Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 18th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point about development co-operation. We lead in many countries, both bilaterally and multilaterally, but co-operation is vital to delivering on the ground for the world’s poorest. We will continue to work not only with the EU, but with other partners in some of the poorest parts of the world where they can add value and where there is great need.

[Dame Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

The United Kingdom has historically imported 50% of the sugar that we consume on preferential terms from developing countries, and it is then refined by Tate & Lyle. Will the Secretary of State reassure the House that the jobs, both at home and abroad, that depend on that agreement will be given proper consideration in the Brexit negotiations?

[Priti Patel]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about trade preferences and the implications for securing jobs in this country and about creating new markets in developing countries and new trading opportunities. As part of the discussions, those subjects will be at the heart of securing a prosperous future for our country and for poor countries around the world.

Report of the Iraq Inquiry

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My recollection of the debates is that there were honest disagreements between colleagues who were listening to the arguments and making their decisions. I do not think that anyone should be accused of appeasement for voting against the war, and neither should those who voted in favour of it in good faith and on the evidence that they were given be subject to unfair criticism. People who voted for the war, like me, have to take their share of the responsibility. That is important, but I do not think it right to accuse people who voted against the war of appeasement.

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

I was shadow International Development Secretary at the time, and I asked 91 written questions of the Government, culminating in an Opposition day debate on 30 January 2003 because I had not received any satisfactory answers. For the sake of the many, many victims, will the Prime Minister please assure the House that we have truly learned the lessons of failure to plan for contingency?

[The Prime Minister]

I remember well how effective my right hon. Friend was in holding those many debates. People say that we did not debate the post-war reconstruction of Iraq, but actually we debated it endlessly in the House, and a lot of questions were put and a lot of debates held. It is clear from the report that there was a total planning failure, an assumption that the Americans had a plan when they did not, and that the UN would move in comprehensively when it did not. According to Sir John, there was an assumption that British troops would be out in three to four months, which obviously did not happen. That is one of the clearest areas of criticism; it is the area of failure that should be accepted most clearly, and for which we should plan most carefully in any future conflict.

EU Council

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his kind remarks. He is right that our commitment to and membership of NATO, an important organisation, continues. He is also right that our spending of 2% of national output is now responsible for a large share of the overall European commitment and that we should be encouraging others to increase their spending. We must ensure that our membership of NATO continues and that we are not disadvantaged by being in one and out of the other.

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend consistently made the case for British car workers. Indeed, he made his final appeal to the country from Birmingham, which was much appreciated. Does he agree that reciprocity between the UK and the EU is absolutely vital in protecting the hundreds and thousands of jobs that depend on our access to that principal market?

[The Prime Minister]

I grateful for what my right hon. Friend says. Anyone who thinks that something of a manufacturing renaissance is not happening in Britain should go to that Jaguar Land Rover plant. Seven or eight years ago there were 4,000 people there; there are now 14,000. It is about not just manufacture and assembly, but design, R and D and technology. The company is taking on hundreds of apprentices every year. It is a magnificent car plant and we want to see more of them. It is absolutely crucial for companies such as that that we keep the European market open, and it is crucial that they keep investing in our country rather than in countries inside the European Union. That will always be an alternative, which draws into sharp relief the importance of maintaining strong access to the single market.

Debate on the Address

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 18th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, as follows:

Most Gracious Sovereign,

We, Your Majesty’s most dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in Parliament assembled, beg leave to offer our humble thanks to Your Majesty for the Gracious Speech which Your Majesty has addressed to both Houses of Parliament.

It is an honour to be asked to propose the Loyal Address, especially in Her Majesty’s 90th year. When I was asked to see the Chief Whip, my first thought was: what have I done? The relief in discovering that it was for a good reason was followed almost immediately by the angst of how to do it well. I looked carefully at how my right hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Sir Simon Burns) tackled it last year. Unfortunately, he cannot be with us today as he has to attend a funeral. We all now know of his unswerving admiration for Hillary Clinton. We have shared with him the anxieties of the primaries, so I put all colleagues on alert that if they are standing next to him when the news of the presidential election comes through, be prepared to provide moral support whichever way it goes, but especially should Hillary be trumped.

First, may I say to my constituents in Meriden how grateful I am to them for electing me to Parliament? I am always proud to represent them. A lot has changed since my first day here 19 years ago. I was often the only woman in meetings. I was one of very few women around the Cabinet table with school-age children. This could prove awkward, such as at the shadow Cabinet meeting interrupted by the news that one of my sons had fallen off a drainpipe at school.

In 1997, only 18% of MPs were women. This has now risen to a total of almost 30%—not yet parity, but we are heading in the right direction. It has also been a great privilege to help mentor newcomers, and in return I have been especially grateful to Baroness Shephard for her mentoring down the years.

The Chamber now looks more like the electorate at large. [Interruption.] On all sides! Better decisions are made when those who make them are more diverse. For example, when assessing the priorities for public transport, men rate reliability and cost as the most important factors, but women put something else first—their personal safety. Put the two perspectives together and a better outcome is achieved.

I hope that by now the nearly new Members are beginning to make friends in all parties and discover that they can have allies across the Floor. In fact, the work of Parliament is often enhanced by the friendships that transcend party lines. When I was party chairman, the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field) asked me to organise a debate with him on the subject of dying well, as we each had a parent with a poor experience of that in hospital. The Whips did not bat an eyelid at that. The only objection was to the title: dying was considered far too controversial, and we had to call it end-of-life care.

I also worked with the right hon. Gentleman on the Modern Slavery Bill, as we both served on the Joint Committee of both Houses. If ever there was an outstanding example of a cross-party approach to tackling a terrible injustice, this is it. The Home Secretary deserves the credit for securing a piece of landmark legislation, which is a world first in this area. The legal expertise of Baroness Butler-Sloss forced us all to think very hard how to get this absolutely right, and I felt that it was my red letter day when the noble Lady uttered these magic words to me: “I think the right hon. Lady has a point.”

I have been in a cross-party prayer fellowship all the time I have been here. It consists of two Conservative MPs, two Labour MPs, one Liberal MP and one Democratic Unionist MP. We could not have done that better by using proportional representation if we had tried. We and our families met up in each other’s constituencies, and my children were initially perplexed by the fraternisation until I explained that it was like when your friend supports Aston Villa and you support Coventry: you think he is misguided, but you are still friends.

We will shortly face a big decision about our membership of the EU. Whichever way the vote goes, we will need to ensure good relations with our neighbours. I commend to the House the recent concert by the Parliament Choir in Paris to show our solidarity with the people of France after the terrorist attacks last year. There are often opportunities for soft diplomacy, and we should take them. My hon. Friend the Member for Harwich and North Essex (Mr Jenkin) and I may not see eye to eye on Europe, but his rich baritone and my alto voice have produced delightful harmony.

I welcome the clear references in the Gracious Speech to the life chances agenda, and I am pleased that this is to be a key theme in the year ahead. My right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith) pioneered this approach, and the new Secretary of State for Work and Pensions has the life experience and the ability to drive it forward. My constituency has a council estate of nearly 40,000 people, and I have seen how the life chances of my constituents have improved through the regeneration of housing and schools by Solihull Council. When I took a Minister on a visit there recently, two tenants emerged from one of our 37 refurbished tower blocks to express their delight that their energy bills had halved as a result of the new energy-saving features. The Minister turned to me and asked, “How much did you pay them to say that, Caroline?”

Buildings can be regenerated but it is the life chances of the human beings within them that really make the difference, so I am delighted that so many of our young people are getting apprenticeships as engineers, including many young women, in the great tradition of those women who built the Spitfires in the last world war. All of this is made possible by the renaissance of manufacturing and the economic recovery that we have seen.

Parts of my constituency are rural, and despite being at the very centre of England, we have mobile and broadband not spots, so I am glad to hear that a renewed effort is being made to address the digital divide. With my Church Estates Commissioner’s hat on, may I remind the Government of the offer of church spires and towers to help to crack this problem? They may bring us closer to God, but a proper signal can feel like heaven on earth to those who have had none.

Prison reform is well overdue. We know that reoffending can be dramatically cut with the right kind of help. The Justice Secretary and the Education Secretary know how important it is to improve the life chances of school children, as far too many prison inmates are unable to read and write. I am glad that the Justice Secretary is now using his reforming zeal to give prisoners a better chance to turn their lives around. I have witnessed at first hand how this can be achieved. I helped to set up a charity called Welcome to tackle drug and alcohol abuse and to get people free of addiction and into work. We started with just one employee in a community hall; now we employ more than 20 and we do the triage for the NHS in our borough of 200,000 people. Some of the best advocates are our volunteers who have achieved this themselves and are role models for others.

No party has a monopoly on compassion, and Members on both sides of the House have sought to help the vulnerable. On entering politics, it was my personal resolution to speak for those who were unable to speak for themselves. Few people in our country are more vulnerable than a child leaving care. The state has not often proved to be a great parent, and knowing how hard it is to be a parent, we should not be surprised. But I take my hat off in particular to the parents who adopt. We need more parents to come forward to foster and adopt, so I welcome the Government's intention to speed up adoption—indeed, this was the objective of my private Member’s Bill on the subject—but children can still be left too long in care and the damage can be irreparable. so let us improve the follow-up care and keep it going until a young adult is fully fledged. Eighteen may be the notional age of adulthood, but, in my experience, it takes a good few more years of parental support before young adults’ wings can take life’s turbulence.

New measures are clearly needed to prevent sections of society feeling alienated, but I appeal to the Government not to take a hammer to crack a nut. Good role models and moderate voices are what are needed, and I have high expectations of the new Mayor of London, who is not only an excellent cricketer, as the Lords and Commons cricket team will testify, but uniquely well placed to help. Good luck, Sadiq—no pressure!

Let me return to my opening theme of making friends across the House. Over the years, there have been a good few Members whom I have sought to encourage after they had suffered setbacks in their parliamentary careers. My key piece of advice has been, “Don’t give up! Get stuck back in and fight for the causes you know and care about, and this House will ultimately respect you for it.” May I therefore say a heartfelt thank you for the way the House has helped me rediscover the fulfilment of being an elected Member of this mother of all Parliaments. As long as you have the chance to make a difference, there is no such thing as having had your day. We are elected to change things for the better and to take up the issues that confront us, so seize the day! I commend the motion to the House.

ISIL in Syria

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

There is an important religious dimension to this debate and faith leaders shape public opinion, so I thought it might be helpful if I shared with the House the views expressed by the Church of England on the subject.

At a meeting of the General Synod last week, a motion on the migrant crisis called unanimously upon the Government

“to work with international partners in Europe and elsewhere to help establish safe and legal routes to places of safety, including this country, for refugees who are vulnerable and at severe risk.”

That motion passed with 333 votes and none opposing. The Archbishop of Canterbury made it clear that, in his view, force might be necessary to keep the refugees safe. He also said that the Church would not be forgiven if it turned inwards at this time of crisis. Rather, it must face the fact that extremism is now a feature of every major faith, including Christianity.

Cardinal Vincent Nichols has backed proportionate military intervention to tackle Daesh, and he cites Pope Francis saying that where aggression is unjust, aggression is licit against the aggressor. These are views which I share, which is why I will support the motion.

As the Prime Minister has said, this is not a war against Islam. Religious extremism is global and the key to solving this is the determination of people of faith to overcome it, not just in Syria, but right around the world. The Church is well placed to help, as the conflict is both theological and ideological. By reaching out to other people of faith and showing common cause in tackling extremism, we can demonstrate to a fearful secular world that faith leaders hold one of the keys to finding a solution. Where religion is being hijacked for political ends, we should say so.

The Anglican Communion offers a worldwide network of churches to deploy in the joint global endeavour to stamp out extremism. Together, the integration of hard and soft power is likely to produce a better outcome. I urge my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary, who will be replying to the debate, to consider this question: to combat Daesh, it is important that prominent theological and ideological strategy is alongside any potential military humanitarian intervention. Unless we understand our enemy and those we choose as our allies in the region, we are unlikely to properly understand the conflict. I hope he will be able to inform the House what thought the Government have given to this advice as they develop their strategy.

The Church can also play an important practical role in offering hospitality, accommodation, support and friendship to refugees, whatever their religious tradition, and advocacy for those who are being persecuted because of their faith. Hospitality is seen as a spiritual gift by the Church and explains why this country, with its Judeo-Christian roots, has a long tradition of providing safe haven to successive waves of migrants. We need to recognise that the conflict may affect the number of migrants and displaced people, and the Prime Minister is therefore right to convene a donors conference early in 2016.

We should also recognise that international development aid agencies, many of which are Christian in origin, would emphasise that it is better to help refugees in their own region, so that once it is safe they can more easily return and rebuild their country. My local imam, who is from Syria and has family still there, is very anxious about the safety of civilians and the need to avoid a power vacuum.

The public will need continuous assurance and transparency about why action is being taken and what outcomes are being achieved, so I welcome the commitment to quarterly updates for the House.

It is all important how we give our international aid, during and post-conflict, and how we ensure that the voice of the displaced is heard in the post-conflict planning. As we know, it is the most vulnerable, and often the women, who have no voice at all in war. We have a duty to ensure that they are heard.

Her Majesty the Queen

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Second Church Estates Commissioner (Mrs Caroline Spelman)]

On behalf of the Church of England, I would like to pay tribute in this House to the Queen as head of the Church for the faithful and inspiring leadership she has provided to the Church, regularly speaking about the importance of her faith in her personal life and in her role—not just in the Christmas broadcast but all through the year. In the House of Lords, the Bishop of Peterborough will be placing a tribute, and up and down the country churches will be celebrating her long reign with services and other events. We wish her many more happy years to reign.

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Letwin]

I am happy to tell the hon. Lady that the Minister for constitutional reform—my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose)—is proactively stepping in to try to ensure that those local authorities do take further action. The Electoral Commission has also reported on this, and we are keen to see that every local authority ensures right away that it no longer has large groups of people who are unregistered and that it cleans its register.

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend acknowledge the positive impact on voter registration of civil society campaigns and the campaign by the Church, Have Your Say, before the last election?

[Mr Letwin]

Yes, my right hon. Friend is absolutely right about that. I am glad to say that we see a pattern of local authorities in many parts of the country doing what she describes and working with civil society partners to reach those people who might not otherwise be reached by more formal means to persuade them to register.

Iraq: Coalition Against ISIL

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Friday 26th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Rosindell]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct, and that is why we must consider taking action in Syria as well as in the area in Iraq that ISIL controls. The Royal Air Force should be there alongside our allies in the United States, Australia and others leading the fight to crush those who seek to inflict such cruelty and wickedness on the people of the middle east. As the Prime Minister has said, the action is also about protecting our people and protecting the streets of Britain. We cannot win the fight alone, and other nations, particularly Muslim and Arabic countries, must play their part. We have a global duty to stand together, and every nation dedicated to the cause of humanity must play its part. Walking by on the other side of the road is not an option for any nation in such tragic circumstances.

We must be uncompromising in guarding our own country and our own people. Whatever action is necessary to preserve the safety and security of the British people must be taken. It is right that the United Kingdom play an integral role in building a coalition of nations from across the world that are prepared to stand up to extremist Islamism. Although British action has the full support of Iraq’s Government, we must also recognise that there is now no border between Iraq and Syria, and if battle must be taken there as well, so be it.

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

I am sure that my hon. Friend is aware that RAF Akrotiri is only 100 miles from the Syrian border. Will he join me in reinforcing the importance of keeping safe all the dependants of the families who live at RAF Akrotiri and commending them on the role that they play?

[Andrew Rosindell]

I entirely support what my right hon. Friend has said. RAF Akrotiri is a British sovereign base area and an important overseas territory that we use in such conflicts. The people there must also be protected and looked after.

Many contributions today have played an important part in our debate. To sum up the situation that we face and the decision that we must make, there are no finer words than those spoken by Margaret Thatcher on 22 November 1990, when she told the House:

“To those who have never had to take such decisions, I say that they are taken with a heavy heart and in the knowledge of the manifold dangers, but with tremendous pride in the professionalism and courage of our armed forces.

There is…a sense of this country’s destiny: the centuries of history and experience which ensure that, when principles have to be defended, when good has to be upheld and when evil has to be overcome, Britain will take up arms.”—[Official Report, 22 November 1990; Vol. 181, c. 453.]

Oral Answers to Questions

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I was not aware of the specific case that the hon. Gentleman has raised, and I will of course go away and have a look at it. However, I think that a commitment to equality—whether we are talking about racial equality, equality between those of different sexes, equality in terms of people who have disabilities, or, indeed, tolerance of and equality for people with different sexualities—is a very important part of being British.

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

Will the Prime Minister welcome—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I want the question to be heard. I want all questions to be heard.

[Mrs Spelman]

Will the Prime Minister welcome the President, MPs and choir of the German Parliament, who have come to sing in a joint concert with our parliamentary choir in Westminster Hall tonight to commemorate the centenary of the first world war and the tercentenary of the Hanoverian monarchy?

[The Prime Minister]

I am very happy to join my right hon. Friend in welcoming the German choir. I suspect that, after last night’s result, they will be in rather good voice.

On a serious note, let me say that we properly commemorate the outbreak of the first world war, the key battles of the first world war and, of course, Armistice day as we approach these vital 100th anniversaries. I am absolutely determined that, in Britain, we will mark them in appropriate ways. There will be a service in Glasgow, followed by a number of different events. I think it very important that we learn the lessons of that conflict, and commemorate those who fell.

Cost of Living: Energy and Housing

Caroline Spelman Excerpts

Thursday 5th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

It will certainly be in my interest to keep my speech relatively short. I rise to speak in support of the Gracious Speech and, in particular, of the historic significance of the Modern Slavery Bill. I realise that it has only a tenuous connection to the themes we are debating today, but I want to talk about the housing of trafficked victims and I hope that the Ministers present will take that into account.

It is no coincidence that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Sir Edward Garnier) also chose to focus on this subject today. The Modern Slavery Bill is the proposal in the Queen’s Speech with the greatest historic significance. Who would have thought that we would need to pass further legislation to tackle slavery more than a century after all the efforts of William Wilberforce and his supporters? The brutal truth, however, is that the estimated number of slaves worldwide now stands at 21 million and that the slave trade generates £150 billion of illegal profits annually. That is three times more than was previously estimated. Those figures come from the International Labour Organisation. In this country, the trouble is that the slavery is largely hidden. It was no surprise that the Centre for Social Justice entitled its report on the subject “It Happens Here”, because it does. I hope that the publication of the Bill will raise awareness.

I could not speak on this subject without paying tribute to someone who has really raised awareness of modern-day slavery: the former Member of this House, Anthony Steen. In 2006, he began his work of shining a searchlight on this iniquitous trade in human beings. He has worked for the Human Trafficking Foundation and now plays a pivotal role in raising public awareness. The foundation includes among its trustees the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field), who was asked by the Home Secretary to chair the pre-legislative scrutiny Committee. He did so with remarkable skill, garnering support from both sides of the House.

The Home Secretary is to be commended for tackling this wicked issue head-on. It is also significant that the whole House came together during the pre-legislative scrutiny stage in recognising that we need to tackle the matter on a cross-party basis. My right hon. Friend has clearly been motivated by the shortcomings in the existing law. A good Queen’s Speech should contain legislation that brings together, rationalises and simplifies existing laws that are dotted around in other Acts. This Bill will do that.

I was surrounded by erudite lawyers during the pre-legislative scrutiny stage, and I was struck by the fact that the prosecution rate was so poor because of misunderstandings surrounding the definition of slavery. Indeed, those misunderstandings extend as far as the European directive that covers the problem, which highlights trafficking. Those prosecutions often fail because victims of trafficking stand up in court and swear on oath that they came here of their own free will. Indeed, they are sometimes paid to come here, only to find themselves subject to servitude. When we try to prosecute on the ground of trafficking, the case therefore often fails because the witness says that they moved here of their own accord. In a funny sort of way, if the European directive had been drafted in English first, we would have spotted that problem: trafficking is not actually the overarching term that needs to be used. We need to refer to “exploitation”, of which trafficking is an aggravation. This Bill is an opportunity to get that balance right, and we are indebted to such people as Lady Butler-Sloss, who applied her razor-sharp mind to that pre-legislative scrutiny Committee and helped all of us to understand where these kinds of problems lie.

The Bill will break new ground because it will pay attention to the need for victim care and support. If it had neglected that aspect of this problem of modern-day slavery, I would be a good deal less enthusiastic about the Bill than I am. But I was delighted to hear that need to improve victim care and support spelled out in the Queen’s Speech. I do not underestimate the political challenges of protecting those who admit to breaking the law under coercion, but we will never stamp out this iniquitous trade in human beings until we get enough victims to testify. That is why I was encouraged to hear that a serious crime Bill will strengthen powers to seize the proceeds of crime as part of this Queen’s Speech. I firmly believe that some of those proceeds need to come back to the victims, which would help them to come forward to give evidence against the real criminals, who are the ones we need to catch. The care of victims of slavery in our country is nothing short of a scandal. I am sure there will not be a Member in this House who has not sat in a surgery hearing from someone—often someone young—who has been brought to this country under false pretences and still remains stateless within our society.

We also face real problems in trying to distinguish between those victims and the genuine criminals. I have heard evidence from victims who, just hours before being deported, were saved only by the swift intervention of lawyers, often working on a pro bono basis and some funded by the POPPY project, at detention centres. That happens all too often because of the inherent conflict of interest whereby UK Visas and Immigration, formerly the UK Border Agency, which is primarily responsible for getting immigration down, is the agency overseeing the decision about who stays and who goes. In some cases those almost deported faced a dangerous future, returning to families complicit in their trafficking in the first place. Anyone alleging slavery is invited to use the national referral mechanism, which contains questions designed to elucidate their real status. If they get through that, they are given just 45 days’ protection. That is my point about housing: what are these victims of trafficking expected to do about accommodation, after just 45 days of protection, while their whole situation remains uncertain? That is a cross-departmental consideration, so I hope the Ministers here today could give it some thought.

America is ahead of us, with statutory victim care and support. It has a designated independent anti-slavery ambassador, with a full-time complement of 80 staff, reporting directly to the President. The plan in this country is for a commissioner to be appointed by the Home Secretary, but an anti-slavery commissioner must be able to crack the whip round Whitehall, precisely because of the example I have just given about the lack of suitable housing for trafficked victims. We will not be the first country in Europe to have a commissioner; countries that have developed the role include Finland and the Netherlands. Of course I understand that the commissioner needs to have the sponsorship of one Department in order to secure adequate resources from the Treasury, but the commissioner must remain sufficiently independent to put a rocket up the prosecution service, as a Home Office Minister put it.

Children who are victims of slavery are a particularly important concern to us. The Government have recognised that with pilots for children’s advocates. A young person does need someone to fight their corner with authorities and stay on their case. A particularly worrying aspect of child slavery in this country is the fact that sadly children are often send to the UK to serve family members as slaves, even for sex. One victim told us that even when she was allowed to go to church on Sundays, she was forbidden to speak to other people. That shows how we need to open our minds and our eyes to the hidden slaves around us. We should try asking the chamber maid, the cleaner and those we fear might be under duress and offer a friendly hand of help where we can.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

The right hon. Lady is making an excellent speech. She must be aware of the problem of children living in informal foster care with distant relatives in this country, which means that nothing is done to regularise their immigration status and they are threatened with removal at age 18, having been completely unaware that they had no status whatsoever. The Home Office needs a different approach to the matter.

[Mrs Spelman]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important anomaly, and it certainly ought to be debated in relation to the Bill.

I have two more points to make. The first is about the Gangmasters Licensing Authority’s transition from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs—it was under my wing when I was Secretary of State— to the Home Office. The Gangmasters Licensing Authority does an excellent job in the sectors of the economy that it currently covers—agriculture, fisheries and horticulture—but sadly, slavery is rife in many other sectors, such as catering, cleaning and hospitality. I urge all Government Departments to make use of the Gangmasters Licensing Authority model to tackle slavery in the economic sectors for which they have responsibility.

Finally, I believe that the Bill must contain a clause on supply chains. That would make the legislation world-class. Businesses in general need to reappraise the risk of slavery in their own supply chains. That has already been achieved in America, where the Transparency in Supply Chains Act has been passed in California. Any European company that wants to do business in California must be compliant. The hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty) introduced a private Member’s Bill on the subject, which I am sure he would wish me to remind the House of. We need a clause in the Bill that tackles the problem. Until businesses are made to report on due diligence, ruling out slavery the length of their supply chains, they will continue to be at significant reputational risk and, sadly, the victims will continue to suffer.

The UK has the potential to provide global leadership on this important issue. Frankly, with our heritage and the Wilberforce spirit behind us, we ought to be able to do that, and this Queen’s Speech opens the way.