Covid-19: Ethnic Minority Disparities

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Monday 1st March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Kemi Badenoch]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I add my thanks to the Aylesbury mosque for its vital work in promoting vaccine uptake. Working with religious leaders and other respected local voices to promote vaccine uptake among ethnic minorities is key to ensuring that we reach all parts of the community. As I mentioned, the NHS has now opened 47 vaccination sites in places of worship and community centres across the country, and it is fantastic to get feedback from local MPs on how this is going.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP) [V]]

The Joint Committee on Human Rights has heard evidence that BAME communities, as well as being under-protected from covid, have been over-policed. This is evidenced by a considerable disparity in the number of fixed-penalty notices issued to BAME people over white people in England and Wales. Will the Minister consider including inequality of policing outcomes as well as health outcomes in her quarterly reports?

[Kemi Badenoch]

I thank the hon. and learned Lady for her question. Inequality of policing outcomes, I am afraid, is outside the remit of this report. We are looking purely from a health perspective at the disproportionate impact of covid-19, but I take the point that she made, and I think she will find that we will talk about this shortly, when the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities reports, because it has been looking at these specific issues.

Ministerial and other Maternity Allowances Bill

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Thursday 11th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP) [V]]

It is an honour and a privilege to follow the hon. Member for Belfast South (Claire Hanna) and the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper). I welcome this Bill, but, as others have said, it does not go far enough to tackle maternity discrimination. That said, I am delighted for the Attorney General, and I wish her every blessing with her pregnancy.

I want to focus my concerns on one aspect of this Bill that has been mentioned already: why does this Bill make no mention of women? It is women who give birth and women who benefit from maternity leave. Is this a reflection of the ideological language that is now seen across schools, universities and the NHS, which bans use of the word “woman” and use of the word “lesbian”? Why must we deny the fact that there are two sexes, and why must we deny that biological sex exists? Why are the Government not complying with the Equality Act 2010? That legislation refers to pregnancy and maternity, and uses the day-to-day language of centuries: woman, she and her.

If this is an innocent mistake, then let us put it right quickly and easily by replacing the word “person” with “woman”, but if it is not, let us talk just for a moment about the erasure of women. Most women do not even know that this erasure of their sex class is going on, and when they find out they are appalled and they cannot believe it. Those of us who try to warn of the consequences of the erasure of biological reality and the reality of womanhood from legislation are often pilloried. Many politicians are now so in thrall to those who wish to erase women for the purposes of advancing gender identity theory that they call those of us who advocate for women’s sex-based rights transphobic, even when we have never done or said anything against equal rights for trans people in our lives, and even when some of us were trans allies before it was fashionable to be such.

It is not transphobic to advocate for women’s sex-based rights under the Equality Act 2010. It is possible, and right, to support both trans rights and women’s rights. Neither should be sacrificed for the sake of the other. We can have an inclusive society for everyone without doing that. Sex is a protected characteristic for a very good reason: discrimination against women is rooted in their biology. That is our lived experience. We must find a way to be inclusive without erasing women’s biology and women’s lived experience from the statute book, so why is this Bill doing that? Women are not “chest feeders”, a phrase we heard earlier this week: women have breasts, and women feed their children with their breasts. Lesbians are same-sex attracted: we are attracted to women’s bodies, not men’s bodies, and to say we must be attracted to men’s bodies is homophobic. These things need to be said, and they need to be said in this mother of Parliaments, so let us put this Bill right and reflect the reality and the law, as set out in the Equality Act and supported by the CEDAW convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.

Future of Financial Services

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Monday 9th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

My hon. Friend has long been a fantastic champion and advocate for this sector, and he is right to be so. I agree with him about the importance of making sure that our listings regime is as competitive as it can be to make sure that we attract companies to list here in London. I look forward to getting input from him and the bodies he mentioned in the forthcoming review that we have commissioned.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP) [V]]

Would the UK Government not be in a better position to deploy these bonds if they had not flogged off the Green Investment Bank, which is headquartered in my Edinburgh South West constituency? Will the Chancellor consider passing these bond-issuing powers to the devolved Governments so that they can be put to best effect in facilitating low-carbon developments across the United Kingdom?

[Rishi Sunak]

Sovereign gilt issues will remain a reserved competency, but one of our hopes is that creating a sovereign green bond market will catalyse a domestic green bond market, as we have seen elsewhere, which would provide a benchmark for private companies to issue private green credit. I hope that will provide more capital for more companies in every part of the UK.

Oral Answers to Questions

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Tuesday 20th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

[The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (John Glen)]

[Joanna Cherry [V]]

[John Glen]

Public Health Restrictions: Government Economic Support

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

I know that my hon. Friend is a strong champion of the aviation sector, not least because he and I have discussed the issue. I know he has championed it within Government. It is not the case that the aviation sector has not had support. I pointed earlier to the £8.5 billion through the corporate financing facility. In terms of Government focus on the sector, he is absolutely right that it is an important sector for the UK to focus on. We have the largest aviation network in Europe, the third largest in the world. My hon. Friend draws attention to an important sector, and that is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport has launched a global travel taskforce, and is working with the travel industry as part of that.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

Local lockdowns affect a far wider range of businesses than just those that are forced to close. Food and drink suppliers such as Edinburgh Beer Factory in my constituency will be severely affected. Small and medium enterprises such as that are the backbone of the Scottish economy, so why has the Chancellor’s furlough replacement scheme so drastically slashed support for innovative and thriving businesses such as the Edinburgh Beer Factory?

[Steve Barclay]

It has not. It has provided a universal offer to all firms that are able to be open, for exactly the reason at the heart of her question. She is quite right that the displacement impact goes far beyond areas in tier 3 or tier 2. Businesses supplying them are affected. We had a question earlier about support for the fishing industry. One of the key challenges with the fishing industry was exactly the point to which she refers—they were supplying other businesses that had been affected, and that is why we put £10 million of support into that sector.

We have taken a universal approach. It is at odds, though, with the questions we often get in the House, which are very much about whether we can support this sector or that sector. We have taken a universal approach because we recognise that one cannot necessarily draw a geographical line around the suppliers of businesses that are impacted.

Oral Answers to Questions

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

What fiscal support he is providing to mitigate the economic effects of the covid-19 outbreak.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

What fiscal support he is providing to mitigate the economic effects of the covid-19 outbreak.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Rishi Sunak)]

We have provided unprecedented support worth more than £190 billion to protect public health, businesses and jobs, and the Government remain committed to supporting the economy throughout this crisis. In July, we published our plan for jobs, which announced further support for the economy, with initiatives such as eat out to help out, the £2 billion kickstart scheme and the £9 billion job retention bonus, all of which aim to support, create and protect jobs.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joanna Cherry]

The events and conferences industry was the first to be affected by lockdown and will be the last to see demand return. Many freelancers, such as my constituent Karen Colvin, have not benefited from support in the same way as other workers. Does the Chancellor have anything new to offer to people such as her?

[Rishi Sunak]

Many self-employed people have received the second of the self-employment income support grants—almost 3 million people have now received support through that scheme—but the hon. and learned Lady is right that the best way to provide support for people in that industry is slowly and safely to reopen those bits of our economy. My colleague the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Secretary of State is engaged with that industry to start piloting the return of business conferences and events. The situation remains under review.

Protection of Jobs and Businesses

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

I will make some progress.

In addition to our support for businesses, we have provided nearly £40 billion of support through the tax system, with tax cuts, tax deferrals and the time to pay scheme. We have provided direct cash grants of £10,000 and £25,000 for small businesses and an extensive range of loan programmes, including dedicated investments for innovative tech firms through our Future Fund, and 100% Government guaranteed loans for the smallest businesses through the bounce back loan scheme. The shadow Chancellor said that she wanted the Government to listen, and bounce back loans are a good illustration of how the Government listened to concerns and changed the coronavirus business interruption loan scheme to include that additional measure. That scheme has benefited 1.1 million businesses. The House does not need to take just my word for it, because the chief economist at the CBI described the Chancellor as

“standing shoulder to shoulder with small businesses to help them through this crisis.”

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the CBIL scheme, but many medium-sized and larger businesses in my constituency have struggled to get the loans they require. Lloyds Banking Group in particular has been poor at making positive lending decisions. What are the right hon. Gentleman and his Government doing about that?

[Steve Barclay]

I can give a clear and direct answer to that because, together with UK Finance, my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary to the Treasury has discussed bounce back loans, CBILS and larger business interruption loans. Those were targeted at up to £200 million for that mid-tier category of businesses, and I know from discussions with colleagues that a lot of regional businesses in that mid-tier category have been particularly impacted. The point is that this is about the package of Government schemes. Where there are individual constituency cases, we are, of course, always happy to look at them and UK Finance does a very good job in terms of its response.

I have set out the first phase. The second phase of the extraordinary support given relates to our plan for jobs. As part of protecting jobs, we have temporarily applied a reduced rate to VAT for tourism and hospitality, supporting over 150,000 businesses and protecting 2.4 million jobs. I do not know whether you, Mr Speaker, had an opportunity to benefit, but you will be familiar with the popular eat out to help out scheme, which has been a real success. The latest figures—only the one course, clearly, Mr Speaker—show that 100 million covers have been claimed, helping to support 130,000 businesses and protect almost 2 million jobs in a sector which, very seriously, has been particularly acutely hit by the covid pandemic.

Our plans also create new jobs, injecting new certainty and confidence in the housing market by increasing the stamp duty threshold to £500,000 for first-time buyers. That will drive growth and support across housebuilding and property sectors. It also builds on other schemes, such as creating green jobs through a £2 billion green homes grant, saving households hundreds of pounds a year on their energy bills, and through our £1 billion programme to make public buildings, including schools and hospitals, decarbonised. Together, they are all a part of the £640 billion capital investment in economic recovery, job creation and revitalising our national infrastructure over the next five years.

Public Health England Review: Covid-19 Disparities

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 4th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kemi Badenoch]

My right hon. Friend is right, and I thank her for that question. Equalities are not something that happens in the Equalities Office; equalities happen across Whitehall. Every Department has responsibility to ensure that it makes the right policies for all the people who are impacted by the activities that are carried out, and I will continue to work with them on that.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I wish to reassure Scotland’s BAME communities that the SNP takes this issue very seriously. On 20 May, the Scottish Government published Public Health Scotland’s preliminary analysis, which suggested that the proportion of BAME patients among those seriously ill with covid is no higher than the proportion in the Scottish population generally. However, the Scottish Government are treating those findings with caution, given the findings in England and Wales. Further work is under way to deepen understanding of the risk factors and improve analysis.

It was good to hear the Prime Minister agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) yesterday that black lives matter. However, actions speak louder than words and some Government policies impact more strongly on BAME communities. What action will the UK Government take to review their no recourse to public funds policies, given that the Prime Minister revealed that he was unaware that thousands of people are locked out of available support due to those rules? In addition, why will the UK Government not lower the earnings threshold for statutory sick pay, which is forcing people in BAME communities out to work when it is not safe for them to be working?

[Kemi Badenoch]

On Public Health Scotland having different results from Public Health England, we are finding this in a range of reports and it is one reason why we are not rushing to recommendations. It is important to note that the PHE review did not take into account other factors such as comorbidities. On no recourse to public funds, we have taken extensive action to support those with recourse to public funds. The range of such actions includes: protections for renters from evictions; mortgage holidays for those who need them; support for those who are vulnerable and need assistance with access to medication and shopping; the coronavirus job retention scheme; and the self-employed income support scheme. Those with no recourse to public funds do have access to statutory sick pay, which the hon. and learned Lady mentioned. Furthermore, if an individual has been working in the UK and sufficient national insurance contributions have been made, they may be entitled to claim contributory employment and support allowance. We have also allocated £750 million of funding for charities, which are providing vital support to vulnerable people at this difficult time.

Beer and Pub Taxation

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Wednesday 5th February 2020 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South) (SNP)]

I thank the hon. Member for Dudley South (Mike Wood) for securing the debate. This is my first experience of a Westminster Hall debate, and it is fantastic that so many hon. Members are interested in beer—more than are interesting in sitting in the main Chamber most of the time. That is the state of play in politics.

We have heard some interesting contributions, not least from the hon. Member for Clacton (Giles Watling), who highlighted the fact that he is well kent in many pubs. I invite him to come to Aberdeen South any time he wants to go for a beer, but the pint is on him.

I actually have shares in a brewery company, but I do not need to declare them because I have only two. I am sure that many hon. Members are aware of the company, BrewDog, which is one of the huge success stories of north-east Scotland. We have many brilliant local craft breweries in north-east Scotland that must be celebrated, such as Park Brew in Angus and Eden Mill in the constituency of the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain), who I saw earlier. We have to celebrate the number of breweries in Scotland and across the UK.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

The brewing industry is important to the Scottish economy across the nation. In my constituency alone there is the Caledonian Brewery, the headquarters of Heineken UK, the award-winning Edinburgh Beer Factory and the International Centre for Brewing and Distilling at Heriot-Watt University. Does my hon. Friend agree that if the Chancellor wants to help the Scottish economy, he will cut beer duty?

[Stephen Flynn]

It is an important discussion and I will come on to that point. I have been an elected Member in Scotland for a considerable period of time, and what I hear from Conservatives there is that the business rates in Scotland are a complete and utter mess. Having listened to this debate, it appears that they are an even bigger mess in England, if the contributions from Conservative Members are anything to go by.

The important point in the Scottish context, as my hon. Friend the Member for Angus (Dave Doogan) noted, is that Scotland has the most competitive business rates in the entire Isles. Indeed, more than 100,000 businesses, many of them local pubs, are in receipt of the small business bonus, without which they would not survive. In the Scottish Parliament the Conservatives have put that at risk in the last few days. It was only after a dramatic U-turn that they decided to side with the Scottish Government to ensure that the small business bonus was kept in place. That was right, but it should never have been in doubt. With regard to business rates, we in Scotland are well placed to say that we support local pubs and local industry, but there is certainly more that can be done.

One aspect that has not been touched on in enough detail when it comes to taxation is the public health impact.

Mortgage Prisoners

Joanna Cherry Excerpts

Thursday 6th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Charlie Elphicke]

I thank the hon. Lady for that powerful point. Like me, she is a member the Treasury Select Committee and has been pressing for us to explore this matter on the Committee in greater depth. She has been a true champion on behalf of mortgage prisoners. As the House can see, it is a subject that has crossed the political partisan divide to become an issue on which we need to work together collaboratively to provide a solution and resolution.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this important debate. We do not always agree on issues, but we certainly agree on this one. He mentioned Cerberus. Constituents of mine, Mr and Mrs Neave, were subject to pretty appalling treatment at the hands of the Clydesdale Bank, which converted their loan into a totally inappropriate overdraft facility without their agreement or signing off on any papers. Then the Clydesdale Bank flogged it off to a Cerberus subsidiary, which has effectively bankrupted my constituents. Does he agree that when banks package up these debts without any permission from the debtors and then flog them off to vulture funds, they are effectively packaging up people’s lives and flogging them off, as they have done to my constituents, Mr and Mrs Neave?

[Charlie Elphicke]

The hon. and learned Lady makes a powerful point, and a slightly separate point, if I understand her correctly. I have been talking so far about mortgage prisoners. I think she is referencing small business borrowers, which is a separate issue on which I shall also be touching in this debate. It is a very important issue, because they, too, are vulnerable customers, in many cases, and need very similar protections to mortgage prisoners.

There has been some change on the matter of mortgage prisoners. The FCA launched a consultation in March and proposed changing the mortgage affordability rules for customers who are up to date with payments, but there is a shortcoming. Its proposals only give lenders the option to apply the modified assessment. It does not propose to introduce an obligation.

It is also welcome that in July last year UK Finance, the banks’ trade association, launched a voluntary agreement under which lenders committed to supporting existing mortgage prisoners to switch to an alternative product with their present lender, but that does not help people to switch from the vulture funds, and it does not seem to help Mr and Mrs Adams escape TSB’s Whistletree fund, even though they are with the same lender. I hope that the FCA consultation will address and enforce that and make sure that people are not left in that difficult position.

How can we free the mortgage prisoners? These mortgages were taken out many years ago, back in 2007—some even before that—well before the post-crash rules came in. These borrowers have proven their ability to pay for over a decade in making their payments. Why do we have a computer-driven affordability test that ignores the reality of the real world? We have to move beyond “computer says no” to “reality says yes”. These borrowers should be treated as grandfathered as regards the regulatory rules that came in later. Banks should be obliged by the FCA to take people on and treat them as grandfathered, be they existing customers or not, and the new mortgages should be permitted without any regulatory penalty for the bank they move to.

The Treasury needs to take responsibility too. The Treasury’s UK asset resolution division has been selling off Northern Rock’s loan book to funds such as Cerberus. The instruction seems to have been to get the highest price at any price. Indeed, the head of UKAR, who is paid more than £650,000, recently boasted in The Times about how much it had managed to get for its loan books. His pay will rise to £823,000 next year if he completes the loan book sell-off. He is incentivised to achieve value for money not to consider the wider circumstances and necessary protections. I hope the Minister will address that in his remarks. There is real concern that the Government could be facilitating the creation of more mortgage prisoners.

When selling these books, the Treasury should be making sure there are the proper protections so that borrowers do not unfairly lose out. It claimed it did that in the case of Cerberus, but that turned out to have certain shortcomings—something I think the Treasury Select Committee should look into. It is wrong for the Treasury to pursue the highest amount of cash at the expense of vulnerable borrowers who have been placed in a worse position than otherwise would have been the case.

Moreover, if the Treasury is willing to sell mortgage books to vulture funds, what is to stop the likes of Tesco, Metro Bank and many others following that example? That is why we need to consider a wholesale ban on selling these mortgages to unregulated firms—full stop. The best way to achieve that is through the regulation of the whole industry. Regulating mortgages—all mortgages—will ensure that all customers are treated more fairly by mandating best practice in each and every case. That might mean that when books are sold off a little less is achieved because they cannot enjoy the fruits of regulatory arbitrage, but it will mean that vulnerable people get better protections and are more safely and carefully looked after.

There needs to be a better deal for business borrowers as well. The hon. and learned Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry) rightly mentioned that issue just now. Business loans above £25,000 are unregulated. Time and again, we have seen the results of this—the Royal Bank of Scotland’s Global Restructuring Group, the Lloyds business support unit, and others. Small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy. We must treat them fairly so that they can focus on what they do best, which is creating jobs and making our country more successful.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Grant (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Rushanara Ali), and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke) on securing this important debate. I know he feels strongly about this issue, and I understand that his ten-minute rule Bill has been taken up by the Government. This is an emotive topic for nearly 200,000 of our constituents who find themselves trapped with an unaffordable mortgage, in many cases simply because they happened to be mortgaged to a financial institution that foundered during the financial crisis. The majority, although not all, were with Northern Rock or Bradford & Bingley.

For the most part, those families did everything correctly. They saved for their future and made every mortgage payment on time, yet they remain trapped with interest rates of around 5%. They are unable to transfer their mortgage to a more reasonable and current percentage rate of 2% because that is, bizarrely, deemed unaffordable by lenders as a result of responsible lending rules brought about by that same financial crisis—an unhappy and unfortunate irony.

I was very surprised to learn that regulated mortgages could be sold on to unregulated funds overseas, such as Cerberus, which we heard about earlier and is based in the United States. In addition to mortgage prisoners, the issue also affects those who have loans. A family in my constituency had two tailored business loans with the Clydesdale Bank, a reputable name with a sense of security, which they took out in 2011. The Clydesdale subsequently sold the loans, which involved significant sums, to Cerberus. If I may, I would like to quote from my constituent:

“Communications received from Cerberus and those responsible for managing our loan on their behalf, were very confusing, with letters being received from various sources: Henrico Ltd, Engage Commercial, Pepper UK Ltd and Cerberus European Servicing Ltd. There was a complex web of names and numbers and it was impossible to get anyone to answer any queries. Emails were not replied to. One letter intimated our interest was to be a staggering 29%, causing us considerable alarm. It was unclear whether, legally, we needed to pay interest or repayments to Cerberus. We calculated monthly interest payments and paid them to”—

wait for it—

“Thames Collections Ltd. There was considerable anxiety on our part as to whether even a few pence short payment might be used as an excuse to put us into administration.”

[Joanna Cherry]

The hon. Gentleman’s constituents’ experience with Cerberus reflects the experience of my constituents, the Neaves. They had a friend’s accountant look at the papers. That person identified overcharging in the region of £75,000 in interest and charges, but they have just not been able to do anything about that. As I say, they have been bankrupted.

[Bill Grant]

I thank the hon. and learned Lady for that intervention. I regret the journey her constituents had. Fortunately, while it was a very dark journey for my constituents, the result was not as catastrophic, but these are serious matters. As has been said in this Chamber, small business people are the backbone of Britain and they need our support.

The family’s fear was about putting the company into administration to gain access to their assets—assets that were greater than the value of the loan. As I said, there was a reasonable outcome. Eventually, the family, through their own diligence, were fortunate enough to be able to escape and move to another bank. The effect that dealing with this company had on their business and day-to-day lives is still very raw. Yet for more mortgage prisoners, it remains an ongoing concern.

I welcome to a degree the fact that the Financial Conduct Authority is taking this issue seriously—not before time. In March, it launched a consultation on rule changes that would allow mortgage prisoners to move to a better deal. I understand that the consultation closes on 26 June and I encourage anybody in this situation to respond to it. It is also clear that the Treasury is in agreement with the FCA’s stance, with the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen), confirming in a written question earlier this year:

“HM Treasury welcomes the FCA’s announcement that it intends to change its mortgage lending rules to move to an affordability assessment for customers seeking to switch to a cheaper mortgage without borrowing more”.

That is encouraging, but sadly it does not include an obligation for it to do so.

With a consensus in Parliament, positive action from the regulator and indeed Government support, one might wonder why there is even a need for this debate. It is simply that the issue has gone on for far too long, has caused too much stress, grief and misery for our constituents throughout the UK, and can be so obviously resolved that it must not be allowed to persist much longer.

I urge the FCA and the Government to act swiftly and provide a binding solution that will extricate our constituents from this unsatisfactory situation. We can free the mortgage prisoners. If I may, I would like to borrow a small phrase from the British Transport police, “See it, say it, sorted”. We have seen it and we have said it. Sort it.