Grenfell Tower Inquiry

Giles Watling Excerpts

Monday 14th May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully) for presenting this important debate.

Grenfell Tower was quite simply an horrific tragedy that will doubtless have an effect on all of us for the rest of our lives. As someone who served as cabinet member for regeneration on my local authority, I am keen to have concrete answers as to how it was allowed to happen, who must be held accountable, and what will be done to prevent it from happening again.

I am sure that none of us here or anywhere else across the country will ever forget waking up on that Wednesday morning to see those terrible images of that blazing inferno in the heart of our capital city. Lives were lost that should never have been lost, and lives were also changed for ever. It could all have been avoided. That is why I welcome the findings of the Hackitt review’s interim report that calls for a culture change within the construction industry, which should take on much greater responsibility for what is built and how it is built.

The interim report also highlighted several broad areas for change, including improvements to the process, compliance and enforcement of regulations, as well as providing and creating a quick and effective route for concerned residents’ voices to be heard.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

In the interim report, Dame Judith stated that she would not recommend detailed changes to the technical requirements. Does the hon. Gentleman agree with groups, including the Royal Institute of British Architects and the Local Government Association, who have repeatedly called on Dame Judith to recommend bans on combustible materials on tower blocks and on so-called desktop studies? Does he not agree with me that the only solution is to ban combustible cladding?

[Giles Watling]

I absolutely agree that we must ban combustible cladding. It should never have been used in the first place. We must move on and that is why I was talking about how the construction industry must take on greater responsibility for what is built and how it is built.

I am pleased that the Government will consider any recommendations made by the review and how they will interact with the requirements of the construction product regulations. That is a step forward, but we still have many steps to take, including the work that Ministers have been doing with local government officials and organisations to provide support to the victims—both in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy and in the long term. The autumn Budget 2017 also committed £28 million of additional community support to victims. It is right that we do all we can to support victims and to ensure that such a tragedy never ever happens again.

I call on all my colleagues to support the Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation and Liability for Housing Standards) Bill, introduced by the hon. Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck). It is a truly cross-party endeavour. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government helped to draft the Bill ahead of its publication. It will ensure that everyone is entitled to a decent home and that all properties should be free from potential risks to the health and safety of occupants. That really should go without saying. We can all agree that provisions must be put in place to ensure that that can happen everywhere. Having read the Bill, I agree with Shelter that it would help to achieve that aim by enabling meaningful action to be taken on poor and unsafe living conditions for renters.

The Bill will build on a raft of policies introduced by the Government aimed at driving up standards in the private and social rented sectors. Those include empowering local authorities to fine failing landlords up to £30,000. From April, local councils will also be able to issue banning orders to put the worst offenders out of business altogether. Passing the Bill would be another positive step towards ensuring that such a tragedy never happens again.

Although we have done some good work, I am conscious that questions remain unanswered, so it is right that we are having this very important inquiry and that the inquiry panel was expanded. Those we are seeking to provide answers for must feel certain that the inquiry is working for them. An expanded panel will provide that certainty, and all Members of the House must now allow the inquiry to proceed without its being used as a political football. In the face of such tragedy, we should all work together.

I do not say that the issue is not political—everything is political, from planning decisions to housing—but we need rational and responsible politics if we want to do right by the people who lived in that tower and by the countless people who live in other such towers across the nation. By doing that, we may well be left with the type of reasonable, thought-provoking and evidence-based political debate that uncovers all the aspects of Grenfell and moves us towards a better policy for all people in such housing in the future.

G4S: Immigration Removal Centres

Giles Watling Excerpts

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

Where there is bad practice, it is important that staff are empowered to speak out. Will my hon. Friend tell me what G4S is doing to ensure that secure whistleblowing procedures are in place?

[Victoria Atkins]

That is one of the requirements in the action plan that the Government set G4S after the programme. We are very clear that whistleblowers are essential to ensuring that problems are brought to light effectively and quickly. As part of the action plan, G4S has reinforced its whistleblowing policy. All staff have been issued with cards featuring telephone numbers to enable them to raise concerns confidentially, and following work with the Jill Dando Institute, G4S has trained staff to become “speak out” champions, promoting and embedding the message that whistleblowing is not just desirable, but a clear expectation when unacceptable behaviour is witnessed. In addition, there is also the introduction of body-worn cameras, which serve, I hope, to reassure the House and others that there is transparency and that, if there are allegations, we can very quickly get to the truth of them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Giles Watling Excerpts

Monday 8th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Gillian Keegan (Chichester) (Con)]

8. What steps she is taking to upgrade Border Force boats.

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

17. What steps she is taking to upgrade Border Force boats.

[Craig Mackinlay (South Thanet) (Con)]

21. What steps she is taking to upgrade Border Force boats.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Wallace]

By the end of the financial year, the Border Force maritime fleet will have six CPVs and three cutters in the UK, plus two cutters deployed overseas to deal with the issue upstream—one in the Aegean and one in the central Mediterranean. Border Force has invested £108 million in new technology and capability to deal with some of those challenges and will commit a further £71 million this year.

[Giles Watling]

While I was volunteering with the lifeboats at Walton-on-the-Naze, I learned how important local maritime knowledge is. I believe that such intelligence would be useful to Border Force when solving and preventing crime. Is Border Force engaging with other agencies, including the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, the coastguard and pilot boats, to share intelligence, tackle crime and keep our coastline safe and secure?

[Mr Wallace]

The key to improving our coastal security is better collection and exploitation of data. Some of that happens through full-time people, but it also happens through the many volunteers who populate the coastal paths and watch stations of our communities. That is why Border Force has set up the multi-agency general maritime intelligence bureau to bring together the existing organisations of HM Coastguard, HM Revenue and Customs, Border Force, the Ministry of Defence, and the bureaux linked directly to the National Maritime Information Centre.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

Order. If everybody asks a short, one-sentence question, and if replies are correspondingly brief, far more people will be able to contribute—it is not magic—and then we will spread the happiness across the Chamber.

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

T2. Thank you, Mr Speaker. I apologise for not wishing you a very happy new year from the sunny shores of Clacton-on-Sea.Does my hon. Friend agree that sheer numbers of police is not the whole answer in tackling crime? In Clacton, Tendring District Council and Essex police have established a successful community safety hub with some 47 partners. Will the Minister please come to sunny Clacton to see how the scheme has been working and to look at some of the successes that we have achieved for ourselves?

[The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Mr Nick Hurd)]

The answer to an invitation to visit sunny Clacton-on-Sea is, of course, yes.

Policing

Giles Watling Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

I hesitate to correct the hon. Gentleman, but I am afraid that, once those on the Labour Benches take a bit more time to understand how the police settlement actually works, they will know that the flat-cash settlement is a combination of precept and the grant from the centre. Taking those in combination, local police forces are going to move from a situation of flat cash to flat real. That is a significant change. If the hon. Gentleman bothers to go and talk to his local PCC, which I am sure he will, the PCC will explain it to him.

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend for this very encouraging statement, particularly around flexibility in the police precept—an issue he knows I have been campaigning on for some time. However, will he confirm that the settlement will dramatically improve policing across Essex and particularly on my much overlooked sunshine coast at Clacton-on-Sea?

[Mr Hurd]

I thank my hon. Friend and other Essex colleagues who were very forceful and constructive in coming to me with clear endorsements from police and crime commissioners across the system for the proposals on increased flexibility on precepts so that democratically accountable police and crime commissioners have the freedom to increase local taxes for local priorities. Roger Hirst, an excellent police and crime commissioner, has surveyed several thousand people in Essex. The results of that survey show that what we are proposing today will be extremely acceptable to the people of Essex because they want to see more investment in their policing, and that is what this settlement will deliver.

Report on Recent Terrorist Attacks

Giles Watling Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Amber Rudd]

My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister was clear that we would make those resources available to Manchester, and we have done that. We will look carefully at the proposal from the Mayor of London, to see how we can assist. We will have to see the evidence first, but are likely to give the same sort of support.

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that our security services are second to none in being proactive through the use of initiatives such as Prevent, without which we would probably be far worse off?

[Amber Rudd]

That is an interesting point, and we do need to safeguard individuals who might become victims of radicalisation. The Prevent programme strives to do exactly that, and between 2015 and 2016 has diverted over 300 people through the Channel programme, who might otherwise have sought to do us harm on the streets.

Oral Answers to Questions

Giles Watling Excerpts

Monday 16th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

T6. After lengthy conversations with the district commander of my local district of Tendring and with Roger Hirst, the police and crime commissioner for Essex, I know that there is a strong feeling that they could do with some additional funding to fund their frontline officers. This could be raised from the council tax precept. Essex currently has a very low per capita precept, meaning that residents in Essex pay less than comparable areas. Will my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary consider lifting the 2% cap on any precept increase without the need for a referendum?

[The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Mr Nick Hurd)]

I refer my hon. Friend to the answer given to my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford). I will be delighted to sit down with Essex MPs to discuss this. As I said, a number of commissioners have approached us in similar vein, and it is part of our thinking as we look ahead towards the 2018-19 settlement.

Health, Social Care and Security

Giles Watling Excerpts

Wednesday 28th June 2017 Commons Chamber

[Amber Rudd]

I am going to make some more progress.

We are recruiting over 1,900 additional security and intelligence staff. To combat terrorism, we also work with technology companies to tackle terrorist and extremist use of their platforms. The UK has been leading in driving a global response on this subject. This week, leading communications service providers announced the formation of an industry-led global forum to counter terrorism, which they committed to following a meeting I had with them in March.

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that in the perfect utopian society—as Sir Thomas More would have it—we would have no police at all, so it is clearly not about numbers and vast amounts of cash, but effectiveness?

[Amber Rudd]

I welcome my hon. Friend to the House and thank him for his comments about wanting a much more peaceful world—I think that is something we can all endorse.