Immigration Detention

Debate between Caroline Spelman and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 10th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

Further to that point, the percentage of women returning to the community is even higher among pregnant women. In 2014, the independent inspection report recorded 99 pregnant women, of whom only nine were eventually deported. The rest returned to the community to pursue their claims, which shows that, aside from anything to do with the welfare of pregnant women, detention is not the best use of resources.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

One minute left.

International Women’s Day

Debate between Caroline Spelman and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Spelman]

rose—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. We need to speed up the debate a little because we are running out of time. There are still a number of speakers waiting to contribute. I ask subsequent speakers to aim for speeches of 10 to 14 minutes, which would be very helpful.

[Mrs Spelman]

I thank you for your guidance, Mr Deputy Speaker. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod), who has done outstanding work on the all-party parliamentary group on women in Parliament, leading to the report “Improving Parliament”. I hope it will be taken up and that the changes it calls for will be made.

Let me deal briefly with economic empowerment in the United Kingdom, without repeating what others have said. I want to take up a theme about FTSE 100 companies. It is true that significant progress has been made in ensuring that every single FTSE 100 company now has a female on the board, yet still only 6.9% of their directors are female. I throw out a challenge to a female figure in the City—Fiona Woolf, for example—to invite all the chief executives from the FTSE 100 companies to come and present their female board members and two mentees from their own organisations whom they seek to promote to senior leadership roles. There are examples of good practice. Antony Jenkins, the chief executive officer at Barclays, set a target of 26% of senior leadership positions being held by women, and Barclays is on track to meet it. There are other such examples.

The Government have taken important action to empower women in our country economically, looking at issues such as the pay gap, recruitment, retention and promotion. I agree with the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) that we should work together across the House to deal with anomalies such as women, particularly older women, being seriously left behind on wage differentials. We should take action on a cross-party basis.

There are still many areas for improvement. Research produced by Cambridge university’s Murray Edwards college, entitled “Women Today, Women Tomorrow”, clearly showed that the most difficult challenge its respondents faced in their careers was still the non-supportive culture of their workplaces.

The workplace of Parliament is a difficult workplace for women. I call on you, Mr Deputy Speaker, as well as the Front Benchers, to take forward the recommendations in “Improving Parliament”, particularly that calling for the creation of a new Select Committee on equalities to consider departmental policies and programmes and scrutinise Government performance on equality. It is significant that the House’s own workplace equality network, principally a staff network, strongly supports the call for such a Select Committee to be created—the conditions in which women work affect our staff just as much as female Members of Parliament.

Let me finish with the simple observation that we need more women in this place—and, in the spirit of this year’s theme, we need to make it happen.

Modern Slavery Bill

Debate between Caroline Spelman and Lindsay Hoyle

Tuesday 8th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Caroline Spelman (Meriden) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy). I saw the report in the paper to which she referred and thought, like her, that a three-year sentence for the serious criminal behind those abuses was too light. Hardly a day goes by when we do not have yet another report in the paper of different forms of modern day slavery. I commend the Home Secretary, as previous speakers said, on having the determination to bring in a Bill on modern day slavery in the final Session of Parliament before a general election. I commend her also on the way in which she has built the consensus about which we have heard over the last four hours or so in the Chamber. She has built consensus with all parties to make sure that we get the Bill on to the statute book.

My right hon. Friend had the foresight to appoint the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field) to chair the Joint Committee of both Houses, a decision for which I respect her. I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to serve on that Committee. It is probably true to say, Mr Deputy Speaker, that you really would not have known from which political party the Members of both Houses hailed as they sat on the Committee due to their absolute determination to do their best in that pre-legislative scrutiny exercise.

If this Bill is to be world class, it must tackle the issue of modern day slavery on a global scale. When we as a country are implicated, it is no good turning our backs to where the majority of the slavery occurs. I shall, therefore, focus on the issue of the supply chain.

There are various estimates of the number of slaves globally—as high a figure as 30 million has been given, yet that is probably an underestimate. It is appalling to think just how profitable this despicable trade in human beings is, generating an estimated $150 billion each year. We must use the Bill to send a clear signal, not just at home but abroad, that criminals who perpetrate these crimes will not prosper in our country. We do not want them to prosper through any intervention of ours either inside or outside this country. The Bill will become the first Act of its kind in Europe, and tougher sentences for this human piracy will help send that strong signal. The Bill undertakes an important exercise in streamlining existing legislation and ensuring that there are no gaps in the law through which criminals can evade prosecution.

Through William Wilberforce, we have an important legacy to live up to; he had the courage and moral determination over years and years to ensure that this country got rid of terrible injustice perpetrated on poor people outside our shores. That is the spirit in which we need to look at supply chains and how they impact on people—abroad, but in ways in which we as a country are implicated.

Mindful of our reputation as one of the leading legal jurisdictions in the world—we have a proud history of the rule of law—we can do no less than pick up from where Wilberforce left off and continue his fight against this inhumanity, wherever it occurs. It can be a difficult issue for any Government. We obviously do not want to burden business unnecessarily, but I genuinely doubt whether British businesses out there would knowingly associate themselves with this blight on humanity. Despite our current efforts, however, businesses often do not have clear oversight of their complex supply chains. We saw that in the experience of Primark, caught up in the collapse of the factory in Rana Plaza. It might well have undergone due diligence on the seventh floor of that factory to establish that the working conditions were all right on the floor it had contracted for garment workers to work; it realised in hindsight, however, that it needed to go beyond that and to look at the floors above and below to see what was going on there.

As I say, not a day goes by without an example of modern day slavery taking place, and the problem with the supply chains should be properly exposed. I want to put a case study briefly before the House, and it is thanks to the Human Trafficking Foundation that I am able to do so. The person cannot be named, but is otherwise present.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I may be able to help. He can be named, but we cannot point out that the person is present—that is the difference.

[Mrs Spelman]

I think that the record will reveal to the wider world the true position. I am grateful to the Human Trafficking Foundation for bringing these cases to our attention.

One particular example shows why the supply chain issue must be tackled. It comes from the Islington law centre, and it concerns 10 Hungarian men who were trafficked to the UK. They were told that they would earn £250 a week with good accommodation and food, but they received only £10 a week and two packets of cigarettes. They were told nothing more until they had paid back the £400-worth of flight costs incurred in coming here. It was the equivalent of 40 weeks’ work just to pay that back. They worked first in a slaughterhouse, then a bed factory and then a tile factory. Interestingly enough, that bed factory was a supplier to the household name John Lewis, which terminated the contract when it found out, and the bed factory has now been closed. The labourers, the factory and John Lewis were all exploited by the traffickers, and in their own way they have all been victims.

Only one trafficker was arrested, because the others got away too quickly, and by the time that trafficker had been charged, all the assets had been transferred back to Hungary. That is a prime example of why we need the Bill. As for the issue of the supply chain, I doubt very much that a company such as John Lewis would want to find itself in the same position again—to find that its very high reputation had again been damaged by the discovery that products which were on sale in its stores, and which we could buy, had been produced by slave labour.

We need to balance the debate. Is the Bill a burden on business? Does business want it or not? All the businesses that gave evidence to the Joint Committee made clear that they wanted a level playing field—that they wanted the law to change so that we did not have to depend on best practice, because it would be crystal clear that companies must undertake due diligence to ensure that no part of their supply chain could be touched by modern-day slavery.

The answer to the problem lies with all of us: Governments, companies, employees, consumers and shareholders, all working together. We need to require Britain’s public companies to engage with their shareholders on their supply chains in their annual reports by amending the Companies Act 2006, which would create the level playing field that the businesses that have been harmed say they want to see. That was what the Joint Committee recommended to the Government. From now on, British corporate governance and social responsibility ought explicitly to include human rights in supply chains. How companies deal with the issue in detail, along with their shareholders, customers and employers, should be left to their good conscience, but the requirement in law would be there. I certainly have faith that British companies will do the right thing; they usually do.

In the end, the change requires just five words. That way, Britain will not turn its back on millions of suffering people around the world. We will be able to shine a light on those shadowy areas through the time-tested strength of our great legal system, and we will challenge all nations that respect the rule of law to follow suit, and join Britain in consigning this horrific crime to the history books once and for all.

Bovine TB

Debate between Caroline Spelman and Lindsay Hoyle

Tuesday 19th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Spelman]

This is a balanced package of measures for the control and eradication of TB in cattle, and at its foundation are cattle movement measures. My hon. Friend is quite right, and we are looking to tighten up on pre-movement testing. We have already introduced an expansion of areas for more frequent testing. We are extending the use of gamma testing, and we will be strengthening enforcement of TB surveillance and control. I can assure my hon. Friend that we are tightening up on cattle movement as an integral part of this package of measures.

Royal Assent

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that Her Majesty has signified her Royal Assent to the following Acts:

Supply and Appropriation (Main Estimates) Act 2011

Finance Act 2011

European Union Act 2011.