Census (Return Particulars and Removal of Penalties) Bill [Lords]

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 17th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Steve Double]

I will come on to why I believe that, at this time, the Cornish have a unique claim on the matter. In future, this may apply to other peoples, but I suspect that it does not at this time.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Steve Double]

I will, gladly.

[Eddie Hughes]

I thought I had better get in before my hon. Friend moves on. I did not come to the Chamber today expecting to hear the Christmas story in the middle of July, but as we have inadvertently touched on religion, I want to say that I have 3,500 Sikhs living in my constituency. The idea that they would have some sort of write-in box to identify their ethnicity is not appropriate either. It is not too much to ask for Sikhs to have a box specifically to identify their ethnicity on the census.

[Steve Double]

I would say the same thing in reply to my hon. Friend: I believe that the Cornish have a unique claim in this regard, because it is the only UK national identity affected that is formally recognised by the Council of Europe under the framework convention for the protection of national minorities, which has been fully accepted and endorsed by the UK Government. I therefore think that there is a unique case for Cornish that perhaps does not apply to other ethnic identities. I say that in no way to belittle or denigrate other national identities, but—