First elected: 4th July 2024
Speeches made during Parliamentary debates are recorded in Hansard. For ease of browsing we have grouped debates into individual, departmental and legislative categories.
These initiatives were driven by Deirdre Costigan, and are more likely to reflect personal policy preferences.
MPs who are act as Ministers or Shadow Ministers are generally restricted from performing Commons initiatives other than Urgent Questions.
Deirdre Costigan has not been granted any Urgent Questions
Deirdre Costigan has not been granted any Adjournment Debates
Deirdre Costigan has not introduced any legislation before Parliament
Deirdre Costigan has not co-sponsored any Bills in the current parliamentary sitting
The Department for Business has not made an assessment of the merits of creating a new employment right for Disability Leave.
The Government has set out its immediate priorities for reforming employment law in the Plan to Make Work Pay. The Plan includes a number of measures which will help disabled workers to enter, remain and progress in work - including making flexible working the default and introducing a right to switch off.
As outlined in the Plan to Make Work Pay, we will end exploitative zero hours contracts by giving workers the right to a contract that reflects the number of hours they regularly work. We will also introduce a new right to reasonable notice of shift patterns and a right to reasonable notice of changes to shifts, with compensation for shifts cancelled or curtailed at short notice.
These measures will end one-sided flexibility, ensuring all jobs provide workers with a baseline level of security and predictability.
Heat batteries are one of the most promising alternative electric heating technologies, however, they are less efficient than heat pumps and will therefore use more energy to meet the same heating demand.
We expect most properties will ultimately switch to heat pumps as these are a proven technology and have been installed in high numbers in other countries. The Boiler Upgrade Scheme has also been designed to direct support towards technologies that offer the greatest carbon savings.
The Government will keep its position on alternative electric heating technologies under review as the supporting evidence base develops.
In an unstable world, the only way to guarantee our energy security and protect billpayers from future energy shocks is to speed up the transition away from fossil fuels and towards home‑grown clean energy. Through supporting the transition to clean energy, Great British Energy will save families money by ensuring electricity bills are no longer exposed to the kinds of gas price shocks which helped drive increases in the electricity price cap of over £1,300 for a typical household during winter 22/23.
The government is committed to breaking down barriers to opportunity and giving every child the best start in life. Breakfast clubs will remove barriers to opportunity by ensuring every child, no matter their circumstances, is well prepared for school and can achieve their full potential by providing a supportive start to the day.
The government has taken decisive action by announcing in the King’s Speech that, under the Children’s Wellbeing Bill, every primary school in England will offer a free breakfast club. The department will be working closely with the sector on the details of the programme.
The Secretary of State recently met with water company bosses to make it clear that water firms will be held accountable for their performance for customers and the environment. During the meeting, water bosses signed up to the government’s initial package of reforms to reduce sewage pollution and attract investment to upgrade infrastructure.
The government also announced a new Water (Special Measures) Bill, which will turn around the performance of water companies, in the King’s Speech. The Bill will strengthen regulation, give the water regulator new powers to ban the payment of bonuses if environmental standards are not met and increase accountability for water executives. These are the first critical steps in enabling a long-term and transformative reset of the entire water sector.
I would also refer the hon. Member to the Written Statement made by the Secretary of State on 18 July, HCWS3.
As set out in our manifesto, the Government is committed to supporting the transition to electric vehicles by accelerating the rollout of chargepoints across the country. We will set out further plans in due course.
The Equality Act 2010 (the Act) protects disabled people against unlawful direct or indirect discrimination in employment, including by placing a duty on employers to make, on request, reasonable adjustments to any element of a job, job application or interview process, which may place disabled people at a substantial disadvantage compared to non-disabled people.
There are no current plans to amend the reasonable adjustments duty in the Act. In most cases, it is fairer to apply a “reasonableness” test which enables each situation to be considered on its merits, rather than impose rigid, universal requirements on employers and service providers. Where an employer takes an unreasonably long time to make a decision on a reasonable adjustment request, this omission could, of itself, potentially be considered a failure to make the adjustment, which could in turn be actionable by the affected person at an employment tribunal.
Following the announcement in the King's Speech in July to take forward work on an Equality (Race and Disability) Bill, and this government's manifesto commitments to introduce the full right to equal pay for disabled people and disability pay gap reporting for large employers, the Disability Unit is currently taking forward work in these areas. Ministers will update the House as this work progresses.
No one should be forced to choose between their health and financial hardship, which is why we plan to strengthen Statutory Sick Pay (SSP), so it provides a safety net for those who need it most. The Plan to Make Work Pay commits to remove the Lower Earnings Limit to make it available to all workers and remove the waiting period so that everyone receives fair earnings replacement when they have to take time off work.
Any changes to SSP will be accompanied by a full Regulatory Impact Assessment and Equalities Impact Assessment to assess the impact of the changes on a range of protected characteristics, but this will not directly assess the impact of the changes on the disability employment gap. However, we would expect that strengthening SSP would increase the overall employment rate of disabled people as well as reduce the difference between the employment rates of disabled and non-disabled people.
The Government has ambitious employment plans, including for disability employment. We will be setting this out through a forthcoming White Paper, the Employment Rights Bill and the Equality (Race and Disability) Bill. A fully inclusive labour market that enables disabled people and people with health conditions to have access to the same opportunities as everyone else to the benefits of work is crucial to meeting our ambition for an 80% employment rate.
Employers play a key role in supporting the health of their workforce and minimising health-related job loss. Proactive initiatives from employers and all parts of society, such as the Disability Employment Charter, to support disabled people and people with health conditions to thrive in work are welcome. While the Government has not made a formal assessment of its impact, we know that the employers signed up to the Disability Employment Charter are sending a positive message to current and potential employees.
The Government has ambitious employment plans, including for disability employment. We will be setting this out through a forthcoming White Paper, the Employment Rights Bill and the Equality (Race and Disability) Bill. A fully inclusive labour market that enables disabled people and people with health conditions to have access to the same opportunities as everyone else to the benefits of work is crucial to meeting our ambition for an 80% employment rate.
Employers play a key role in supporting the health of their workforce and minimising health-related job loss. Proactive initiatives from employers and all parts of society, such as the Disability Employment Charter, to support disabled people and people with health conditions to thrive in work are welcome. While the Government has not made a formal assessment of its impact, we know that the employers signed up to the Disability Employment Charter are sending a positive message to current and potential employees.
People with mental health issues are not getting the support or care they deserve, which is why we will fix the broken system to ensure that mental health is given the same attention and focus as physical health, so that people can be confident in accessing high quality mental health support when they need it including in Ealing Southall. We will recruit an additional 8,500 mental health workers to reduce delays and provide faster treatment, which will also help ease pressure on hospitals. By cutting mental health waiting lists and intervening earlier with more timely mental health support, we can get this country back to health.
Tackling waiting lists is a key part of our Health Mission and a top priority for the Government, as we get the National Health Service back on its feet. Equality of both access to care and outcomes will be at the heart of building an NHS that is fit for the future. This includes ensuring that women’s health is not neglected.
We have committed to achieving the NHS constitutional standard that 92% of patients should wait no longer than 18 weeks from Referral to Treatment by the end of this Parliament, which includes those waiting for gynaecology treatment. To achieve this, we will start by delivering an extra 40,000 operations, scans, and appointments each week across the country, and will increase the number of computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and other tests, that are needed to reduce elective and cancer waits. This urgent work will help the nearly 600,000 women stuck on gynaecology waiting lists get the medical care they need.
From September 2023, the routine shingles vaccination programme changed from the Zostavax vaccine to the more effective two dose Shingrix vaccine, to better protect individuals from the effects of shingles, provide better clinical outcomes, and reduce pressures on the health system. As a result, almost 1 million more people became eligible for the shingles vaccination.
When a vaccination programme is expanded, decisions must be made regarding who to offer the vaccine to first. These decisions are based on advice given by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), and include evidence on the impact of the vaccine in different age groups as well as the capacity of the National Health Service to deliver the vaccination programme alongside other important healthcare priorities.
The expansion of the shingles programme currently includes those turning 65 years old on or after 1 September 2023, as well as those aged 50 years old and over who are at increased risk of serious complications. Phasing the roll-out of the shingles vaccination over time to everyone 60 years old and over is in line with the JCVI’s recommendation and maximises cost effectiveness and population benefit, ensures consistent messaging over time to maximise coverage, and takes account of NHS capacity, all while being consistent with the approach taken by all four nations in the United Kingdom. This is a newly expanded programme and anyone unsure if they are eligible for the shingles vaccination should check online, on the NHS.UK website, or should speak to their general practice.
This Government is committed to restoring ODA spending at the level of 0.7 per cent of GNI as soon as fiscal circumstances allow. The Government will set out its approach to the House in due course.
Tackling anti-social behaviour is a top priority for this Government, and a key part of our Safer Streets Mission to take back our streets.
We will put thousands of neighbourhood police and community support officers into local communities so that residents have a named officer they can turn to when things go wrong.
We will crack down on those causing havoc on our high streets by introducing tougher powers via a Crime and Policing Bill, including a new Respect Order to tackle repeat offending.The Home Office is providing £66.3m funding this financial year (2024/25) to police forces in England and Wales for hotspot policing to tackle anti-social behaviour and serious violence. The Metropolitan Police have been allocated £8,139,508 of this funding.
We know that drugs drive crime and cause harm to individuals and society. We will take action as part of our Safer Streets Mission to drive down crime and anti-social behaviour across the country, drawing on evidence for what works in identifying drug users and intervening effectively to change patterns of behaviour including, where appropriate, treatment and recovery services for those dependent on drugs. For instance, we will consider learning from Project ADDER (Addiction, Diversion, Disruption, Enforcement, Recovery), a programme that is testing a whole-system response to combatting drug-related harms in 13 areas across England and Wales, including through increased police activity to tackle visible street-level dealing and trialling new approaches to address persistent offending.
Tackling anti-social behaviour is a top priority for this Government, and a key part of our Safer Streets Mission to take back our streets.
We will put thousands of neighbourhood police and community support officers into local communities so that residents have a named officer they can turn to when things go wrong.
We will crack down on those causing havoc on our high streets by introducing tougher powers via a Crime and Policing Bill, including a new Respect Order to tackle repeat offending.The Home Office is providing £66.3m funding this financial year (2024/25) to police forces in England and Wales for hotspot policing to tackle anti-social behaviour and serious violence. The Metropolitan Police have been allocated £8,139,508 of this funding.
We know that drugs drive crime and cause harm to individuals and society. We will take action as part of our Safer Streets Mission to drive down crime and anti-social behaviour across the country, drawing on evidence for what works in identifying drug users and intervening effectively to change patterns of behaviour including, where appropriate, treatment and recovery services for those dependent on drugs. For instance, we will consider learning from Project ADDER (Addiction, Diversion, Disruption, Enforcement, Recovery), a programme that is testing a whole-system response to combatting drug-related harms in 13 areas across England and Wales, including through increased police activity to tackle visible street-level dealing and trialling new approaches to address persistent offending.
The Government is committed to strengthening neighbourhood policing as part of its Safer Streets Mission, which is a vital part of restoring confidence in policing. That is why we are introducing a Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee, providing a more visible police presence in town centres, recruiting thousands of extra additional police officers, PCSOs and Special Constables, and giving every community a named local officer. We will set out our plans for the Guarantee as soon as is practicable.
The Government is also providing £66.3m funding this financial year (2024/25) to police forces in England and Wales for hotspot policing to tackle anti-social behaviour and serious violence, which is already helping to ensure the public feel safe in town centres.
Future local authority funding decisions will be a matter for the next Spending Review and Local Government Finance Settlement. The department will work with local government leaders to ensure they are better able to fulfil their statutory duties.