Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point. Of the more than 400 pages in the White Paper, page 238 is perhaps one of the most important, not least because it contains an image of what we can hope to see and what my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care will be announcing, which is action to ensure that my right hon. Friend’s constituents get the state-of-the-art, 21st-century hospital that they deserve. That would not happen, I am afraid, under the Opposition, because it is only through the investment that we are putting in and the sound economy that has been created under my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister’s leadership that we are able to ensure that the citizens of Harlow get the hospitals that they need.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

rose—

[Michael Gove]

I am always delighted to give way to the hon. Lady.

[Caroline Lucas]

I wonder if there is a page missing in my copy of the Bill, because I was looking for the net zero test, which I am sure the Secretary of State would agree ought to be applied to all planning decisions, policies and procedures, yet it is conspicuous by its absence. Does he agree that if we are serious about using this Bill to really level up, then we need to have that net zero test? Can he commit to that now?

[Michael Gove]

I will say three things as briefly as I can. First, the national planning policy framework that will be published in July will say significantly more about how we can drive improved environmental outcomes. Secondly, there is in the Bill a new streamlined approach to ensuring that all development is in accordance with the highest environmental standards. Thirdly, as the hon. Lady knows, under the 25-year environment plan and with the creation of the Office for Environmental Protection, the non-regression principle is embedded in everything that we do. The leadership that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has shown, not least at COP26, in driving not just this country but the world towards net zero should reassure her on that front.

Building Safety Bill

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 19th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I assure him that the 30-year retrospection is what we decided on; it is not a typo and it should not read 25 years.

The prospective limitation period will remain at 15 years, as is currently proposed, which still represents a substantial extension beyond the existing six years. In a small number of cases, the retrospectively extended limitation period will expire very soon following the commencement of the provision. We believe that it is important that the extended limitation period is of practical benefit in the case of all buildings that fall within scope. That is why we have proposed adding section 4B(4) to the Limitation Act 1980 through clause 128, which will ensure that there is always a minimum amount of time to lodge a claim under section 1 of the Defective Premises Act for buildings whose limitation periods will be revived for a very short period of time.

As introduced, the Bill provided for an initial period of 90 days in which action relating to defective premises could be taken when the extension was about to run out. I agree with several of my hon. Friends that 90 days is an insufficient amount of time to take the necessary advice and lodge a claim, which is why we are bringing forward amendments 42 and 43 to extend the initial period to one year. That means that those in any buildings completed between mid-1992 and mid-1993 will always have one full year in which to lodge their claim, once this Bill and its provisions apply. These amendments will ensure that the retrospectively extended limitation period can be of practical benefit in the case of all buildings in scope, and I trust that the House will support them.

Clause 127 expands the scope of the Defective Premises Act to include refurbishment works, and a technical amendment in the next group will ensure that this commences two months after Royal Assent, ensuring that this important new safeguard against shoddy workmanship is taken up as soon as possible. This was a debate that we had, and agreed about, in Committee. I am grateful to my right hon. and hon. Friends, and indeed to colleagues across the House, for debating these matters and for tabling amendments in this area, but I hope that in the light of what I have said from the Dispatch Box they will feel able to withdraw their amendments.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I want the Minister to clarify one last thing before he sits down, because although other hon. Members have raised it, I am still not entirely clear what reassurance there is for our constituents who are leaseholders experiencing problems that are not related to cladding. Others have raised the issues of internal partitions, roof spaces and so forth, and the Minister has referred to other legal channels that may be available, but can he tell me clearly now what reassurance there is for leaseholders who are not facing cladding problems but are facing other fire defects? Will the legal protections that he is offering extend to them?

[Christopher Pincher]

We will work with parties across this House—across both Houses—and with interested parties to ensure that these issues are properly understood and debated.

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Lucas]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland). I pay tribute to all his work on this issue, and the work of the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman), the Select Committee and many others.

There is much to welcome in this Bill, but I want to return to the issue of leaseholders, which is still one of the most worrying outstanding issues. I welcome the fierce determination that I have heard from Members in all parts of the House to make sure that we will not rest until we ensure that that protection for leaseholders is absolutely written into the Bill. I welcome the spirit of the Secretary of State’s statement last week, including the recognition that leaseholders are blameless in the scandal. He said that

“it is morally wrong that they should be the ones asked to pay the price.”—[Official Report, 10 January 2022; Vol. 706, c. 283.]

I agree, but unfortunately there is still too much lacking in this Bill. Like the gaps and defects in my constituents’ homes, there are gaping holes that still need fixing, including the firm commitment that we need to ensure that the burden for repairs, including non-cladding remedial work, does not fall on leaseholders. I am disappointed that the Minister has been unable to offer us more reassurance on that point.

This is not just about determining who will pay for construction defects. We need to know when they are going to pay, what happens should they refuse, and exactly what costs will be covered when they do so. What will happen in March if there is deadlock and developers do not agree to the £4 billion suggested in the Secretary of State’s letter to the residential property developer industry? What assessment have the Government made of the need for housing associations to access funding collected from the industry to cover the costs of leaseholders and to ensure that the delivery of social housing is not impacted by the fall-out from this crisis? What measures will be put in place to end individual legal disputes about liability if developers or manufacturers of materials, for example, refuse to accept liability for defects of their making?

I want to focus on one particular issue, which comes down to the fact that many developments are owned by absent and faceless freeholders via asset management companies. That means that getting something that should be very simple, like the signature of a freeholder on an application form, is very far from being straightforward, especially when offshore companies appear determined to avoid paper trails that might lead back to them at a later date. Let me give an example. On Friday, leaseholders at Stepney Court in my constituency received legal papers from their managing agent, FirstPort Property Services Ltd. They were horrified to be told that FirstPort intends to recover the estimated £4,912,000 for repairs from the leaseholders if the application to the building safety fund is not successful. That will mean that constituents such as the single working mother who paid £60,000 for a 25% share of her property will be lumbered with a repair bill of £110,000. That is not fair and it should not be allowed to happen.

All the while, the head lessee of those residential properties, Abacus Land 4 Ltd lurks in the background. Its role in the saga remains unclear, but what we do know about the elusive Abacus is that it is registered in Guernsey. It is administered by the asset management company, Long Harbour. Although I recognise that Abacus is not the developer, the mystery surrounding it and the confusing chain of accountability suggests that it is an example of what is at the very heart of the scandal: faceless investors making money out of shoddy, substandard and often downright unsafe housing.

It is not okay for freeholders to hold leaseholders to ransom. It is not okay for freeholders to hold up building safety fund applications by refusing to sign paperwork while, in the meantime, tightening up their legal positions before doing so. It is not okay for the Government to allow that to happen.

Last week, the Secretary of State said that he was “clear about who should” be “remedying failures”. He said:

“It should be the industries that profited, as they caused the problem, and those who have continued to profit, as they make it worse.”

He went on to say:

“I have established a dedicated team in my Department to expose and pursue those responsible.”—[Official Report, 10 January 2022; Vol. 706, c. 283-284.]

Let us see that come to fruition and see what that really means on the face of the Bill.

Stepney Court is just one of multiple blocks in the New England quarter of my constituency where defects have been identified and residents are battling with those responsible. Will the Minister ensure that his team looks into the problems facing residents in the area, where unpicking the responsibility for where remedial work lies has led to unacceptable delays in accessing support from the building safety fund? It is not just Stepney Court; residents in Embankment House and Temple House are still waiting for a decision on their application, too.

To be clear, on who should pay, we need guarantees that the buck will not be passed to those who, frankly, cannot pay. I have scores of constituents who are trapped in properties that they cannot sell—mortgage prisoners who cannot move on. I have more than 1,000 constituents living in dangerous homes. They need guarantees that issues other than cladding will be covered in the Building Safety Bill, whether that means missing fire breaks, compartmentation, defective fire doors, wooden balconies or other construction defects. They need to know that they will not have to wait years for that to happen. They need certainty that the Bill, along with the commitments in the Secretary of State’s statement last week, will ensure that the wait for work to make their homes safe finally ends. Allowing people to remain living in unsafe homes is highly dangerous. It needs to end, and the Bill is the opportunity for the Government to address past failings as well as to look ahead. I hope that they will act with the speed and certainty that our constituents all need.

Elections Bill (Instruction)

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Instruction
Monday 20th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara).

Today, we are faced with yet another example of a Government with absolutely no respect for democracy, demonstrated both by this process and by the use of it in relation to a policy change of such huge electoral importance.

Ironically, the Minister who tabled this instruction—the hon. Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith)—was the very Minister who recently criticised the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) for using this little-used mechanism himself. The irony is compounded not least because the hon. Gentleman used it as a Back Bencher, with few other options at his disposal, faced with a Government blatantly leaving the issue of suspending Parliament out of a Bill that should have included it. By contrast, in this case, the Government of the day are abusing parliamentary process in two ways: first, they did not give notice of this extension of the scope of the Bill; and secondly, there is no good reason for using this instruction mechanism in the first place.

That raises questions as to why this attempt to foist the undemocratic and unfair first-past-the-post electoral system on mayoral and police and crime commissioner elections was slipped in as quietly as possible. For example, why was this silently published on the day of the reshuffle? More substantively, why did the Government not include this issue in the Bill in the first place so that the principle could have been debated on Second Reading?

Frankly, the disrespectful nature of this instruction is compounded by the fact that this is an Elections Bill—a Bill of constitutional importance, which requires those in power to behave with the highest respect for due process in order to protect our democracy and trust in Government. Anything else looks like rigging the system to the Government’s own electoral advantage. Extending the use of first past the post, and stripping out the proportional aspects of mayoral and police commissioner elections are not changes that should be bounced on MPs of other parties with no pre-legislative scrutiny or discussion.

Since 1997, every new representative body in the UK has been elected using an electoral system other than first past the post. We have had two decades of experience with PR systems in devolved Assemblies, mayoralties and local government. Now, suddenly, we have this blatant abuse of parliamentary procedure to allow the Government to scrap the PR systems that we have. Instead of the surreptitious use of this last-minute instruction, we should have had pre-legislative scrutiny so that we could properly explore on a cross-party basis the serious concerns that first past the post is unfair, unrepresentative and undemocratic. It is unfair and unrepresentative because it regularly delivers powers to those who win only a minority of the popular vote, ignoring the number of votes cast for smaller parties, and undemocratic because it promotes voter inequality, giving disproportionate power to swing voters in marginal seats and encouraging the belief that voting never changes anything, which is dangerous for participation in our democracy.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)]

The hon. Lady, my friend and neighbour, is making a very good set of points around why we need a more proportional, not less proportional, system in our voting system more broadly. Does she share my concern that Ministers have been grilled, questioned and interrogated over a number of years on the clauses in the Bill in the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Select Committee, on which I sit, and the fact that this has been brought in without PACAC being able to consider the issue beforehand with the Minister is an example of this Government undermining the Committee system as well?

[Caroline Lucas]

Of course, I absolutely agree with my constituency neighbour; this just smacks of deceitfully slipping it out so that the provision cannot have the proper scrutiny that it deserves.

When we teach young people about what the suffragettes went through to get the vote for women and how important it was to vote, it really would help if we could tell them that we had a system now where their vote actually counted. That means that the Government of the day should be treating any change in the law on our voting systems with the respect that it deserves. The fact that the Government are not going to through the normal due legislative process with this change rings major alarm bells. Second Reading debates exist for good reason; they are a high-profile part of the scrutiny process, and I can see no good reason why we were not allowed to scrutinise this outrageous proposal then. How different it would feel if we had a Government who were pluralist, open, willing to engage in dialogue with all people and parties, and willing to improve our democracy with a commitment to fairness and to increasing wellbeing for all citizens.

In May, the Tories lost 11 of 13 mayoral elections, all under the supplementary vote system, which allows voters to express their top two preferences. Now they want to change these elections to first past the post, but without any normal scrutiny. We can only conclude that they are seeking to do this unfair thing in an unfair way because they understand that when elections are fair, they tend to lose.

Building Safety

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green) [V]]

I welcome the opportunity to be part of this debate about estimated Government spending on building safety, which is of course essentially about public safety. It is a very timely debate, given that the deadline for applications to the building safety fund is tomorrow. It is a fund that, this time last year, the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee found to be seriously lacking, and it falls far short of the estimated £15 billion needed to address all fire safety defects, not just combustible cladding, in every high-risk residential building.

The problem goes even deeper, however, and is equally about the current height and product-based approach. Fire does not discriminate between buildings based on their height. It is illogical and nonsensical to exclude buildings of under 18 metres in height from applying to this fund. Eight blocks in my Brighton, Pavilion constituency are under 18 metres, and many more right across the country fall into this category. No wonder the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee is advocating a comprehensive building safety fund, alongside remediation that applies to all high-risk buildings of any height, irrespective of tenure; covers all fire safety defects, including combustible insulation; and covers all associated costs.

The Minister will be aware that the Committee, in common with many MPs and groups such as End Our Cladding Scandal, is also calling for a holistic risk and evidence-based approach that prioritises occupants who are most at risk and for the cost to be met by Government and industry, not pushed on to leaseholders. Yet we have constituents left in limbo and in fear, waiting for further details of the flawed loans scheme the Government announced earlier this year. The sums needed to ensure leaseholders do not pay more than £50 a month, as has been promised, simply do not stack up. Leaseholders in a block of below 18 metres in Manchester have been sent bills of over £100,000 each. It would take 169 years to pay back a loan that size if payments genuinely are capped at £50 a month without interest.

The reality is that the Government’s so-called solution will saddle people with debilitating debt and push them into bankruptcy, so the loan scheme needs to be scrapped and the gaps in existing support closed as a matter of priority, with responsibility falling where it is due. For every day that passes without the Government keeping their promise to leaseholders about fixing historical safety defects that they did not cause, remedial work is still not happening and people are still living in dangerous homes. I have so much correspondence from residents who are struggling to get responses and clearer information from their housing providers, which in turn are crumbling under the volume of inquiries and struggling to get responses from the developers they are in dispute with about defects.

Back in 2019, it was simply good luck that none of my constituents lost their lives at a fire in a block of below 18 metres in Pankhurst Avenue in Brighton. Residents lost everything, and many are still displaced and living in temporary accommodation. They are rightly horrified, as am I, that the Government’s approach has been characterised by doing the bare minimum. I invite the Minister to meet some of my constituents to hear directly from them about the impact of the building safety crisis and how that makes them feel.

That brings me, finally, to waking watch. In my constituency, I am aware of 11 blocks, totalling 686 flats, where there are questions about building safety. Two blocks with waking watches have to date incurred costs that exceed £703,000 for waking watch patrols alone. That figure increases every day that the Government do not intervene in disputes over remedial work and liability between housing providers and developers. In any case, the name of the waking watch fund is, frankly, a misnomer, given that it often does nothing more than cover the cost of alarms being installed in blocks with unsafe cladding. It does nothing to help my constituents who have been unable to get alarms installed in their blocks, and instead continue to pay for 24-hour patrols to alert residents in the event of a fire. Put simply, the waking watch fund does not cover waking watch costs.

In conclusion, the Government must absolutely deliver on the removal of all dangerous cladding from buildings by 2022 at the latest, but building safety is about more than cladding. More than four years on from the Grenfell Tower tragedy, the Government must ensure people are safe in their own homes, that buildings are remediated when needed, and that those who are affected can move on with their lives without being saddled with lifelong debt.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 29th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

Not for the moment.

Any net emissions increase from a particular policy or project is therefore managed within the Government’s overall strategy for meeting carbon budgets and the net zero target for 2050, as part of an economy-wide transition. Moreover, through the Environment Bill that was introduced into this House in January, the UK Government will have a power to set long-term, legally binding environmental targets across the breadth of the natural environment.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

That whole section of the Minister’s speech was a perfect example of why he should not be objecting to this amendment. It is a helpful amendment that would simply ensure that the financial contributions would actually support all those lovely climate and nature objectives he has just talked about. EU structural funds have a requirement to align with sustainability. His Government keep telling us how Brexit gives us the opportunity to go further than EU environmental policy, so in that case, why does he not accept the amendment? Why is he flunking his first test?

[Paul Scully]

I have had non-viability and flunking today—I am doing well! I will come to this in a moment. We are framing this in a number of pieces of legislation. I have talked about the Environment Bill, which was introduced in January. It will require the Government to set at least one target for each of four priority areas: air quality, biodiversity, water and waste reduction, and resource efficiency. It will also protect the environment from future damage by—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Powell]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. For the first time probably in my political career, I agree with Lord Howard on that point as well. Our new clause 1 would require Ministers to respect the rule of law while implementing their own withdrawal agreement. This is the crucial amendment today for those who want to stand by those values espoused by members of the Cabinet.

The Government have also told us that this is merely a tidying-up exercise or an insurance policy, as we have heard today—it is okay because there were “deep flaws” in the withdrawal agreement, and it was not any good anyway. It just beggars belief. In October last year, the Prime Minister tweeted that he had a “great” new Brexit deal. He told the House that this deal was a good arrangement for Northern Ireland, so which is it? No, okay, we do not have any answers to that. As the former Prime Minister also said in her speech last week:

“The United Kingdom Government signed the withdrawal agreement with the Northern Ireland protocol. This Parliament voted that withdrawal agreement into UK legislation. The Government are now changing the operation of that agreement. Given that, how can the Government…be trusted to abide by the legal obligations in the agreements it signs?”—[Official Report, 8 September 2020; Vol. 679, c. 499.]

Ministers had no answer for her then and I wonder whether they do today—no, no answer on that one.

[Caroline Lucas]

The hon. Member is making a powerful case in favour of new clause 1, which I absolutely support. Does she agree that Government amendment 13 makes the illegal power grab that she is describing even worse, because not only are Ministers seeking to take powers to legislate in breach of international law, but they are trying to close down every possible way in which Parliament could hold the Government to account?

[Lucy Powell]

I strongly agree; I will come to that point shortly.

The Government’s next justification was that it was necessary to rip up the withdrawal agreement because the European Union is ripping it up itself, but we have heard differing accounts of this: the Northern Ireland Secretary said throughout the summer:

“The Government is extremely confident that the EU is working in good faith”.

Which is it? We are still not clear about that.

Perhaps the most dangerous of all the contortions relates to Northern Ireland. The shifting justifications of the Government over the last three weeks have added to the sense that they are using Northern Ireland as a pawn in a wider negotiating strategy. Remember, this is a deal that the Prime Minister told the House was

“in perfect conformity with the Good Friday agreement”—[Official Report, 19 October 2019; Vol. 666, c. 583.]

Callous or careless? Untrustworthy or incompetent? The Government are playing a dangerous game, and it is the people and businesses of Northern Ireland who risk paying the price.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Edward Leigh]

I rise to speak to new clause 8 in my name. I shall attempt, within your time constraint, Madam Deputy Speaker, to get these complex legal and international law arguments on the record.

The problem is not the possibility of the UK breaking international law, which we do not want to do, obviously; the problem is the UK’s being prepared in case the EU fails in its willingness to interpret the protocol on Northern Ireland in a proper way. We have a legal tool at our disposal that would help clarify the situation in accord with international law: a unilateral interpretative declaration. My new clause 8 describes in some detail how that could be done. It would help our negotiating position in securing an EU trade agreement and, just as importantly, it would help get the Bill through the House of Lords.

Many in the other place will be concerned about the possibility that the UK Government may be opening the door to breaking international law. We pride ourselves on the rule of law and we should maintain our commitment to it. The real problem is whether the EU is willing to implement the protocol in a reasonable and effective manner. We do not need to break international law; we need to prevent the EU from breaking international law by violating its treaty commitments.

The EU has suggested that it would break its commitments in the protocol. It has said that it would consider breaking its commitments to allowing food from England, Wales or Scotland to be sold in Northern Ireland if the UK did not make concessions on the free trade agreement. That is on the record in Michel Barnier’s statement on 10 September. In the light of that, the Government understandably introduced this Bill, so that we can act when the EU threatens the economic integrity of the United Kingdom.

We are committed to implementing the protocol, which we signed up to, but we are only committed to what we actually agreed to—no more and no less. This is the nub of the problem. We are not bound by new interpretations of the protocol that the EU might seek to impose on us. We are not required under international law to accept all the proposals that the EU tables in the negotiations. We cannot accept any bargaining linkage being made between implementing what has been agreed under the protocol in good faith, and what has still to be agreed about our future relationship.

There is a compromise available. We can use international law to ensure that the EU meets the commitments it made in the protocol. We can assert our position, as I have argued, in a unilateral interpretative declaration, if—and only if—the EU behaves unreasonably.

The initial version of the Northern Ireland protocol agreed to in November 2018 could have bound us indefinitely to maintaining full alignment with the EU’s single market regulations and membership of the customs union. In an Adjournment debate in February 2019, I advocated the use of a conditional unilateral interpretative declaration to assert the temporary nature of the backstop. That word “temporary” was then in the protocol.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Torridge and West Devon (Mr Cox), who was then the Attorney General, took this up to seek a time limit or a withdraw mechanism from the backstop. That was the basis of documents tabled on 11 March 2019 for the second meaningful vote. Unfortunately, the unilateral declaration issued then was not made strong enough to guarantee an exit from the backstop according to many people in this House. The Government, I believe, should have asserted a stronger interpretation.

Nevertheless, in December last year, we succeeded in getting rid of the backstop. The question is whether the agreed Northern Ireland protocol will be implemented in good faith. The protocol is a good compromise. Rather than abandoning international law, we must use the full provisions of international law to ensure that the protocol is implemented as we agreed.

The general principles of international law applicable to the withdrawal agreement and the protocol are spelled out in the 1986 Vienna convention on the law of treaties. In addition, in 2011, the International Law Commission of the UN codified a guide of practice for handling disagreements about the interpretation of treaties. That allows an individual Government to issue a declaration on their interpretation of the meaning of specific aspects of a treaty. The UK can do that unilaterally, without any agreement from the EU.

To leave the realm of politics and enter the realm of international law, any unilateral interpretative declaration must be sent to the depositary of the treaty. I proposed in an amendment in Committee that the Government should use this declaration to assert their position if the EU were to fail to implement aspects of the protocol. My new clause 8 now spells out in some detail how the declaration could be used. Subsection (1) specifies that the Government should invoke this procedure if the EU fails to carry out the requirements of the protocol. Subsection (2) specifies that the Government should ensure that their interpretation of the protocol is justified by, and in accord with, the provisions of the Vienna convention.

It is important to note that the Vienna convention covers the need to act in “good faith” and the need to avoid results that are “manifestly absurd or unreasonable”. Subsection (3) therefore requires the Government to obtain parliamentary approval before they make a legal challenge, and subsection (4) requires the Government to report back to Parliament on whether the EU has approved the interpretation. If the dispute were to continue, there would be a choice: we could seek negotiations to achieve a compromise in the Joint Committee, or we could invoke the withdrawal agreement’s arbitration procedures. If the dispute could not be resolved and arbitration were required, we would have acted in good faith—that is the point—in international law. We would have established our case and started arbitration on our own terms.

The Government are right to challenge the EU. We can uphold international law. We can challenge the EU with proper legal methods. We do not need to accept its interpretation of the protocol. When we face unreasonable demands, we have a chance to state our interpretation of what we agreed when we signed the protocol. We can challenge the EU with a unilateral interpretative declaration and, hence, defend our position in full accord with international law. I ask the Government to consider positively this compromise, on which we can all agree and which is offered to the Government in good faith.

[Caroline Lucas]

I rise to speak to new clause 6, which is in my name. Its intention is to ensure that those seeking public money for economic development under this legislation are obliged to undertake a climate and nature emergency impact assessment.

The powers set out in part 6 of the Bill provide assistance in a way that would be subject to very few restrictions. New clause 6 is designed to be a genuinely constructive and practical suggestion to help Ministers see the serious gap in the legislation, and to help them to assess and decide whether the money they are dishing out is trashing the environment or supporting its restoration.

Both the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully), earlier this afternoon, and the Minister of State, Cabinet Office, the hon. Member for Norwich North (Chloe Smith), last week, said that the UK Government have a determination to see climate and environmental goals achieved. Well, I am very glad to hear that, but it makes me even more perplexed that they are not willing to accept what I regard as a helpful and friendly amendment. In fact, both Ministers have also said that it was not necessary to introduce any kind of conditions on the financial assistance powers in the Bill, because apparently there is already an overarching legal and policy framework for achieving those goals. That is not good enough. We need commitments that would make those fine words actually bite when it comes to the wide financial assistance decisions set out in the Bill.

The Bill has conferred astoundingly broad powers on Ministers, but without clarity or direction over the mechanisms that they will use to judge whether they are upholding policy commitments—and vague references to overarching frameworks just will not cut it. The bottom line is that, in order to tackle the nature and climate emergencies that we face, the state must not risk supporting projects, companies or industries that threaten to undermine progress toward meeting climate, nature and environmental goals and targets. To avoid that risk, people need to be asking and proving how their requests measure up to climate, nature and environmental goals and targets, and the Government need to check.

The production of impact statements for any proposal for financial assistance will not only help to ensure that individual projects consider long-term sustainability, including avoiding or mitigating potential negative impacts, and maximising the benefits of delivering a green economy; it will also enable Governments across the UK to better understand the aggregate impacts of such financial assistance, and measure them against the goals and targets to which they have already committed themselves. In other words, impact statements would be not an additional burden, but a necessity to reach stated goals. They would also provide a useful opportunity to demonstrate the positive impact that ambitious and well directed investment can bring. The statements would help Ministers—and, indeed, all of us—by providing the benefits of public accountability and value for money, as well as important integrated policy making to tackle the nature and climate crises.

Let us not forget that we have had so many commitments —at least in fine words—from this Government on keeping high standards post Brexit. The Conservative party manifesto promised

“the most ambitious environmental programme of any country on earth.”

It is extraordinary that a Government who say that balk when it comes to any practical measure that would enable them to implement that commitment.

Just yesterday, the Prime Minister’s comments at the signing ceremony of the Leaders’ Pledge for Nature sounded positive. He said that we need to turn words into action, and I could not agree with him more. He said that we need ambitious goals and binding targets and, in his characteristic language:

“We cannot afford dither and delay because biodiversity loss is happening today.”

Yes, Prime Minister, it is, and this straightforward measure would enable him to deliver on the fine words by supporting a mechanism that is designed to achieve exactly that. Otherwise, words are cheap.

New clause 6 is not just a “nice to have” or a green add on; it is a vital way of ensuring that we implement our existing commitments. In May last year, Parliament passed a motion declaring a climate emergency. Marvellous —I was the first to be pleased about that, but we need a mechanism to ensure that subsequent policy making is in line with that commitment. Otherwise, it is meaningless. We have heard time and again how post Brexit, the UK will be able to have higher environmental standards than the EU, yet the next round of European structural funds will have tackling climate change and addressing the just transition as a major theme. Surely at the very least we should aspire to do the same.

Evidence that we must act responsibly and urgently is mounting every day. As I have already said, the UK Government are failing to meet as many as 17 of the 20 biodiversity targets that we set ourselves 10 years ago. We have plenty of examples of money that is being spent in a way that undermines environmental sustainability, so we know we need to act.

Just this morning, Professor Simon Lewis of University College London reminded us that the biodiversity crisis is not a problem in someone else’s backyard; it is happening in the UK. We live in one of the most nature depleted countries on earth. We have lost 55% of our forest birds in 50 years, and 97% of our flower-rich meadows since the second world war. We have just 13% woody cover, compared with an EU average of 38%. Scientists regularly document huge declines in beetles, bees, butterflies, moths and ladybirds.

Those things do not happen by accident. They happen as a direct result of public policy. They happen as a direct result of where money is spent. It is therefore critical that, if and when Ministers choose to exercise the powers in the Bill, they do so in a way that is consistent and compatible with any environmental and climate goals and targets in the relevant part of the UK.

I know time is short, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I want to say how much I support new clause 1, which has been tabled in the name of the shadow Business Secretary, the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband). His powerful speech to the House on Second Reading left the Prime Minister embarrassed and exposed. Embarrassed because this is frankly all a bit of a game for a Prime Minister who does not like to lose, and exposed because the Prime Minister is at least supposed to uphold international law. In this case he is asking Parliament to give his Government authorisation to break a treaty that he negotiated and signed last year, and on which his whole general election campaign was based. You almost couldn’t make it up, but that comes after the Prorogation scandal, and a string of attacks on civil servants and the operations of our democracy, delivered by a Prime Minister who thinks little of shutting down Parliament when it gets in his way.

Under any Government of principle, new clause 1 would not be contentious, but sadly it is needed tonight because the Government’s amendment still leaves us with a Bill that clearly authorises Ministers to break international law. This is not a matter of left or right, or of leaving or remaining in Europe; this is about our democracy. To vote for the “treaty undercut” clauses in this group is not to provide a safety net, as the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster desperately suggested yesterday. Instead, it is to fire a cannon ball through the safety net of democratic principle. By contrast, new clause 1 gives MPs the opportunity to demonstrate the immovable principle that it is outrageous for any Prime Minister, any Attorney General, any Justice Secretary—indeed, it should be out of the question for any MP—to be part of legislation that authorises Ministers to break the rule of law. So I hope that every Member of the House will vote for new clause 1, and against the indefensible precedent that the Government seek to set.

Government amendment 13 is yet another attempt by the Government to avoid scrutiny of their actions, this time by the courts. It is basic to our way of life and to our history that no one is above the law, but clause 45 is a crude attempt to put Ministers above the law. Not only are Ministers seeking the power to legislate in breach of international law, but Parliament is being asked to pass a law whose aim is obviously to prevent any effective constraint on Ministers. This should be out of the question for any Government with any respect for the rule of law. Again, none of the Law Officers, no Minister and no MP should be prepared to vote for such an attack on the basic principles of our constitution.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Holden]

No, I have already given way to the hon. Lady once on this point.

More broadly, it is crucial that as we leave the European Union we give as much confidence as possible to British business, especially at this time of covid-19. There is a lot of uncertainty at the moment in my constituency—and I am sure in the constituencies of other hon. Members—particularly relating to the covid pandemic, and anything we can do to provide assurance on our important ongoing internal market relationships will be crucial. That is why I shall be supporting the Government and opposing the amendments proposed by the Opposition.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Rosie. I reiterate my support for amendment 9, which would very effectively put powers back where they belong with the devolved nations.

I turn to my new clause 10 on environmental standards, an issue that has been raised by several hon. Members on the Opposition Benches. I want to start by reminding hon. Members of two Government commitments. The first was in the Business Secretary’s foreword to the UK Internal Market Bill White Paper, which stated that its proposals would

“prevent any part of the UK from blocking products or services from another part while protecting devolved powers to innovate”.

The second was when the Bill was published and the Government website sought to assure us:

“The UK’s existing high standards across areas including environmental standards, workers’ rights, animal welfare and food standards will underpin the functioning of the Internal Market”.

I have tabled new clause 10 because the Bill does not give legislative effect to either of those commitments, and fails to create the proper framework and give the safeguards and assurances needed to ensure that all four nations of the UK will be able to legislate ambitiously, progressively and, indeed, effectively to protect the environment.

As it stands, the Bill allows market access principles to trump the environment, risking, as others have said, a race to the bottom and stagnant, if not actually diminishing, environmental standards. To date, the UK Government and the devolved Administrations have been aligned behind a common baseline of minimum EU standards, and that baseline has been kept high in part by the requirement for environmental measures to aim at a high level of protection. EU law has also provided—crucially, in certain circumstances—scope to go beyond the baseline to protect the environment and human health.

Regulatory divergence already exists in the UK, and there have been several examples from the devolved Administrations of innovative policies that deliver legitimate public policy objectives and, specifically, progressive environmental rules and regulations. I am thinking, for example, of the fact that Wales was the first country in the UK to introduce a charge on carrier bags. I have tabled this new clause because I believe the measures set out in the Bill could affect the ability of all Administrations within the UK to achieve their environmental ambitions and, indeed, to keep improving environmental standards. It could, in other words, lead to a race to the bottom in the absence of commonly agreed minimum standards.

Under the current Bill, while the devolved Administrations are not legally prohibited from introducing new requirements for goods and services, under the market access commitment, these new requirements will be disapplied for incoming goods if standards remain lower elsewhere. That risks rendering such measures ineffective in practice, creating a chilling impact on their creation in the first place. The mutual recognition principle means that the lowest standards legislated for by any of the UK Parliaments must automatically be adopted by all, and that will disincentivise individual Governments from improving existing standards and implementing new higher standards.

The Bill sets out no possibility of exception to mutual recognition requirements for environmental purposes. Mutual recognition can be denied only to prevent the spread of pests, disease and unsafe foodstuffs, and even then only under extremely strictly controlled conditions. The broad scope of the mutual recognition and non-discrimination duties and the lack of grounds to justify local requirements will stifle policy innovation in the devolved Administrations, as well as more routine improvements.

My new clause provides for a wider system of derogations, allowing an individual jurisdiction to refuse mutual recognition on the justification of legitimate public policy objectives and, specifically, on the grounds of measures to protect the environment. This is needed to begin more properly to address the need to improve environmental standards to deal with the climate crisis and nature’s stark decline. It is also needed to support and respect the devolution settlements by ensuring that measures taken by the devolved Governments in areas within their competence will not be undermined by this Bill.

It might be helpful to give a few examples of the difference that this new clause makes. First, on the blight of single-use plastic items, the Welsh Government are proposing to introduce a ban on the sale of nine single-use plastic items, while the UK Government are proposing to ban only three. The mutual recognition principle would mean that the Welsh Government would not, in effect, be able properly to regulate the sale of the additional six products if they were manufactured elsewhere in the UK. Producers in England would be able to sell the six products in Wales, irrespective of the higher Welsh environmental standards. As the Welsh Government have stated, a ban that could apply only to Welsh-produced plastics would undermine the policy and render it ineffective.

Secondly, as this Bill stands, the rules governing packaging would also be classified as a product requirement, and would therefore be fully subject to the principle of mutual recognition. Therefore, imported goods would not have to comply with any new devolved requirements. As Professor Dougan from the University of Liverpool has said—others have already quoted him today—the basic effect of the UK internal market

“would be a powerful disincentive for Scotland to exercise a devolved competence to regulate packaging on environmental grounds, since any new rules would end up applying only to domestic goods, not English imports.”

Finally, a third example is a Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs initiative that, without new clause 10, could be negatively impacted by the provisions of this Bill. DEFRA has plans to phase out sales of house coal and wet wood in England. However, if this Bill comes into force before those bans, they will be less effective, since the sale of materials originating from other parts of the UK would not be banned. For example, pre-packaged domestic coal originating in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland could be sold in England because the ban will be disapplied in relation to its sale. There will be no possibility of an exception or defence of proportionality, because the Bill does not provide for one.

My new clause 10 would address the Bill’s failure to include the exceptions and derogations vital to enabling all four UK nations to put in place sensible and proportionate measures to protect the environment. It deals with the practical consequences of mutual recognition by requiring suppliers to comply with devolved rules where they relate to the pursuit of environmental protection. The condition under paragraph (b)—that any regulation to which this amendment applies must be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim—will help to ensure that derogation on the grounds of environmental protection cannot be exploited for other policy or market aims.

Deaths of Homeless People

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 1st October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Luke Hall]

It is genuinely important to note the raising of the housing revenue account borrowing cap, so that local authorities have the ability to borrow money to build properties themselves. I take what the hon. Gentleman says extremely seriously. We should make sure that in areas such as his we have the rough sleeping initiative, as we are seeing progress, with a 19% direct fall. I am happy to have further discussion with him on this matter.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

Behind one of the shameful homeless death statistics is Jake Humm, a 22-year-old from Brighton who took his life last year, despite trying so hard to access support from local services such as Room to Rant, a brilliant project that helps young people find peer support through music. The Government have slashed local authority services and funding, which means that grassroots projects such as Room to Rant do not necessarily have the funding they need to support people such as Jake. When will the Minister reverse those cuts to funding so that those grassroots projects, which are literally a lifeline for so many, can continue in the future?

[Luke Hall]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. We are doing a huge amount in Brighton with local partnerships, and Dame Carol Black has visited Brighton as well. It is an area covered by the rough sleeping initiative, but I know that there is a huge amount more progress to be made. I am happy to speak to the hon. Lady or go to Brighton to look at what more can be done to make progress on an extremely challenging issue in her constituency.

Preston Park Train Services

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Tuesday 24th July 2018 Westminster Hall

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered train services to and from Preston Park.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I welcome the Minister and the hon. Member for Hove (Peter Kyle), who cares deeply about this issue and other subjects relating to rail services in Brighton and Hove. Today, the focus is on Preston Park.

This debate is sadly necessary because of the decimation—quite literally—of rail services at Preston Park station in Brighton. People travel from that very busy commuter station to London, and to the station to attend the many schools and the two sixth-form colleges in the area. The station also supports Brighton and Hove Albion—fans are shuttled to and from the station by buses located near it—and is essential for key events such as Brighton Pride and the marathon.

It therefore beggars belief that, following the introduction of the new timetable on 20 May, services have been slashed by about 30% at peak times. Cancellations on top of the devastated timetable have left Preston Park almost unusable. Even with the new timetable, since 16 July some 63% of Preston Park services have been either delayed or cancelled. Although cancellations appear to have been slightly improved, I hope the Minister will not suggest that people should be grateful that 37% of trains now run on time, compared with 29% after 20 May.

The ongoing fiasco is leading to dangerous overcrowding and distress. Preston Park commuters are at their wits’ end. It is no surprise to me, given the daily messages of distress that fill my inbox, that in just five days more than 1,000 people signed a petition, which I presented to the House of Commons last Tuesday, calling for the restoration of services. I have repeatedly raised my concerns with the Rail Minister, and he recently wrote to me in response. I want to take this opportunity to explain to him directly why his reply did not go down well with the constituents I sent it on to.

On the inadequacy of the new timetable, it has been explained to the Minister that the Gatwick Express to Victoria no longer stops at Preston Park, after having served the station for 10 years. There is not a reduced Gatwick Express service; the service no longer stops at Preston Park. People have bought annual season tickets with a huge premium to enable them to use Gatwick Express services from that station. They moved to that area to make their lives work with a commute to London, based on an understanding and an expectation that the service would be there. The Southern trains that have replaced the Gatwick Express start at Littlehampton, 11 stops before Preston Park, so by the time they reach Preston Park they are—unsurprisingly—crammed full.

The service cuts are causing massive distress and are ruining lives. These are just three quotes from my bulging inbox. The first person said:

“I commute from Preston Park to London Bridge...The trains are cancelled and delayed more than they run on time. I spend the (standing) journey fretting as I’m late for work. I spend the journey home fretting as my child has one parent, me, and I’m left stranded 70 miles away.”

The second person said:

“I would like to let you know about the severe difficulties I have experienced going from Preston Park to London Victoria and back for work. I pay nearly five and a half thousand pounds a year for a Gatwick Express service that no longer stops at Preston Park.”

Finally, the third person said:

“The train service from Preston Park is appalling with trains constantly cancelled. The ones that do are packed and often I am left sitting on a dirty floor.”

[Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab)]

I am very grateful to the hon. Lady for securing this debate. I had the pleasure of speaking to one of her constituents today, who told me that the train he now regularly gets to London now is only four carriages long. The problem is not just that some trains do not stop at Preston Park, but that the ones that do stop have only four carriages, so many people cannot get on in the first place. Does she agree that, if the Government are going to prevent the Gatwick Express from stopping there, at the very least they should ensure that every train that stops there is 12 carriages long?

[Caroline Lucas]

Of course I agree, but I do not want to concede yet that the Gatwick Express might not be restored. That is my big ask from today’s debate: we need those train services restored. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that it adds insult to injury, first, to see the Gatwick Express trains fly through Preston Park station pretty much empty and, secondly, to have four-car trains, which, as he says, are simply not enough. Somebody told me today that they had been commuting for 18 years through rail strikes and all kinds of problems, but this is the straw that broke the camel’s back and caused them to give up commuting and their work.

I have raised this issue with the Minister on many occasions. When he wrote to me on 12 July, he suggested that services to Victoria are better since the introduction of the new timetable:

“Before the timetable change, Preston Park received six services into Victoria in the morning peak made up of three Gatwick Express services and three Southern services. Following the timetable change, Preston Park now receives seven services into Victoria into the morning peak, all of which are Southern services.”

He ended the paragraph with a spectacularly out-of-touch comment:

“Scheduled journey times have in fact improved since the timetable change, with the average morning peak journey time being around a minute quicker.”

The purpose of the debate is to explain to the Minister again why his suggestion that Preston Park services to Victoria are more frequent and faster has gone down like a cup of cold sick with Preston Park commuters. When the seven trains he referred to are not cancelled, a large proportion are full on arrival. As I mentioned, they start at Littlehampton, 11 stops back, rather than at Brighton, just one stop back. I repeat that point, because I am not quite sure it is getting through. Trains are short formed, as the hon. Member for Hove identified, and often have only four carriages, making journeys extremely unpleasant, if commuters can even squeeze themselves on to the packed trains when they arrive.

Crucially, of the seven new services, one arrives in London after 9 am and two arrive after 9.30 am. Those times are too late for the large proportion of commuters. In place of six reliable peak trains to Victoria, three of which were Gatwick Express, we have effectively just four or five totally packed short-formed trains, and on top of that there are chronic cancellations and delays. I want to ensure that the Minister really understands why people who have paid in advance for the premium Gatwick service are incredibly angry and not at all satisfied with his letter.

The solution to the mess cannot be only to address the cancellations and delays, because the base timetable itself is unacceptable. The Minister is aware that Hassocks has four Gatwick Express trains an hour and Preston Park none. That simply does not make sense. The Gatwick Express sails by virtually empty while people who have paid a premium to catch it from Preston Park are making the journey backwards into Brighton to get it—a significant number of them drive to do so.

More than 40 people have replied to a post on the Preston Park train campaign Facebook page, saying that they now have to travel to other stations by car or via other means because the Gatwick Express service no longer runs. It urgently needs to be reinstated. There is no justification for removing the Gatwick Express from that incredibly busy city station while Hassocks, a small town, gets four Gatwick Express services an hour. Gatwick Express must be reinstated at Preston Park, and more trains need to start from Brighton, with enough carriages to meet demand. People have paid a huge amount of money to commute a relatively long way. They need to be able to get on the trains that arrive, and they need to be able to get a seat.

The Victoria service is not the only issue. London Bridge-St Pancras trains have been massively hit with a 43% cut in the morning and a 53% cut in evening peak time. Again, the Littlehampton issue in the morning makes those trains unusable, and in the evening it is complete carnage as none of the 53% fewer trains start from London Bridge, which leads to massive overcrowding. Trains often miss out London Bridge completely because more passengers cannot be fitted on, so the trains and platforms are a serious health and safety risk.

Added to that, there are massive gaps in the timetable to Preston Park, including a 1.5-hour gap between about 6 pm and 7.30 pm. That is a key commuting time, but if people miss the train—or, more likely, the train does not stop or is full—they have to wait 1.5 hours with no service at all. Preston Park commuters want more trains that start at London Bridge, as they used to. Commuters face packed trains when they arrive for boarding, so it is plain that there is demand.

The Minister’s 12 July letter to me showed that he is aware of the huge cuts to Thameslink services from Preston Park to London Bridge, Blackfriars and onwards. He simply said that, before the May timetable change, there were 12 morning peak services to those London stations, and that from 15 July there would be eight. He said that, for people going home, the numbers went from 15 trains before the May change to seven. He had two comments for those affected: first, that journey times are now quicker, and, secondly, that he expects Govia Thameslink Railway to keep the timetable under review.

Constituents are incredulous, as am I. Nearly half their services have been removed and the ones that remain are overcrowded, and telling people who cannot get on trains that the ones that do go are very slightly faster simply does not cut it. Vague assertions about expecting things to be reviewed are an appalling dereliction of duty. People are losing their jobs over this; they are missing family events, unable to pick up their children on time and looking at moving house. How bad does it have to get before the Government get a grip?

On the issue of demand, there are serious concerns that the footfall at this incredibly busy and vital station has not been accurately measured and taken account of. The Office of Rail and Road has produced statistics for Preston Park, but without barriers it is hard to know how many people are using that station. A lot of guesswork is going on. How confident is the Minister that he has a sound estimate of Preston Park numbers? It would be very interesting if he shared that estimate with us. Not only are there no barriers, so the number of people going through cannot be counted, but when commuters buy their season ticket they often designate Brighton, or even Hove, as their station of origin because it does not cost them any more to do that but it gives them greater flexibility.

I live near London Road station, another Brighton station, but my season ticket is for Brighton, because that allows me to use London Road or any surrounding station. Simply looking at the destination written on the season ticket will not make the Minister any wiser about the number of people using that station. I urge him to look at other ways of counting, perhaps manually if necessary, to demonstrate to him how busy the station is.

In response to the dire impact of the cancellations and delays that have come on top of the slashing of the base Preston Park timetable, the Minister is likely to talk about the new interim timetable of 15 July. However, from my inbox and just a glance at the Preston Park train campaign Facebook page, it becomes clear that that has not solved the problems. Indeed, the campaign analysed the new timetable and found that there are still severe cuts and the service remains, in commuters’ words, “catastrophically inferior”. The campaign explains that there are now even fewer trains or connections to the hub of Haywards Heath, making travel to all destinations more difficult and time consuming. At night, there is often only one Preston Park train an hour from Victoria; if trains are missed there are no timely connections at Haywards Heath or Brighton. My inbox is full. Last Thursday—19 July, after the new timetable came into effect—a constituent wrote to let me know:

“It has been consistently awful since I last wrote. Yesterday the 08.11 to Cambridge was cancelled without explanation so all passengers at Preston Park could do was watch as two Gatwick Expresses whizzed by. Getting home in the evening is still a game of chance.”

Even when passengers get on a train, their station might be skipped. Following such an infuriating experience at the end of last week, one constituent wrote:

“How do you expect people to be able to run lives, collect children, arrive for NHS, police, rail and other security shifts, be punctual for meetings, keep businesses viable?”

I would like to hear the Minister’s response. I must ask him, when he does answer, not to suggest that things are getting better on other bits of the network, as that is tantamount to saying that it is fine for Preston Park to be sacrificed in the interest of benefits somewhere else. It is not fine for my constituents to be sacrificed in that way.

Preston Park is considered a station for which the higher amount of one month’s season ticket cost can be claimed as compensation for recent disruption. However, that is only for those whose season tickets start at Preston Park and are valid for Thameslink services. As I mentioned, plenty of people have season tickets from Hove, Southern-only season tickets or other types of ticket. They will be left out of that compensation, even though they start their journey at Preston Park. I urge the Minister to find a way to ensure that they too are eligible for compensation. Passengers are often advised at rail offices to buy their season ticket in a way that is more flexible, not specifically for Preston Park. As a result of doing so, they will lose out.

Why should my constituent, who is a low-income freelance worker who visits London only two or three times a week, be left out of the compensation? Many different people—men and women—work part time, but a disproportionately large number of those who work part time are women, such as those who go back to work after maternity leave. Has the Minister considered that the season-ticket-only system of compensation he has devised is discriminatory, particularly since we do not yet have part-time season tickets in Brighton and Hove? It cannot be right for non-season ticket holders to be excluded; there is no principled basis for that.

This debate is not long enough for a discussion on the shambles of our fragmented and privatised railways, which should be reunited and put into public hands, but I will say something specific to the dog’s breakfast of the GTR franchise. As Ministers well know, the word “franchise” is utterly misleading in this case. GTR has a management contract and Ministers are meant to be overseeing it. The Rail Minister said last week:

“There is too much buck-passing, and we want to bring that to an end.”—[Official Report, 18 July 2018; Vol. 645, c. 417.]

I can only agree, but to follow that logic the Secretary of State himself should resign. If that is what was meant, I would certainly support it.

I want today’s debate to be a constructive demonstration of what real democracy looks like: hundreds of people contacting their MP, and getting together to campaign to seek resolution and accountability over something that is drastically affecting their everyday lives. A very large number of passengers want to hear the Minister’s response to their very reasonable demands, which include a reinstatement of Gatwick Express trains, for trains to and from Preston Park to have adequate capacity when passengers board, no gaps of more than 15 minutes in peak time services, investment in the stations and trains to be fit for commuting.

I end with a request for the Minister to provide solutions, not excuses. I want to hear that there will be an end to the ongoing Preston Park train nightmare.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joseph Johnson]

The hon. Gentleman has been a strong voice for his constituents in recent weeks—I have had almost as many conversations and meetings with him as I have had with the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion. It is obviously important that the Government focus on compensating first those passengers who have suffered the most disruption. That is the approach we took to the disruption of Southern services a year and a half ago, and we are taking a similar approach now.

That means we have created two categories of passenger. Category 1 passengers are those with a very heavy dependence on Thameslink or Great Northern services from their station. Passengers with a lesser dependence on those operators receive a lower level of compensation, reflecting the fact that they have an alternative means of getting to or from work, primarily. That explains the different approaches to passengers travelling from Preston Park and those travelling from the station the hon. Gentleman mentioned in his constituency.

The compensation scheme covers the period from 20 May 2018 to 28 July 2018, and it will go live in two waves. GTR will contact registered qualifying passengers proactively by the end of August before a web portal is opened for other passengers at a later date. As I said, that is identical to the system used for the Southern industrial action disruption about 18 months ago. Annual, monthly and weekly season ticket holders will all be eligible for up to one month, or four weeks, of the cost of their ticket. That is in addition to the standard Delay Repay compensation GTR passengers are entitled to after any 15-minute delay. That package was designed to compensate the worst affected passengers, who travel every day on season tickets bought in advance. Those who travel less frequently can claim Delay Repay compensation for the disruption they have experienced.

[Caroline Lucas]

Will the Minister address the point that there are people who are not season ticket holders because they work part time? There are a lot of flexible workers in Brighton who do not necessarily go up to London every day but none the less need to be there on the days they do go. Simply saying, “Use Delay Repay,” does not address the fact that, as I understand it, if their train is cancelled rather than late, they cannot use Delay Repay. Will he look at ensuring that those part-time workers—particularly women—have some way of getting more compensation than he describes?

[Joseph Johnson]

Let me correct the hon. Lady. Passengers are entitled to claim Delay Repay against cancelled services—that very much is possible. On her broader point about part-time workers and those who do not have season tickets but travel regularly, our priority has been to get compensation out fast using a model that was already up and running—namely, the model that was used for the Southern disruption of about 18 months ago. That was the best way for the Department to get compensation out quickly to the people most affected by the disruption. As the Secretary of State has said, we are looking carefully at the logistics and affordability of compensating other groups of passengers. The logistical challenges of doing so when there is not a season ticket to look at as evidence of regular travel to and from work should not be underestimated.

The Department has not just compensated affected passengers; it is also looking to ensure it learns all the lessons from what has happened, and it has commissioned two reviews into what went wrong with the implementation of the 20 May timetable. The independent Glaister review by the chair of the Office of Rail and Road is under way. That seeks to understand all the factors that led to the disruption following the timetable change. Within the Department, we have also started a hard review of the franchise to establish whether GTR has met, and continues to meet, its contractual obligations.

I turn to the core of the hon. Lady’s remarks: the pattern of services to and from Preston Park. I understand that some passengers would prefer to have the choice of travelling on either Gatwick Express or Southern services. However, the timetable change was designed specifically to bring about improved performance on Southern services, and having a regular and repeating pattern of services during the peaks is important to making that work. That is why Preston Park now receives a half-hourly Southern service rather than the mixture of Gatwick Express and Southern services it previously received.

[Caroline Lucas]

Does the Minister not concede, though, that Preston Park passengers are worse off? Before, at least Southern trains started in Brighton—they were not already full—and passengers had the option of taking the Gatwick Express. The service they are now offered is massively worse. As I said, some trains arrive too late to be useful to commuters, no Gatwick Express trains stop at all, and the others start in Littlehampton and are full.

[Joseph Johnson]

I certainly recognise the hon. Lady’s points about short formations and crowding on some Southern trains as the result of the knock-on impact on Southern of disruption elsewhere. Trains must have the capacity to meet demand, and GTR’s performance regime, which the Department monitors very closely, includes capacity and short formations. Where they happen, short formations are counted by the Department as a fail under the performance regime, which we keep under close scrutiny. However, the consistent calling pattern that results from moving to just Southern services rather than the mixture of Gatwick Express and Southern services is designed to bring about a more reliable and resilient service in the long term.

As I wrote in my letter to the hon. Lady, the frequency of services to Victoria has remained roughly the same compared with the pre-May timetable. Before 18 May, Preston Park received six services into Victoria in the morning peak, made up of three Gatwick Express services and three Southern services. Following the timetable change, services from Preston Park have increased—her constituents now receive seven services into Victoria in the morning peak, all of which are Southern services.

[Caroline Lucas]

Will the Minister give way?

[Joseph Johnson]

Let me finish this point. The hon. Lady complained that the journey time was just a minute quicker, but ultimately, when the service is up and running, that extra minute will be welcomed by passengers.

There is a similar picture in the evening peak, with the same number of services from Victoria to Preston Park as before the timetable change and a very similar average journey time. Although the request for another stop to be introduced on that service is reasonable, the service is already under significant pressure to maintain punctuality. Extra stops would increase that pressure and lead to additional delays, to the detriment of passengers using the service.

Turning to Thameslink, before the May timetable change Preston Park received eight services to Blackfriars and four to London Bridge in the morning peak. In the interim timetable, there are eight Thameslink services in the morning peak from Preston Park to London Bridge and Blackfriars, and onwards through the Thameslink core. Although, overall, that represents a loss of three Thameslink services compared with the pre-May timetable, it provides Preston Park with the same number of Blackfriars services and four additional London Bridge services. Before the May timetable change, there were six services from Blackfriars and nine from London Bridge in the evening peak. In the interim timetable, seven evening peak services make that journey. That provides an additional service from Blackfriars but two fewer services from London Bridge.

Journey times from Preston Park on Thameslink services are now quicker than they were before May. Once GTR has stabilised performance, it will reinstate the additional service in each peak that was removed as part of the interim timetable. In addition, the Littlehampton to Bedford service and the Brighton to Cambridge service are currently one train per hour, but the next wave of the Thameslink programme will bring one additional service on the Brighton to Cambridge route each hour all day, as well as additional services on the Littlehampton to Bedford route. That was originally planned for December 2018, but it will now be delivered once GTR has delivered the May timetable as planned.

I appreciate the hon. Lady’s constituents’ request for services to start from London Bridge. However, one of the key benefits of the Thameslink programme is that it provides passengers with direct services through London Bridge to Blackfriars, City Thameslink, Farringdon and St Pancras. In many cases, that provides an alternative route for passengers who would previously have changed at London Bridge to connect with the London underground.

[Caroline Lucas]

Will the Minister give way?

[Joseph Johnson]

No, I am going to conclude my remarks.

I expect GTR to keep the timetable under review to identify any particular pressures and make amendments as appropriate if they are possible. However, GTR will be able properly to assess the viability of the timetable only once it is performing reliably, and ensuring that happens is our overriding priority. I will ask for an update from GTR on its assessment of the performance of the interim timetable and its impact on Preston Park passengers ahead of the hon. Lady’s meeting with the operator on 23 August.

Motion lapsed (Standing Order No. 10(6)).

Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation and Liability for Housing Standards) Bill

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

Committee Debate: House of Commons
Wednesday 20th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

It is of course wonderful to have these new powers, but we have to have the means to enforce them. I hope that the Government are listening to that point as well.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Mr Wilson. I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Westminster North, and I echo what others have said about her hard work, much of it behind the scenes.

I simply want to add how extraordinary it is that landlords have no legal obligations to their tenants to put or keep the property in a condition fit for habitation. Like every member of the Committee, I have, over my eight years as the Member for Brighton, Pavilion, seen literally hundreds, if not thousands, of cases of people living in the most awful conditions. In my experience, it is the most disadvantaged people who live in the worst and most dangerous rented housing. I want to put on record my pleasure at the progress of the Bill. I look forward to seeing it reach the statute book very soon.

Finally, I echo the words of the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne on the next challenge, which I agree is about controls on rent. I hope that one day we will get to that as well.

[Luke Pollard (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Lab/Co-op)]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North for her dogged determination in introducing the Bill.

Some 43% of people in Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport, live in the private rented sector. We are one of the areas in the south-west with the highest concentration of people in the private rented sector, and there are still far too many examples of really poor standards. In particular, people have been really scared about complaining. I wonder whether my hon. Friend, or perhaps the Minister, could briefly explain what education and empowerment can accompany the Bill, once it passes into law—assuming, as I hope, that it will—to help people who are living in substandard accommodation but do not complain about it for fear of being evicted.

Tenant Fees Bill

Caroline Lucas Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 21st May 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (James Brokenshire)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

This Bill takes forward essential measures to promote fairness in the private lettings market by banning unfair fees charged to tenants, as promised in the Government’s manifesto. It is a Bill that we should all welcome. The Bill will make the market more transparent, yes, but it also has the potential to save tenants—especially young people and families—hundreds of pounds. It caps tenancy deposits, further protecting tenants from high up-front costs when renting a home. It also introduces a lead enforcement authority for the lettings sector to support local authorities in their enforcement activities.

These measures have been informed by consultation with the sector and by the scrutiny of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee. I am grateful to the members of the Committee for the constructive and positive way in which they have contributed to the Bill. We have accepted the majority of the recommendations, which have helped to improve the final Bill.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

The Secretary of State is talking about the benefits of the Bill, and it certainly has some, but it would have an awful lot more if he had listened to the complaints about the setting of the deposit at six weeks rather than four. Can he explain why he has gone for a figure that means that only about 8% of renters will benefit and that many others will see their rents go up as a result?

[James Brokenshire]

The hon. Lady has intervened early, and that is a point that I will come on to. I would say that that is a maximum level, but I will deal with the specific issue in my remarks.

I am pleased that the Tenant Fees Bill was introduced to Parliament soon after my appointment. It is the latest step in our work to create a housing market that is fit for the future. I have been greatly encouraged by the broad support for banning unfair fees—something that has come through very clearly in our consultation. We have listened and we are taking action. This Government are making sure that everyone, whether they rent or own their home, has a safe, secure and affordable place to call their own.

I am confident that the Government’s ambitious house-building programme will transform the sector in the years to come, but it is also important that we help people now. The Tenant Fees Bill will enable us do this. It will ensure that tenants will no longer be stung by hidden costs. In the first year alone, we believe this could collectively save tenants as much as £240 million a year.

--- Later in debate ---

[Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Secretary of State on his appointment and welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones) to our housing team. This tenant fees legislation is very welcome. We know that the majority of landlords are good landlords, or strive to be, and understand the expectations upon them before they embark on becoming a landlord. However, a number of rogue landlords and letting agents give the sector a bad name, undermine the good work of quality agents and landlords, and they have squeezed tenants for cash in unfair ways, with disproportionate charges for unjustifiable reasons. It is right that the Government are acting to change this unfair system and Labour welcomes that, but it would be remiss of me to fail to remind the House that we first suggested a move to ban letting fees back in 2013. After five years, it is good that the Government are finally acting on this issue. If we get the Bill right, it will have a positive impact on people’s lives on a day-to-day basis.

The overriding purpose of the legislation is to help to shift the balance of power from unscrupulous agents and landlords towards decent tenants—to make renting fairer, more affordable and more transparent and to give tenants greater clarity and control over what they pay. We will all have heard horror stories of agents or landlords charging people excessive fees to secure properties, or throughout tenancies, imposing additional charges with excessively high administration fees. With fewer social properties available, this places great difficulties on those with low incomes, or those who are renting alone or simply cannot afford thousands of pounds in up-front fees. In an increasingly competitive market, that has led to the UK’s nearly 5 million private renters sometimes feeling that they are an easy target from which to extract unnecessarily large sums of money. That is on top of the £50 billion a year paid in private rents.

As the number of private renters is predicted to rise to 5.6 million people by 2021, we should be aiming for a gold standard of contract of understanding between renters and landlords, or their agents. As it stands, there is an inherent tension between landlords who view their property as an asset or investment and a tenant who sees it as their home. We have to take steps to bring those two positions closer together.

Increasingly there are larger, more professional companies recognising the importance of peoples’ home life and striving to provide properties in high-demand areas. They do not use agents, seek to develop a sense of community and aim to retain tenants for as long as possible and keep rents affordable in line with local incomes—in places such as Argo Apartments—and stand in stark contrast to the enormous billboard I saw from Wentworth Estates, boasting that it could guarantee rents for between one and five years for landlords, would provide three months’ rent in advance and could offer “free evictions”.

[Caroline Lucas]

Does the hon. Lady agree that another way the Government could follow both Labour and Green party policy would be to tackle extortionate rents? The elephant in the room is the need for some kind of rent controls, including rent caps, because although what is in the Bill is a welcome step forward, until we tackle the size of rent increases, we will not be able to provide the homes for the people who need them.

[Melanie Onn]

Labour absolutely recognises the—[Interruption.] Before the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry) leaps on me—before I am able to make myself clear—Labour absolutely recognises the issue of the amount that people are paying in rent and recognises that there could be restrictions on the percentage of increases in rent, not a rent cap.

The pressure in the housing market is rapidly producing new forms of exploitation. For example, an alternative letting agency-cum-landlord service called Lifestyle Club London markets itself as a membership club. Tenants or members pay an annual fee instead of rent. Club staff are entitled to inspect rooms unannounced at any time and fines can be given for anything even as minor as dirty dishes. This is a fast-moving area. We can see that there are wildly differing practices in the world of private rental and that tenants have had difficulty in getting the treatment that they deserve, which is why groups such as Generation Rent and Marks Out of Tenancy have emerged to give a collective voice to private renters on matters of not only policy but practice.

Although the Bill is satisfactory in many respects, it still provides the opportunity for the continuation of an exploitative approach. For example, clauses 1 and 2 detail the prohibitions on landlords and agents applying fees in many circumstances. The cap of £50 for any of those charges is very welcome, but the explanatory notes go on to say

“or reasonable costs incurred if higher”.

That is a clear opportunity for a coach and horses to be driven through this otherwise very good Bill. We know that some letting agencies and landlords will push these grey areas, and without directly spelling out what charges are permissible and what “reasonable costs” are, there is undeniably room for incorrect interpretation.

The Government have so far given an indication that they will provide guidance on these and other issues, but how can that be enforced? If I speak to Shelter about how a renter can take a case against a banned fee being levied against them, the question then becomes a test of reasonableness. Whether or not such charges are reasonable, I know that it will say that if the Government want to genuinely give tenants additional powers, regulation is required to ensure that they are enforceable and meaningful.

The same goes for default fees, which are to be capped at the level of the landlord’s loss. At first glance, this seems eminently reasonable. A landlord should not be required to pay for a banking or other fine due to a tenant making a payment late or the replacement of a lost key or entry fob. However, the Minister must be aware of the scope for this to become a nice little earner for agents or landlords who would seek to unfairly penalise their tenants for minor errors.