Houses of Parliament (Family-friendliness)

Fabian Hamilton Excerpts

Tuesday 10th November 2015 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Fabian Hamilton (in the Chair)]

Order. Before we continue the debate, I need to say that because of the number of Members who have indicated that they wish to speak, I am imposing, with the authority of the Chairman of Ways and Means, a five-minute time limit on Back-Bench speeches. I remind Members that for each of the first two interventions accepted during a speech, the clock will be stopped, with one minute added to the time remaining for the Member who gave way. A third or subsequent intervention will count against the time limit. The clocks on the wall will display the time remaining to a Member.

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[Sir Simon Burns]

No, because I do not have much time—I am not sure how much time I have got.

[Fabian Hamilton (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Dr Rupa Huq.

[Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)]

The other day at about 8 o’clock, I found myself heading back from the mother of Parliaments, which is—I still pinch myself—my workplace. I was heading from tube to road with a neighbour of mine from a few doors away, who said, “Late night at work, was it?” I was not fast enough to say no, this was an early night; as all Members know, it can be a lot later than that on a Monday.

Last night I did not even see my 11-year-old, who started high school this year. All the parenting guidebooks would say that that is a crucial time to be with one’s child. Until we get elected to this place, we do not really know what goes on in here. I have been here for six months and I am still acclimatising. We do not know what time we will get away until the day itself, and that unpredictability is part of the problem that my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips) so persuasively highlighted.

To those on the outside, a debate such as this, as the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Sir Simon Burns) mentioned, will not get a lot of sympathy. We are seen as overpaid and all the rest of it, but, after six months here, I have worked out that this place is many things. It is awesome in the true sense of that word: awe-inspiring. It is traditional and humbling, but one thing it is definitely not is family-friendly, so I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this timely debate today.

A Mumsnet survey from 2011 found that 91% of MPs would not describe their job as family-friendly. One of the early visits that I hosted here was for a school party from Ellen Wilkinson school in West Acton; I am proud that my constituency has a school named after a woman Labour MP who led the Jarrow march. In the Q&A bit afterwards, one of the girls said to me, “Why are there so few women MPs?” Partly, we take that for granted when we are on the inside, and my hon. Friend highlighted well the inside/outside divide on these issues. In my reply, I cited the family-unfriendly hours. On Mondays, I have been getting away at half-past midnight—and I am always the first person to leg it. Even when I was heading home at eight o’clock, and my neighbour thought it was late, I had been trying to get away quickly.

The Speaker’s Conference on parliamentary representation talked of the

“inflexible and unwelcoming attitude of the House towards families”.

That should not be so. However, as my hon. Friend said, we need reform on many levels. We need to be a modern Parliament, to reflect the communities we seek to serve; otherwise, we will have an ever-narrowing talent pool, and the big fish in that small pond will be self-replicating professional politicians. My hon. Friend mentioned that the Labour party’s previous leader—indeed, the three party leaders at the general election—had done nothing other than work for head office; they were backroom boys who had become leader. We need people from outside who have had other adult workplace experience and can bring in fresh thinking.

How would we define the average family in the UK today? The definition would have to take into account 2 million single parents. Gingerbread remarks that, contrary to media reports,

“these days, bringing up children on your own is actually a very normal part of family life in the UK.”

One in four dependent households is now a single-parent family. As a parent, every working mother constantly feels guilt about where their loyalties lie. If they work in a place such as this, that is magnified and multiplied severalfold, and that is even truer if they are a single parent. Flexibility in the workplace has been legislated for, but it seems not to apply to this place. Wherever people work, flexibility has a stigma attached to it, and they are made to feel embarrassed about even asking for flexible arrangements. However, that is even truer in the House. Gingerbread states that 57% of single parents work and that their average age is 38, contrary to the Daily Mail stereotype of their being feckless, teenage, brown-faced people.

All the research shows that mums are under-represented in this place, and single mums even more so. It takes a certain type of person to be an MP—we have to be shameless exhibitionists and a bit megalomaniac, and we must have a sense of public service and an ability to adapt. If all those things stifle diversity, that is a bad thing. We have to balance all these things.

To some extent—we heard this from the right hon. Member for Chelmsford—the idea that we have always done things this way—

[Fabian Hamilton (in the Chair)]

Order. I am sorry, but you are out of time.

[Dr Huq]

Really? There is so much more I could have said.

[Fabian Hamilton (in the Chair)]

There always is. I call Alison Thewliss.

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[Jo Cox]

That is a great intervention. First, we are behind the curve compared with working practice in much of industry, and the charitable and public sectors, and that is a problem. Secondly, if we act differently and change the culture and working practices here, we can change how others operate. We should do that, because we are here to change and improve the United Kingdom.

Women are already under-represented here, but women with children are even less well represented. Research in 2012 found that 45% of male Members of Parliament had children compared with 28% of women. I do not think that parents of any background are attracted to this place, and that is a problem.

My experience of being a parent—I think that this is true for men and women—is that I have changed beyond measure. I understand how hard it is to be a parent, and to balance trying to earn an income and to be a good mum with caring responsibilities for elderly relatives. Such experiences will make people in this place better law makers, so we must attract women, and both women and men who are parents. I want to be the Member of Parliament for my home town in Yorkshire, but I also want to be a mum, and I do not think anyone in this place should have to make a choice about that. It should be possible to be both, but currently it is quite hard to get it right. I share the sentiments that have been expressed about that situation.

All of us who are Members of Parliament knew the working deal when we applied for the job. People come here with their eyes open, but I had not realised quite how hard things would be. I am desperate to encourage people to apply for this job, but we must make it more appealing. The experience has been quite hard—getting home after midnight and not seeing the kids for four or five nights in a week is tough. The unpredictability of the business of the House is a challenge. I have probably spent five hours in the past couple of weeks trying to organise childcare because there were changes affecting votes and business, and whether something was on or off the Whip. That was such a headache, and while I know that every working parent in the country has headaches, I do not think that we need to do things in that way. We can be much more effective.

I agree with the comments of the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) about not having a crèche here. My kids are regularly dragged here, and then I have to ask a member of staff to look after them when I run in to vote. If there were a nice place for them to go where they had mates and toys, that would be such a relief for me. I think we can be flexible about breastfeeding. I breastfed on demand for four years, probably, and it is doable. It is possible to be discreet about it; there is no need to be overt. Lots of places of work offer that opportunity. We should take on the popular press if it is critical and say, “This is what women do; get over it.” It is good for children, so we should advocate it.

More efficient management of business would be a good thing. I agree that there could be shorter time limits on interventions and speeches, and that points could be made much more effectively and business could be more efficient. The European Parliament also does that. We should look to the best practice in other Parliaments, as well as in industry and the charitable sector, which are ahead of us. I welcome the debate and Professor Childs’s work.

[Fabian Hamilton (in the Chair)]

If the next speaker is brief, we can fit in another.

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Fabian Hamilton (in the Chair)]

Order. According to my calculations, each of the Front-Bench speakers has about nine minutes.