Home Affairs

Jim Dowd Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. I am not having interventions that are speeches. Interventions are exactly that, and I think the right hon. Gentleman has got his point across.

[Jim Dowd (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

He did say he would speak slowly.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

He spoke at a reasonable speed; there were just too many words.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Dowd (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson), as we are both alumni of the London Nautical school, albeit a few years apart. I leave it to Members to judge what has happened to the educational standards there since I left, but it is a pleasure to follow him. This is the first time that I, like my right hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett), have spoken in the Chamber in the past couple of years in a debate without a time limit on Back-Bench speeches. Nevertheless, Madam Deputy Speaker, I am aware of your exhortation and I shall attempt to be as brief as I can.

I am not sure whether this Queen’s Speech is the final act of this Government or the epilogue. It is patently clear that it is not designed for a full Session of Parliament; it is not a full programme at all. Given the provisions for five-year Parliaments, this Parliament will be dissolved at the end of March, so this is a programme for little more than nine months, including the times when the House is in recess.

The Queen’s Speech contains some welcome measures—I cannot think of any Queen’s Speech introduced by any Government that did not contain some welcome measures—although the devil will be in the detail, and more information needs to be obtained. The Modern Slavery Bill, which the Home Secretary and others have mentioned, commands universal support across the House, and we can only hope that it will have the desired effect.

The measures relating to child care costs will also be welcome, provided they do not merely translate into increased prices from the providers of child care, as has been the case in the past. I also welcome the further reforms to pensions, although we should tread warily, given the history of mis-selling of pension products once that market had been liberalised. I also note that the Government intend to introduce a more collective approach to pensions, along the lines of the system currently operating in the Netherlands. My understanding, however, is that the Netherlands Government are considering changing their scheme. We must also bear in mind the fact that the contributors to that scheme pay substantially more than people in this country are used to contributing to their pensions. None the less, I am sure that we can make progress in that regard.

Other measures are more contentious, even though this Queen’s Speech is very thin. The infrastructure Bill will contain measures on fracking, and the Government are engaged in a three-month consultation period on that at the moment. There are those who are opposed to fossil fuels, full stop, and who would never accept the case for fracking, even if it were totally safe for the environment and for residents. However, there is always a conflict in which the broader national interest is set against legitimate local concerns. Everyone will be keen to see the results of the Government’s consultation.

Further controversy might arise over the proposed levy on plastic carrier bags, as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) said. I would have thought that such a proposal would have registered as one of Lynton Crosby’s barnacles, yet it still seems to be in the Queen’s Speech. We must assess the environmental impact of 7 billion bags being used each year. If the Bill’s objective is achieved, I am not sure who will get the income from the levy. I suspect that it will simply save the supermarkets an awful lot of money and increase their sales of bin-liners, because that is what most people use their plastic carrier bags for, but we shall have to wait and see how events unfold.

[Mr Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Con)]

It was a delight to hear Her Majesty say the words “plastic carrier bags”, but I am sure that that is not the reason why they were put into the Queen’s Speech. Money will be raised from the levy initially, although I believe that it will deter people from using such bags in the longer term. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that this will provide the supermarkets with an opportunity to direct that money towards some kind of social networking or community action groups within their areas, in order to support local communities?

[Jim Dowd]

The charitable and philanthropic activities of the supermarkets are of course to be welcomed wherever they occur; most supermarkets have community schemes of some kind. There is a paradox involved, however. If the aim of this tax, levy or cost—whatever we care to call it—is to reduce demand, very little income will be generated by it. I was as amazed as everyone else to hear Her Majesty utter the words “plastic carrier bags”, as I am not sure how often she comes across such things, but it was not clear whether the objective of the measure is to depress demand or to raise revenue. We will discover from the details whether it will be beneficial. I openly confess that the first job I ever had was in my local supermarket. In those days, we had nothing so glamorous as plastic carrier bags. We had brown paper bags with handles that almost invariably came off when anyone put more than a couple of tins of beans in them.

The hon. Member for Peterborough mentioned the proposed recall provisions—the so-called recall provisions. I think they are inadequate; they do not command a wide degree of public trust. I have also seen early-day motion 25, tabled by the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith), and that does not make much sense either, even though he is a stern critic of the Government’s proposals. Far more consideration needs to be given to this matter. We need to reach a conclusion that will be workable and viable, and that will command public support.

I am deeply disappointed by the absence of one measure from the Queen’s Speech, despite a previous indication from the Prime Minister that it would be included. The absence of a commitment to ban the use of wild animals in circuses is extremely disappointing, especially as the Prime Minister pledged that action would be taken when he met a delegation from various animal welfare charities in April this year. This measure might well be one of Lynton Crosby’s barnacles that the Government have rejected, but it is undeniably extremely popular with the public and I cannot understand why the Government do not just introduce this simple measure, given that it has such widespread public support.

In the light of that, I have today tabled the following early-day motion:

“That this House is deeply disappointed that the Gracious Speech did not contain measures to ban the use of wild animals in circuses, despite repeated pledges from Ministers that action would be taken; notes that since the House of Commons voted unanimously in favour of a ban in 2011 big cats have returned to Britain and is concerned that the continued delay may lead to other wild species being forced to perform in circuses; further notes that the draft Wild Animals in Circuses Bill has already been scrutinised by the Environment and Rural Affairs Committee; supports Animal Defenders International and other animal welfare organisations in their ongoing campaign to end this outdated practice and calls on the Government to introduce legislation to ensure a ban can be introduced during the current session.”

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

I agree with my hon. Friend that it is a great shame that the Government have not included such a measure in the Queen’s Speech. Will he join me in encouraging Government Members present today to take back the message that the Government should at the very least provide a hand-out Bill to a Member who has been successful in the ballot for private Members’ Bills? In that way, we might just get this into legislation.

[Jim Dowd]

My hon. Friend’s suggestion sounds as though it has the virtues of brevity and simplicity, but unfortunately, given the technicalities of such a Bill, I do not think that it would get through the private Members’ Bill procedure. I speak as one who was responsible for the Government’s private Members’ business for a number of years. If that were the only route that could be adopted, however, such a Bill would deserve as much support as possible and the Government should give an undertaking to give it whatever support they could, perhaps along the lines of the support that they gave to the European Union (Referendum) Bill last year. The signatories to my early-day motion come from all parts of the House, and I am sure that it will generate support.

Although it does not feature in specific legislation, the economy features prominently in the Queen’s Speech and it would be churlish not to admit that the recent narrative on the economy has moved in the Government’s favour. It is easy to forget, however, that the Chancellor’s original five-year plan said that by now the deficit would have disappeared and we would be paying off debt. Of course we are not doing either. Debt is growing at an unprecedented rate; the Government are now borrowing more money than the Labour Government did in the previous 13 years. The old five-year plans in the Soviet Union were rewritten every year, and that is rather what the Government have done.

Even what economic good news there is has been based on a couple of questionable propositions, not the least of which is quantitative easing, as it is now called. It used to be called printing money. It has robbed savers of millions of pounds, the full effect of which we will not see for some time. These are unorthodox fiscal measures. The housing bubble is not an unqualified good either for people in London and my constituents or people in other parts of the country. It is a huge problem for the children of my constituents who are trying to buy property in London for the first time, and it is skewing the economic recovery.

Beyond the measures that I have mentioned, the Queen’s Speech is thin, bordering on anorexic. That is because the most significant political developments in the next nine months or so will take place not just outside this Chamber but outside this building. I highlight just three. The first is the referendum in Scotland. However it turns out, I am certain that there will need to be a major reconsideration of how the United Kingdom is organised. If the result is against the nationalist case, we will need as a minimum to resolve the West Lothian question in a durable and sensible fashion. I do not wish to intrude, but my position is rather similar to that of David Bowie and Barack Obama, although as the President said the other day, it is a matter for the folks up there.

The second political development is EU reform. I am glad that all three major party leaders in the House have agreed that Mr Juncker is not an appropriate appointment as President of the EU. My fear is that he represents a strain of Eurocrats—I am never sure whether the phrase is derived from bureaucrat or aristocrat, which is certainly how they behave—who fail to understand the feeling of a large swathe of people right across the nations of the EU. They have the gravest disillusionment and doubt about the efficacy and efficiency of the organisation, and those who simply swing on as if nothing has happened and behave as if the project has an inevitability and momentum entirely of its own fail to understand what we need. I hope that we will have a candidate who will more readily reflect those priorities.

I will be candid, Madam Deputy Speaker; I am a member of the Labour for a referendum campaign. I do not accept the artificial timetable that the Conservatives have instituted of 2017. I think there should be a reform process and once it has reached a decision, whenever that might be, a package should be put to the British people for their approval. After all, the only referendum we have ever had on membership of what was then the European Economic Community was provided by a Labour Government.

[Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman refers to the artificial timetable. When would he want to have a referendum on our membership of the EU?

[Jim Dowd]

Once the process is complete; once progress has been made and it has been established that there is no further progress to be made. Putting down the finishing line before you have described the course is a ridiculous proposition and it was designed wholly and solely—I sat on the European Union (Referendum) Bill Committee—to keep Conservative Back Benchers happy. That is all it was.

As everyone knows, the other facet of the coalition Government is that the Prime Minister has spent more time rowing with his Back Benchers than he has ever done with the Liberal Democrats. That is the point that I want to come to now—the separation of the coalition. It has already unravelled so we will just see how the parting of the ways occurs.

In the European and local elections of the week before last, the biggest losers by a mile were the Liberals. I am delighted to say that in my constituency we also resisted firmly, as they did across London, the blandishments of UKIP. There are no Liberal councillors now in the London borough of Lewisham or the London borough of Bromley, and no Tory councillors in the London borough of Lewisham for the first time in history, but that is another consideration. So we feel that we did quite well in our small corner.

The reason why the Liberal Democrats were almost wholly obliterated in large parts of the country is that people do not know what they stand for any more. They used to be the party of “a plague on all your houses”. UKIP has supplanted them in that, so what purpose do they have? The answer in most people’s estimation is precious little. I heard a defeated Liberal councillor say, “We need to get out and get our message across more clearly.” I think it is the other way round. I think they went out with their message and people understood it and rejected it. That is the truth of where they are. There is no automaticity about recovery between now and the election. I shall miss some of them, though. There was a fabulous anti-war song by Roy Orbison back in the ’60s called “There won’t be many coming home.” When I look at the Liberal Benches now, I think to myself that after the next election there won’t be many coming back.

[Jim Shannon]

Don’t sing it.

[Jim Dowd]

No, I wouldn’t.

A lot of people said that the coalition would not last. I always thought that it would, and so it has proved, but the most intriguing question was always going to be how it disengaged. The Conservatives have worked themselves into a position in which they will get the credit for anything that, rightly or wrongly, is perceived to have gone right, and the Liberals will get all the blame, and that bodes ill for them.

We are exactly where we are, but the position is exacerbated by the Liberals promising to do one thing before an election and doing the total reverse afterwards. They cannot get away with behaving in that fashion and people do have memories and will exercise their judgment in the light of that. It will be hugely entertaining in the next few months to see how the coalition parties defend the coalition but attack each other. They will do so more and more ferociously as next May beckons.

Lord Ashcroft has embarked on an expensive round of weekly polls, principally on behalf of the Conservative party, although to give him his due, he makes them freely available to anyone who wants to read them. The polls have shown a number of changes just in the past week between the three parties. Perhaps we are in three or perhaps we are in four-party politics. I think that we may be in three-party politics in so far as UKIP has supplanted the Liberal Democrats in the national political scene. We will wait for it all to unravel. We are in for an intriguing and exciting time, but one thing is certain—this coalition will end with a whimper, not a bang.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

I will say two things. First, the department has been beefed up, as the hon. Gentleman puts it: there are now more people working there than ever before. Secondly, if he can contain himself for less than 10 minutes, he will be able to listen to and contribute to the Adjournment debate, which is on that very subject and will be responded to by my hon. Friend the Minister for Security and Immigration.

A number of points have been made about immigration, which is worth addressing even though it is not in the legislative programme. The right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett) made a very thoughtful contribution about the need for a sensible debate about immigration. I agree that we need a rational debate, but I disagree with Members from both sides of the House who say that we need a Bill in this Session, because, first, we had a Bill in the previous Session.

The Leader of the Opposition has apologised for the immigration problems under the previous Administration, so we now appear to be in the slightly perverse position where the only party still defending Labour’s immigration policy is the Scottish National party. The hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) is hanging on grimly to the previous immigration policy, even though at least part of the Labour party, including its leader, is seeking to move beyond it. The second reason why we do not need another Bill is that if there is one lesson we can all draw from the previous Administration’s problems—whichever position we occupy on immigration—it is that legislation is not always the solution.

The previous Government passed eight immigration Bills in 13 years. If legislation were the solution to immigration problems, we would have had the most secure borders and the most controlled immigration in the world by 2010, but everyone—even the Leader of the Opposition—admits that, palpably, we did not.

[Jim Dowd]

I accept that legislation is not always the answer and that this is about the way the system operates. Obviously, as the representative of an inner-London constituency, I have a large volume of immigration cases and see many replies to people who clearly have no grounds to remain in this country. The reply from the Department or the agency says, “You have no grounds to remain and should make arrangements to leave. However, you can also make arrangements to regularise your stay in this country.” That is an open invitation to those who have no grounds to stay simply to go through the whole cycle again. Will the Minister look at the situation, ask why we are doing that and arrange for a system whereby we say to people, “You have no right to be in this country. Please leave”?

[Damian Green]

I would hope that that is precisely the message—in fact, I am pretty sure it is from my own experience—a ministerial letter would send. My hon. Friend the Immigration Minister does not write letters saying, “Please make efforts to regularise your stay.” He writes letters saying that people should leave, and we have beefed up enforcement. Indeed, our reforms have cut non-EU net migration to close to its lowest level since 1998. There are now 77,000 fewer people arriving annually from outside the EU than when we came to power.

Many Members on both sides of the House have mentioned employment and jobs. It was certainly the case a few years ago that the majority of growth in employment was taken up by foreign nationals, but over the past year 76% of the growth in employment has been accounted for by British citizens.

Another point that is worth making in this debate is that work is the most common reason for immigration to the UK. The main reason used to be study, but the fact that it is now work, as well as the fact that the vast majority—three quarters—of jobs are taken up by British citizens, suggests that the balance is much better than it was.

The other very serious issue that needs to be addressed is EU free movement. I can only repeat the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon that freedom of movement is an important principle, but not an unqualified right. Freedom of movement is not and cannot be a freedom to claim benefits; it must be grounded in the freedom to take up work in another member state, to contribute to our economy and to integrate into our society. That applies across the board to people who come here as students or to work.

Let me deal with some of the many individual issues that came up. My hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert)—he has sent his apologies, because he cannot be in the Chamber for the winding-up speeches—raised revenge pornography. Such behaviour is despicable and unacceptable. I make the point that something illegal offline is also illegal online. Legislation is in place to tackle harassment and malicious conduct of this kind. The Director of Public Prosecutions has published guidelines for prosecutors considering cases that involve social media networks. We continuously review the use and effect of legislation to ensure that it is fit for purpose. I assure my hon. Friend that legislation is in place, and that we look very carefully at its effectiveness.

The hon. Member for Strangford mentioned health tourism, which is indeed important. I assure him that a system of NHS overseas visitor charges for secondary care already applies to short-term visitors and illegal migrants. The Department of Health is taking forward a programme to reform and strengthen the arrangements, including the recovery of costs related to European health insurance card reciprocal charging for European visitors and students. In parallel, we are implementing a provision in the Immigration Act 2014 to introduce the immigration health surcharge, which will ensure that temporary migrants make a financial contribution to the NHS commensurate to their immigration status.

The hon. Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) raised the very important issue of online child abuse. We already have robust legislation to deal with the creation and dissemination of illegal images. With the US Attorney General, I jointly chair a taskforce that is already galvanising the industry to develop technical solutions for it to apply in relation to child online sexual exploitation. Early signs from the work done by the industry are very encouraging. I absolutely share the hon. Lady’s concern about the issue, which is a very high priority.

The hon. Member for Plymouth, Moor View (Alison Seabeck) asked about having an offence of domestic abuse. In its review of the police’s response to domestic abuse, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary did not highlight any problems with the current legal framework, but it made it clear that delivery against the recommendations will be critical in driving the sort of sustainable and systemic culture change in the police’s response that is the best long-term solution.

My hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood) mentioned vulnerable witnesses in court. She will know about the pre-recorded evidence pilot that we are conducting in three courts. It has been running for the last couple of months, and I am happy to assure her that it is running very well, with witnesses being protected in a way that they have not been protected before.

This Government clearly have many challenges ahead during the final Session of this Parliament, and we will address all of them with the same vigour and determination that we have shown since we were elected. That is why crime is 10% lower, non-EU net migration is down by a third, victims’ services are better than ever, rehabilitation of offenders is being transformed and human traffickers are now being confronted as never before. We will build on that record in the months and, I hope, years ahead. I commend this programme to the House.

Ordered, That the debate be now adjourned.—(Mr Gyimah.)

Debate to be resumed tomorrow.