime Minister would do it. They have now done a W-turn, and they are trying to bash me again. Which is it? Do they believe the Government should be supporting British manufacturing in delivering ventilators—yes or no? That is the question for Labour.
Dr Luke Evans (Bosworth) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend. No matter how many pints I joined him in lifting in the pubs of Bosworth, it could not do as much for the economy of Bosworth as what we are already doing with the £56 million welcome back fund, which is probably even more welcome than my presence in Bosworth, I venture to suggest—that is hotly contested, perhaps. We have extended the cut in VAT for tourism and hospitality to 5% right the way through until the end of September.
Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister
I think that what people think is that the Labour party is losing all the arguments across British politics, that it has nothing to say, and that it has no plan for our future and no vision for our country. People see a Conservative Government who are getting on with uniting and levelling up, with the most ambitious agenda any Government have had for generations, and I think that is what they are listening to.
Ben Bradley (Mansfield) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I do, and I thank my hon. Friend for all the wonderful work that he does for his constituency. My message would be, yes, I hope that the people of Nottinghamshire will get out and vote Conservative. It is we who share their priorities on crime, on the NHS, on investment in infrastructure and on levelling up across our country, so I hope they will vote Conservative on 6 May.
Rachel Hopkins (Luton South) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister
I first was made aware of the plan for a European super league on, I think, the Sunday night, and we acted decisively using the arsenal of legislative freedoms that we now have thanks to leaving the European Union, which the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) opposed, of course. We acted decisively to make clear that the UK Government took a dim view of this matter. [Interruption.] And the same goes for my chief of staff.
Siobhan Baillie (Stroud) (Con)
My constituency of Stroud recently won the title of best place to live. There is much to visit there, including an historic lamp standard that was erected to celebrate Queen Victoria’s diamond jubilee. Next year, our own Queen will mark 70 years since her accession to the throne. Will the Prime Minister join me in supporting the gift being proposed by Parliament to mark Her Majesty’s platinum jubilee?
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend for that wonderful proposal, and I certainly encourage all colleagues to support and contribute to her project.
Andrea Jenkyns [V]
Thank you, Mr Speaker. Next week, we will elect our first Mayor of West Yorkshire.
Does the Prime Minister agree that for far too long Labour has taken our northern heartlands for granted? On Thursday 6 May, we have the opportunity to elect patriotic, hard-working northerners such as Matt Robinson, Ben Houchen, and Jill Mortimer in Hartlepool. They will be strong voices and champions for infrastructure, housing and jobs. We must seize the chance to build back better after the pandemic, and only the Conservatives will deliver on that. [Interruption.]
The Prime Minister
Well, Mr Speaker, they don’t like that sort of thing, do they? They don’t like focusing on the issues that actually matter to the British people and the people of West Yorkshire.
I thank my hon. Friend, who is absolutely right. I hope that on 6 May the people will get out and vote for a party that believes in supporting our NHS; that believes in fighting crime, not being soft on crime; and that will bring jobs and regeneration across the country. I hope that they will vote Conservative on 6 May.
Mr Speaker
I am suspending the House for a few minutes to enable the necessary arrangements for the next business.
Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(3 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
Today, on Holocaust Memorial Day, I know that the whole House will want to join me in solemnly remembering the 6 million Jewish men, women and children murdered during the holocaust, and all other victims of Nazi persecution. Last week, I had the privilege of hearing from holocaust survivor Renee Salt and from Ian Forsyth, one of the last living British servicemen who liberated the camp at Bergen-Belsen. Their courage to share their testimonies must inspire us all never to forget the holocaust and the fight against all forms of hatred and prejudice, wherever they are found.
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Rehman Chishti
I associate myself entirely with all that the Prime Minister said.
I thank the Prime Minister and the Government for all their hard work in these difficult and challenging times with regard to the delivery of the covid-19 vaccination. However, my constituents in Gillingham and Rainham and the wider-Medway towns would like me, as their Member of Parliament, to raise their concerns with regard to the availability of the vaccine in our local towns. I have constituents who are in their 80s and 90s who have not yet had the vaccination. Medway was one of the hardest-hit areas in the country, the mutant variant was discovered in Kent, and North Kent has some of the highest health inequalities in the country. Will the Prime Minister please ensure that we have a mass vaccination centre in Medway?
The Prime Minister
I share my hon. Friend’s sense of frustration about the pace of the vaccine roll-out. In spite of the fact that we have the fastest roll-out anywhere in Europe, it is entirely right that a constituency MP should want to see more done as fast as possible. I can tell my hon. Friend that we have vaccinated more than 80% of those over 80 across the country, and we are certainly looking at establishing a large-scale vaccination centre near him. In his immediate vicinity, we have done 127,000 vaccines already, providing the hope of long-term immunity for the people of Medway and Gillingham and Rainham.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab) [V]
May I begin by joining the Prime Minister in his remarks about Holocaust Memorial Day? This evening, I will be joining the UK ceremony and lighting a candle to remember the 6 million Jews murdered in the holocaust, along with, of course, the other genocides and persecutions that have taken place around the world.
Yesterday, we passed the tragic milestone of 100,000 covid deaths in the United Kingdom. That is not just a statistic: behind every death is a grieving family—a mum, a dad, a sister, a brother, a friend, a colleague, a neighbour. The question on everyone’s lips this morning is: why? The Prime Minister must have thought about that question a lot, so will he tell us why he thinks that the United Kingdom has ended up with a death toll of 100,000—the highest number in Europe?
The Prime Minister
Like the right hon. and learned Gentleman, I mourn every death in this pandemic and we share the grief of all those who have been bereaved. Let him and the House be in no doubt that I and the Government take full responsibility for all the actions that we have taken during this pandemic to fight this disease. Yes, there will indeed be a time when we must learn the lessons of what has happened, reflect on them and prepare. I do not think that moment is now, when we are in the throes of fighting this wave of the new variant, when 37,000 people are struggling with covid in our hospitals. What the country wants is for us to come together as a Parliament and as politicians and to work to keep the virus under control, as we are, and to continue to roll out the fastest vaccination programme in Europe. That is where the minds of the public are fixed.
Keir Starmer
I am sure that the Prime Minister regrets the fact that 100,000 people have lost their lives. The question is: why—why has the United Kingdom the highest number of deaths in Europe? Why has the United Kingdom a death rate that is higher than almost anywhere in the world? The Prime Minister is going to have to answer that question one day and he should have the decency to answer it today. A few days ago, the chief scientific officer said, and this was his view: prepare to give it now. The lesson, he said, is:
“You’ve got to go hard, early and broader if you’re going to get on top of this. Waiting and watching simply doesn’t work.”
Does the Prime Minister agree with that?
The Prime Minister
Mr Speaker, when you have a new virus and, indeed, when you have a new variant of that virus of the kind that we have in this country, and when you have dilemmas as hard and as heavy as this Government have had to face over the last year, I must tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman that there are no easy answers. A perpetual lockdown is no answer, but we will continue to do, as I have said to the House and to you, Mr Speaker, everything we can to roll out our vaccine programme to give the public the protection that they want and deserve. As I speak to you today, Mr Speaker, 6.9 million people in our country have had the vaccine. We are on target, if we can get the supplies, to deliver the target of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation on groups 1 to 4, the most vulnerable groups, by 15 February. I hope very much to set out in the next few weeks in much more detail how this country can exit now from the pandemic.
Keir Starmer
The problem with the Prime Minister avoiding the question of why is that vital lessons will not be learned. The reality is this: the Prime Minister was slow into the first lockdown last March; slow in getting protective equipment to the frontline; slow to protect our care homes; slow on testing and tracing; slow into the second lockdown in the autumn; slow to change the Christmas-mixing rules; and slow again into this third lockdown, delaying 13 days from 22 December before implementing it. I fear that he still has not learned that lesson. The latest example is the continued delay in securing our borders. We have known about the variants to the virus since early December, when it was announced in the House of Commons. We know some of those variants are coming from abroad, but we do not know the route. Surely the Prime Minister can see that what is required now is that everybody coming into the country from anywhere in the world should be tested and subject to quarantine in a hotel. Why can that not be put in place today?
The Prime Minister
Throughout this pandemic, it has been the habit of the Opposition first to support one approach and then to attack it and to twist and to turn. It was only recently that the shadow Transport Secretary was saying that quarantine measures should be relaxed. We have one of the toughest regimes in the world. We ask people to test 72 hours before they fly. They have to produce a passenger locator form, otherwise they are kicked off the flight. They already have to quarantine for 10 days and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary will be setting out later today, if the right hon. and learned Gentlemen cares to wait for that, even tougher measures for those red list countries where we are particularly concerned about new variants. Again, what the people of this country want us now to do is to come together as a Government, as a Parliament, and to get this thing done.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister complains about the Opposition, but the greatest criticism of the Prime Minister at the moment in relation to borders is coming from his own Home Secretary. She is busy telling anyone who will listen that the Prime Minister did not do enough in relation to the borders last year. I fear that the Prime Minister is repeating the same mistake in relation to the new variants of the virus.
Let me turn to schools. Everybody agrees that reopening our schools should be a national priority, but that requires a plan, and the Prime Minister has not got a plan. So as a first step—as a first step—does he agree with me that, once the first four categories of the most vulnerable have been vaccinated by mid-February, he should bring forward the vaccination of key workers and use the window of the February half-term to vaccinate all teachers and all school staff?
The Prime Minister
Of course it follows that all teachers in JCVI groups 1 to 9 will be vaccinated as a matter of priority. I pay tribute, by the way, to the huge efforts that parents are making across the country struggling to educate their kids. I know how deeply frustrating it is: the extra burden that we have placed on families by closing the schools. No one has worked harder than my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education to keep schools open. We all want to open schools. I think what we want to hear from the Leader of the Opposition is that he will say loudly and clearly what he has refused to say so many times and what the public need to hear—that schools are safe. It is absolutly critical that he says that.
Keir Starmer
I am sorry, but I am none the wiser as to whether the Prime Minister agrees with me that school teachers and school staff should be vaccinated, taking advantage of the February half-term. That is two or three weeks away. It is a fantastic opportunity, and I am no wiser as to whether the Prime Minister thinks that is a good idea or a bad idea.
In the meantime, the Government have a duty to ensure that every single child can learn from home. Without access to a laptop, a computer or the internet, that cannot happen. The Government were challenged on this last summer; they were challenged on it last autumn; and here we are, nearly at the end of January—the best part of a year into this pandemic—and a third of families say they do not have enough laptops or home computers, and over 400,000 children still cannot get online at home. Does the Prime Minister realise how angry many families are that he still has not got to grips with this?
The Prime Minister
As I said just now, I do fully understand the frustration and impatience of families across the country who are educating their kids at home. I know how difficult it is. I know how frustrated teachers are with educating through remote learning as well. That is why we have provided 1.3 million laptops. That is why we have provided a £1 billion catch-up fund. I will be making a statement in the House in just a few minutes setting out what more we propose to do with the reopening of schools and the way forward with schools, and what more we propose to do by way of supporting pupils and teachers and parents, if the right hon. and learned Gentleman will just wait a few minutes. But he has missed his opportunity, once again, to say what I think people need to hear if we are to get schools to reopen, because that is the best thing for pupils and the best thing for families across the country. I would like to hear from the Leader of the Opposition, in defiance of his union paymasters, that schools are safe.
Mr Speaker
I just remind the Prime Minister: it is Prime Minister’s questions.
Keir Starmer
Every week the Prime Minister comes with his pre-prepared lines. I think when 100,000 people have died he should take the time to answer the question. When one in three families are saying that they do not have enough laptops or computers, his answers are simply not good enough. We are nearly a year into this pandemic—this has not happened in the last few weeks—and one and three families say they do not have the wherewithal to do home teaching. Those children are going without home schooling. That is the question that the Prime Minister should be answering. The UK is the first country in Europe to record 100,000 covid deaths. We also have the deepest recession of any major economy. Our schools are closed and our borders are open. My biggest concern is that the Prime Minister still has not learned the lessons of last year. I fear that as a result we will see more tragedy and more grim milestones.
This afternoon, I will be speaking to families who have lost loved ones to covid. The last time I did that, I asked the Prime Minister what he would like me to say to them on his behalf. He replied with a pre-prepared, childish gag. I can tell the Prime Minister just how badly that went down with those families when I spoke to them later that afternoon. I ask him again—I hope that this time he will have the decency to answer them properly—what would he like me to say to those bereaved families on his behalf this afternoon?
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for meeting the families of the bereaved, as I have done and I know Members of the House have done throughout the pandemic. It is important that we do that. The message that I would give those families is the same that I have given everybody I have met: I of course deeply personally regret the loss of life and the suffering of their families, but I think the best thing that we can do to honour the memory of those who have died and to honour those who are currently grieving is to work together to bring this virus down and to keep it under control in the way that we are. Throughout this pandemic, I am sad to say that the Leader of the Opposition has never failed in his efforts to try to score political points when he could be doing just that. He has twisted, and he has turned. One week, he calls for tougher border measures after the shadow Transport Secretary called for a looser quarantine. He calls for schools to go back, but he will not even say this morning that schools are safe. He tries to associate himself now with the vaccine programme, because he senses that that may be going well, but he stood on a manifesto to unbundle the pharmaceutical companies—the big pharma—that made those vaccines possible.
I know you want me to sit down, Mr Speaker, but I want to make this point, because I tried to make it last week. The right hon. and learned Gentleman even attacked the vaccine taskforce for spending £675,000 on an effort to discover whether hard-to-reach groups would take a vaccine. I really cannot think of a better investment right now of public funds, and I hope that later on this afternoon, he might think of apologising for what he did and for that attack on the vaccine taskforce. The Opposition and the right hon. and learned Gentleman can go on making their party political points. We will go on, with or without his help, in taking this country forward, fighting the pandemic and getting coronavirus down.
Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and she is right to be militating for the eastern leg of HS2. We will be publishing the integrated rail plan early this year, and I am delighted that the £161 million from the transforming cities fund for Nottingham and Derby includes £10 million for a new cycle route between Nottingham, Derby and East Midlands airport. I look forward to cycling it with my hon. Friend.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP) [V]
May I associate myself with the Prime Minister’s remarks on the holocaust? We all remember the 6 million Jews who lost their lives and those terrible crimes against humanity. We should never forget that, nor, indeed, those who have sadly followed them in genocides around the world.
Last night, the Prime Minister claimed that
“we truly did everything we could”
to avoid the deaths of 100,000 people across the UK from covid-19, but we all know that that is simply not true. The UK Government response has been defined by a lack of leadership, last-minute U-turns, mixed messaging and devastating policies. All of this has had an effect on the scale of the pandemic. Professor Linda Bauld has said that nearly a quarter of all deaths we have seen have occurred in the last month. Since the start of the pandemic, the Prime Minister has promised to always follow the advice of scientists. This morning, scientists have said that this Government are responsible for a “legacy of poor decisions” during the pandemic. Does the Prime Minister still agree with the scientists?
The Prime Minister
We have throughout followed scientific advice and done everything we can to minimise disease and suffering throughout the country. The right hon. Gentleman will have heard my answer to the Leader of the Opposition: there are no easy solutions when we are facing dilemmas as tragic as the ones being confronted by countries around the world. But I think that everywhere in the UK can be proud of the efforts now being made by the NHS, by the Army, by volunteers and by pharmacists to roll out the fastest vaccination programme in Europe. That is something that the Government must do, can do, are doing and will do.
Ian Blackford
I must respectfully say that this is not about apportioning blame for honest mistakes; it is about learning lessons from a Prime Minister who has repeatedly ignored the scientific advice. When we called on the Prime Minister to introduce tough border controls last spring, he refused. When we told the Prime Minister it was a mistake to end lockdown prematurely and push millions of workers back to the office, he ignored us. When we said that tough restrictions and full furlough support were still needed, he dithered, delayed and left it too late. People have been asked to make huge sacrifices by his Government. They at least now deserve financial certainty. Tell people straight, Prime Minister: will this UK Government extend furlough, maintain the universal credit uplift and finally offer support to the 3 million excluded, or will he leave families struggling with the uncertainty while he dithers and delays?
The Prime Minister
On the subject of dithering and delaying, I am delighted that the British Army is helping the Scottish National party Government to roll out the vaccine faster. That is extremely important and one of the benefits of the Union of the UK.
On the right hon. Gentleman’s point about the support for people and families across this country, I do not think anybody could seriously deny that this Government have given absolutely unprecedented—and unequalled, by global standards—support throughout the pandemic. We will continue to put our arms around people across the whole UK throughout this crisis.
Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is right to raise those concerns, because there are some people in the self-employed group whom it has been hard to reach and to support in the way that we want. They are fewer in number than is sometimes suggested in this House, and I can tell him that 2.7 million self-employed people have received support totalling over £18.5 billion. But the ideas that he suggests will, I know, be taken up by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, and he can expect to hear more on 3 March.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) [V]
The Prime Minister
First of all, I must absolutely contest and deny what the hon. Member has said about action. She talks about coalmines, and she may not know that in 1970—I was alive; she may not have been alive—this country got 90% of its energy from fossil fuels, from coal, and we now get 5%. That is thanks to the green, active, technologically optimistic policies driven by Conservative Governments, and I am very proud of it. I am also proud of what we are doing to ban plastic and ban the export of plastic waste around the world, which is in our Conservative party manifesto, which we will fulfil.
Holly Mumby-Croft (Scunthorpe) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed. I thank my hon. Friend for what she is doing to campaign for such an excellent charity and, indeed, for her constituent David. I can tell her that the Department of Health is working with Tessa Jowell’s Brain Cancer Mission, announcing £40 million over five years on brain tumours of the type that she describes. I would encourage my hon. Friend to continue the excellent work that she is doing in this area.
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD) [V]
The Prime Minister
I do not want to anticipate the Budget, but I know that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor habitually does things to support fantastic industries such as Scotch whisky. But one of the reasons for leaving the EU is that we will be able to do a free trade deal with the US and to obviate tariffs of the kind that the hon. Member describes, which would be there in perpetuity if the Scottish nationalist party were to get its way and to take Scotland back into the EU.
Damian Collins (Folkestone and Hythe) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend makes a very important point, and I know that it is something that everybody wants to see across this House—the sharing of data at local levels. There are particular problems, obviously, with sharing medical records—detailed medical records—with local government, but what we are doing is giving public health officials at local level all the information we can give them, without breaching that confidentiality, to find those hard-to-reach groups, and to get them and encourage them to take vaccines. Wonderful work is being done to get people to take vaccines. I encourage all Members, in your constituencies, to get your constituents to take up this offer.
Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)
The Prime Minister
Of course we will, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government will be bringing forward a plan very shortly. It is also important that mortgage companies do not unreasonably refuse mortgages on properties that are perfectly safe.
Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
In a few moments, later this afternoon, I will set out in more detail what my hon. Friend would like to know about our approach to schools, and in the course of the next few weeks, assuming that the vaccine roll-out continues well, and assuming that we do not find new variants of concern or have to change our calculations, I will be setting out a broader roadmap for a way forward for the whole country, of a kind that I think my hon. Friend and his constituents would appreciate.
Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising that issue. I have come across this problem before, but the case he describes is obviously acute and I will ensure that he gets the meeting he desires with the relevant Minister.
Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that, because in the last few weeks this has been an issue for many fishing businesses and communities. There has been too much red tape, and we are providing an immediate £23 million to help businesses with the problems they are encountering through no fault of their own. We are also investing £100 million in a long-term programme for the UK fishing industry, to help with equipment and processing, and to enable this country to be in a position to take advantage of the incredible access to our fisheries that we will have as the years go by.
Steven Bonnar (Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill) (SNP) [V]
The Prime Minister
I repeat what I have said before: we will continue to look after the people of this country throughout this pandemic, and it is a feature of the strength of the UK Treasury that we can continue to do this.
Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend, who is a fantastic campaigner for his constituents. I can tell him that we are indeed looking at expanding the free school programme—wave 14 of free schools will be announced very shortly—and I hope that he will not have too long to wait.
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab) [V]
The Prime Minister
I am conscious that, as the hon. Gentleman says, there have been difficult cases with self-employed people who have not qualified for some of the support that we have offered. I would invite him to send the details of Alison’s case to us and we will see what we can do, but I must remind the House that we have spent about £18 billion supporting self-employed people throughout this pandemic and, as I say, we will continue to put our arms around the British people for the duration of the crisis.
Paul Bristow (Peterborough) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I know the stress that people are under—not just school pupils, whom my hon. Friend is right to raise, but particularly NHS workers—during this current wave of the pandemic. It has been really gruelling the last few weeks and months. We are investing hugely in mental health support; on top of the £13.3 billion in 2019-20, we will see a further £2.3 billion a year by 2023-24, and that will support 380,000 adults and 345,000 children.
Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab) [V]
Given that the Prime Minister has already said today that he will take full responsibility for all the actions his Government have taken during the pandemic, will he confirm that that will include the woeful and reckless management of the covid outbreak at the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency sites—Government sites—in my constituency? Will he also ensure that his Transport Secretary is held accountable for the inexcusable damage and devastation that that has caused?
The Prime Minister
I thank the hon. Lady for raising that question with me. May I offer her, by the way, my condolences on the death her father? I can tell her that we have been working flat out on the problem at the DVLA. All staff who can work from home are doing so, measures have been taken to minimise the number of people on the site at any one time, and more than 2,000 tests have been carried out by the DVLA in the last fortnight alone, with all the results so far coming back negative.
Mr Speaker
I am suspending the House to enable the necessary arrangements to be made for the next business.
Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(3 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
I know the whole House will want to join me in sending our deepest sympathies to the family and friends of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, who sadly passed away on Saturday. His leadership had a profound impact on our whole country and across the world. May his memory be a blessing.
This morning, I attended the service at Westminster Abbey to mark the centenary of the tomb of the unknown warrior. Armistice Day allows us to give thanks to all those who have served, and continue to serve, and those who have given their lives in service of this country.
Ruth Cadbury
According to Home Office figures, just 12% of Windrush victims have received compensation and nine people have died waiting. This is two and a half years after the Windrush taskforce was set up. What will the Government do and what will the Prime Minister do both to rectify this injustice and to ensure that no others who have come to the UK to live and work suffer in the same way as the Windrush victims?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady is right to raise this issue. What happened to the Windrush generation was a disgrace and a scandal, and we are doing our best collectively to make amends. I can tell her I have met members of that generation, and this Government are taking steps to accelerate the payments and to make sure that those who are in line with payments are given every opportunity and all the information they need to avail themselves of the compensation that they deserve.
Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed, and I thank my hon. Friend for the work that she does to champion that cause. We all know that wherever freedom of belief is under attack, other human rights are under attack as well. We will continue to work closely with like-minded partners to stand up for members of such marginalised communities.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
May I join the Prime Minister in his comments about Jonathan Sacks? May I also send all our thoughts to those affected by the terrible events in Saudi Arabia this morning? May I welcome the victory of President-elect Biden and Vice-President-elect Harris—a new era of decency, integrity and compassion in the White House? May I also welcome the fantastic news about a possible breakthrough in the vaccine? It is early days, but this will give hope to millions of people that there is light at the end of the tunnel.
Today is Armistice Day, and I am sure the whole House will join me in praising the remarkable work of the veterans charities such as Help for Heroes and the Royal British Legion. Like many other charities, Help for Heroes has seen a significant drop in its funding during this pandemic, and it is now having to take very difficult decisions about redundancies and keeping open recovery centres for veterans. So can the Prime Minister commit today that the Government will do whatever they can to make sure our armed forces charities have the support that they need so that they can carry on supporting our veterans?
The Prime Minister
I echo entirely what the right hon. and learned Gentleman says about Help for Heroes; it is a quite remarkable charity and does wonderful things for veterans. In these difficult times, many charities are, of course, finding it tough, and in addition to what the Government are doing to support charities through cutting business rates on their premises and cutting VAT on their shops, I urge everybody wherever possible to make online contributions to charities that are currently struggling.
Keir Starmer
I thank the Prime Minister for his reply. The truth is the Chancellor’s package for forces charities was just £6 million during this pandemic, and that is just not sufficient. May I ask the Prime Minister to reconsider that support on their behalf, because at the same time we have all seen this weekend that the Government can find £670,000 for PR consultants? And that is the tip of the iceberg: new research today shows that the Government have spent at least £130 million of taxpayers’ money on PR companies, and that is in this year alone. Does the Prime Minister think that is a reasonable use of taxpayers’ money?
The Prime Minister
I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman is referring to the vaccines taskforce, and after days in which the Labour party has attacked the vaccines taskforce, I think it might be in order for him to pay tribute to it for securing 40 million doses. By the way, the expenditure to which he refers was to help to raise awareness of vaccines, to fight the anti-vaxxers and to persuade the people of this country—300,000—to take part in trials without which we cannot have vaccines. So I think he should take it back.
Keir Starmer
Nobody is attacking individuals—everybody is supporting the vaccine—but £130 million, Prime Minister: there is a real question about the way that contracts are being awarded and about basic transparency and accountability. I know the Prime Minister does not like that, but this is not the Prime Minister’s money; it is taxpayers’ money. The Prime Minister may well not know the value of the pound in his pocket, but the people who send us here do, and they expect us to spend it wisely.
Let me illustrate an example of the Government’s lax attitude to taxpayers’ money. Earlier this year, the Government paid about £150 million to a company called Ayanda Capital to deliver face masks. Can the Prime Minister tell the House how many usable face masks were actually provided to NHS workers on the frontline under that contract?
The Prime Minister
We are in the middle of a global pandemic in which this Government have so far secured and delivered 32 billion items of personal protective equipment; and, yes, it is absolutely correct that it has been necessary to work with the private sector and with manufacturers who provide such equipment, some of them more effectively than others, but it is the private sector that in the end makes the PPE, it is the private sector that provides the testing equipment, and it is the private sector that, no matter how much the Labour party may hate it, provides the vaccines and the scientific breakthroughs.
Keir Starmer
The answer is none: not a single face mask—at a cost of £150 million. That is not an isolated example. We already know that consultants are being paid £7,000 a day to work on test and trace, and a company called Randox has been given a contract, without process, for £347 million; that is the same company that had to recall 750,000 unused covid tests earlier this summer on safety grounds.
There is a sharp contrast between the way the Government spray money at companies that do not deliver and their reluctance to provide long-term support to businesses and working people at the sharp end of this crisis. The Chancellor spent months saying that extending furlough was
“not the kind of certainty that British businesses or British workers need”—[Official Report, 24 September 2020; Vol. 680, c. 1157]—
only then to do a U-turn at the last minute. Yesterday’s unemployment figures show the cost of that delay: redundancies up by a record 181,000 in the last quarter. What is the Prime Minister’s message to those who have lost their jobs because of the Chancellor’s delay?
The Prime Minister
With great respect to the right hon. and learned Gentleman, he knows full well that the furlough programme has continued throughout this pandemic. It went right the way through to October; it is now going through to March. It is one of the most generous programmes in the world, with 80% of income supported by this Government and an overall package of £210 billion going in to support jobs, families and livelihoods throughout this country. I think this country can be very proud of the way we have looked after the entire population, and we are going to continue to do so. The right hon. and learned Gentleman should bear in mind that the net effect of those furlough programmes—all the provision that we have made—is disproportionately beneficial for the poorest and neediest in society, which is what one nation Conservatism is all about.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister must know that because the furlough was not extended until the last minute, thousands of people were laid off. The figures tell a different story: redundancies, as I say, at a record high of 181,000; 780,000 off the payroll since March; the Office for National Statistics saying unemployment is rising sharply—so much for putting their arms around everybody. The trouble is that the British people are paying the price for the mistakes of the Prime Minister and the Chancellor. If they had handed contracts to companies that could deliver, public money would have been saved. If they had extended furlough sooner, jobs would have been saved. If they had brought in a circuit breaker when the science said so, lives would have been saved.
Let me deal with another mistake. The Chancellor has repeatedly failed to close gaps in support for the self-employed. Millions are affected by this. It is bad enough to have made that mistake in March, but seven months on, the Institute for Fiscal Studies says the scheme remains—its words—
“wasteful and badly targeted for the self-employed”.
The Institute of Directors says:
“Many self-employed…continue to be left out in the cold.”
After seven months and so many warnings, why are the Chancellor and the Prime Minister still failing our self-employed?
The Prime Minister
Unquestionably, this pandemic has been hard on the people of this country, and unquestionably there are people who have suffered throughout the pandemic and people whose livelihoods have suffered, but we have done everything that we possibly can to help. As for the self-employed, 2.6 million of them have received support, at a cost of £13 billion—quite right. We have also, of course, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, uprated universal credit. That will continue until next year. He now champions universal credit, by the way, and calls for its uprating to be extended. He stood on a manifesto to abolish universal credit.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister just doesn’t get it. I know very well that the self-employment income support scheme has been extended, but the Prime Minister must know that that scheme simply does not apply to millions of self-employed people. They have been left out for seven months.
There is a real human cost to this. This week on LBC, I spoke to a self-employed photographer called Chris. He said to me:
“Our…industry has been devastated… Three million of us that have fallen through the cracks… Our businesses are falling—absolutely falling—and crashing each day.”
He asked me to raise that with the Chancellor. I will do the next best thing. What would the Prime Minister say to Chris and millions like him who are desperately waiting for the Chancellor to address this injustice?
The Prime Minister
What I would say to Chris—and what I say to the right hon. and learned Gentleman and to the whole country—is the best way to get his job working again, the best way to get this country back on its feet, is to continue on the path that we are driving the virus down. It is a week since we entered into the tough autumn measures that we are now in. I am grateful to the people of this country for the sacrifices that they are making, and I am particularly grateful to the people of Liverpool and elsewhere—tens of thousands of people in Liverpool are taking part in the mass testing work that is going on there. It is fantastic news that we now have the realistic prospect of a vaccine.
Science has given us two big boxing gloves, as it were, with which to pummel this virus, but neither of them is capable of delivering a knockout blow on its own. That is why this country needs to continue to work hard, to keep discipline and to observe the measures that we have put in. I am grateful for the support that the Labour party is now giving for those measures. That is the way to do it: hands, face, space; follow the guidance, protect the NHS and save lives.
Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
Absolutely; I thank my hon. Friend. I can tell him that the landmark Immigration and Social Security Co-ordination (EU Withdrawal) Bill receives Royal Assent today, thanks to this House, paving the way for the fulfilling of our manifesto commitment to end free movement and have a new, fair points-based immigration system—one of the advantages of leaving the European Union that the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) would of course like to reverse.
Mr Speaker
Let us head up to Scotland and the leader of the SNP, Ian Blackford.
The Prime Minister
I am delighted that the right hon. Gentleman, the leader of the Scottish nationalists is now supporting universal credit. He was opposed to it at the last election. Yes, of course that uplift continues until March. I am delighted to say that the furlough scheme is being extended right the way through to March as well. That will support people across our whole United Kingdom, protecting jobs and livelihoods across the whole UK in exactly the way that he and I would both want.
Ian Blackford [V]
May I respectfully say to the Prime Minister that the idea is that he tries to answer the question that has been put to him? It is shameful that the Prime Minister still refuses to give a commitment to the £20 uprating of universal credit. The SNP will continue to demand a permanent U-turn on Tory plans to cut universal credit.
Another group who have been left behind by this Prime Minister are the 3 million people who have been completely excluded from UK Government support. Since the start of this crisis, the Prime Minister has repeatedly refused to lift a finger to help those families. In the run-up to Christmas, those forgotten millions will be among those who are struggling to get by and are worried about their future. Will the Prime Minister finally fix the serious gaps in his support schemes to help the excluded, or will he make it a bitter winter for millions of families across the United Kingdom?
The Prime Minister
The right hon. Gentleman knows, I hope, that we are not only continuing with the uprating of universal credit until next year, but we have invested £210 billion in jobs and livelihoods. We have also just brought forward a winter support package for the poorest and neediest: supporting young people and kids who need school meals, and supporting people throughout our society throughout the tough period of covid, as I think the entire country would expect. That is the right thing to do and we will continue to do it.
Simon Jupp (East Devon) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor will have heard my hon. Friend’s words. I thank him for what he said; he is quite right to champion regional airports and the aviation business. The Bank of England’s covid corporate financing facility is helping to support the airlines’ current liquidity problems, with the sector drawing down £1.8 billion in support. The Department for Transport is also looking at giving bespoke support to particular regional airports to keep them going in these tough times.
Jonathan Edwards (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) (Ind)
The Prime Minister
On the contrary, the UK Government are continuing to support all parts of the UK. We will now, as the hon. Gentleman knows, have the opportunity to fund projects with our own money, rather than siphoning it through Brussels. The quantum will be identical and, in addition, through the Barnett formula, the UK Government have already given the Welsh Government £2.4 billion in capital funding alone this year.
Imran Ahmad Khan (Wakefield) (Con)
While we are rightly focused on battling covid, we should not ignore humanitarian injustices and the plight of persecuted minorities. On Remembrance Sunday, 82 year-old Mahboob Ahmad Khan was shot dead, the fourth Ahmadi recently slain in Peshawar. His crime under Pakistani law: to call himself an Ahmadi Muslim, whose creed is love for all, hatred for none. Does my right hon. Friend agree that hatred preached in Pakistan ends up on the streets of Britain and that it is in the interests of our own security that Her Majesty’s Government should make it clear to Pakistan that state-supported persecution must end?
The Prime Minister
I agree passionately with my hon. Friend. I can tell him that that is why the Minister for South Asia and the Commonwealth recently raised this very issue with Pakistan’s Human Rights Minister and we urge the Government of Pakistan to guarantee the fundamental rights of all their citizens.
Ben Lake (Ceredigion) (PC)
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman raises an excellent point. One of the things that we are looking at, together with local authorities and the Welsh tourist authorities, is ways of making sure that we keep a tourist season going throughout the tough winter months.
Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) (Con)
The Prime Minister
All I can say is that the more intensively we together follow the rules and the more we follow the guidance in this tough period leading up to 2 December, the bigger the chance collectively we will have of as normal a Christmas as possible and getting things open in time for Christmas as well.
James Murray (Ealing North) (Lab/Co-op) [V]
The Prime Minister
We are looking into the issue of repeat calls, but to say that the test and trace system has been a waste of time and money, which I think is what I heard the hon. Member say—I could not disagree more. It has enabled us to locate where the disease is surging, to take appropriate measures and to allow people in huge numbers to get tested. More people have been tested in this country than in any other country in Europe. The PCR tests that NHS Test and Trace is conducting are of real value in fighting the disease, and now we are rolling out the lateral flow rapid turnaround tests as well.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed I urge York council and councils across the land to take up the offer of mass lateral flow testing—it is a very exciting possibility. It is, as I said, one of the boxing gloves we hope to wield to pummel this disease into submission—the other is the prospect of a vaccine—and that is what we will do continuously throughout the weeks and months ahead. But I must stress that the way to get ourselves in the best position to achieve that is to make the current restrictions work so that we can come out well, back into the tiers on 2 December.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)
The Prime Minister
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. It is a subject in which I have a keen interest, because I had a wonderful morning on that crab boat where there were fantastic, prodigious quantities of crabs that, as I recollect, were being sold to China. I will make sure that the Home Secretary is immediately seized of the matter and that we take it forward. That is one of the things that we are now able to do thanks to taking back control of our immigration system, which, alas, his party opposed for so long and would reverse if it could.
Neil O’Brien (Harborough) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes. One of the many merits of the excellent conversation I had yesterday with President-elect Joe Biden was that we were strongly agreed on the need once again for the United Kingdom and the United States to stand together and stick up for our values around the world: to stick up for human rights, to stick up for global free trade, to stick up for NATO and to work together in the fight against climate change. It was refreshing, I may say, to have that conversation, and I look forward to many more.
Ms Angela Eagle (Wallasey) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I had, and have, a good relationship with the previous President. I do not resile from that—it is the duty of all British Prime Ministers to have a good relationship with the White House—but I am delighted to find the many areas in which are the incoming Biden-Harris Administration are able to make common cause with us. In particular, it was extremely exciting to talk to President-elect Biden about what he wants to do with the COP26 summit next year, in which the UK is leading the world in driving down carbon emissions and tackling climate change.
Chris Clarkson (Heywood and Middleton) (Con)
This Armistice Day, restrictions mean that we cannot mark the occasion with services as we normally would. However, in Heywood and Middleton, veterans associations are following the guidance to mark the day in a covid-safe way. Will my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister join me in praising them, the Royal British Legion and, indeed, all those across the United Kingdom who are doing their best to ensure that we can pay tribute to those who made the ultimate sacrifice?
The Prime Minister
Yes indeed. It was really impressive to see the way the Royal British Legion organised covid-secure memorials across the country in the way that it did. As we salute our veterans, I just want to remind the House that we have launched a new railcard for our veterans and their families that will entitle them to substantial reductions in rail fares, and that we are introducing a national insurance break for employers of veterans in their first year of employment.
Kate Hollern (Blackburn) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
Of course we publish all contracts, and quite right. I would just respectfully remind the hon. Lady, as I reminded the Leader of the Opposition earlier, that it is absolutely necessary in a massive global pandemic to work with those in the private sector, not to scorn them or despise them, and to understand that it is they who make the PPE and the tests. Indeed, it is thanks to the researches of giant conglomerates—which Labour would break up if it could—that we have the possibility of a vaccine.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
On Armistice Day, as we remember those who gave their lives for our country and those who still serve, will the Prime Minister give a positive response to the “Living in our shoes: understanding the needs of UK Armed Forces families” report on making life better for our armed forces families? These wonderful people put up with more separation, moving of family homes and worry about the safety of their loved ones than anyone else, and looking after them should be a national priority.
The Prime Minister
Our armed services simply could not function without the support of their families, and I thank my hon. Friend for what he is doing to raise this issue and for the comprehensive piece of research that he refers to. We are making good progress on increasing childcare provision for armed services families and on our support for employment of partners of members of the armed services.
Mr Speaker
In order to allow the safe exit of hon. Members participating in this item of business and the safe arrival of those participating in the next, I am suspending the House for a few minutes.
Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(4 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Sir David Amess [V]
Next month, a book that I have written, called “Ayes and Ears: a Survivor’s Guide to Westminster”, will be published. Part of it covers Brexit—and, yes, by inference, everyone will be in the book. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the last general election was not fought on how political parties might handle the coronavirus pandemic, but was categorically about ensuring that the result of the 2016 referendum is implemented in full? Will he confirm that he intends to see that happen?
The Prime Minister
I can indeed. I congratulate my hon. Friend on his new book. I assure him that this country has not only left the European Union, but that on 1 January we will take back full control of our money, our borders and our laws.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
This is a crucial moment if we are to gain control of the virus, yet for eight days nearly 16,000 positive tests were missed by the Government. That means that about 48,000 contacts were not traced. As of yesterday, thousands had still not been reached. Does the Prime Minister accept that this very basic mistake has put lives at risk?
The Prime Minister
This is certainly a problem that we have fixed. The computer glitch and error to which the right hon. and learned Gentleman refers has been addressed. All the 16,000 people he refers to have, in fact, got their positive test results and should be self-isolating. As soon as we became aware of the missing data, we brought in 800 people to chase up those index cases, and we continue to chase their contacts. I think it will be for the reassurance of the House and the country that the missing data points do not, now that we look at them, change in any way our assessment of the epidemiology—the spread of the disease. That is why we continue with our package to suppress the virus not just nationally, but locally and regionally.
Keir Starmer
This is not just a technical issue; it is a human issue. The attempted reassurance by the Prime Minister just does not wash. In Greater Manchester, some of the missing cases date back to 18 September. That is two and a half weeks ago. There are three very serious consequences: first, it is now much harder to reach the contacts of the 16,000 people after so long; secondly, even if they are contacted successfully, for many the self-isolation period has already expired; and, thirdly, important decisions on local restrictions were made using the wrong data. Some £12 billion has been invested in this system, and yet a basic Excel error brings it down. No wonder it has been described as “intergalactic” incompetence. Why, at this crucial moment, did it take so long to catch this error and address it?
The Prime Minister
The right hon. and learned Gentleman cannot have it both ways; he cannot call it a human error and a basic Excel error. Let me just remind the House and the right hon. and learned Gentleman of what I just said. The crucial thing is that, yes, of course there has been an error, but the data points—the cases—that we are looking at do not change the basic distribution of the disease. It is very important for people to understand that. That is really what he was, I think, trying to drive at. Although the cases are considerably up across the country this week on last week, the seven-day statistics show that there are now 497 cases per 100,000 in Liverpool, 522 cases per 100,000 in Manchester and 422 in Newcastle. The key point there is that the local, regional approach combined with the national measures remains correct, I think, because two thirds of those admitted into hospital on Sunday were in the north-west, the north-east and Yorkshire. That is why, I think, that approach continues to be correct.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister says that it does not alter the basic distribution, yet thousands of people have been walking round when they should have been self-isolating. It patently has an effect on the basic distribution.
If this was an isolated example, I think the British people might understand, but there is a pattern here. On care homes, protective equipment, exams, testing: the Prime Minister ignores the warning signs, hurtles towards a car crash, then looks in the rear mirror and says, “What’s all that about?” It is quite literally government in hindsight. Today it is 100 days since the first local restrictions were introduced. Twenty local areas in England have been under restrictions for two months. Prime Minister, in 19 of those 20 areas, infection rates have gone up. In Rossendale and Hyndburn they have gone up tenfold. Yet all the Prime Minister has to say is, “It’s too early to say if restrictions are working.” But it is obvious that something has gone wrong here, so what is he going to do about it?
The Prime Minister
As the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, we are continuing to provide support, with £5 billion of support for the north-west and north-east for the lockdowns—the extra restrictions—that they are experiencing. We will continue to support all areas across the country that have to go into local measures. Two weeks ago, I set out that strategy. I said that we would go forward with the national measures such as intensifying the rule of six—making sure that we reinforced the rule of six. Two weeks ago, the right hon. and learned Gentleman supported it. In fact, I think he went on the Nick Ferrari show saying, “I support the rule of six—yes I do.” Yet last night the Labour party abstained on the rule of six. He asks what we are doing to enforce local measures; he cannot even be bothered to get his own side to support them himself.
Keir Starmer
For the Prime Minister’s benefit, let me take this slowly for him. We support measures to protect health. We want track and trace to work. But the Government are messing it up and it is our duty to point it out.
Let us get back to the questions—because these are not trick questions; I have the figures here, Prime Minister. In Bury, when restrictions were introduced, the infection rate was around 20 per 100,000; today it is 266. In Burnley, it was 21 per 100,000 when restrictions were introduced; now it is 434. In Bolton, it was 18 per 100,000; now it is 255. The Prime Minister really needs to understand that local communities are angry and frustrated. So will he level with the people of Bury, Burnley and Bolton and tell them: what does he actually think the problem is here?
The Prime Minister
The problem is, alas, that the disease continues to spread in the way that I described to the House earlier. The figures that the right hon. and learned Gentleman gives are no surprise, because they are fundamentally a repetition of what I have already told the House. What we are doing is a combination of national and local measures which one week he comes to this House and supports, and from which, the next week, mysteriously, he decides to whisk his support away. He cannot even be bothered to mobilise his own Benches to support something as fundamental as the rule of six, which he himself said only three weeks ago that he supported. He cannot continue to have it both ways. Does he support the rule of six—yes or no?
Keir Starmer
Yes. But if the Prime Minister cannot see and hear local communities when they say that the infection rate has gone up tenfold under restrictions, and he does not realise that is a problem, then that is part of the problem.
There is a further cause of anger—[Interruption.] Prime Minister, if you actually listen to the question, we might get on better—which is the lack of clarity about why particular restrictions have been introduced. For example, in the Prime Minister’s own local authority of Hillingdon, today there are 62 cases per 100,000, yet no local restrictions, but in 20 local areas across England, restrictions were imposed when infection rates were much lower. In Kirklees, it was just 29 per 100,000. Local communities genuinely do not understand these differences. Can he please explain for them?
The Prime Minister
The right hon. and learned Gentleman has heard from me and heard repeatedly from the Government why we are bringing in differentiated local restrictions. I have just given the figures for the north-east and the north-west. I wish I could pretend that everything is going to be rosy in the midlands or, indeed, in London, where alas we are also seeing infections rise, but that is why we need a concerted national effort. We need to follow the guidance. We need “Hands, face, space” and people to get a test if they have symptoms and to obey the rule of six. I think it quite extraordinary that the right hon. and learned Gentleman just said that he personally supports the rule of six while allowing his entire party to abstain.
Keir Starmer
The Prime Minister cannot explain why an area goes into restriction, he cannot explain what the different restrictions are and he cannot explain how restrictions end. This is getting ridiculous. Next week, this House will vote on whether to approve the 10 pm rule. The Prime Minister knows that there are deeply held views across the country in different ways on this. One question is now screaming out: is there a scientific basis for the 10 pm rule? The public deserve to know and Parliament deserves to know. If there is a basis, why do the Government not do themselves a favour and publish it? If not, why do the Government not review the rule? Will the Prime Minister commit to publishing the scientific basis for the 10 pm rule before this House votes on it next Monday?
The Prime Minister
The basis on which we set out the curtailment of hospitality was the basis on which the right hon. and learned Gentleman accepted it two weeks ago, which is to reduce the spread of the virus. That is our objective. That is why we introduced the rule of six, which again he supported only two weeks ago, yet last night the Opposition abstained and today they are withdrawing their support for other restrictions. What kind of signal does that send to the people of the country about the robustness of the Labour party and its willingness to enforce the restrictions? That is not new leadership; that is no leadership.
We are taking the tough decisions necessary, imposing restrictions—which we do not want to do—locally and nationally to fight the virus to keep young people and kids in education and to keep the bulk of our economy moving. At the same time, we are getting on with our agenda—our lifetime skills guarantee and our green industrial revolution—by which we will take this country forward and build back better.
John Stevenson (Carlisle) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I have spent at least one very happy night out in Carlisle, and it is a wonderful place. I will certainly look with interest at my hon. Friend’s suggestion. We have an ambitious programme to disperse and to unite and level up across our country.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP) [V]
This week is Challenge Poverty Week, and I would like to thank all the organisations across Scotland and the United Kingdom that are helping families through the most difficult of times. Their dedication and commitment should inspire every single one of us in the fight to end poverty. With mass unemployment looming, having the right social security measures in place to help families over the long term is vital. The Chancellor has so far refused to commit to make the £20 universal credit uplift permanent, which means that 16 million people face losing an income equivalent of £1,040 overnight. Will the Prime Minister now commit to making the £20 uplift to universal credit permanent?
The Prime Minister
I welcome the right hon. Gentleman’s support for universal credit, which the Conservative party introduced. I am proud that we have been able to uprate it in the way that we have, and we will continue to support people across the country, with the biggest cash increase in the national living wage this year. The result of universal credit so far has been that there are 200,000 fewer people in absolute poverty now than there were in 2010. I know that he was not a keen supporter of universal credit when it was introduced, but I welcome his support today.
Ian Blackford
One of these days, the Prime Minister might consider answering the question—it was about making the £20 increase permanent. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has painted a clear picture for his Government: strip the £20 universal credit uplift away, and 700,000 more people, including 300,000 children, could move into poverty, and 500,000 more people could end up in severe poverty—more than 50% below the poverty line. The Resolution Foundation has called the £20 uplift a “living standards lifeline” for millions of families during the pandemic. Challenge Poverty Week is a moment for all of us to take unified action against poverty. The Prime Minister has an opportunity here and now. Will he do the right thing, will he answer the question, and will he make the £20 uplift permanent?
The Prime Minister
I do not want in any way to underestimate the importance of what the right hon. Gentleman is saying. It is vital that we tackle poverty in this country. That is why this Government are so proud of what we did with the national living wage. We are putting another £1.7 billion into universal credit by 2023-24. If that does not give him the answer he wants, he can ask again next week. We will continue to support people and families across this country, and we will continue to spend £95 billion a year in this country on working-age welfare. But the best thing we can do for people on universal credit is to get this virus down, get our economy moving again and get them back into well-paid, high-skilled jobs—and that is what we are going to do.
Simon Baynes (Clwyd South) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend, who represents a constituency that I once fought for—he represents it well, but I do not think I fought for it very well. I know the A483/A5 connection well, and Sir Peter will certainly look at that scheme and many others in his Union connectivity review.
Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson (Lagan Valley) (DUP)
The Prime Minister is passionate about the Union, as am I, and I welcome the review of connectivity within the Union. Does he agree that, while it is good to consider connectivity across the Irish sea, it would be devastating to Northern Ireland to have barriers to trade in the Irish sea? In the remaining days of the negotiations with the European Union, may I urge him to hold firm and to commit to protecting Northern Ireland’s place within the internal market of the United Kingdom by ensuring full and unfettered access for businesses that trade in either direction and for the consumers who benefit from Northern Ireland being an integral part of the United Kingdom?
The Prime Minister
The right hon. Gentleman is entirely right, and I am sure his words will have been heard loud and clear by our friends in Brussels, but just in case they have not, of course we have the excellent United Kingdom Internal Market Bill to prevent such barriers from arising.
Christian Wakeford (Bury South) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, I can indeed confirm to my hon. Friend that, in addition to the particular support that he mentions, we are directing another £160 billion of support for business and local authorities and business improvement districts, and I am more than happy to congratulate The Only Way is Melts, by Tracy in Radcliffe.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
It is very important that students should return to university in the way that they have, and I want to thank the overwhelming majority of students for the way that they have complied with the guidance, complied with the regulations and are doing what they can to suppress it. Clearly, there are particular problems in some parts of the country, which we have discussed at length already, and we will be pursuing the measures that we have outlined to bring them down in those areas, and I hope that the hon. Member will support them.
Andrew Jones (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I totally agree with my hon. Friend about the importance of the conference and exhibition industry. I think it is worth about £90 billion to this country. It is of massive importance. It was a very difficult decision to take to pause conferences and exhibitions. We want to get them open as fast as possible. Of course, they have had a lot of support, as I indicated earlier—the £190 billion package is there to help businesses of all kinds—but the best way forward is to get the kind of testing systems that will enable not just conferences and businesses of that kind but all types and even theatres to reopen and get back to normality. That is what we are aiming for.
Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
That is simply not what the Chancellor said. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor has already provided £1.7 billion of support for the creative culture industries and for sport. The hon. Member is right, by the way, to identify the massive economic value of those industries, and that is why we are supporting them through these tough times. That is why we are working to get the virus down and get our economy back to normal as fast as we possibly can, and I hope that he will support our strategy.
Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
I thank my right hon. Friend, and we are committed to protecting areas such as the Chilterns area of outstanding natural beauty. I understand that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is considering each of the recommendations in Julian Glover’s review, and following the correct procedures. I hope my right hon. Friend will acknowledge—I hope she knows—that the Government are also leading the way globally in protecting biodiversity, habitats and species, and that is what we will be doing at the G7, and in the run-up to COP26 in Glasgow next year.
Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I share the hon. Lady’s feeling about the loss of jobs, and the potential loss of jobs, and it is wretched that we have to do this. We have already allocated £2.6 billion to the north-west, and Knowsley in particular has had £12 million, and Liverpool another £40 million. We will continue to provide support across the country, and to put our arms around jobs and livelihoods in the country, as we have done throughout this pandemic.
Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Yes, indeed. We are building a new hospital at Basingstoke and North Hampshire Hospital, and there will be a major refurbishment at Royal Hampshire County Hospital in Winchester. We will continue to support Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust as it develops its plans, including with local infrastructure such as Alton Community Hospital.
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady is entirely right to raise the issue of support for hospitality. In areas that face tougher restrictions we will continue to do whatever we can to provide support. She will be familiar with the big package that we have already brought in. I think that the Opposition really need to decide whether they are in favour of the plan to reduce transmission to bear down on the virus or not. If they are, I am afraid that they must recognise that there are consequences of that plan.
Paul Bristow (Peterborough) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend, because it is indeed part of our plan to fuel a green economic recovery that we put £14 million from the Getting Building fund into Peterborough to accelerate the delivery of a key new educational and research facility. We are giving Peterborough another £1 million of accelerated payment for investment in capital projects to enable it to build back better.
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
Of course, we keep all these things under constant review, but I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman joins the Opposition in support—and approval now—for what the Government have done with universal credit.
David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)
The Prime Minister
That is exactly what this Government were elected to do in 2019. We were elected on a manifesto not just to build 40 more hospitals—now 48—and put 20,000 more police on our streets but to unite our country and level up across our country, and unleash the potential of the whole United Kingdom. That is what we are going to do.
Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
There is abundant brownfield space across the whole UK, and I speak as someone who used to be the planning authority for London, and I know whereof I speak. The opportunity is there. In many cases, the restrictions are caused by cumbersome planning procedures, but they are also caused by the inability of young people to get the mortgages that they want to buy the homes that they want. That is why we are bringing forward fixed-rate mortgages for 95% of the value of a property to help young people on to the property ladder. We are going to turn generation rent into generation buy.
Mr Speaker
In order to allow the safe exit of hon. Members participating in this item of business and the safe arrival of those participating in the next, I am suspending the House for four minutes.
Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(4 years, 1 month ago)
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Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Munira Wilson
If Ministers think it is acceptable for this Government to not obey the law, how on earth can the Prime Minister expect the public at home to do so?
Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the continual support he gives to the people of Gibraltar and to Gibraltar. I can assure him that the sovereignty of Gibraltar is inviolable, and I join him, as I hope all Members join him, in wishing the people of Gibraltar a very happy national day on Thursday.
Mr Speaker
We now come to the Leader of the Opposition, with the first of six questions.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
Yesterday, I spoke to a mum who lives in London. She has a four-year-old daughter, who had a very high temperature yesterday morning. She phoned 111, and was told to get a test. She tried to book, and was told the nearest was Romford. That was 9 o’clock in the morning. She explored that, but there were no tests there. She was then told Haywards Heath, halfway to Brighton—on exploration, no tests there. By lunch time, this mum was told the nearest place was Telford or Inverness. A slot became available in Lee Valley in the afternoon—one slot—but, unfortunately, that was being offered across the country, including to people in Manchester, and it was impossible to book. At 9 o’clock last night, she was told the nearest centre was Swansea. This is, frankly, ridiculous. Who does the Prime Minister think is responsible for this?
The Prime Minister
Clearly, I take responsibility, as I have done throughout, for the entire handling of the coronavirus crisis, but I would just say to those who attack NHS Test and Trace, and those who deprecate the efforts of the people who are doing their level best to keep us safe, that it is precisely because of the success of test and trace that capacity has gone up from 2,000 a month in March to 320,000 a day. We know, thanks to NHS Test and Trace, in granular detail, in a way that we did not earlier this year, about what is happening with this pandemic. We know the groups that are suffering, the extent of the infection rates, and we have been able, thanks to NHS Test and Trace, to do the local lockdowns that have been working. We also know that, alas, some people have not been following the guidance in the way that they should and, therefore, we are seeing a rise in infections, and that is why today we are taking decisive steps to intensify our social distancing measures—the rule of six that will be familiar to the country—in order that we can keep our economy going, that we can keep our schools open and keep this virus under control. I hope that he will support those measures and, indeed, support NHS Test and Trace.
Keir Starmer
I will hear the measures later on, but we will in principle support them, as I have supported all the measures the Prime Minister has introduced, as he well knows. It is the right thing to do, and I have asked people to follow Government advice at every opportunity.
Nobody is attacking here. The Prime Minister needs to know how anxious hundreds of families are. In the past few weeks, they have been sent all over the country or told there are no tests. It cannot be brushed off. Earlier this year, the Health Secretary said:
“Anybody who needs a test can get a test, and it’s the most important thing that you can do to stop the spread of this virus.”
This is a very serious issue, but the Government line on it seems to be changing all the time. Yesterday, the director of NHS Test and Trace said,
“Can I…offer my…apologies to anyone who cannot get a covid test...it’s our laboratory processing”
that is the problem. This morning, the Health Secretary changed tack and appeared to blame the public. I note that he made a statement yesterday and faced questions but he did not say anything about the excuse that he puts forward this morning that emerged overnight. So who is right—the director of Test and Trace, who says it is a laboratory problem, or the Health Secretary, who says it is the public’s fault?
The Prime Minister
I, of course, sympathise with all those who are facing difficulties getting a test as fast as they want, but demand is at an unprecedented high, particularly because of demand for asymptomatic patients, but the right hon. and learned Gentleman should know that this country has done more tests—17.6 million—than any other country in Europe. He likes international comparisons. That is thanks to the efforts of NHS Test and Trace, which is, in my view, doing an absolutely heroic job in spite of the difficulties that it faces. It has massively raised its output and it will be up to 500,000 tests a day by the end of October. This is an organisation that is working heroically to contain the spread of the disease, and it requires the public to trust the organisation and to participate. Yesterday, the right hon. and learned Gentleman said that it was on the verge of collapse. I think that those were ill-chosen words. I think he now regrets those words. I think he should reflect and he should take them back.
Keir Starmer
Hundreds of families have been trying to get a test in the last week, and they cannot get one. I do acknowledge the number of tests overall, but this is basic stuff. People who have got covid symptoms are very anxious about themselves, their children, their families and what to do. It means they cannot go to work and they cannot send their children to school. It matters, and if they cannot get tests the Prime Minister needs to take responsibility and not just tell us about the future or something else, but address this problem.
I want to take it further, because it is not just that people are being told to go hundreds of miles. Somebody contacted me yesterday and said: “My wife has a temperature and they said we needed to isolate and get a test done. I have been trying to book a test”. This is yesterday, Prime Minister. They continued: “the site says, ‘No capacity’. Then I tried for a home test kit and they are telling me that there are no kits available at present.” That is the situation yesterday. Yesterday, there were no tests available in London and it was the same the day before. Prime Minister, what is happening?
The Prime Minister
I note that the right hon. and learned Gentleman will not take back his criticism and his attack on NHS Test and Trace, and I regret that. I gave him the opportunity to withdraw his verdict that it was on the verge of collapse: it is not. It is doing a heroic job and testing hundreds of thousands of people. Yes, we will do more, and the world we want to move to as fast as possible is a world in which everybody can take enabling tests at the beginning of the day and antigen tests to identify whether or not we have the virus., like a pregnancy test, within 15 minutes or so, so that we know whether we are able to live our lives as normally as possible. That is the vision that the Health Secretary and others have been sketching out over the last few days and that is where we intend to get to.
In the meantime, NHS Test and Trace is doing a heroic job, and today I can tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman that most people get an in-person test result within 24 hours, and the median journey is under 10 miles if someone has to take a journey to get one.
Keir Starmer
We all want test, trace and isolate to succeed, and I have offered my support before. The Prime Minister is ignoring the problem: if people are being told to go hundreds of miles, something is wrong. This has got a lot worse in the past week or two—all Members of the House know that, because they have all had constituents telling them that. The Prime Minister talks about capacity. The latest Government figures were updated last night. They show that, on average, 75,000 tests are not being used every day. If 75,000 tests are not being used, why yesterday were people being told to go hundreds of miles for a test? Why yesterday were people being told that there is no capacity?
The Prime Minister
The issue at the moment is that there has been a massive increase in the number of people who need or want tests, particularly people who do not have symptoms. We need—I hope the right hon. and learned Gentleman agrees—to prioritise people such as NHS front-line staff and our care workers who urgently need those tests. As we massively increase the number of tests, it is those groups who are getting priority.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman is wrong in what he says about the failure of NHS Test and Trace, so let me tell him that of those contacts who supply details, 80% are reached, and 320,000 people have been persuaded to self-isolate and stop the spread of the disease. That is the British people ignoring the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s attempt to undermine confidence in test and trace. They are ignoring his attempt to undermine confidence, and working together to get this disease defeated.
Keir Starmer
I am listening carefully to what the Prime Minister says, and what is undermining confidence is families being told to go hundreds of miles and they cannot get a test. That is undermining confidence. I just want this fixed. We do not need to have an argument. What is the problem? The Prime Minister should accept that there is a problem, tell us what the solution is, and we will all muck in, try to make it better, and tell our constituents.
I have been listening. Is the Prime Minister saying that too many people are coming forward for tests and that it is a capacity problem, or not? People are trying to do the right thing. They want to go back to work. We want children back in schools. The Prime Minister is encouraging that—quite right too—and we understand and support that. The Government side of the bargain was to deliver an effective test, trace and isolate scheme, but two weeks into September there is a glaring hole. Will the Prime Minister tell the House when he first knew about this particular problem of people having to go hundreds of miles, or that tests were not going to be available? It is in the last week that this issue has arisen. When did he first know that that was a problem?
The Prime Minister
It is obviously a function of the growing demand and growing public confidence in NHS Test and Trace that we have to supply more and more tests, and that is what we have been doing. I do not know whether you have been listening, Mr Speaker, but I have been trying to give the House the figures. Thanks to the heroic efforts of NHS Test and Trace, we have gone up from 2,000 tests a day in March to 320,000 a day today. That is thanks to the efforts of thousands of people, who are listening keenly to the words of the right hon. and learned Gentleman for some support, encouragement or belief in what they are trying to do. Thanks to them, on average, people have to travel less than 10 miles, and thanks to them, 80% of the contacts that they or a coronavirus patient identify are reached and told to self-isolate. That is what we are trying to do. It is hard work. It is a big job, and they are doing a fantastic job. I think that what they would like to hear is some praise, encouragement and support from the right hon. and learned Gentleman.
Keir Starmer
Why can we not just hear from the Prime Minister an honest answer? If he stood at the Dispatch Box and said, “I know something’s gone wrong in the last couple of weeks. We have been getting hundreds of examples of people being sent all over the place or being told there is no test. I have looked into it. I have worked out what the problem is and here is my plan”, people might be reassured. But, as ever, he pretends the problem is not there. The infection rate is rising. This is the very point at which we need a functioning testing regime. Far from the “world-beating” system we were promised, the Government cannot even get the basics right. The Government are lurching from crisis to crisis. They still lack even basic incompetence—[Interruption.] They lack competence. [Interruption.] Yes, Prime Minister, they lack competence, and that is what is holding Britain back. My final question is this: when is the problem with test, trace and isolate going to be fixed?
The Prime Minister
I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman was on the money when he said that this Government lacked incompetence. I just say to him that we are working flat out to address all the issues confronting us today, including trying to get the infection rate down, and we are getting on with taking the tough decisions and making the tough calls that will take this country forward.
When it came to saying schools were safe, the right hon. and learned Gentleman was silent because he did not want to offend his union bosses. When left-wing anarchists tried to destroy the freedom of the press, he was silent because for some reason he did not want to offend crusty left-wing anarchists. When it comes, by the way, to sticking up for our UK internal market and for delivering on the will of the British people—one of the most important issues facing us today—he is totally silent on the Bill that obsesses the rest of his Back Benchers. He is totally silent. A great ox once again has stood on his tongue. He has nothing at all to say about that subject today, because he does not want to offend the huge number of his Back Benchers who want to overturn the verdict of the people and take us back into the EU, which is of course what he wants to do himself.
This Government get on and take the tough decisions on behalf of the British people, delivering thousands of jobs through our kickstart scheme, record-breaking investment in affordable housing with a £12 billion programme, and getting on with all our work, working with the British people and working with the right hon. and learned Gentleman—if he would only do so—to get coronavirus defeated and to take our country forward. We make the tough calls; all he does is sit on the sidelines and carp.
Andrew Lewer (Northampton South) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend. I indeed recognise the importance of the Clare Street barracks. Indeed, I salute the work of the entire armed services in what they have done across the whole of our United Kingdom to help us fight coronavirus.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)
Shortly, the Government will publish their internal market proposals. I have seen them. They are nothing short of an attack on Scotland’s Parliament and an affront to the people of Scotland. As we have already heard, this legislation breaks international law, but it also breaks domestic law. The Prime Minister and his friends—a parcel o’ rogues—are creating a rogue state where the rule of law does not apply. Why does the Prime Minister think that he and his friends are above the law?
The Prime Minister
On the contrary, the United Kingdom Internal Market Bill is about protecting jobs, protecting growth and ensuring the fluidity and safety of our UK internal market and prosperity throughout the United Kingdom. It should be welcomed, I believe, in Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and throughout the whole country.
Ian Blackford
Of course, we saw the Prime Minister breaking the law last year with the Prorogation of Parliament. We have seen the behaviour of Dominic Cummings, and we know that the Government are prepared to break their international obligations. What the Prime Minister said is complete rubbish, and the Prime Minister knows it. His own White Paper was clear that state aid is going to be grabbed back from Scotland and handed to Westminster. If the Prime Minister will not listen to the Scottish Government, will he listen to the National Farmers Union Scotland president, who warned that the proposals “limit” the devolved Administrations? The Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee warned that they will
“create new reservations in areas of devolved competence.”
The General Teaching Council for Scotland has warned that the proposals undermine devolved education functions. That, Mr Speaker, is the reality.
Scotland is speaking out, and I state that the Scottish Parliament will reject this attack on devolution, so the question is: will the Prime Minister break domestic law, disregard the settled will of the Scottish people, ignore the concerns of Scotland’s communities and press ahead with this Bill? The time for Scotland’s place as an independent, international, law-abiding nation is almost here. Our time has come.
The Prime Minister
The answer is that yes, indeed, we will press on with the Bill, because I believe that the right hon. Gentleman’s attacks on it are totally illogical. It actually represents a substantial transfer of powers and of sovereignty to Scotland, to Wales, to Northern—it is a massive devolutionary act. What it also does is—I believe this is common ground across the Dispatch Box—[Interruption.] It also ensures the integrity of the UK internal market. He speaks of a transfer of powers to the UK Government. On the contrary, what he would do is transfer powers back to Brussels not just over competition and state aid but, of course, over fisheries too. That is the policy of the Scottish nationalist party, and it would be a disaster for our country. [Interruption.]
Mr Speaker
I am sure that the leader of the SNP would like to withdraw that last comment about being a liar. No hon. Member would do that. Please withdraw it.
Ian Levy (Blyth Valley) (Con)
The Prime Minister
Every suicide is an absolute tragedy, and my hon. Friend is right to focus on that issue in the way that he does. I am proud that the Government are rolling out record investments in suicide prevention. I also pay tribute to the charitable sector—to Mind, ENGAGE and Davy Orr—for the fantastic work it does to make a difference at that crucial moment and to prevent suicide.
Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
The hon. Lady is entirely right to draw attention to the plight of the Uyghurs, as both I and the Foreign Secretary have done. We raise these concerns directly with the Chinese authorities and will continue to do so in the G20, the UN and every other context.
Elliot Colburn (Carshalton and Wallington) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I understand that the council concerned has acknowledged the failures and the improvements that are needed. For our part, we are reviewing the oversight of special educational needs schools and will be commissioning a new round of inspections by Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission. I am happy to write to my hon. Friend further about that issue.
David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)
The Prime Minister
I thank the hon. Gentleman, and I know that the whole House will join me in sending our deepest condolences to the family and friends of Mercy Baguma. We take very seriously the wellbeing of all who are in the asylum system, and I can assure him that the relevant Minister will take up that particular case with him.
Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I draw a sharp distinction and contrast between the civilised approach of my right hon. Friend to environmental protest and that taken by those who tried in vain to frustrate the freedom of the press. I must say that I was struck by the silence of the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) when he had an opportunity to condemn it. To answer my right hon. Friend’s point directly, I do think it is important now, given the weight of the economic interests that were under threat and the threat to the freedom of the press, that we look at what we can do under public order and, indeed, under the law on nuisance. That is what we will do.
Kate Osborne (Jarrow) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I have every sympathy with those who now want to get tests, and the demand is very acute, partly because so many people who do not have symptoms want a test. Our view is that the priority should be those who do have symptoms, and the groups that I mentioned earlier. We will do everything we can to address the issues in Jarrow and across the country. I remind the hon. Lady that NHS Test and Trace has so far conducted 17.6 million tests, which is more than any other European country, so she should take at least some pride in that.
Mark Eastwood (Dewsbury) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I thank my hon. Friend, and I thank the people of Dewsbury for their fortitude in doing what they have done and the local action that they are taking to defeat the virus. Of course, as soon as we see results in the case of a local lockdown, we do take that area out of lockdown. I have no doubt that the same will happen in Dewsbury and elsewhere.
Jessica Morden (Newport East) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
It was this Government that introduced the living wage, and I am proud that we have so far delivered a record increase in the living wage and supported families throughout the crisis, not just with the living wage but with a huge £160 billion package of support. This is a Government who put their arms around the people of the country and help them through tough times.
Antony Higginbotham (Burnley) (Con)
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to champion Burnley College and the cutting edge education in the technologies of the future that this Government support. I welcome all the plans that Burnley College has for capital investment to develop its campus.
Kim Johnson (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
This Government have already built far more council homes, as far as I can remember, than Labour did in 13 years when they were last in office, and we will go on. You have just heard, Mr Speaker, about the huge £12 billion investment in affordable homes that are making this week, and we will deliver beautiful new homes across the country, building on brownfield sites in a way that is affordable and helps young people on to the housing ladder in the way that they need, either through affordable rent or through part-buy, part-rent schemes, which are immensely attractive. That is the way forward for our country.
James Wild (North West Norfolk) (Con)
King’s Lynn will benefit from the Government’s levelling up agenda with £25 million through the towns fund. Will my right hon. Friend encourage Ministers to look favourably at proposals for a school of nursing at the College of West Anglia, to help to kickstart local training and job opportunities for the people of west Norfolk?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is an excellent champion for his area, and if he can just contain his impatience a little bit, he may hear something to his advantage and to the advantage of his constituency from his right hon. Friend and mine, the Communities Secretary.
Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)
The £150 million spent on faulty masks, the £120 million spent on contracts awarded to a Tory council and the staggering £1 billion-worth of contracts awarded without proper due diligence—where has the money gone, Prime Minister?
The Prime Minister
All I can tell the hon. Lady is that there has been a massive investment in PPE throughout this pandemic, and billions of items have been supplied. If she has a particular anxiety about some particular contract, I am more than happy to address that if she will take the trouble to write to me.
Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)
The Prime Minister
As somebody who grew up on a farm many years ago, I am thrilled to support Back British Farming Day. It is thanks to them that we have fantastic food on our plates every day, and also that we have an amazing opportunity to increase our agricultural exports around the world. That is why I am so much looking forward to that period, which comes at the end of this year, when we will be able to take advantage of the freedoms that Brexit brings, and I hope very much that Opposition Members will join the whole House in pushing through the valuable United Kingdom Internal Market Bill, which will help to support UK farming across the whole country and build a stronger agricultural industry for our whole country.
Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)
The Prime Minister may be aware that there are some Scottish nationalists who want Scotland to follow the example of Catalonia and have a wildcat independence referendum. I oppose that because it would be illegal. If the Prime Minister thinks it is acceptable for his Government to ignore international law, on what basis would he oppose it?
The Prime Minister
I have great respect for the right hon. Gentleman. Let me just say this, because the Leader of the Opposition in my view neglected to raise this important subject. My job is to uphold the integrity of the UK, but also to protect the Northern Irish peace process and the Good Friday agreement. To do that, we need a legal safety net to protect our country against extreme or irrational interpretations of the protocol that could lead to a border down the Irish sea in a way that I believe, and I think Members around the House believe, would be prejudicial to the interests of the Good Friday agreement and prejudicial to the interests of peace in our country. That has to be our priority.
Oral Answers to Questions
Boris Johnson Excerpts(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Claudia Webbe (Leicester East) (Lab)
The Prime Minister (Boris Johnson)
One hundred and eighty-one NHS and 131 social care workers’ deaths have sadly been reported involving covid-19. I know that the thoughts of the whole House are with their families and friends.
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my meetings in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Claudia Webbe [V]
The Government keep saying that this virus does not discriminate, but that is not true. Office for National Statistics figures show that black people, African and African Caribbean people are four times more likely to die from covid-19. The figure is also disproportionately high for Bangladeshi, Pakistani or Indian communities. What is the Prime Minister going to do now about this,- and will he act now to ensure that African, Asian and minority ethnic communities in Leicester East and across the country are supported in the next phase of this virus?
The Prime Minister
Yes. As the hon. Lady may know, we are looking at all the comorbidities associated with the coronavirus and all the reasons why people might be disproportionately affected. A rapid review is now being conducted by Professor Fenton, who will report at the end of the month about particularly vulnerable groups. We will take steps to ensure that they are protected where that is appropriate.
Mr Richard Holden (North West Durham) (Con)
The Prime Minister
I congratulate my hon. Friend on his imagination and his plan for a new railway. It is entirely in keeping with our infrastructure revolution, and I can assure him that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport will be getting back to him. I note that Nexus has already identified several possible extensions of the Tyne and Wear Metro scheme, which may be of advantage to his constituents.
Keir Starmer (Holborn and St Pancras) (Lab)
Last Friday, the Health Secretary said:
“Right from the start we’ve tried to throw a protective ring around our care homes.”
That caused quite a reaction. Yesterday, it was flatly contradicted by the chief executive of Care England. He was giving evidence to the Select Committee on Health and Social Care, and he said that we should have been focusing on care homes from the start and that despite what is being said, there were cases of people who either did not have a covid status or were symptomatic who were discharged into our care homes. The Government advice from 2 to 15 April was:
“Negative tests are not required prior to transfers/admissions into”
care homes. What is protective about that?
The Prime Minister
As the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows full well—of course he is right to draw attention to what has happened in our care homes, and we mourn the loss of every victim—no one was discharged into a care home this year without the express authorisation of a clinician, and they have the interests of those patients at heart. As I said to him last week—he does not seem to have remembered—actually, the number of patients discharged from hospitals into care homes was 40% down in March on January. The guidance was changed to reflect the change in the epidemic, and that guidance was made available to care homes—and, of course, since the care homes action plan began, we have seen a sharp reduction in the number of deaths in care homes. Indeed, since I last stood before the House, the number of deaths in care homes has come down by 31%. I think he should pay tribute to all those who have helped to fight that epidemic across the NHS and across our local services.
Keir Starmer
I think the Prime Minister rather missed the point. The question was whether people were tested going back into care homes. The chief executive of Care England says that because they were not, people who had no covid-19 status or who were symptomatic were discharged into care homes. That is a very serious issue that requires an answer.
Yesterday, the chief executive of Care England, in his evidence, was also asked when routine testing would start in care homes. This is the answer he gave yesterday: “I think the short answer is that we’ve had the announcement, but what we haven’t had is delivery, and we are not really clear when that will arrive.” This is the chief executive of Care England in his evidence. Even the Government’s Command Paper, published last week and introduced by the Prime Minister to this House, says within it—[Interruption.] The Health Secretary says, “He’s wrong.” I am quoting the Government’s paper. It says that
“every care home for the over 65s will have been offered testing for residents and staff”
by 6 June.
That is from the Prime Minister’s Command Paper. That is over two weeks away. What is causing the continued delay in routine testing in our care homes?
The Prime Minister
I am afraid the right hon. and learned Gentleman is simply in ignorance of the facts. The reality is that already 125,000 care home staff have been tested, 118,000—[Interruption.] Perhaps he did know that. One hundred and eighteen thousand care home workers have been tested, and we are absolutely confident that we will be able to increase our testing, not just in care homes but across the whole of the community. Thanks to the hard work of my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary and his teams, we will get up to 200,000 tests in this country by the end of this month. The right hon. and learned Gentleman may know this—perhaps it is one of those international comparisons he hesitates to make—but actually this country is now testing more than virtually any other country in Europe.
Keir Starmer
Again, the question was when would routine testing start, and the chief executive of Care England, who knows what he is talking about, gave evidence yesterday that it has not. [Interruption.] If the Prime Minister is disputing the evidence to the Select Committee, that is his own business. [Interruption.]
Keir Starmer
To assure the Prime Minister, I am not expressing my own view; I am putting to him the evidence of experts to Committees yesterday.
Testing was referred to by the Prime Minister. That on its own is obviously not enough. What is needed is testing, tracing and isolation. At yesterday’s press conference, the deputy chief scientific adviser said that we could draw particular lessons from Germany and South Korea, which have both had intensive testing and tracing. The number of covid-19 deaths in Germany stands at around 8,000. In South Korea, it is under 300. In contrast, in the United Kingdom, despite 2 million tests having been carried out, there has been no effective tracing in place since 12 March, when tracing was abandoned. That is nearly 10 weeks in a critical period without effective tracing. That is a huge hole in our defences, isn’t it, Prime Minister?
The Prime Minister
I must say that I find it peculiar, because I have given the right hon. and learned Gentleman repeated briefings on this matter. He is perfectly aware of the situation in the UK as regards testing and tracing in early March. It has been explained many times to him and to the House. I think his feigned ignorance does not come very well. However, I can tell him that today I am confident that we will have a test and trace operation that will enable us, if all the other conditions are satisfied—it is entirely provisional—to make progress. I can also tell him that we have already recruited 24,000 trackers, and by 1 June we will have 25,000. They will be capable of tracking the contacts of 10,000 new cases a day. To understand the importance of that statistic, I remind the right hon. and learned Gentleman that today the new cases stand at 2,400. We are making vast progress in testing and tracing and I have great confidence that by 1 June, we will have a system that will help us greatly to defeat this disease and move the country forward. I therefore hope that he will abandon his slightly negative tone and support it.
Keir Starmer
Thirty-four thousand deaths is negative. Of course I am going to ask about that, and quite right too. The Prime Minister says “feigned ignorance”, but he knows that for 10 weeks there has been no tracing, unlike in Germany and South Korea. Tracing is critical—there is no getting away from that. The Prime Minister knows it is vital—he made a great deal of it in his speech to the nation Sunday week ago. He said,
“we cannot move forward unless we satisfy”
the tests that he has set, one of which is a “world-beating” test and trace system. World-beating. Leaving aside the rhetoric—“effective” will do—there now appears to be some doubt about when the system will be ready. This is the last Prime Minister’s questions for two weeks. Can the Prime Minister indicate that an effective test, trace and isolate system will be in place by 1 June—Monday week?
The Prime Minister
The right hon. and learned Gentleman seems to be in the unhappy position of having rehearsed his third or fourth question but not listened to my previous answer, brilliant forensic mind though he has. He has heard that we have growing confidence that we will have a test, track and trace operation that will be world-beating, and yes, it will be in place by 1 June.
To repeat the figures, since the right hon. and learned Gentleman has invited me to do so, there will be 25,000 trackers, who will be able to cope with 10,000 new cases a day. That is very important because currently new cases are running at about 2,500 a day. They will be able to trace the contacts of those new cases and stop the disease spreading. I hope very much, notwithstanding the occasional difficulty of these exchanges—and I totally appreciate the role that the right hon. and learned Gentleman has to fulfil—that he will support us as we go forward, that he will be positive about the test, track and trace operation and that we can work together to use it to take our country forward. That is what the people of this country want to see.
Keir Starmer
I am very happy to work with the Prime Minister on that. He knows that from our previous exchanges.
Every Thursday, we go out and clap for our carers. Many of them are risking their lives for the sake of all of us. Does the Prime Minister think it is right that careworkers coming from abroad and working on our frontline should have to pay a surcharge of hundreds, sometimes thousands of pounds to use the NHS themselves?
The Prime Minister
I have thought a great deal about this, and I accept and understand the difficulties faced by our amazing NHS staff. Like the right hon. and learned Gentleman, I have been a personal beneficiary of carers who have come from abroad and frankly saved my life. I know exactly the importance of what he asks. On the other hand, we must look at the realities. This is a great national service—it is a national institution—that needs funding, and those contributions help us to raise about £900 million. It is very difficult in the current circumstances to find alternative sources, so with great respect for the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s point, I think it is the right way forward.
Keir Starmer
I am disappointed, because the Prime Minister knows how raw this is. The fee in question, the immigration health surcharge, is currently £400 a year. From October, that goes up to £624 a year. For a careworker on the national living wage, that will require working for 70 hours to pay off the fee.
The Doctors Association and a number of medical groups wrote to the Home Secretary this week, and they set it out this way:
“At a time when we are mourning colleagues, your steadfast refusal to reconsider the deeply unfair immigration health surcharge is a gross insult to all”—
of us—
“who are serving this country at its time of greatest need.”
We agree, and Labour will table amendments to the immigration Bill to exempt NHS and careworkers from this charge. Can I urge the Prime Minister to reconsider his view as we go through this crisis?
The Prime Minister
I have given my answer, but what I will say is that I think that it is important that we support our NHS and that we invest massively in our NHS. This Government—this one nation Conservative Government—are determined to invest more in our NHS than at any time in modern memory. We have already begun that, and we will want to see our fantastic frontline workers paid properly. That is, I think, the best way forward. I want to see our NHS staff paid properly, our NHS supported and I want to continue our programme not just of building 40 more hospitals, but recruiting 50,000 more nurses and investing hugely in our NHS, and I believe that will be warmly welcomed across the whole of our establishment of our fantastic NHS.
Sara Britcliffe (Hyndburn) (Con) [V]
The Prime Minister
Indeed, I can, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Hyndburn and Haslingden will indeed continue to receive funding for their town centres—indeed, the high streets taskforce will be increasing that support—in addition to 118 km of safe new green cycleways thanks to the Lancashire local growth fund, for which I know she has also campaigned.
Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP) [V]
Our thoughts this morning are with the communities in India and Bangladesh dealing with the landfall of super cyclone Amphan. I am sure the Government will be monitoring the situation and will seek to give all necessary support.
Every week, members of this Government applaud our truly heroic NHS and care staff, who have been on the frontline of this pandemic, regardless of whether they were born here or elsewhere. Indeed, the Prime Minister has thanked the nurses who cared for him, who were from New Zealand and from Portugal. The UK has the highest number of deaths in Europe, and without their sacrifice, we would be facing something much worse. I know the Leader of the Opposition has already asked the Prime Minister about overseas careworkers, but on Monday the Prime Minister ordered his MPs to vote for an immigration Bill that defines many in the NHS and care sector as low-skilled workers. Given their sacrifice, is the Prime Minister not embarrassed that this is how his Government choose to treat NHS and care workers?
The Prime Minister
This is a Government who value immensely the work of everybody in our national health service and our careworkers across the whole community. I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that the reason for having an immigration Bill of the kind that we are is not to keep out people who can help in our NHS; on the contrary, we want an immigration system that works for the people of this country and works for our NHS. I think what the people of this country want to see is an immigration system where we control it, we understand it and we are able to direct it according to the needs of our NHS and the needs of our economy, and that is what we are putting in place.
I know it is rejected by the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), and indeed by the right hon. Gentleman himself, but it is the right way forward.
Ian Blackford
The harsh reality is that the Prime Minister does not even pay NHS and care staff the real living wage and wants to block many of them from working here at all. We need an immigration system that is fit for purpose. The Home Secretary and the Prime Minister seem hell-bent on implementing a purely ideological immigration policy with no basis in fairness or economics. The Government have talked about giving back to our NHS and care staff. It is time for him to deliver. People migrating to these nations and choosing to work in our NHS and care sector must have the Government’s cruel NHS surcharge removed immediately. Will he make that pledge today, or will he clap on Thursday, hoping that no one really notices that he is giving with one hand and raking it in with the other?
The Prime Minister
First, the right hon. Gentleman mentions the living wage. This is the party and Government who instituted the living wage and have just increased it by a massive amount. Secondly, this is the party that is putting £34 billion into the NHS—the biggest investment in modern times—and believe me we will continue with that investment. He talks about discriminatory policies at the border. The logic of his policy is to have a border at Berwick.
Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con) [V]
The Defence Select Committee heard recently that France is conducting a root-and-branch review of its defence supply chain following concerns that China is buying up defence-related companies that are going bust during the pandemic. Does my right hon. Friend think it might be wise to consider doing the same thing here in addition to rowing back from his plans to allow Huawei to roll out 5G?
The Prime Minister
I am sure there is a legal term for imputing to me a policy that I have not yet announced, but my hon. Friend is right to be concerned about the buying up of UK technology now by countries that may have ulterior motives, and we are certainly introducing measures to protect our technological base. He will be hearing a lot more about that in the next few weeks.
Colum Eastwood (Foyle) (SDLP) [V]
In Ireland, both jurisdictions are working hard to organise contact tracing on a north-south basis, but the Prime Minister’s obsession with avoiding a Brexit transition extension means we risk crashing out without a data-sharing framework, which will critically undermine our ability to protect people from covid-19. When will he put the lives of people in our community above petty, narrow Brexiteer politics?
The Prime Minister
I must respectfully disagree with the hon. Gentleman. We are working very closely not just with our colleagues in the Government in Northern Ireland but with our colleagues in Dublin. I had a very good conversation with Leo Varadkar the other day and we saw eye to eye on the way forward. There is a huge amount shared between the UK and Ireland, and it will continue to be so.
Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con) [V]
As a stunning coastal destination built on hospitality and tourism sectors hard hit by the impact of the virus, Eastbourne is none the less looking to bounce back when it is safe to do so and is part of work on a covid-secure kitemark to inspire public confidence. Does my right hon. Friend see merit in this, and when the coast is clear, will he visit?
The Prime Minister
I am sure the coast is always clear in Eastbourne. I will do my utmost to get there as soon as I can within the social distancing rules that we must all observe. We will look at the kitemark idea. The best I can say is that my hon. Friend is a fantastic champion for Eastbourne and its attractions, and I look forward to supporting her in any way I can.
Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
Actually, I think that the hon. Lady has an extremely important point, and I have taken dramatic action, even before a reshuffle. The two most important appointments that we have made recently, after Lord Deighton doing the personal protective equipment, was Dido. One of the reasons we are making such fast progress, I think, now on test and trace is that Dido Harding has come on board, and Kate Bingham is leading the national effort to co-ordinate our search for a vaccine with other countries.
Chris Loder (West Dorset) (Con)
I am very grateful for my right hon. Friend’s hard work, and in particular, his commitment to doing whatever it takes to help people to make ends meet during this pandemic, but in West Dorset I have many constituents who were employed before 19 March who are not eligible to be furloughed under the job retention scheme—particularly those who have changed jobs. Will he look at this area again to see, please, what he can do to help those who have slipped through the net and those who have no financial support at this time?
The Prime Minister
Yes. We have pushed back the cut-off date in order to help people, but we are also looking to support people who are in difficulties with some temporary measures on welfare, as he knows—the significant £1,040 increase in universal credit standard allowance and the working tax credit basic element. If there are particularly hard cases, and there will be hard cases, I say what I have said before to the House: I am happy to take them up on my hon. Friend’s behalf.
Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP) [V]
The Prime Minister
All I can say is, no, I will not, and I think that the Secretary of State for Scotland does an admirable job.
Tom Randall (Gedling) (Con) [V]
My constituent, Elizabeth Gull, has proposed the creation of a medal for NHS workers and others to recognise their distinguished service in their work against coronavirus. I think that this idea has merit. Will my right hon. Friend consider a medal or other accolade in the fullness of time for those who have gone above and beyond in the last few months?
The Prime Minister
As I am sure the whole House can imagine, we are indeed looking at the excellent suggestion made by my hon. Friend’s constituent, Elizabeth. We are thinking how to recognise the work of healthcare staff, carers and many others, and we are engaging with staff and employers at the present time.
Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP) [V]
The Prime Minister
Perhaps I can just say that I continue to be very happy with the level of co-operation, in spite of what we sometimes hear in this Chamber, between the Governments of all four nations, particularly Scotland. I just remind the hon. Lady, of course, that Scotland has benefited from about £1 billion of coronavirus funding in the last period and will get about £3 billion overall, which is perhaps a material consideration on which she might like to reflect.
Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con)
Unemployment in the under-24 age group has already doubled in Telford compared with this time last year, and it is clear that the aftermath of the pandemic will hit our young people hardest, with disruption to education and training, as well as job losses. I know that my right hon. Friend is passionate about opportunities for young people, particularly in areas such as Telford, which has suffered disproportionately in previous recessions. Will he ensure that the recovery strategy focuses on young people and equipping them with the skills they need to survive in a post-pandemic economy and, indeed, thrive in the longer term?
The Prime Minister
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to speak up for the young people of Telford and their immense potential, and that is why we will be supporting her and them with a new national skills fund worth £2.5 billion, so that young people can be at the very forefront of our effort to come out of this epidemic.
Mr Speaker
That is the end of PMQs. Before the urgent question, I should say that I plan to allow a statement by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster on the UK’s approach to Northern Ireland protocol as part of the scrutiny proceedings. I will allow less time for the urgent question and the business statement as a consequence.
We now come to the urgent question to the Leader of the House. I will end the urgent question at 12.55. I call the Leader of the House, Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg, to answer the urgent question from Alistair Carmichael. The Leader of the House should speak for no more than three minutes.