Ceasefire in Gaza

Debate between David Lammy and Toby Perkins

Wednesday 21st February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

I beg to move amendment (a), to leave out from “House” to end and add

“believes that an Israeli ground offensive in Rafah risks catastrophic humanitarian consequences and therefore must not take place; notes the intolerable loss of Palestinian life, the majority being women and children; condemns the terrorism of Hamas who continue to hold hostages; supports Australia, Canada and New Zealand’s calls for Hamas to release and return all hostages and for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, which means an immediate stop to the fighting and a ceasefire that lasts and is observed by all sides, noting that Israel cannot be expected to cease fighting if Hamas continues with violence and that Israelis have the right to the assurance that the horror of 7 October 2023 cannot happen again; therefore supports diplomatic mediation efforts to achieve a lasting ceasefire; demands that rapid and unimpeded humanitarian relief is provided in Gaza; further demands an end to settlement expansion and violence; urges Israel to comply with the International Court of Justice’s provisional measures; calls for the UN Security Council to meet urgently; and urges all international partners to work together to establish a diplomatic process to deliver the peace of a two-state solution, with a safe and secure Israel alongside a viable Palestinian state, including working with international partners to recognise a Palestinian state as a contribution to rather than outcome of that process, because statehood is the inalienable right of the Palestinian people and not in the gift of any neighbour.”

There are times when this House can come together with clarity and a unity of purpose, and I hope that this can be one of those moments. It is with pain and sadness that this House gathers today—the pain and sadness of war that has gone on too long. It is now 137 days since the appalling 7 October massacre, and since that day, the killing has gone on. Flattened cities, ransacked kibbutzim, teeming refugee camps, hostages in chains—we have seen it all on our TV and phone screens.

A ground offensive in Rafah would be a humanitarian disaster, a moral catastrophe and a strategic mistake. It must not happen. That is our position, it is the position of the European Union, it is the position of our friends in the Arab world, and it is the position of our Five Eyes partners in Australia, Canada and New Zealand. We must not just avert a ground invasion of Rafah, essential though that is; all violence against civilians must now stop. That is why Labour is saying unequivocally that we need an immediate humanitarian ceasefire to end the bloodshed and the suffering.

[Mr Perkins]

It is important that we try to come out of this debate not only with the House united, but with the United Kingdom in line with international partners. If the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara) had given way, I would have said to him that although the leader of the SNP, the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Stephen Flynn), spoke during Prime Minister’s questions about being in line with the international community, it is actually Labour’s amendment that would put us in line with international partners. The SNP motion puts us outside the space in which the vast majority of the international community is.

[Mr Lammy]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. This is a moment when the whole House can come together. Let us be clear, whether from the Government Benches or the Opposition Benches, that we all agree that the time for a ceasefire has come, to end the bloodshed and suffering, and to allow a sustained effort to salvage the hope of a two-state solution. There are three motions before us today. Only one can be supported by all sides.

Protecting the Public and Justice for Victims

Debate between David Lammy and Toby Perkins

Wednesday 9th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lammy]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for seeking to assist his good friend the Secretary of State, but let me just say to him that all around the common law world—in Australia, in New Zealand, in the United States of America—there is a movement to increase the minimum sentences for rape. We in this party have looked closely at what has been done in those jurisdictions. I think in India the term has just increased to nine years because of the controversies around some rape cases there in the past few years, and in Australia it has increased to, I think, seven years. For that reason, it is our position that we should increase the minimum tariff.

I recognise that there is a legitimate debate around time served, and the Secretary of State has put his position in the Bill. I recognise also that, for heinous crimes, a whole life-sentence is appropriate. Indeed, we propose that in the Bill—someone who abducts, rapes and kidnaps a woman should serve a whole-life sentence. That is not currently in the Bill—we are proposing that. I will not refer to the controversial case before the courts at the moment, but the hon. Gentleman knows why we are proposing that. I say to him gently that this debate boils down to the value of a woman’s body and how seriously our party is taking it. That is why there is a serious legal disagreement between myself and the Secretary of State.

If we do not work cross-party on this, the Government will, in our view and in my view, be letting down victims of rape, domestic abuse, assault and violence once again. It is impossible to separate that failure of victims of violence against women and girls from the Government’s failures across the justice system as a whole. The backlog in the Crown courts is at an unprecedented level of more than 57,000 cases. It sat at 39,000 cases even before the pandemic began.

The backlog has been exacerbated by the pandemic, but it was created by the decision of this Conservative Government to close half of all courts in England and Wales between 2010 and 2019, allowing 27,000 fewer sitting days than in 2016. As the Secretary of State stares at the backlog figures, which worsen every month, does he now regret his Government closing the courts and telling those that stayed open to have so many days off?

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend is making an incredibly important point. There is no way that a party that has presided over the court backlog that we have—which has a huge impact on victims, who are sat nervously waiting to see perpetrators in court and then hopefully in prison—can say that it is in any way serious about being tough on crime, is there?

[Mr Lammy]

It absolutely cannot say that it is tough on crime when victims of crime face watching their cases collapse. I recognise that this has been a very pressured time—it is a pandemic—and the Secretary of State has had to deal with a range of issues in our prisons, in our probation, in our police and in relation to our judiciary. I recognise that, but in the end, the justice system has to serve victims of crime, and palpably and honestly, on any objective measure, things have got worse for victims of crime in our courts, and we need to do something about it.