National Care Service

Debate between Brian Leishman and Alison McGovern

Thursday 15th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Alison McGovern]

I thank my hon. Friend and pay tribute to her for all the work she is doing with her local hospice and her community on this issue. Members across the House will understand that we have a challenge in hospice funding, which I am looking at as part of the end-of-life care work that I am doing. It sounds like she is more than on top of it with her ICB, but if I can be of any assistance to her, I would be happy to do so.

[Brian Leishman (Alloa and Grangemouth) (Lab)]

The creation of a national care service is in the very best socialist traditions of the Labour party. However, pensioners funding its creation through the removal of the triple lock is not, especially when we have over 2 million pensioners living in poverty. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has said that the £15 billion of savings from the removal of the triple lock is actually more like £4 billion. Making any savings is a bit of a speculative gamble, because if we see high inflation, there are potentially no savings to be made. If there is going to be a financial shortfall in providing the national care service, how will it be funded and realised?

[Alison McGovern]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question, and in responding to him, I would like to quote the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, who said in his statement to the House this week:

“We know that people want security in retirement and we are committed to protecting the poorest pensioners. Under our plans, pensioner poverty is set to fall.”—[Official Report, 13 October 2026; Vol. 791, c. 198.]

I hope my hon. Friend read that statement, and I hope he understands why I will respectfully disagree with him.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Brian Leishman and Alison McGovern

Monday 24th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alison McGovern]

We recently put forward our response on improving standards. We are looking for an opportunity to take that forward, for the reasons the hon. Gentleman mentions.

[Brian Leishman (Alloa and Grangemouth) (Lab)]

I have residents from Tillicoultry who have not had access to their homes for two years because of RAAC—reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete. Their lives have been turned upside down. A year ago, the Scottish Government were given the largest settlement figure in the history of devolution, but they have not helped my residents. Will the Secretary of State inform me what discussions his Department has had with regard to residential RAAC with Scottish Government counterparts?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Brian Leishman and Alison McGovern

Monday 3rd February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alison McGovern]

I hope the hon. Lady will understand from the tone of what I said that this matter is urgent and that we are working quickly and will bring forward proposals as soon as we can.

[Brian Leishman (Alloa and Grangemouth) (Lab)]

Alarmingly, there has been talk of ruthless cuts to welfare. That would be utterly devastating as any cuts would push more families into poverty. We will not see a reduction to child poverty by economic growth alone; it will require targeted policy action—something that the Trussell Trust and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation agree with in their essentials guarantee. Do Ministers have plans to change the basic rate of universal credit so that it reflects the cost of life’s essentials—food and household bills?

[Alison McGovern]

As I have said several times, we are working quickly to bring forward the detail of that plan. In fact, only last week we had a parliamentary engagement session so that colleagues across the House could be brought up to speed on the detail of that work. I sat on the Opposition Benches and watched for 14 years as the Conservatives put our children into poverty. We will waste no time in dealing with this problem.