Universal Credit

Debate between Chris Philp and Angela Rayner

Tuesday 13th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

I ask all Members of the House to bear in mind what Madam Deputy Speaker has said when they make interventions. I will try to be as brief as I possibly can.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), the shadow Chancellor, has said, this Tory Government have created a crisis on a scale that we have not seen before. Today, they did nothing to tackle it, and in these regulations they seek to make it even worse. If the House does not vote for our motions today, more than 1 million families will lose out. First, they will lose their free school meals.

[Chris Philp (Croydon South) (Con)]

Does the hon. Lady agree with Channel 4’s FactCheck, which says:

“This is not a case of the government taking free school meals from a million children”?

These are children who are not currently receiving free school meals, and in fact the Government’s proposals would see 50,000 extra children receive free school meals. Perhaps the hon. Lady could stop giving inaccurate information to the House.

[Angela Rayner]

The hon. Gentleman should know that his Government have introduced transitional arrangements, and we are clear that under the transitional arrangements, those 1 million children would be entitled to free school meals. With the regulations, the Government are pulling the rug from under those hard-working families.

In my own boroughs of Oldham and Tameside, a total of 8,700 children growing up in poverty are set to miss out. In the Secretary of State’s own area, the total is 6,500. So much for the light at the end of the tunnel that the Chancellor mentioned over the weekend on “The Andrew Marr Show”!

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[Angela Rayner]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point, which I will come on to later in my contribution. As I said, those who are just above—

[Chris Philp]

rose—

[Angela Rayner]

You have had your chance, thank you. As I said—[Interruption.] Hon. Members have been told that more than 40 people want to speak in this debate, and I am trying to give way as best I can. The hon. Gentleman has already intervened once; I think that was more than enough.

Those who are just above the threshold would be better off earning less under these proposals. The Government are pulling the rug from under their feet, because once they earn above £7,400, they will be about £400 a year worse off for each child they have in school. So just when did the Government abandon the principle that work should pay? Perhaps the Secretary of State can tell us why she will be voting for a policy that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford East (Imran Hussain) said, is twice as generous in Northern Ireland as it will be for her own constituents?

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Philp (Croydon South) (Con)]

We live in strange political times both in this country and across the Atlantic, where we frequently hear reports about fake news. In such times it is therefore particularly incumbent on Members of all parties in this House to be very careful about the way in which they use and present facts, because democratic discourse is impossible without honest and accurate facts. We undermine our entire system of democracy when elected Members of this Parliament play fast and loose with facts.

We have heard Members in this debate saying that free school meals are going to be reduced—that was the phrase used by the previous speaker. Other Opposition Members have said that free school meals would be “taken away”. It is clear that those statements are not accurate. Several colleagues have referred to the “Channel 4 News” FactCheck discourse on this matter, and it is clear that no children currently in receipt of free school meals will have them taken away. In fact, more children will receive free school meals as a result of these proposals. It is simply untrue to say that 1 million children will have their free school meals taken away or reduced. By making comments implying that, the shadow Education Secretary, who I can see chuntering, is doing our democracy a disservice.

Perhaps the hon. Lady is trying to insinuate that there was a Government policy that would have provided extra school meals, but for some kind of U-turn. The “Channel 4 News” FactCheck is clear about that as well, and the Government have also been clear about it. There was an interim transitional measure. My right hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock), when he was a junior Skills Minister, made that clear when the scheme was set up in April 2013, and my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), when he was a junior Education Minister, made the same point last July. It is wholly inaccurate to suggest that there was ever a hypothetical Government policy under which these children would ever have received extra school meals.

The shadow Education Secretary has done this House and herself a great disservice—[Interruption.] Indeed she has the right to speak, but she ought to take care to be accurate when she does so, because her words matter and she should weigh them carefully.

[Angela Rayner]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Is there any recourse for me to challenge the fact that an hon. Member is suggesting that I have misled this House in this debate?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)]

First of all, nobody will mislead this House because we are all hon. Members. I am sure that when we come to the wind-ups, everything will be put in its correct order.

Budget Resolutions

Debate between Chris Philp and Angela Rayner

1st reading: House of Commons
Tuesday 14th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

I will come to the hon. Gentleman’s points about the cost-efficiency of free schools later in my speech.

Either the Prime Minister has made an announcement without the Chancellor actually funding it, or they are simply disguising yet another eye-watering overspend on their staggeringly inefficient free schools programme and pretending that it is new money for new places. That would not be much of a surprise. The National Audit Office has helpfully reminded the Chancellor and the Secretary of State:

“In 2010 the Department estimated that it would cost £900 million by March 2015 to open 315 schools.”

By March 2015, the Department had spent double that initial budget and not even managed to hit its target for new schools. The NAO found that the Department had already spent around £3.4 billion on the land alone for free schools and it was on course to be Britain’s largest land purchaser, even before this Budget sank yet more money in. The NAO also showed that new places in free schools were far more expensive than those in conventional schools. Will the Minister tell the House and the British people how much money her Department will actually spend on delivering these new free schools, and will she guarantee that they will open in places where there is a clear need for spaces?

The Chancellor pledged £216 million for every other school over a three-year period, as the Secretary of State mentioned in her speech, but the NAO has found that, as the hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh) said, £6.7 billion is necessary just to return all existing schools to a satisfactory condition. The NAO also found that 85% of schools that applied to the priority schools building programme were rejected in the last round, and that that investment was cheaper than the free schools programme.

Of course, we know why the Chancellor focused on free schools despite the cost—because it

“will enable the creation of new selective free schools.”

It was the former Education Secretary who said that he had “had enough of experts”, but not even he tried to bring back grammar schools, let alone pretend that it was a policy for social mobility.

[Chris Philp (Croydon South) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Angela Rayner]

I am not giving way. Only one in every 25 pupils at a grammar school is eligible for free school meals, while one in every eight pupils at grammar schools previously attended an independent school. Even among the highest-achieving 20% of pupils, those from the most affluent backgrounds are 45% more likely to get into a grammar school than those from the most disadvantaged. Of course, the Government have suggested —again, not to this House, but in leaks to the press—that they intend to take action to change that in existing grammar schools; that has not gone down very well on the Conservative Back Benches. Given that the Government have been happy to jump the gun on the rest of their consultation, perhaps the Secretary of State could be as forthcoming to the House about those plans as she was to the press?

[Chris Philp]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Angela Rayner]

The Secretary of State has spent a huge amount of time speaking and I have a lot of Back Benchers who want to speak, so I am going to carry on.

The Chancellor announced one other measure in the Budget to address the issue: £5 million a year for the Government’s cash-for-cabs scheme, bussing children to grammar schools. Of course, the Chancellor forgot to mention that the Government had just cut £6 million out of the schools transport budget for every other child. Those cuts left no statutory provision for disabled 16 to 18-year-olds and others, who were forced to change school. They are paying the taxi tax so that a handful of pupils can be ferried up to 15 miles to the nearest grammar school by cab, at a cost of thousands of pounds each. Apparently, the comprehensive school bus is out, and the grammar school Uber is in. That is all to give the Government a fig leaf of social mobility. The Chancellor said:

“We are committed to that programme because we understand that choice is the key to excellence in education”.—[Official Report, 8 March 2017; Vol. 622, c. 818.]

I remind the Government that good teaching, school leadership, proper funding, the right curriculum and many other things are also key to that excellence.

It is also a rather obvious point that the Government’s proposed system is not one in which parents or pupils choose the school; instead, the schools choose the pupils. Parents are unlikely to have the choice they have been promised on childcare either. The Chancellor told the House that

“from September, working parents with three and four-year-olds will get their free childcare entitlement doubled to 30 hours a week.”—[Official Report, 8 March 2017; Vol. 622, c. 816.]

But the Secretary of State has already admitted in written answers that only a small minority of the parents receiving 15 hours will be eligible for the 30 hours. Fewer than 400,000 families will qualify, despite the Government’s promise at the last election that more than 600,000 would benefit.

The Chancellor’s plans for adult education are no closer to reality. He announced £40 million to trial new ways of delivering adult education and lifelong learning, but his own Government have cut the adult skills budget by 32% since 2010, taking out more than £1 billion. I know that the Chancellor’s aides have referred to their neighbours in No. 10 as “economically illiterate”, but surely even they realise the absurdity of trying to reverse the damage caused by £1 billion of cuts with £40 million in trials.

It is a similar story with the £500 million a year to deliver the new T-levels. That amount of new investment would be welcome—after all, further education budgets were cut by 7% in the last Parliament, and the Institute for Fiscal Studies found that between 2010 and 2020, funding per pupil in further education would be cut by 13%—but the briefing lines do not quite match the Budget lines. The Red Book shows that in 2018-19 the new funding will be only £60 million. Even by 2021-22, the new funding will not have risen to the promised half a billion a year.

Education and Social Mobility

Debate between Chris Philp and Angela Rayner

Tuesday 22nd November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

I find myself agreeing with the former Prime Minister, who was elected to make those contributions to the debate. That was the platform and the manifesto on which the Conservative Government stood, which they are currently rejecting.

I know from personal experience, as will parents from across this Chamber, the incredible impact that childcare can have, not just on children and their education, but on entire families. Leaving school at 16, with no qualifications and a newborn son, Labour’s Sure Start centres helped me to learn to be a better parent to my son. I know that I would not be speaking in this House today without those programmes, and that they have helped to offer my son the opportunities I never had growing up.

[Chris Philp (Croydon South) (Con)]

What would the hon. Lady say to parents in my constituency and in the rest of Croydon—where there are no grammar schools—who have to travel for miles and miles to an adjacent grammar school in either Sutton or Bromley? She is seeking to deny those parents choice, is she not?

[Angela Rayner]

I am seeking to ensure that every child has the best opportunities in life and a great start. I do not want the hon. Gentleman’s constituents to have to travel miles away from his constituency; I want them to have absolutely the best education possible, and selection does not provide that for every child.

Draft Occupational Pension Schemes (Scheme Administration) (Amendment) Regulations 2016

Debate between Chris Philp and Angela Rayner

Thursday 3rd March 2016 General Committees

[Angela Rayner]

We may laugh, but it will hardly be amusing to someone who finds their employer has invested their pension with a dubious scheme and without safeguards. Alarmingly, the programme also cited one industry expert who suggested that only around 10 existing master trust schemes could be considered completely safe and reliable. There is a view, therefore, that strengthening the requirements to enter the market, such as with authorisation or licensing, should filter out the least desirable operators. We would like to know more about the regulatory framework within which the Minister envisages today’s regulations will sit.

This issue was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton South West (Rob Marris), who, as shadow Financial Secretary to the Treasury, represented the Opposition during the Committee stage of the Bank of England and Financial Services Bill. The Economic Secretary to the Treasury responded that the Government would bring forward regulations as soon as practically possible. Can the Minister tell us today what discussions the Department for Work and Pensions has had with the Treasury about that legislation and give us an update? Perhaps he will tell us how such legislation relates to the comments of his colleague, the Minister of State for Pensions, in the press on 1 March. She complained that the Government would not give the Department parliamentary time for pensions legislation specifically in relation to master trusts. She said:

“We need legislation and have been bidding for a bill, a pensions bill but it has been refused. It was refused at the end of last year and it has still not happened…I am hoping we will get one because we can’t do anything properly without it.”

We seem to be in the extraordinary position of the Minister for Pensions admitting that she cannot do anything properly on this issue because she cannot get parliamentary time from her own Government, whose legislative agenda is hardly full. However, this seems to be flatly contradicted by the remarks of the Economic Secretary, so is the Treasury more up to date on pensions policy than the Minister for Pensions, or is that just where the power lies in this Government? Perhaps none of them knows what is going on.

If the Minister knows anything about his own Department’s legislative agenda, perhaps he would clarify whether we can expect a Bill and, if so, when. There are a number of questions about the regulatory framework on which it would also be helpful to hear his views.

[Chris Philp (Croydon South) (Con)]

With great respect to the hon. Lady, whose comments are interesting, we seem to have strayed a long way from the regulations before us. Does she plan to get back to the matter at hand in the near future?