Refugee Citizenship Rights

Dawn Butler Excerpts

Tuesday 1st July 2025 Westminster Hall

[Brian Leishman]

I thank the hon. Member for his contribution; I can appreciate the political nature of what he has said. Yes, Scotland is a nation, and it has its own unique needs. This is something that both Governments need to collaborate on, to try to thrash out something for the benefit of Scotland.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has expressed serious concerns about the UK’s updated guidance on the good character requirement for citizenship. It has been clear that the policy risks breaching article 31 of the 1951 refugee convention, which prohibits penalising refugees for irregular entry when fleeing persecution. The lack of clarity from the Government and the presumption of refusal may deter eligible refugees and stateless individuals from even applying for citizenship, especially given the exorbitant cost of applying—British citizenship applications are non-refundable and cost £1,630.

The refugee convention also explicitly requires states to facilitate, as far as possible, the naturalisation of refugees and stateless persons. That is a particularly interesting article, because not only is the UK a signatory to the treaty, but the British Government of the day are widely credited with incorporating the article into the convention. Not only are we abandoning our international obligations; we are abandoning the very international obligations for which the UK historically advocated.

This policy change undermines the very values of cohesion, unity and fairness that the UK aspires to uphold. It denies people who have sought protection from us the dignity and security of citizenship. I want to see a system that welcomes refugees not as second-class residents but as full members of our society, with the rights and recognition they deserve as human beings. Before my final questions to the Minister, here are the thoughts and feelings of a young man with refugee status in Glasgow:

“I have lived in Glasgow since 2017, after gaining refugee status the same year. I work and study civil and environmental engineering full time at Strathclyde University. I’ve had indefinite leave to remain since 2022 and was about to apply for citizenship, having already passed the UK life test and English language assessment. These are my thoughts:

Denying people the right to gain British citizenship after waiting for the legally required amount of time and upon gaining indefinite leave to remain is modern-day segregation. It splits people into different classes by keeping some stuck as second-class citizens. Not having the right to be a UK citizen stops me from being equal with my local community. People who have already the UK had no idea that they one day would not be allowed to become a citizen because they were claiming asylum—it feels like you have been targeted.

Throughout my journey, other countries rejected me—Italy gave 48 hours to leave the country, France gave 72 hours to leave the country. Coming to the UK is not necessarily something you can control yourself; it was my only option. However, fulfilling the good character requirements, which are things you can control yourself after entering the UK, should remain important.

This policy completely erases the point of people showing they have good character, and instead rejects us based only on something that I could not control. This new guidance does not encourage contribution to the community, if you are not one day going to be a proper part of the community by being a full and equal citizen.”

I put it to the Government that they should reconsider their stance, in the light of Lords amendment 186 to the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill. First, it would ensure that the good character requirement is not applied in a manner contrary to the UK’s international legal obligations. Secondly, it would uphold the best interests of children by prohibiting the consideration of a child’s irregular entry or arrival. Thirdly, it would remove retrospectivity, to further uphold the rule of law.

An adult’s irregular entry or arrival may be taken into account only to the extent specified in guidance that was published when they entered or arrived in the UK. Previously, the guidance permitted a person to acquire citizenship so long as 10 years had passed since their irregular entry. At present, the guidance applies to someone whether they arrive two months or two decades ago. It cannot serve as a deterrent to people who are already here. It serves only as a penalty and a scarlet letter.

[Dawn Butler (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind hon. Members that they should bob if they wish to speak.

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[Chris Murray]

The hon. Gentleman and I have debated this issue a lot. I was not debating whether citizenship is a good or a bad thing—I fully believe it is a good thing. My point was that citizens do not get many more rights and entitlements in Britain today than people who are settled. We could have a wider debate about whether that is fine—I think we should—but a lot of things, such as applying to institutions, colleges or universities, or entitlement to benefits, to housing or to vote, are contingent not on citizenship, but on settlement. The distinction on voting depends on whether the person is a Commonwealth citizen or not. My argument is that in Britain, unlike other countries, we do not make a clear distinction between settlement and citizenship. The distinction between citizenship and indefinite leave to remain—settlement—makes little material difference for refugees living in our communities.

That brings me to my second point. There is clearly a case for citizenship reform in this country. It has been decades since we seriously looked at the issue. I welcome the fact that we are having the debate and that the immigration White Paper has kicked off a discussion about the distinction. The system should be managed, controlled and fair. As I said, the real distinction with citizenship is whether the person has been here an extra year or two and whether they can pay the fee. That is how they get citizenship.

However, some people come to this country and work hard, obey the rules, pay loads of tax, volunteer, do good in their communities and make a huge contribution. Some go on to score goals and win medals for us. Other people come here and do not do any of those things. They do not commit a huge offence, but they do not do any of those things. Is it right that the system treats those people just the same? I would argue that we should differentiate between them.

Madeleine Albright’s family fled the Nazis. They came first to Britain, and the question they were asked was, “Okay, you are refugees and are welcome here, but how long until you leave?” Then they went to the US—

[Dawn Butler (in the Chair)]

Order. I would also like to give Brian Leishman two minutes to wind up.

Windrush Day 2025

Dawn Butler Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Helen Hayes]

I thank my hon. Friend for all the work she is doing on this issue. As I have said, I believe this is an unaddressed issue on which there is still work to do.

In that vein, it is devastating to read the words of John Carpenter, which I have shared before in this House, who travelled on the Windrush aged 22. Speaking in 1998, he said:

“They tell you it is the ‘mother country’, you’re all welcome, you all British. When you come here you realise you’re a foreigner and that’s all there is to it.”

Despite the hardships and injustices they endured, the Windrush passengers and those who followed them settled in the UK and put down roots, using the Pardner Hand community savings scheme to buy property to circumvent the racist landlords, and to establish businesses and churches. Sam King became a postal worker, was elected to Southwark council and became the first black mayor of the borough. It was a very brave achievement since he faced threats from the National Front, which was active in Southwark at that time. Sam was also instrumental in establishing the Notting Hill carnival and the West Indian Gazette. He later established the Windrush Foundation with Arthur Torrington, who still runs it.

In my constituency, the Windrush generation helped to forge the Brixton we know today. In doing so, they made a huge contribution to a community where everyone is welcome, where difference is not feared but celebrated, and where we are not strangers but friends and neighbours. To mark the 70th anniversary of the arrival of the Empire Windrush, talented young people from Brixton designed a beautiful logo, which is based on the pattern of human DNA.

The Windrush generation and subsequent migrants who have come to this country from all over the Commonwealth sparked the emergence of modern multicultural Britain. They are part of us, and part of the UK’s 21st-century DNA. The Windrush generation made an extraordinary and enduring contribution, because the Windrush generation continued to endure—

[Dawn Butler (Brent East) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Helen Hayes]

Yes.

[Dawn Butler]

On that point about the expats who came over from the Caribbean and what they endured, does my hon. Friend agree that we sometimes fail to recognise the strength and the resilience of the Windrush generation, which often gets overlooked?

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[Dawn Butler (Brent East) (Lab)]

It is always a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis). History is written by the person holding the pen. That does not necessarily mean that it is the history of what happened at the time; it is told through a specific lens. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) for instigating this important debate on Windrush.

My Brent East constituency is one of the most diverse constituencies in Europe. On that point, as this is the first time I have spoken in the Chamber today, I send my condolences to everyone affected by the plane crash in India, as many of my constituents have been. Ultimately, what affects one, affects us all.

The Windrush ship brought people from Jamaica, Trinidad, St Lucia, Grenada and Barbados. As my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham and Brixton Hill (Bell Ribeiro-Addy) said, many served in the British armed forces in world war two, so they were owed something by their mother country.

I will talk a bit about my mum. My hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi) talked about people coming over in their Sunday best. If we look at those pictures, we can see how crisp and sharp their suits were, with shirts that were sparkling white. They were proud—so proud. We had our playing out clothes, our school clothes, and our church clothes, and never the three did meet. We were taught an inherent sense of pride in ourselves. We were not allowed to eat on the street, because that would give the impression that we did not have food at home. We were not allowed to carry clothes in a plastic bag, because they called that a scandal bag in Jamaica, so we had to have a proper cloth bag. We were taught so much.

We washed every day, which might seem like a weird thing to say now, but my parents would tell me that they had only washed once a week because they had to go to a wash house. We had to wash every single day. We also washed our meat and our chicken before we seasoned it—and the seasoning was more than salt and pepper; salt and pepper were an accompaniment. What was brought from the Caribbean is more than some people appreciate, because it is now taken for granted.

When we went to other West Indian people’s homes, we would find lots of things in common, like hand crocheted doilies on the chairs and on the table. My mum used to crochet little ducks and dip them in dye so they had little red beaks. It was so inventive. Nowadays, we would pay a fortune for that skill. All our clothes were bespoke; I would be embarrassed that my mum made my clothes, but now I would love my mum to make my clothes to measure. Now I have grown up, I realise that the things that we were taught to be almost ashamed of when we came here were actually very special—very unique and grand.

The reason we would find the same picture frame in West Indian people’s homes is that there was only one photographer who would take pictures of black people and frame them. Pictures of weddings kind of looked the same then, because there was only one place that would do that for the West Indian community. That is how West Indian people were treated in a place that they called the motherland.

The Windrush scandal was about not just the loss of employment, the loss of access to benefits, homelessness and the loss of access to housing, or the loss of access to healthcare and education. As my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Riverside (Kim Johnson) said, the system was deliberately structured to make sure that black people did not progress by labelling them as educationally subnormal—to stop their ability to work and earn. It stopped people buying their house or sending their child to college, which a lot of West Indian people had done.

The reason only 2,000 people have claimed is that there is a lot of shame that comes with that; the West Indian community is a very proud community. That is why we have to instil Labour values from a Labour Government in how we readdress what has happened to the Windrush generation. It has been an absolute scandal. Around 50,000-plus people have been affected by this issue, and some will die. Some have died, and some will die before they see justice. We must speed up progress.

The scheme was not a light-touch design, as the then Government said it was. It was something like 45 pages, and although they said that people did not need a lawyer, they did because it was so complex. I am ashamed that not one Back-Bench Member of His Majesty’s Opposition has come to this debate. This is not a niche debate; this is a debate about hundreds of thousands of people who came to this country to rebuild it, who were invited here, and Opposition Members have not even had the decency to come here and contribute—and they are the cause of the scandal and injustice.

I will end as I began. Martin Luther King said that what affects one affects us all, because that is the interrelated structure of society. We are all intertwined in life’s journey, and as racism is increasing in some parts of the country and people are trying to divide us, I hope that we remember—on Jo Cox day—that we have more in common.

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[The Minister for Equalities (Seema Malhotra)]

I start by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) for securing this debate and all Members who have spoken in an incredibly powerful and moving discussion. That includes my hon. Friends the Members for Ealing Southall (Deirdre Costigan), for Liverpool Riverside (Kim Johnson), for Clapham and Brixton Hill (Bell Ribeiro-Addy), for Huddersfield (Harpreet Uppal), for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi), for Norwich South (Clive Lewis) and for Brent East (Dawn Butler). I also thank the shadow spokespeople, who made powerful contributions.

I will try to refer later in my speech to a number of the points that have been raised, but let me first thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East (Mrs Brackenridge) for her stories about Professor Chevannes and Paulette Wilson, which, like so many stories told during the debate, were very powerful. I also want to acknowledge Basil Watson’s wonderful sculpture, and the story that it tells to all who come and go through Waterloo station. When my hon. Friend the Member for Brent East spoke about her mother, I think we all recognised a little bit of her mother in all our mothers, and I am sure that her pride in her mother would have been reflected very much in her mother’s pride in her and her contributions.

This Sunday marks 77 years since the Empire Windrush arrived at Tilbury. Along with the thousands of others who came to the United Kingdom from the Caribbean and countries across the Commonwealth in the 1940s, 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, they became known as the Windrush generation. They and their children and grandchildren have enriched our society in myriad ways, and we owe them an enormous debt of gratitude. On Windrush Day, we celebrate them and their extraordinary achievements and contribution to our economy, communities, society and culture; but we also acknowledge the appalling and humiliating treatment to which many members of the Windrush generation were subjected owing to the actions of past Governments.

Let me say, clearly and without equivocation, that the Home Office Windrush scandal was a travesty that caused untold pain and suffering. There has been much talk about righting the wrongs, but words alone are not enough, and this Government are backing up our promises with action. We promised a reset when we were in opposition, and since the general election we have sought to strengthen engagement with victims, their families, communities and stakeholder organisations. I have regularly met many organisations, including the Windrush National Organisation—I pay tribute to Bishop Desmond Jadoo, and I was honoured to join a very powerful vigil with some of my hon. Friends in April—and Windrush Defenders Legal.

From London to Manchester and from Cardiff to Edinburgh, I have heard victims describe how their lives were turned upside down, about the trauma they went through, and about the impact that the scandal is still having on their lives. As we have sought to embed a culture of listening and learning throughout the Department, we have worked to improve training and standards, as well as publishing the report “The Historical Roots of the Windrush Scandal” last September. I am clear about the fact that the lessons we learn should inform our ways of working across Government.

In April, the Home Secretary and I were honoured to host the Windrush Cymru Elders for a special screening in the Home Office, with Professor Uzo Iwobi and Race Council Cymru, of the BAFTA-nominated film “Windrush Cymru @ 75”. Last week we were proud to host the first day of the National Windrush Museum’s annual summit, led by Dr Les Johnson and Denize Ledeatte—a powerful summit addressing the theme of “reframing Windrush and justice for a new Britain”. We will very soon announce the appointment of a new independent Windrush commissioner, underlining this Government’s unwavering determination to ensure that the voices of the Windrush generations are heard, their experiences are acknowledged, and proper compensation is delivered.

We are committed to improving the Windrush compensation scheme to ensure that those to whom compensation is due receive the support that they deserve quickly. In opposition, we frequently heard that the application process was too complicated, with insufficient support for those wishing to make a claim.

The Government are determined to ensure that the victims of the Home Office Windrush scandal are heard, that justice is sped up, and that the compensation scheme is run efficiently and effectively. We have already made changes to the casework processes, reducing waiting times for the allocation of claims from four months to under six weeks. In April, we launched a £1.5 million advocacy support fund to provide dedicated help from trusted community organisations when victims apply for compensation. However, we recognise that there is much more to be done, which is why Ministers are continuing to engage with community groups on improvements to the compensation scheme, and we will ask the Windrush commissioner to recommend any further changes that they believe are required.

I want to address two points that were made in the debate. The first is about people who unfortunately passed away after submitting a claim—we are aware of about 64 claimants. In these very difficult circumstances, the teams continue to work closely with their appointed representative, who is usually a member of the family, to ensure that claims continue and are concluded as quickly as possible. We prioritise those claims where we are notified that individuals are suffering from critical or life-limiting illnesses, and officials are reviewing the current exclusion in the rules on compensation for private and occupational pensions. We are working at pace to consider options for how we can compensate for these losses, and working closely with the Government Actuary’s Department to support this critical work.

The Windrush story has resonance for us all, and for communities across the country. I am pleased to tell the House that this Government have supported this year’s commemorations through the Windrush Day grant scheme, which is chaired by Paulette Simpson and works with my noble Friend in the other place, the Minister for Faith and Communities. We are funding projects to celebrate and commemorate the Windrush, and to educate people about it. We are funding the National Windrush Museum to collect and preserve precious assets for future generations, and as a great educational resource for schools, researchers and the wider public.

[Dawn Butler]

My hon. Friend the Member for Clapham and Brixton Hill (Bell Ribeiro-Addy) talked about the Government giving a little bit of money for this and that. I am really pleased to hear about the Windrush Museum. Will the Minister consider setting up an emancipation educational trust, so that we can have a building where we can talk not only about the injustice of Windrush, but about the injustice of people being enslaved?

Dedicated Schools Grant

Dawn Butler Excerpts

Tuesday 6th May 2025 Westminster Hall

[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Butler. I congratulate the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Cameron Thomas) on securing this important debate.

For far too long, the state of rural and semi-rural schools has been forgotten, particularly in my part of Northumberland, where Northumberland county council, which is still run by the Conservatives, treats my part of the county with what I can only describe as tender contempt. The previous Government thought so little of my constituency that eight and a half years ago they built a school that is already deemed structurally unsafe. Students have had to be transported to another part of the north-east to continue their education. That is the context in which I situate my remarks.

Generations of rural students have been left behind. I thank the hon. Member for Tewkesbury for his circumspectness in his comments about the awful circumstances that the Government inherited. It is not possible to start any discussion of any policy without recognising that we received a generational hospital pass, as I think he put it.

Having grown up in a rural area, I know that there are foundational characteristics. I confess to not knowing too much about Gloucestershire, having not had the chance to go there much beyond, I think, one family funeral when I was about 10, but I am sure it is lovely. From what I can tell, Northumberland has a lot that is similar, including large distances to travel and restricted access to opportunities and services. I went back to my old high school recently to discuss some of the access to work schemes that staff there try to provide and some of the opportunities for younger people to get employment skills. The teachers are working every hour they get, but they are hamstrung by the lack of local bus routes and appropriate public transport, and the lack of employers with the capacity to take on apprentices or students who are in need of work experience.

For far too long during the 100 years my constituency had Conservative representation down here, the challenges were not given voice or addressed. That was the challenge, dare I say it, of being considered a safe Tory seat: people could vote for their MP but not get a voice as part of that. We need to do more to engender stronger ties between communities and schools, to ensure that those growing up in our communities do not have to search too far outside them to find the opportunities and jobs that they want to progress in life. Unfortunately, the reality for many students is that they do have to.

I will direct the remainder of my remarks to two particular schools. First, Haydon Bridge high school is an incredible school in a beautiful location—and I get to visit a lot of schools. Haydon Bridge is a wonderful town on the Tyne Valley railway line—although the railway could do with running on time a bit more—and it has a fantastic school with genuinely fantastic teachers. Unfortunately, when I visited I had to discuss the funding issues with the headteacher.

I would dearly like to see the new administration at Northumberland county hall put their hands in their pocket to do something about the state of the school, which has been underfunded for a long time. There has not been the political will, nous or leadership among the Conservative group in Morpeth to stand up for students in the west of Northumberland. The teachers at Haydon Bridge could not work any harder, nor put on more opportunities. They are always looking at how to make the school more attractive and at how they can drive employment and employability, but for far too long the voice of rural schools has been shut out of the national debate.

Prudhoe community high school was opened eight and a half years ago. It was built under a Conservative Secretary of State and Education Department, but it was closed due to cracks in the infrastructure. I have been working on that with the staff and the community in Prudhoe. It would be a struggle to find a more inspiring group of people, particularly the headteacher and the teaching staff there. They had to deal with cracks appearing in the structure just months before GCSEs and A-levels—an incredibly challenging situation—and did so to the best of their ability. Everyone accepts that the ultimate, best outcome would have been for the students to be able to go back into the school to receive their education on site, but that would not have been safe. People had to work incredibly hard to find an appropriate site that did not involve travel and enabled the students to continue their education safely.

I urge the Minister not just to look at the matters raised in this debate but to consider—as I know she has many times, because I have chased her down corridors about this—the circumstances of those at the community high school. I also put that point to the exam boards, because the students had a black swan event with their school being deemed unsafe so close to exam times. Some of the boards have said that it falls under the definition of a school with reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete, but I do not believe that—I want to put on the record. For far too long schools in my constituency in the west of Northumberland have been forgotten about and done down. It is beyond time that those responsible, particularly at county hall, stand up and take note.

[Dawn Butler (in the Chair)]

I remind Members that if they want to speak in the debate, they should please stand. We have calculated that Members will have about five minutes per speech.

Workplace Pay Gaps

Dawn Butler Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2025 Westminster Hall

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

May I take this opportunity to wish all colleagues present a happy new year?

[Dawn Butler (Brent East) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered pay gaps in the workplace.

Thank you, Sir Roger. I wish everybody a happy new year, too, and it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

There are multiple pay gaps in the workplace. I have had emails about the age pay gap, size pay gap and accent pay gaps—as a certified cockney, I know that that is true, and just for the record, some of the most intelligent people I know are cockneys. But today, for Ethnicity Pay Gap Day, I want to focus on gender, ethnicity and disability pay gaps. The key point is that if we measure something, we can fix it, but at the current rate, it will take another 40 years to fix the gender and ethnicity pay gap. Nobody should feel happy about that slow rate of progress; and imagine how long it will take to fix the disability pay gap—it will take even longer.

Last year, the Fawcett Society reported that Equal Pay Day fell on 20 November, two days earlier than the year before, and that essentially meant that from 20 November until the end of the year women were working for free. It is shocking that, on average, women earn £630 less a month than their male counterparts. On social media, people sometimes say, “What is this all about? Are you trying to reduce how much men are paid?” That is not what this is about. It is about fairness and equality and about paying people more, not less. I do not want on social media the manipulation and the misinformation of people saying, when we talk about equal rights and fairness, that that is somehow doing down men, because it absolutely is not. Currently, the ethnicity pay gap is 5.6% and the disability pay gap is 12.7%. That is a whopping pay gap.

The Government are to be applauded for their ambition and plan to make work pay. The Prime Minister said, as part of his new year message:

“The security of working people…is the purpose of this government.”

That is something that we should all applaud: working people should be secure in their job and in their work. Following the King’s Speech, companies of 250-plus employees have to report ethnicity and disability pay gaps, which is welcome. It is also welcome that gender pay gap reporting has been expanded to include equality action plans. That is great, but producing equality action plans is not enough. What will companies do with the action plans? How will they ensure that they use the action plans to close the pay gaps? It is one step, but it does not go far enough.

It has to be acknowledged that what we do now will actually make the workplace better for everybody—not just women, people with disabilities and people of different ethnicities. Everybody will benefit if the workplace is fairer. Research has found that men want flexibility in the workplace. This is always framed as women wanting flexibility in the workplace, but the reality is that men also want flexibility, so if we make that a standard, everybody will be happy. And no matter who is doing the job, doing the work, they should be paid fairly. That should be the case no matter who they are or what they look like, so there also needs to be a concerted effort whereby we stop stereotyping people into jobs or creating structures that try to normalise inequality.

[Kim Johnson (Liverpool Riverside) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. The Equality Act 2010 states that it is illegal to discriminate on the basis of race, yet in 2024, black people earned an hourly mean rate 19.04% lower than their white counterparts. The Employment Rights Bill provides an opportunity for employers to develop and publish an equality action plan. However, those action plans at the moment cover only gender. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government need to place more emphasis on ethnicity gap issues, and that that Bill, which is in Committee, needs to make that right by covering them at this stage?

[Dawn Butler]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. If our ambition is to make the workplace fairer and secure it for everybody, we should take the opportunities laid before us. That is one opportunity to ensure that we not only close the gap but make workplaces fairer.

There was one case that was easy to identify as a trade union official: men were called chefs and women were called cooks, and chefs were paid a higher rate than cooks. That was an easy one, once we could figure out what was going on. A more difficult case was that of Kay, who said:

“I had been working as a chef with a large catering company for ten years. During a casual conversation, my colleague mentioned he was being paid £22,000 a year. This was £6,000 a year more than me. I thought the right to equal pay would mean I was being paid fairly. For years, I went to work each day without knowing I was being paid less than those I was working alongside. I am not an isolated case. I know there are many women who, like me, don’t realise they are experiencing pay discrimination.”

That picks up on the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool Riverside (Kim Johnson). The law is there, but if someone does not know what the person next to them, who is doing the same job, is paid, they could be discriminated against.

Some people will say that some men and women do different jobs, different types of work or different hours. The law says the “same work” or “work of equal value”, but even when men and women work the same hours and in the same roles, nearly two thirds of the gender pay gap remains unexplained. That points to pay discrimination, which we must tackle as a Government. How do we tackle that and move faster towards security, fairness and equality? One way is transparency. It is important for people to know who is being paid what and why. We should introduce the right to know. In Kay’s situation, she should be able to see how much X is being paid and know that there is a £6,000 pay deficit. We also need actionable and enforceable action plans. Again, an organisation may have identified a pay gap, but unless it has committed to closing that gap, that probably will not happen. Another way companies can do that is by assigning it as a key performance indicator. We have found that when organisations assign that to somebody as a KPI, real action is taken and pay gaps begin to close.

The Government have a huge role to play not just through legislation, in terms of the Equal Pay Act and so on, but by securing the circular economy. The Government can have an active role in making the workplace fairer by ensuring, as has been done in some areas, that they give contracts only to companies that pay people well and fairly and do not have a pay gap. So the Government’s procurement contract processes can ensure that they give contracts only to companies that follow good practices, which will enrich the circular economy. This is not just about doing the right thing. Companies that pay people well and employ the right people for the right jobs generally have a 15% higher profit margin than their nearest counterparts. That also plays out in the fact that a lot of young people are becoming socially informed, so they like to shop with companies that have good ethics and consider climate change. This approach will benefit everybody and is good in itself.

As I come to the end of my speech, some may wonder why I have not mentioned fines. The Minister may correct me, but to my knowledge no company has been fined for its gender pay gap. Unless that part of the law is strengthened, it is meaningless. I am interested to know how we can ensure that we fine companies that are not closing their pay gaps, and what the Government plan to do with any money that is collected.

There is a stark difference across UK regions, with some doing better than others. London has the largest ethnicity pay gap, which currently stands at a whopping 23.8%. That is appalling in one of the most diverse capital cities in the world and the financial capital city of the UK. As chair of the London parliamentary Labour party, I want to accelerate the move towards closing those pay gaps. I commend Dianne Greyson, founder of #EthnicityPayGap, for her work on that.

As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on governance and inclusive leadership—GAIL—I launched a maturity matrix in Parliament. That guide is available online for free for companies to implement in their workplace. It takes them through various stages to recognise and close pay gaps. That has been so successful that companies have asked for it to be expanded for disability and other things, which is currently being done. That is a free resource because, ultimately, we want better and fairer workplaces.

People should be paid fairly on merit. No one should be paid less for their work because of their gender, colour of their skin, ethnicity, background, accent, size, age or class. If we get this right on gender, ethnicity and disability, we will create a better and fairer work environment for all.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

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[Dawn Butler]

A big thank you to everyone who has participated in this debate; it has shown Parliament at its best, and it is great to see that there is no real opposition to championing equal pay. It has taken a long time, but we now have a Labour Government and we can deliver it. That is the beauty of having a Labour Government who are committed to ensuring that people who are working are fully paid and respected in the workplace. Although the hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Christine Jardine) said that she wants to be alive to see the gap closed completely, I think we will see that with a Labour Government, so she will be alive to see it.

It is interesting that a country where the pay gap is really small is Norway, where anyone can find out how much anybody else is paid. That is taking things further than we would in the UK, but it is interesting to see that because people there have that disinfectant and that light on the problem, as hon. Members have said today, they are able to see the gap and close it. I do not think that we should be scared of having people know what other people earn, especially if they are working side by side. There should not be anything to worry about.

It is also interesting that the Employment Rights Bill will tackle a lot of this issue. We need to ensure that as it goes through Committee, we take on all the suggestions that will accelerate progress. This has taken way too long. We know that the gap exists and that equal pay is a problem, and everyone here today has said, “Why don’t we close it?” We know that it exists, and it should not exist for anybody, whether they are male or female; regardless of someone’s gender, colour, class, age or size, this should be about fairness and equality.

Yes, we have come far, but not far enough. We will know that we have reached true equality when everybody is paid well. We should shine a light on everything. I thank all contributors to the debate. We have shown that the purpose of government and legislation is to make the world fairer for everybody in it, and we can do that via legislation, by winning hearts and minds and by shining a light on the injustices that exist. If we close the equal pay gap, we will be taking a huge step forward towards that aim.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered pay gaps in the workplace.