Points of Order

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Nigel Evans

Monday 4th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. In a previous point of order on 12 July I said that I had not received a reply to the letter I sent to the Prime Minister on 17 January, and I can confirm that I had not received a response to that letter at that point. However, in the spirit of my Elected Representatives (Codes of Conduct) Bill, which aims to restore trust in our politics, I wish to clarify that I had received a separate response to my June follow-up letter to the Prime Minister from the noble Baroness Neville-Rolfe on 7 July, and I have written to her to make that clear and to thank her. As such, I would be grateful if I could amend the record.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I am sure the House is incredibly grateful that the hon. Lady has done so in such a speedy fashion.

Cost of Living Increases: Pensioners

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Nigel Evans

Monday 21st March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

The respected Joseph Rowntree Foundation annual poverty report shows increasing poverty over people’s life course—children, working age adults and pensioners. Both the JRF and the Equality and Human Rights Commission say that the key determinant of this rise in poverty is our inadequate social security system, which has been decimated over the last 12 years. The safety net that should be there for all of us in our time of need, providing dignity in retirement, is failing us—it just is not there—and it was doing so before the energy crisis.

Professor Sir Michael Marmot has identified the declining value of social security support and the lack of protection that this provides as contributing to the fall in life expectancy of those on the lowest incomes. More than 14.5 million people in this country are living in relative poverty—that is more than one in five of us—and using the JRF figures we see pensioner poverty increasing by 500,000 since 2010 to 2 million.

Pensioners living on their own, predominantly women, are particularly at risk of poverty. They account for 1.2 million of the 2 million pensioners living in poverty, and we see an associated decline in women’s life expectancy and healthy life expectancy. I hope the Government will bear that in mind as they embark on their consultation on the state pension age. I know the Pensions Minister feels this keenly, but I offer a gentle reminder that groups representing women born in the 1950s estimate that between 2010 and 2020 more than 80,000 older women died before becoming eligible for their state pension, after their pension age was increased from 60 to 66, catching many unawares.

In the remaining time available to me, I want to talk about disabled people living in poverty. The report published last year by the all-party group on health in all policies, which I was involved in developing, shows the savage impact of a slew of social security policies on disabled people in particular. The EHRC estimates that disabled families have lost £3 out of every £10, and similar figures have been produced by the Disability Benefits Consortium. As we know, we have record levels of in-work poverty—work no longer protects people from poverty—but what about those who cannot work because of sickness or disability? We must never forget that nine out of 10 disabilities are acquired. It could happen to any of us. We could be walking down the road and have an accident, or we could contract an illness. In a civilised society that is one of the richest in the world, one would expect that, just as we have the NHS, we would have the disability protection that that affluence affords, but we do not.

The social security cuts and the extra costs people face by virtue of their disability mean that disabled people are the most likely to live in poverty. Of the 14 million disabled people in this country, a third are living in poverty. Where is the adequate system for them?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. Sorry, but we are under pressure of time. The wind-ups will begin no later than 9.40 pm, and anyone who has participated in the debate is expected to be here for them.

Dementia Research in the UK

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Nigel Evans

Thursday 10th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams]

Let me start with some thank-yous. I thank all the speakers who contributed to today’s debate on dementia research, which is absolutely essential for the reasons that many of us have discussed. I am very grateful to every Member who shared their personal stories and experiences.

This is not something that will go away. We will see an increase in people with dementia, but it does not need to be that way. Before I go on to what we need to do and comment on the Minister’s winding-up speech, I pay tribute to my constituency, where we have 3,000 dementia friends. I was the first MP to train as a dementia friends champion; I deliver sessions on the subject across my constituency, and our youth council has taken part in this, too. It is an important way that we can drive up awareness, because so many people have personal experience of the effects of living with dementia. We have an annual memory walk, and many of our retailers have undertaken training, so that when someone gets to a checkout but does not know what they are there for, or what money they need to pay for the goods, there is understanding, rather than tut-tutting.

I worked hard with the Minister over a number of years when he was co-chair of the APPG. There is absolutely unanimity here—my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) referred to it. Members on both sides of the House need to do more. Unfortunately, what has happened so far is not enough. We need to ask the Government to stump up for the commitments that they made in the 2019 general election.

The money that has gone on neurodegenerative diseases research covers a much broader spectrum of diseases than those that contribute specifically to dementia. The early career researchers fund covers all diseases, not just those specifically focusing on dementia. The families of people with dementia deserve better. They deserve delivery on a promise that was made to them more than two years ago. The impact that dementia is having on people’s lives cannot be underestimated.

There is a lot more that can be done. We can have screening programmes, like those that we have for breast, cervical, prostate and bowel cancers, for people in their early 20s and 30s. Diagnostic tools have been developed to enable diagnosis to happen sooner, rather than later, so that dementia does not have an impact on people as they grow older and it is picked up early. It is not good enough for the Government to say, “This is what we are doing.” They really need to deliver.

I hope the Minister will take this message back to the Treasury, so that there is an announcement in the spring statement. I know the Minister is personally committed to this issue, but the Government need to back him up.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

As the Minister said, this has been a significant debate on the last day before the week’s recess. I have been an MP for 30 years and I remember that one of my first surgery cases was a lady who came to see me. Her husband had a very senior position and was well respected throughout the community but he had succumbed to the cruelty of dementia. She broke down in tears as she told me how she had had to put post-it notes all around their home in order for him to know where the cups were and things like that. My eyes welled up listening to her story. It is such a cruel condition, and we wish everybody working in dementia research in the UK and throughout the world well in order that they can protect lives in the future.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved.

That this House has considered dementia research in the UK.

Rail Investment and Integrated Rail Plan

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Nigel Evans

Wednesday 8th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I have been contacted by a constituent who has incurable secondary breast cancer. She has planned a Christmas holiday to Spain with her family, including her 12-year-old and 15-year-old children. The UK Government recommend a single dose of vaccine for over-15s which her daughter has had, but the Spanish Government are now saying that over-12s are to have two doses of a two-dose vaccine or one dose of a one-dose vaccine. My constituent is very concerned that her daughter could be prevented from entering Spain and joining them on their holiday. She is desperately seeking clarification on this matter, as it is not on the Government website or indeed that of the airline, and they are due to travel next Thursday. Given this, I seek your guidance, Mr Deputy Speaker, on how to get a full response from the Foreign Office on what she can expect and how she can ensure her family can make travel plans before Christmas.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I thank the hon. Member for giving me notice of the point of order on behalf of her constituents. It is important that Ministers give timely answers to Members, particularly when they raise issues of an urgent nature. Those on the Treasury Bench will have heard the point raised and I hope they will relay it back, but there will be other opportunities, including business questions tomorrow.

Building Safety Bill

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Nigel Evans

2nd reading
Wednesday 21st July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

My warmest congratulations, Madam Deputy Speaker. I think everybody welcomes the new and enhanced regulatory regimes for building safety in the Bill, but, as many Members have stated, I am equally concerned about the action that is needed now to make existing homes and products safe and to stop leaseholders from being hit with catastrophic bills from building owners to fix historic failures. I also want to put on record my concerns about a statement being issued in the middle of an opening speech presenting the Bill. I think it is absolutely appalling.

Moving on to Dame Judith Hackitt’s report, she concluded that it was the construction industry’s prevalent culture that was undermining building safety. She referred to procurement regimes that were not fit for purpose. In relation to building safety, she added that

“unhelpful behaviours such as contract terms and payment practices which prioritise speed and low cost solutions, exacerbate this situation.”

She concluded that poor procurement and payment practice

“provide poor value for money”

and produce “poor building safety outcomes.” She recommended that contracts’ payment terms and practices should be recorded as part of a proposed digital building safety file. I could not agree more with her conclusions.

There is a toxic culture in too many parts of the construction industry, where fly-by-night firms benefit by accepting the lowest-price jobs achieved by poor payment practices to their supply chain. This Bill provides a unique opportunity to deal with not just the scandal of unsafe buildings, but the scandal of the manipulation of late-payment practices by large, unscrupulous construction companies. Evidence given to Committees of this House following the Carillion collapse revealed the appalling abuse of tier 1 contractors such as Carillion. In spite of my Bill in 2019—the Public Sector Supply Chains (Project Bank Accounts) Bill—to tackle the misery that so many small construction companies continue to face and to protect them from becoming insolvent, as nearly a thousand did after Carillion’s demise, absolutely nothing has been done.

Almost six years on from the Business Department reviewing the practice of retentions that harms thousands of small businesses by depriving them of much needed cash flow, it has sat on its hands. Based on figures provided by the Department in October 2017, every day, almost £1 million-worth of retentions is lost by firms—mainly small businesses—because of upstream insolvencies. Today, according to insolvency specialists, almost 100,000 firms in the industry are under severe financial stress. Small construction firms are having to grapple with the massive cost pressures of their base and many are facing the issues that I have talked about. If an industry is free of the widespread and egregious treatment—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order.

Health and Care Bill

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Nigel Evans

2nd reading
Wednesday 14th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab) [V]]

This is the wrong Bill at the wrong time. To introduce a Bill like this when the covid pandemic is far from over and staff are on their knees shows a lack of understanding of what is needed.

I am concerned that this reorganisation of the NHS is being used as an opportunity to extend the involvement of UK and international private healthcare companies. The Bill proposes that private healthcare companies can become members of the integrated care boards, potentially meaning they will be able to procure health services from their own companies. Under the Bill, ICBs will have only a “core responsibility” for a “group of people”, in accordance with enrolment rules made by NHS England. There are concerns that this evokes the US definition of a health maintenance organisation, which provides

“basic and supplemental health services to its members”.

What is included in the core responsibilities?

Why is there no longer a duty but only a power for ICBs to provide hospital services? What does that mean for the thousands waiting for elective surgery? What about those waiting for cancer and other therapies? For those who say, “What does it matter who provides our healthcare as long as it meets the NHS principles of being universal, comprehensive and free at the point of need?” I say that not only is the Bill a clear risk to those founding NHS principles but there is strong evidence that equity in access to healthcare, equity in health outcomes and healthcare quality are all compromised in health systems that are either privatised or marketised, as the NHS has increasingly become.

That brings me to my third area of concern: health inequalities. It is notable that the Bill places the duties for the reduction of health inequalities with ICBs. The 2012 duty on the Secretary of State and NHS England to reduce inequalities is repealed, showing the clear lack of commitment to levelling up and the reduction of the structural inequalities that have been laid bare by this pandemic and contributed to the UK’s high and unequal covid death toll. With this change, the Secretary of State is ignoring not only decades of overwhelming evidence that clearly shows that health inequalities are driven at national policy level, but the Prime Minister’s commitment to implement the recommendations that Professor Sir Michael Marmot made in his covid review last December to tackle inequalities and build back fairer.

My final point is on social care. As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on dementia, I express my profound disappointment that, 19 months since the Prime Minister pledged to fix the broken care system, it still has not been fixed. The Bill is a missed opportunity to set out the framework for social care reform in the context of an integrated health and social care system. For people with dementia and their family carers, who have suffered disproportionately from covid, this is a real blow. They deserve better. For me, the principle of health and social care—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. Sorry, but we have to go on.

Business of the House

Debate between Debbie Abrahams and Nigel Evans

Monday 2nd November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Let us hope this works—by video link, Debbie Abrahams.

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab) [V]]

My apologies, Mr Deputy Speaker; a thunderstorm seemed to interrupt us before.

I want to express my profound disappointment in the Government’s delay in announcing a national circuit breaker, which, as we have heard, will have cost lives and livelihoods. My concern is that the Government will have learned nothing from the first wave of this pandemic and will carry on with a privatised test, trace and isolate system, which has never been fit for purpose, is a key reason why we are where we are, and will unfortunately hit our cash-starved local authorities as they will be left to pick up the pieces from this Government’s incompetence. Will the Leader of the House ensure that the Government report directly to Parliament, not through the press, on what they will be doing differently in the second lockdown, including when local authorities can expect, as promised, reimbursements for the spending that they have already had to bear during this pandemic?