Parental Bereavement (Leave and Pay) Bill (Money)

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Money resolution: House of Commons
Monday 13th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

The Bill offers two weeks’ paid leave to any employed parent who loses a child under the age of 18. Employed parents with at least 26 weeks’ continuous service will also be eligible to receive statutory parental bereavement pay. As my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) made clear on Second Reading, Labour supports the Bill entirely.

The Bill requires this money resolution to proceed because employers will be able to reclaim some or all of their costs from the Government. As the explanatory notes set out, the

“estimated cost to the Exchequer of 2 weeks’ paid leave at the statutory flat rate (currently £140.98 a week) or 90% of average weekly earnings where that is lower, is £1.77m per year.”

There will also be a one-off cost to amend Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs’ systems, which is estimated at £1.25 million.

It is good that the Government have brought forward this money resolution to allow the Bill, which commands support on both sides of the House, to move into Committee. I hope that this is how they intend to proceed on all private Members’ Bills that receive a Second Reading in this Session. I congratulate the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) on championing the issue in the Bill and other hon. Members on both sides of the House on their work to ensure that grieving parents get the support they deserve.

Residential Premises: Product Safety and Fire Risk

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Wednesday 1st November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Mrs Main. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick) on securing this debate. I also commend my right hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Mr Howarth) on highlighting the danger of electrical cables. I am sure the Minister was listening carefully to that part of the debate.

My hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse is a distinguished former firefighter, and I think I speak for everyone when I say we are grateful for the expertise he brings to the debate around fire safety. That expertise was reflected in his contribution today. I also thank Members for their insightful, thoughtful and often harrowing stories of constituents who have faced the consequences of a fire as a result of faulty white goods. We can all agree that it is a terrifying thought, and we all should do everything we can to stop such things happening.

It saddens me to say that residential fires caused by white goods have become all too familiar, with devastating consequences for families across the UK. In my home town of Sheffield, faulty white goods caused 103 fires in residential homes between April 2014 and March 2017 according to the South Yorkshire fire and rescue service. In London, we have seen the horrific effects of such fires. First, my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) detailed so eloquently the Shepherds Bush fire in 2016, which left 50 people unable to return to their homes. Subsequently, we have had the tragedy that shocked the nation—the Grenfell Tower fire. Both fires are thought to have been started because of faulty Whirlpool household appliances. We have heard today about the attitude shown by Whirlpool in dealing with this immensely serious issue. Such horrendous incidents have brought into sharp focus the fact that our product safety system is not fit for purpose, and an urgent and serious overhaul is required if consumers are to be confident once again that the products they buy are safe to use.

For most consumer products in the UK, it is the responsibility of businesses to ensure conformity with the general requirements set out in the EU’s general product safety directive and implemented by the General Product Safety Regulations 2005. The power to enforce product safety law and oversee product recalls falls to local authorities’ trading standards bodies. However, it is becoming increasingly evident that the deep and continued cuts to local authority budgets since 2010—according to a study commissioned by the Chartered Trading Standards Institute, they have led to some local authority services being cut by 50%—have widely diminished the ability of trading standards to properly inform and enforce product safety measures.

Indeed, there is often a lack of knowledge within trading standards departments on what advice to give manufacturers and the appropriate action to take if faulty goods have been identified. That is no wonder, given the reductions of up to 56% in the staffing of trading standards bodies since 2009, according to National Audit Office figures published in 2016. Incidentally, the lack of expertise within trading standards bodies, as well as their lack of knowledge of the advice to give and action to take, has given manufacturers the flexibility to decide for themselves what action to take. That, of course, is often not in the best interests of consumers and safety.

In the case of Whirlpool, potentially dangerous advice has been issued about the safety of appliances and the circumstances in which to use them. In a Westminster Hall debate on 26 April 2017 led by my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith, we heard about Whirlpool’s total lack of responsibility and accountability. As a result of the lack of expert knowledge and enforcement, we are seeing the vast failure of the product recall system, which is simply not working.

According to Electrical Safety First, an average success rate for an electrical product recall in the UK is between 10% and 20%. That means there could be millions of recalled electrical items still being used in UK homes. There is not a single register for UK product recalls readily accessible to the public online, which makes it difficult for consumers to check whether appliances they have in their home are subject to product recall. That means not only that dangerous products may still be in people’s homes but, worryingly, that those same products are sometimes being sold in second-hand shops. Does the Minister agree that there needs to be much better regulation to control the second-hand selling of any product subject to a recall notice? In the United States, is it illegal to sell something under recall, and fire investigators in London, for example, have found dangerous appliances subject to a product recall being sold in second-hand shops, which is of great concern.

The bruising evidence requires serious action. People’s lives are on the line, and we ought to do everything we can to ensure that the products they buy are safe to use. There has been a series of reviews and recommendations of the current product safety regime. In March 2015, Baroness Neville-Rolfe launched an independent review into the consumer product recall system, led by the consumer champion Lynn Faulds Wood, who is widely respected in consumer protection. Her key and central recommendation was that

“an official national product safety agency...to show leadership and coordinate the system, promoting, protecting, informing and empowering business and consumers”

be created. Sadly, the Government’s response was that they do not

“believe that setting up a new public body in the current financial climate would be an effective use of taxpayer’s money.”

Can the Minister inform us what assessment the Government made of the cost to the taxpayer of setting up such a body, what that cost was, and whether other sources of funding for the body were considered?

In 2016, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy’s working group on product safety was launched. When it finally published its recommendations in July 2017, shortly after the Grenfell Tower disaster, I was dismayed by its half-hearted response to what consumer groups such as Which?, Electrical Safety First and the Chartered Trading Standards Institute had been calling for. The report did not acknowledge that real change is needed in the product safety regime and did not go far enough in ensuring that consumers would have easy access to information about the products they buy or that proper enforcement mechanisms would be in place to remove faulty goods effectively from the market.

There is pretty much a consensus among consumer bodies that the product safety system is not fit for purpose, and that a centralised Government agency, as proposed by Lynn Faulds Woods in 2016, is necessary to co-ordinate and enforce product safety laws. We also saw that broad consensus displayed yesterday in the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee. Will the Minister explain why the Government are so intent on resisting that common-sense approach, backed by a wide variety of consumer bodies and consumer champions?

Leaving the European Union will bring about its own set of opportunities and challenges for UK consumer protection, but thus far we have heard very little about the Government’s plans for consumer protection after March 2019. In a Westminster Hall debate on 10 October about the effects of the UK leaving the EU, it was clear that the Government had side-tracked consumer issues in the negotiations. As I said then, consumer protections did not feature in the Brexit White Paper, or as any of the 12 negotiating principles.

I am particularly concerned, and it has been strongly expressed to me, that the ability and robustness of the current product safety regime to withstand the pressures of the weight of the EU consumer rights laws that will be transferred into the UK is questionable. There is therefore an even more urgent need to seriously overhaul the UK’s product safety regime to ensure that consumers can easily access information about product recalls in a single place, and to co-ordinate and strengthen the enforcement mechanisms available so that consumers are properly protected after Brexit and beyond.

draft Electricity Supplier Obligations (amendment and excluded electricity) (amendment) regulations 2017

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Monday 16th October 2017 General Committees

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

The regulations are essentially a series of sensible clarifications and adjustments to the working of the scheme to exempt energy-intensive industries from paying money towards the cost of supporting energy schemes, such as contracts for difference given to low-carbon projects such as offshore wind. We support the idea that energy-intensive industries should not have that requirement placed on them in addition to the cost of the substantial amount of energy they use, so we will not divide the Committee on the regulations.

However, I would like the Minister to address and clarify questions arising from the new regulations. The first is on the consequence of exemptions on the bills of non-exempt industry and, particularly, on the bills of domestic energy customers. The regulations and their amendments will have a consequence for domestic bills, as obligations to pay for the cost of renewable underwriting are socialised across those paying bills. The exemption of part of that constituency of bill payers will result in marginal increases in obligation payments for everyone else.

It is suggested in the explanatory memorandum that domestic users should anticipate an increase in their bills of around £1 a year. However, in the impact assessment published alongside the original 2015 regulations, it is suggested that the effect of the regulations will be to add about £1.80 to a domestic bill. Will the Minister clarify whether the difference between those figures represents a lowering of the cost of the exemption as a result of the amendments, a change in the method of calculating domestic bill costs or simply a mistake in translating the costs between the two explanatory notes?

The second question relates to a passage in the explanatory memorandum that sets out the difference in the intention and outcome of the regulations. Paragraph 8.8 describes the Government’s intention

“to remove the provisions in the 2015 Regulations that allow direct competitors of eligible EIIs which are not in themselves eligible”

for relief under the regulations to also “claim the CFD exemption.” The memorandum indicates that the proposal was not approved by the EU for state aid, so it is being discontinued. The Minister mentioned that earlier, but we would welcome a more focused clarification, as it appears to have resulted in some over-exemption of liability to pay for green energy costs and thus to possible recovery of that over-exemption from companies that were initially exempted but no longer are.

I note that a mechanism for recovering and redistributing over-exemptions in certain energy-intensive industries is not included in the regulations because it seems that a workable model for doing so has not yet been identified. Will the Minister tell the Committee what the extent of those over-exemptions is, and when she is likely to identify a mechanism for recovering and redistributing those sums? That could be important for the overall effects on domestic bills.

Royal Mail Delivery Office Closures

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Wednesday 11th October 2017 Westminster Hall

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Mr Gapes. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) for securing this debate. Her campaign to fight for the future of the local delivery offices in her constituency is inspirational; she made Royal Mail stop and reconsider what seemed like an inevitable closure. I commend her for standing up for good local postal services for her community and for a certain future for postal workers. I would like to mention the many contributions by hon. Members from both sides of the House—in particular, the hon. Member for Angus (Kirstene Hair), who was the only Member representing the Conservative party.

Last week, CWU members sent a clear message to Royal Mail when they voted by a momentous number—almost 90%—in favour of strike action in defence of their job security, their pensions and the future of the service. Defying the draconian Trade Union Act 2016 and attempts to quell the power of unions to demand better workers’ rights, the stunning vote was a clear mandate for a strike. My hon. Friend the Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Hugh Gaffney) went into that very eloquently so I will not dwell on it, but I am extremely disappointed to say the least by the Royal Mail’s approach to the ongoing dispute with CWU members. It showed the workers very little respect, but, as always, defended Moya Greene’s right to earn almost £2 million per annum, which in my view is completely obscene. The Royal Mail has now escalated the dispute to the High Court. We await that decision tomorrow, but I think it should have honoured the decisive result in the ballot. I welcome both sides back to the table to try to sort this matter out.

The Labour party supports a delivery office network that remains the heart of a community-based Royal Mail, with local posties based in our communities, mail delivered on time and parcels available for collection quickly and easily. Local delivery office closures often leave the most vulnerable and most affected with longer trips to collect mail and, in many cases, later deliveries of crucial post.

The Royal Mail insists that there is no programme of closures, but only ad hoc decisions to close offices where there are operational issues, but that flies in the face of the evidence. Since it was privatised in 2013, 75 delivery offices and up to 90 scale payment delivery offices, where postal workers are based, have been closed. Yet with £850 million more due to be taken out of the Royal Mail in dividends, it is clear that profit, not service, is driving the agenda for the Royal Mail. We have had one closure in my city of Sheffield, but that is dwarfed by large numbers in Manchester, London and many other places. It is difficult to believe that those closures represent anything but a planned programme to cut costs and drive profits in the privatised Royal Mail.

The Royal Mail also insists that there will be no compulsory redundancies. That is welcome, but the closure programme has already forced hundreds of staff to move workplace at a time when changes to the pension scheme are making working relations difficult for thousands of postal workers. I accept that as the type of post changes to more parcels purchased online, so must Royal Mail’s process. We might therefore expect to see a clear plan to adapt, relocate and improve delivery offices where there is need to provide more parking or parcel storage, but the current programme of closures has no timeline and no agreement, and there has been no overall public communication.

I welcome Royal Mail’s efforts to leave parcels safely with trusted neighbours and to offer quick and easy redelivery or pick-ups from local post boxes or facilities, and I am sure that can go further. However, although those options suit some people, for many—especially those in difficult-to-access properties or unpredictable working patterns—they are not appropriate. Everyone, including Royal Mail, knows that people still need collection points. Given the volume of mail we are talking about, that will normally need to be a delivery office. For example, in parts of Sheffield the closures are forcing some people to travel five miles through pretty terrible traffic to a city-centre delivery office with no free parking. Of course, not everyone owns a car, so we can imagine the anxiety that causes many constituents—in particular disabled constituents who have to make that journey, possibly by public transport. We all know about the reliability of that.

Delivery office and scale payment delivery office closures often mean that residents and businesses will receive much needed post later in the day. We need our nation to be as productive as possible, but later post will prevent work from being done. The programme is bad for our economy.

When the Government, together with their bedfellows, the Lib Dems, sold off the Royal Mail at an excruciating low price, there was a clear statutory promise under the Postal Services (Universal Postal Service) Order 2012 that a universal service would continue. I believe delivery office closures are the start of a slippery slope towards a reduced service, falling far short of that promise.

The universal postal service order is a statutory instrument that sets out Royal Mail’s responsibilities as a universal postal services provider. Article 4(d) guarantees that Royal Mail provides delivery offices as an option for the collection of undelivered mail. The closure of so many delivery offices is the start of a threat to the cherished and vital universal service. The order as it stands does not specify a distance from people’s homes or any specification for a collection service. What action does the Minister propose to take to protect delivery offices under the universal postal service? Does she agree that the order is far too vague on how Royal Mail must provide collection services?

The truth is this: there is little currently to stop the universal service from becoming universal in name only. The Government must give Ofcom, as the regulator, a stronger mandate under the universal service order to defend the wider network of postal deliveries. Otherwise, we face the prospect of Royal Mail becoming just another mail delivery company, delivering a service that gives residents and businesses their post later, and of longer journeys to collect undelivered mail.

The Labour party believes in a publicly owned Royal Mail: a people’s post, integrated with a strengthened Post Office, offering a wide variety of services including a post office bank. Such a move would provide a much better basis for an efficient service, potentially combining the collection of parcels with much-valued services to local people. The Government have still, after nearly a year, yet to respond to the submissions to their consultation on the future of the post office network. Will the Minister tell us when they will respond?

My hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood, who moved the motion, and the many other Members who have spoken so passionately have my support in their fight for their local delivery offices, which provide the basis of a high-quality local service. With a Labour Government, we will, once again, have a postal service working simply to provide a high-quality, affordable service: one that does not dress up cuts as improvements or flog off the Royal Mail estate to prop up dividends, but provides a first-class service for citizens to receive their mail at their door or in their local area.

[Mike Gapes (in the Chair)]

Before I call the Minister—I hope she will leave the mover of the motion a minute or two to have the final word—I remind her that we need to conclude the debate by 5.3 pm.

Leaving the EU: Consumer Protection

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Tuesday 10th October 2017 Westminster Hall

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Mr Streeter. I congratulate the hon. Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford) on securing this important debate and particularly her eloquence and passion in introducing it. I also thank hon. Members present for their thoughtful and constructive contributions, which have vividly highlighted the importance of consumers to the UK economy, but also raised serious questions about what Brexit means for consumers and consumer protections.

Each month, consumers in the UK spend £100 billion in the economy, supporting local businesses, our manufacturing services and employees. Many of the consumer rights that we enjoy are embedded in EU legislation and institutional arrangements. I am disappointed by the Government’s approach to consumer concerns and by their refusal to set out the foundations of consumer protections post-Brexit.

The Government failed to mention consumer protection in their Brexit White Paper in February. They did not dedicate one of their 12 negotiating principles to consumers and consumer rights, and that barely had a mention in the Prime Minister’s 5,357-word speech in Florence. In addition, the Government continue to threaten that “no deal is better than a bad deal”, which could mean the UK crashing out of the EU and being forced to accept World Trade Organisation rules, which dictate tariffs on food of up to 62%—that is for beef—and on other goods such as cars. It will come as no shock that one third of consumers think that they will not be represented in the Brexit negotiations.

The Minister will say that the UK has played an important role in consumer protections, and I agree. The UK has often been a beacon for consumer protections in the EU and also globally, with countries across the world looking to us for our consumer protection laws, and we should be proud of that. However, consumers have been left with little assurance about whether, beyond Brexit, they will continue to enjoy the same rights and protections, or what the Government’s Brexit agenda will mean in this regard. Constituents across the country are asking, “Will it result in the UK being forced to accept chlorinated chicken from the US? What will be the overall impact on food and safety standards? What enforcement structures will be in place to support consumer protections?” There is much more they are asking about, as they do not have any clarity on those critical issues.

To begin with, there is deep concern about the current drafting of the Government’s key legislation, the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill. That Bill—in particular, clause 7—goes beyond the ability of Ministers to make technical changes and enters the murky waters of giving Ministers carte blanche powers to “prevent, remedy or mitigate” any “deficiency” in EU law, with no clear criteria about what that means. In effect, they can make whatever changes they see fit behind closed doors without proper parliamentary scrutiny. If left unchanged, that could have a devastating impact on consumer protections, with Ministers effectively able to bring about wide-ranging change on consumer issues such as food, product safety standards, approval systems and oversight of financial services. The uncertainty about the direction of consumer protections after Brexit leaves consumers in limbo about their rights and protections. This is not a question of simply copying and pasting the legislation from the EU into UK law; it is far more complicated with regard to how we apply the law.

Once we leave the EU, the Government maintain, we will be leaving all the EU bodies, so from the point of our departure, the consumer protection legislation of the EU and that of the UK are likely to drift apart, as interpretations of such legislation will differ. As a result, there is little clarity about questions of jurisdiction, conflict of laws and enforceability after Brexit, with the Government making no effort to clarify those issues.

For example, it is crucial that we maintain cross-border consumer protection so that consumers have the confidence and security that the products they are purchasing are safe. Consumers no longer operate within geographical boundaries, so a key tenet of the Brexit negotiations should be to maintain current protections but also to maintain co-operation agreements to maintain the existing rights when people are dealing with companies based in other EU member states.

As the head of consumer policy at Citizens Advice said in evidence to the Justice Sub-Committee of the House of Lords Select Committee on the European Union,

“It is one thing to say that the rule of law applies, but if there is no right to compensation when travelling abroad, or purchasing from an EU trader, if the cross-border agreements are not there to back it up it is not worth as much as it would suggest.”

We have still not heard anything from the Government about what cross-border co-operation post-Brexit will look like. Will the Minister lay out the Government’s position? Furthermore, the current UK consumer protection regime is under severe strain after seven years of Tory budget cuts to local councils. For example, the current domestic products safety regime is not fit for purpose and needs urgent reform, yet at every opportunity the Government have dismissed calls for such changes. The Government’s working group report into product safety, published on 20 July, was disappointing and refused to acknowledge that real change was needed in the product safety regime. It offered no serious proposal to ensure that proper enforcement mechanisms were in place to remove faulty goods from the market. That raises serious questions about the robustness of current enforcement regimes and their ability to withstand the pressures from the weight of EU consumer rights laws, which would be transferred into UK law. We have had no clarity from the Government about what agencies they intend to establish, how much funding that will require, or what their roles and powers will be when breaches of consumer law are found.

Warm words will not cut it. We cannot trust this Government’s vague assurances that consumer protections will be safeguarded when they will not even properly engage with consumer groups. When I asked the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union how many times he had invited and met consumer groups to discuss negotiations on the UK leaving the EU and their implications for the consumer in the UK, his response was that Ministers and officials have met with consumer organisations such as Which?, MoneySavingExpert and Citizens Advice, and that they have plans to host a roundtable with consumer groups. All of those organisations have expressed frustration to me about the difference between engagement with businesses and with the consumer side, with the latter receiving very little attention from senior Government figures. Lip service has been paid to consumers, but there have not been any tangible outcomes in action from the Government, as no consumer and Secretary of State level roundtable or working group has been established. Finally, 16 months after the EU referendum we have yet to see a detailed plan about when this consumer roundtable, which the Secretary of State mentioned in his reply to my parliamentary question, will be held. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Mr Gary Streeter (in the Chair)]

Order. I call the Minister to respond. If she could leave two to three minutes for the initiator of the debate to wind up, that would be great.

Whirlpool: Product Safety System

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Wednesday 26th April 2017 Westminster Hall

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Ms Ryan. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) on securing this important debate and on his actions in leading this campaign. I also thank hon. Members present for their thoughtful, eloquent and constructive contributions. We agree that being faced with a fire in one’s own home is a terrifying thought. We have heard some terrible stories—particularly of the deaths of two young men that my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) detailed so eloquently.

Overall, I am very disappointed that we are in this situation at all. Whirlpool’s actions have been wholly inadequate—that is the best way I can put it—and the Government have not done nearly enough to remedy the situation. That such a serious failing of consumer protection has happened calls into question the whole product safety regime. That is all the more disappointing because, as other hon. Members outlined, the Government commissioned an independent consumer product recall review by Lynn Faulds Wood in 2015, which was published on 18 February 2016. The Government’s response to that review was sadly limited. Where is the interim report that my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith mentioned? I hope the Minister can explain.

We have very little certainty over what will happen to consumer protection standards throughout the Brexit process. We have certainly been given little comfort in that regard—it seems at this point that consumers will not be championed during that process. Other hon. Members spoke of the horrendous danger and extremely serious consequences of fires in tumble dryers and other white goods and electricals. That Whirlpool has not issued a full recall at this point in time is staggering. It must fully recall the affected tumble dryer models now, before Parliament dissolves, because lives are still in danger. Peterborough trading standards and the Government should intervene and urge Whirlpool to issue that recall.

We must also see a serious reform of the consumer protection regime. I hope the Minister will outline the steps she will take in that regard because, when people’s homes are destroyed by fire and their possessions turned to ashes, when people have died due to white goods and electrical fires, and with the state that the product recall and product safety regime is in, it is unconscionable that we should continue as we are. What assessment has the Minister made of an independent national system to monitor and enforce consumer protection?

Organisations such as Which? have done a vast amount of good work in investigating and bringing attention to this issue. The Government would no doubt prefer that work to be done by external organisations, but they have a duty that they are not fulfilling. Statistics from Electrical Safety First show that the success rate of an electrical product recall in the UK is typically below 20%. Will the Minister explain what steps her Department has taken to improve that abysmal recall rate?

The product recall system is not working. Customers do not register because they rightly suspect that they are asked to so that they can be spammed by companies about future products. If consumers had confidence that product registration was only for recalls and safety concerns, we might see some change. Electrical Safety First has argued for a centralised website for product registration similar to that in America. Perhaps a similar approach could work here. Many hon. Members asked the same question.

My hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith described the extent to which Whirlpool has avoided engagement, dialogue and responsibility. Again, it has been left to consumer organisations such as Which? to pursue legal action. While Peterborough trading standards should have enforced the appropriate actions by Whirlpool when the faults became apparent, instead Which? had to take it to court to get it to act. Only then did Whirlpool take the straightforward step of updating its product guidance. Does the Minister find that the actions taken so far by Peterborough trading standards to be sufficient and appropriate?

We need a robust product safety system that is fit for purpose. Anything less will continue to endanger people’s lives. Be assured that a Labour Government, if elected on 8 June, would prioritise reform of the product safety framework to protect consumers, and to make companies such as Whirlpool take proper responsibility for their products. The people of Britain deserve better, and we should make no apologies for preventing further incidents and fatalities. Please deal with Whirlpool robustly.

Post Office Closures

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Tuesday 25th April 2017 Westminster Hall

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Sir Edward. I congratulate the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) on securing this debate. I pay tribute to the Communication Workers Union, which helped us highlight these issues to the public and MPs.

The Post Office is a trusted national brand with a long history. It is instantly recognisable to people across the United Kingdom. It forms part of the everyday fabric of life, offering a wide range of products and services, but it also provides an anchor for communities, decent jobs and, importantly, access to services in rural or urban deprived areas. Instead of making the Post Office fit for purpose for the 21st century, the Government have let that well-loved and trusted institution fall by the wayside and contributed to its managed decline. The Government are intent on privatising our public services. They used to say that they would support a robust Post Office, which former Prime Minister David Cameron promised would be the front office for Government, but they have totally failed on that promise by overseeing a steadfast strategy of cuts to the service that have caused thousands of job losses as well as a decline in the services provided.

The Labour party has made it clear that it would halt further privatisation of the Post Office and instead invest the £80 million of public money that goes into it to ensure the long-term sustainability of branches and services. We will ensure that services are retained and promoted, click and collect facilities are expanded, and banking and financial services, which we know are vital to financially excluded people, are provided.

There were 62 closures and franchising programmes and 500 job losses from the Post Office’s cash handling section in 2016, and more than 2,000 jobs have been lost in total since 2016. On 10 January 2017, it was announced that a further 37 Crown post offices would go under the same franchising scheme, meaning that 300 experienced post office staff and some 127 financial specialist roles will be cut across the network.

Crown post offices typically are directly owned and run by the Post Office. They have directly employed staff and they are often located on prominent high streets. Although there are only 286 Crown branches, they bring in a significant amount—between 10% and 20%—of the Post Office’s overall revenue. Privatising Crown post offices and transferring them into shops such as WH Smith hugely compromises the services provided, causing overall consumer satisfaction to fall, longer waiting and servicing times and poorer access for disabled customers. There are 10% fewer counters per branch in WH Smith branches than in Crown post offices, and 17% fewer foreign currency and business banking positions. At least 30 postmasters have retail businesses in a Bargain Booze franchise.

Not all franchises have worse provision than before, but the overall trend is saddening. Recent independent research for the Government showed that the Post Office continues to deliver more than £4 billion in social value each year to people and businesses throughout the UK.

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend highlights research that proves that the service deteriorates when post offices move into WH Smith branches. When we add the fact that 40% of closures are in the most deprived urban communities, we can see that the most disadvantaged people in this country are in dire straits when it comes to having access to a good post office.

[Gill Furniss]

I completely agree. It is saddening that people in deprived areas get further and further away from accessing the financial services that are necessary to them.

The privatisation of Royal Mail was, quite simply, the transfer of large sums of public money to the already well-off. Since that privatisation, the Government have promised a transformative vision for the Post Office as

“a genuine Front Office for Government”,

and a significant expansion in its banking services, but neither of those promises have borne fruit. Post Office revenues from Government services have fallen by some 40%, and its income from financial services has risen by only 2%—it has not even kept up with inflation. The Government talk about cost-cutting measures, but £3.3 million was spent on refurbishing branches that were then franchised in 2016, at an average cost of £100,000 per branch.

I was pleased that the Government initiated a consultation about the Post Office last December. At that time, the CWU delivered 75,000 postcards signed by members of the public calling for the Post Office—the “People’s Post”—to be saved. Only weeks later, before a consultation response had even been produced, the Post Office announced 37 more Crown post office closures. In fact, nearly five months later, we still await the Government’s response.

The Government’s track record shows that they have been happy to cut public funding at any cost. They have shied away from communicating with the people affected. The Government’s response to the consultation that closed on 21 December has been delayed. Will the Minister tell us when she planned to publish that response? Why have financial services been cut instead of a promoted? Why have we not looked at the example of a Banque Postale in France, which has successfully provided income for the Government and, crucially, financial services for those who need them most? What contingency plans are there for franchises that are coming up for renewal and new franchises? The Association of Convenience Stores has major problems with its members who, due to the hike in business rates, may no longer wish to provide franchise services.

--- Later in debate ---

[Margot James]

I will not give way. I accept that not all Crown post offices lose money; but the majority of those that have been franchised did.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman) put the case very well for the investment made by taxpayers and the Post Office in the service in his constituency; I join him in congratulating Mr Sanjiv Patel on taking the risk, as many others around the country have done. They have then found that it was good not only for their business but for the consumer. The Post Office is doing more for customers and doing it more efficiently for the taxpayer, and it is ensuring that post office services remain on our high streets throughout the country.

Franchising or hosting some Crown branches is part of the Post Office’s long-term plan to ensure that the network is sustainable. It is not about closing services; it is about moving a branch to a lower-cost model, often in a better location for customers, and securing and improving delivery of services. The change from a Crown to a franchise or host branch has been undertaken previously in many locations and is a proven success in terms of sustaining services, as post offices share staff and property costs with a successful retailer. We have heard examples of that this morning. As I was saying, Crown branches have moved from a £46 million annual loss in 2012 to a break-even position today. That is no mean feat. There are still loss-making Crown branches, which is why I do not think we can stand in the way of the Post Office as it makes its service more efficient and sustainable and more accessible to a wider number of people.

[Gill Furniss]

The Chamber is packed. What the Minister believes to be the facts, as she has given them to us, do not ring true with the concerns and experiences that even Conservative Members have described. It seems bizarre that when so many of us tell her there are problems she says the Government should not stand in the Post Office’s way; it does not seem the correct response. It seems to me that we have the responsibility; the Government must provide a proper service for all communities. Clearly, the figures that many eloquent Members have given today are at odds with the Minister’s view.

[Margot James]

I have talked so far mostly about financial issues. It is undisputed that the Crowns were losing £46 million and are now breaking even. There are still some loss-making ones to deal with. I appreciate that changes of the kind we are considering are not easy, especially when they involve staff who have worked in a place for many years. I know that the hon. Lady has had a briefing from the Communication Workers Union, and I have had meetings with it on several occasions; I sympathise with its position. However, it is essential that the business should continue to manage its costs to ensure that it can meet the challenges faced by high streets, let alone the Post Office, now and in the future, as the way we shop and get access to services continues to change.

Several hon. Members made points about Government services, and I agree that in 2010 the Government had hopes that the Post Office could take over many more such services; but the rapidity with which some of them migrated to the internet meant that that hope did not bear enough fruit. The staff in Crown branches that are being franchised have the opportunity to transfer to the franchisee in line with the TUPE process; or they can choose to leave the business. The Post Office offers a generous settlement agreement, which reflects the hard work, commitment and dedication that many employees have shown over the years. However, I reiterate the point that a more efficient Post Office is able to support and supplement thousands of small businesses, as my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) noted; she spoke with great authority about the needs of people in her largely rural constituency. The Government take those needs seriously and have honoured a commitment to maintain a service, even where it is not viable on a financial basis, to people living in the rural parts of her constituency.

Fuel Poverty

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Tuesday 21st March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

We are in a cold homes crisis, with more than 4 million households in fuel poverty across the UK. Across the UK in 2014-2015, there were 43,900 excess winter deaths. According to the World Health Organisation, a minimum of 30% of those deaths resulted from cold homes. In my constituency, there are 7,241 households struggling in fuel poverty. Life in fuel poverty is miserable. No one should be choosing between heating their home and eating. Children should not be growing up in cold, damp rooms. Old people should not have to stay in bed or live in just one room because they cannot warm their house.

This debate is happening because the last Administration’s fuel poverty strategy, published in 2015, mandated it to happen. The current statutory target is to lift as many fuel-poor households up to band C energy efficiency standard “as is reasonably practicable” by 2030. This Government’s record on fuel poverty and their performance against that target are abysmal and going nowhere fast. The charity National Energy Action estimates that at this rate we will miss the target by 80 years. Yes, 80 years. A baby born today will not see the end of fuel poverty in the UK in her lifetime. That is a scandal. That is approximately calculated by noting that around 30,000 fuel-poor houses per year are being brought up to band C. That is so far from what is needed that I do not know how the Government can defend it.

What response to this striking lack of progress have we had from the Government? They say that they will spend less on energy efficiency measures—measures that are recognised in their own fuel poverty strategy as the most sustainable way to make permanent progress on fuel poverty. Under a Labour Government in 2007, we saw 2.5 million energy efficiency measures implemented in a single year. That number has now fallen off a cliff. Under this Government’s policies, we will see 12% of that. Total investment fell by 53% between 2010 and 2015, and England is now the only UK nation without a Government-funded energy efficiency programme. That has not been the case for 30 years.

The Government lack the necessary political will and determination to address this injustice. It is so frustrating, not just because it condemns thousands of households to continued misery, indignity and ill health, and not just because the youngest, the oldest and the poorest in our society are hit hardest by fuel poverty, but because the solutions are so clearly and obviously sensible.

Properly addressing fuel poverty would ease the burden on the NHS. National Energy Action estimates that £1.6 billion is spent each year on treating the impacts of cold homes. Labour’s commitment to insulate 4 million homes would create over 100,000 jobs and apprenticeships, as well as training programmes across every region of the country. Those homes would have reduced energy bills, which is another key driver of fuel poverty. A report by Cambridge Econometrics and Verco found that every £1 invested in an ambitious energy efficiency programme such as Labour’s would return £3. The plan would reduce natural gas imports by 26% by 2030 due to reduced demand, save £8 billion a year on energy bills, increase relative GDP by 0.6% by 2030 and reduce carbon emissions.

One of the ways to bring energy efficiency measures to fuel-poor households is through the energy company obligation or ECO. The newly costed ECO will cost £640 million a year—a 42% reduction compared with the previous phase of the programme. While the Government may say that that is more tightly focused on fuel poverty, the reality is a massive funding cut. This Government are betraying those in fuel poverty and snubbing their own legal targets.

A key risk factor for those in fuel poverty is living in a household that is off the gas grid. Non-gas households rely on more expensive fuels, such as electricity and oil, to heat their homes and often live in harder-to-treat, energy-inefficient properties with no central heating or solid walls. Some 20% of fuel-poor households are off the gas grid, yet they have received only 1.4% of the measures under the affordable warmth element of ECO since 2013.

[James Heappey]

That ties in with the earlier point made by the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows). We could encourage the electrification of heat as a solution for those who are off the gas grid. Heat pumps can operate efficiently and reduce heating costs for those who would otherwise be at the mercy of the oil market. Does the shadow Minister agree that that should be a priority for such customers?

[Gill Furniss]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. We must be bold in these areas and consider everything that we possibly can. I thank him for that intervention.

Gas distribution networks, which manage the network infrastructure that transports gas to homes and businesses across GB, should deliver 14,864 new connections to fuel-poor households, but funding for new central heating systems available through the ECO is limited to 4,000 systems, so funding is lacking for over 10,000 households. In the spring Budget, the Chancellor completely failed to act on that and provided no extra funding to ensure that the most affected fuel-poor households are given the support to stay warm. Regrettably, that seems to be a running theme in the Government’s approach to tackling fuel poverty. Given the shortage of funds, I hope the Minister can explain how exactly the Government intend to tackle the off-gas homes that are most at risk of severe fuel poverty.

The warm homes discount is an annual payment of £140 to around 2.1 million households to relieve pressure on their energy bills, but it was revealed last year that only 15% of those in receipt of the discount were actually in fuel poverty. The Treasury, then under the new editor of the Evening Standard, said that the system was working, but the scheme’s targeting is a total failure. The Minister for Climate Change and Industry said in a Delegated Legislation Committee last year that the Government would address that through better data-sharing in the Digital Economy Bill, but the Government are yet to explain how they will improve targeting.

A co-ordinated, comprehensive approach to fuel poverty at a local level can be key to tackling the cold homes crisis. In its 2015 cold weather plan, Public Health England made it clear that fuel poverty and reducing excess winter illness and death should be deemed core business by health and wellbeing boards and should be included in their strategy plans. However, research has found that 40% of the 152 health and wellbeing boards in England failed to address fuel poverty in their strategies. I have written to my local health and wellbeing board to ask them about its progress on implementing the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines. It replied that the savage cuts to local funding and the lack of Government funding to address fuel poverty directly have made it difficult to implement the NICE guidelines fully. This Government have been standing still on fuel poverty and going backwards on energy efficiency measures to address it.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

We debated this matter in the previous Parliament, but we never seem to resolve it. The Prime Minister has hinted that she may put a cap on prices, but if she is going to do that, she should really tackle the big six cabal, which was raised in the House last week. It is not good enough to tell people that they should shop around and get a different supplier—that does not work. It is about time that this Government put their money where their mouth is and tackled the big cartel.

[Gill Furniss]

My hon. Friend’s intervention is timely in that several hon. Members have put that case well. The Labour party’s last manifesto proposed to freeze the energy prices of the big six.

[Dan Jarvis (Barnsley Central) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend made an important point about the contribution made by local authorities in drawing together the work that happens at a local level. Does she agree that, to reduce the number of excess winter deaths, it is important at a national level that the Government co-ordinate across Whitehall and that meaningful conversations happen between Departments?

[Gill Furniss]

That is absolutely the way forward. We should be looking at new build homes that contain all the necessary measures, and many Departments have a part to play in that. Sheffield Heat and Power is good example of how to take waste and turn it into energy. That is what I mean when I said that we must be bold. We have to take every opportunity and learn lessons from other countries.

[James Heappey]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Gill Furniss]

No, I must move on.

The Government’s flagship green deal policy is universally recognised as a failure. It was well intentioned, but we warned at the time that implementation was going very badly. By the end, the green deal improved only 15,000 homes at a cost of £17,000 per home. No replacement policy is in sight so far as I am aware.

The Government have cancelled the zero-carbon homes initiative. By contrast, Labour would build 1 million new carbon-neutral homes and insulate 4 million more. Labour would roll out a £90 million “homes for heroes” programme that offers free home insulation to disabled veterans. The Labour party has committed to making energy efficiency a key infrastructure priority. That makes economic sense and is the right thing for the future of the UK.

CSC: Redundancies

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Tuesday 28th February 2017 Westminster Hall

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) for securing this debate and for his eloquent words. From the level of detail that he went into, we can be in no doubt about his passion for the subject; I will not repeat everything he said. I also note the excellent points made by many other hon. Members, especially the remarks from my hon. Friend the Member for Preston (Mr Hendrick) about his experiences in his constituency, which has already had the hard knock of job losses at Hewlett Packard, where workers have not received a pay rise for four years.

Labour is the party of working people and we will always stand up for them. My hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield set out plainly the impact that the redundancies will have on CSC workers and the potential knock-on effect on public services. By March, the company intends to make 1,600 working people—a third of its UK workforce—redundant. At the end of March, it will merge with HP Enterprise Services to form DXC Technology, and the new company will be the largest single IT services supplier by quite a long way. In the run-up to the merger, CSC announced two redundancy programmes totalling 1,600 redundancies from 5,400 staff. Those are just the latest in a long line of cuts at CSC, which has had nine separate redundancy rounds this financial year as well as reducing its contractor programme.

The cuts are being rushed through, causing chaos within the company and huge dismay for CSC workers. Some of the roles are being offshored, but that is usually done in a controlled manner. We must consider that, with the scale and the speed of the cuts, CSC will endanger its own ability to provide its IT services; that is the view that we have heard from other hon. Members today, as well as from Unite, the union that represents many CSC workers. CSC provides critical IT systems for many private and public sector organisations, including the Metropolitan police, the NHS, Network Rail, civil nuclear fuels, and the Passport Office. Any knock-on effect to critical IT services could have very serious consequences.

Let us be clear about what is happening. The redundancy programme seems to be a knee-jerk reaction in order to reach arbitrary financial targets and ensure a favourable merger for CSC shareholders, which are largely US financial institutions, pension funds and hedge funds. If the targets are achieved, CSC’s senior executive team, which is based in the USA, will share out $90 million in bonuses. The chief executive officer, the chairman and the president will get between $37 million and $44 million—that is just one person, by the way. Needless to say, the nine members of the executive leadership team are all men, as are eight out of the nine directors. Senior managers of large parts of the UK business who have questioned the process have been removed. I have heard from Unite, the largest union in CSC, that throughout 2016 CSC’s UK management repeatedly advised it that the UK business was healthy and profitable. So this is not about emergency measures to save a failing business; it is corporate greed that will have an enormous impact on the CSC workers who face redundancy and potentially on the public services that depend on CSC’s IT systems.

In June 2013, the then Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), described CSC as a “rotten company”. Sadly, it seems that nothing has changed. It certainly appears that CSC is dangerously and negligently putting critical parts of UK infrastructure, Government services and private industry at risk, as well as unceremoniously getting rid of 1,600 workers in a quest for a successful merger and bumper bonuses.

I look forward to hearing the Minister outline how she will protect British workers and public services. Will she be willing to carry out an impact assessment of the critical IT provision that CSC currently delivers for many Government services? Also, will she please tell us how she will support the workers who face redundancy? Finally, I would like the Minister to comment on how supporting a company that often makes redundancies and then outsources the jobs overseas can possibly benefit our community, and how it can possibly be described as looking after UK workers.

Steel: Preserving Sustainable Jobs and Growth in Europe

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2017 General Committees

[The Chair]

We now have until 3.37 pm, which is one hour after the start of the statement, for questions to the Minister. I remind Members that questions should be brief. It is open to a Member, subject to my discretion, to ask related supplementary questions.

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Wilson. First, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon for his helpful and insightful introduction. I also take this opportunity to congratulate him and his colleagues in the APPG on steel and metal related industries for their recent “Steel 2020” report, which has no small relevance to our discussions. I am sure the Minister has read it thoroughly.

In Yorkshire, the Royce Translational Centre at the Advanced Manufacturing Park in Rotherham will be delivered with £4 million of European regional development fund money. That is expected to support growth and innovation in companies employing more than 13,800 people and is estimated to generate £668 million in the Sheffield city region. Is it the Minister’s opinion that EU funding is still underused and suffering from low take-up and a lack of strategic use? Have the Government reduced their enthusiasm for directing industry towards EU funding?

We would welcome a commitment to match EU funds granted before Brexit. On current timescales, EU funds are set up to 2022, while the Government’s pledge is only up until 2020. Will the Minister confirm that the total funding available post-Brexit will be significantly reduced due to the lack of access to EU funding programmes, including Horizon 2020?

[Mr Hurd]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has made public statements about honouring EU funding commitments. Beyond that, in terms of support for things such as technical innovation and research, which she rightly talked about—it is fundamental to a more dynamic future for the sector—she will be well aware that the Government have made it extremely clear that we see innovation as the cornerstone of the industrial strategy. In fact, this Government have made the largest commitment since 1979 to science, research and innovation.

Through the industrial strategy, we are creating an environment in which sectors—as we have said, we fully expect the steel sector to be towards the front of the queue—come to us and say, “This is our vision of the future in terms of both sustainability and growth. This is how we think we can contribute to what you need in terms of productivity, jobs and better wages, but this is what we need from you in terms of unlocking that potential.” That is the kind of conversation we expect to have with a number of sectors, including the steel sector.

I do not know enough about the specific facility that the hon. Lady mentioned, which I am guessing is in her constituency.

[Gill Furniss]

No, it is alongside it.

[Mr Hurd]

Okay. I am certainly interested to know more about that. It seems part of an ecosystem that we need to nourish in the future, because access to innovation and new ways of making and doing things will be critical to the sustainable future that we all want for this foundation sector.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gill Furniss]

The UK steel industry is a foundation industry that underpins many others and has a supply chain that runs across the country. It is an innovative sector, with new products constantly being created. It is also a sector that requires careful planning and a co-ordinated strategy, particularly around trade but also around training, around access to funding for research and development and for innovation, and around decarbonisation and energy costs.

We are here due to the insufficiency of the answers given to the European Scrutiny Committee on the Government’s position across issues affecting the steel sector before the Brexit vote, so I would have expected the Minister to be at pains to make the Government’s strategy as clear as possible. I can see that he is not doing so, for several reasons, I understand the complexities of the negotiations ahead, but the Minister has left a lot of questions unanswered.

Recently in the Chamber, I noted in a question that the industrial strategy Green Paper referred to steel on only one occasion. The only clarification that I received from the Government then was that they had had very productive discussions with the industry; the Minister has certainly reiterated that today.

I am very concerned about the lack of any clarity on the compensation energy package. It is getting closer and closer every day, and we certainly do not want to be at the cliff-edge, as my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon described it. I am sure we will all be pursuing the matter further. We really need some concrete answers about the Government’s plans for trade defence measures, about international co-operation on Chinese dumping and overcapacity, about what will be available once EU funding sources have gone, and about the ETS.

There is still a crisis in the steel industry. Steelworkers throughout the UK and working people in the industries that depend on steel all along the supply chain deserve some clarity on what is being done to support the sector at this crucial time.