Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Ian Lavery and Mary Glindon(8 months, 1 week ago)
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Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
Britishvolt
Debate between Ian Lavery and Mary Glindon(1 year, 10 months ago)
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Ian Lavery
Thanks for that intervention. The supply chain is so, so important. Britishvolt suggested at the time that there would be 3,000 jobs created at the site and 5,000 jobs created in the supply chain. That would have been felt throughout the whole of our region in the north-east and probably further afield.
Links with Nissan would be brilliant. We need to take a leaf out of Nissan’s book in the way it has operated in the north-east for so many years. We were hoping to see some sort of link. Nissan is looking towards an on-site gigafactory with Envision AESC, which is in progress as we speak.
Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government seem to have forgotten and neglected the area north of Teesside? This great part of our region, whether it is Tyneside, Northumberland or Wearside, always seems to be forgotten. We were forgotten when it came to a freeport, levelling up and now Britishvolt, which, as my hon. Friend says, would have created jobs across the region and given it a brighter future.
Ian Lavery
That is very, very well put. People in our region are very much aware that there has been investment in Teesside. I welcome every penny coming into the region, by the way—every single ha’penny of investment we can get—but it has to be further afield than just one particular pocket of the north-east region. As my hon. Friend says, there has been a complete lack of investment in our region and it has been left behind for decades now. That is just not acceptable any more. This is the idea that could have transformed and changed that for a lot of the people we proudly represent. People were excited by the thought they actually had the potential to get a decent job with good wages, terms and conditions.
North East Ambulance Service
Debate between Ian Lavery and Mary Glindon(8 years, 7 months ago)
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Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bailey. Great credit must be given to my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) for securing this timely debate.
The North East Ambulance Service is not creaking at the seams; it is totally and utterly broken. It is in meltdown, and that causes great concern. As has already been said, there is a total lack of any confidence at all in the North East Ambulance Service among the residents. It is failing people of all ages in their time of most need. As my hon. Friends have said, we must place on the record our thanks for the commitment and passion of the workforce in the North East Ambulance Service.
Unfortunately, there is a staff shortfall of between 10% and perhaps 15%, which has been mentioned. That puts huge stress on the remaining individuals, who must make up for the shortfall. My hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West suggested that 64% of people have complained about stress. There is a high rate of people employed in the service who cannot go to work any more because of stress; and is it not really alarming that one in four people has considered taking their own life: paramedics—people working in the ambulance service, who we are terribly proud of? We urgently need to look at the situation.
There is a complete lack of staff. The service is undermanned and underfunded, and we have not got the resources we need for the situation we have in the north-east. We have to ask why there is a shortage in the first place. I believe that the wages in the North East Ambulance Service are the lowest in the country. That is one factor. We do not have the resources to pay even on a par with the counties next to us. The wages, terms and conditions are much lower than those of other ambulance services.
Like all the other hon. Members who have spoken I want to mention a few instances. My hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West mentioned a young fellow playing football, who broke his leg on the pitch. Now, you would expect an ambulance to come and pick you up, wouldn’t you? Is that too much to ask if someone is lying in agony with a broken bone from playing football on a cold Saturday afternoon? Of course they would want an ambulance. We cannot just push people to the side and wait, and explain to them, “There’ll be somebody coming shortly.”
That is not even the most important example. Everyone who has spoken has given examples of what has been happening—mainly to elderly people. There are lots of elderly people in my constituency—Mrs Robson, for one. She is 78 years old. She slipped on a pavement in the middle of winter. She had to wait one hour and 40 minutes for an ambulance; but the message that comes is: “I’m sorry; you’re going to have to wait, because it is not at crisis point. You are not an emergency.” Of course she is an emergency. If a 78-year-old lady is lying on the floor crumpled in absolute agony, that is an emergency; but on paper—“Sorry, you’re not an emergency.”
I will tell hon. Members what happens. Someone rings up, and they have got a crib sheet in the central office. My hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) mentioned that if someone is unconscious or has got pains in the chest, the service will come to them. The first question is “Are they conscious? Are they breathing?” “Yes.” “Right. Are they bleeding?” “No.” Then, if they are conscious and not bleeding, they are put right down the pecking order. Quite frankly, it is simply not acceptable.
Mary Glindon
Does my hon. Friend agree that the morale of the call centre staff has been lowered? They can no longer care when they talk to people, but are like call centre handlers, with things being very automated; and they do the minimum to reassure patients because everything is down to time and hitting targets. They are no longer people dealing with callers who are in distress. They are not able or allowed to show any emotion or any support, because they simply have to deal with the call as quickly as they can, to get on to the next one.
Ian Lavery
What I am saying is not meant to be any criticism of the people in the call centre, either—because if they veer from the crib sheet they have got, they are in trouble; but it shows how bad the whole situation is.
I want to mention Mr Taylor. I must say that he is a relative of my wife, who waited 11 and a half hours for an ambulance to arrive. He was really poorly. Plenty of people came from the NHS and said, “He needs an ambulance”—and then someone says “He doesn’t” and someone says “He does,” and someone else says “He doesn’t”. When he actually got the ambulance, at 1.45 in the morning, he was in a coma. That was seven months ago, and he is still lying in a coma as we speak. If that ambulance had turned up before, he might not be.
I will not dwell on that point other than to say that that brings me on to the complaints procedure, because MPs have complained, as well, about what happens to our constituents. We get a chronological list of what happened, and why the ambulances could not come, because they were diverted to other more serious incidents. That is not good enough. It is not good enough for me to say to one of my constituents, “Your mam couldn’t get an ambulance because somebody else was more important”—when she was lying suffering. Or if someone has a terminal disease and is desperate, or someone has a chest disease—it is not good enough; and the complaints procedure is not good enough. They are not treating people like human beings.
I have got lots to say and not a lot of time to say it, but I am going to reiterate the fact that these delays are utterly unacceptable and we cannot continue on this basis with the North East Ambulance Service operating as badly as it is. Someone mentioned that the service will be fully operational in 12 months. I have heard that before. It is not good enough for the people who will trip, fall and stumble. It is not good enough for elderly people, or young people playing football.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Ian Lavery and Mary Glindon(11 years, 2 months ago)
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Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
6. What steps he is taking to help households with their energy bills.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
18. What steps he is taking to help households with their energy bills.
2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers
Debate between Ian Lavery and Mary Glindon(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
It is an honour to follow the hon. Member for Newark (Patrick Mercer), who has defended the motion so eloquently.
I thank the Backbench Business Committee and congratulate the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) on securing this important debate. He has worked extremely hard over the past few months on behalf of the 2nd Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers and its supporters, and has drawn together MPs from across the House to forward the campaign. Had it not been for his exceptional effort, I do not think we would be having this debate today. Nor would we have witnessed the wonderful sight of 400 Fusiliers marching down Whitehall to join us in Parliament.
I give my full support to the motion, but in doing so I do not wish to slight our Scottish colleagues in the House or the brave soldiers who serve in the Scottish battalions. The motion serves to highlight the Government’s flawed strategic defence and security review, which sees 30,000 servicemen and women lose their jobs in cuts.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
I stand fully behind the retention of 2RRF, which is really important, but does my hon. Friend agree that the mention of the Scottish battalions does no favours to the motion? Had it not mentioned any other battalions, it would have been more comradely and in the right spirit, and would probably have garnered more support.
Mrs Glindon
The Scottish battalions are mentioned because of the unfortunately political manner in which the Government are carrying out the disbandment.
The cuts will not only cost jobs but cost people their careers, could result in thousands of ex-servicemen and women facing long-term unemployment, and in time could pose a threat to the security of our nation. In the north-east, 200 soldiers will lose not only their jobs but, as I have said, the careers they have trained hard for and of which they are rightly proud. Soldiers from the north-east have a long history of service in the British Army. During the first world war, the Northumberland Fusiliers raised more battalions than any other in Britain—52—and in those days a battalion was more than 1,000 strong.
Today, the north-east still provides more soldiers for the Army than any other region in the UK, so it is no surprise that, when the Secretary of State announced the disbandment, veterans, the public and politicians joined the campaign to make the Government see the unfairness of their actions.