Repeal of the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011

John Hemming Excerpts

Thursday 23rd October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Allen]

I am not saying that it is the fixed term that has helped create a lively Parliament; it is Members of Parliament who have done that, by carving out a niche and exploiting the difficulties of coalition Government, and more credit to them for doing so. However, I have to say to the hon. Gentleman, who is foremost among those pushing back the envelope—I congratulate him on that—that what the Executive giveth, the Executive can take away. Were we to return to a one-party Government, of whichever party, I guarantee that they would seek to roll back some of the gains that he and just about every colleague in the Chamber today have played a part in securing, bringing greater responsibility to Parliament. I warn colleagues here today that the tide will go out very rapidly indeed. We now have, for the first time in parliamentary history, Select Committee Chairs elected by secret ballot and by the whole House, as in my case, and that could easily become a thing of the past. In a one-party Government, the Prime Minister would instruct people to clamp down on dissent and nonconformity.

Similarly, colleagues elected to Select Committees by secret ballot and by party, such as the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope), could be under threat. Difficult and awkward customers of the sort I revel in dealing with in my Committee, many of whom are in the Chamber today, will be the first casualties. I say that not because I am trying to scare them, but because I used to be in the Whips Office and had to take Members out of Select Committees and try to get compliant Chairs elected. Sadly, I have been there, done that—I am the gamekeeper turned poacher, and possibly turned gamekeeper again.

The idea that we have cracked it and that we now have a Parliament that in a one-party Government will be as frisky as this one is misleading. We have to protect the small gains we have made in recent years and build upon them, rather than regressing to the good old days when we used to allow Prime Ministers the unprecedented power in a democracy of deciding the date of an election.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

I share the hon. Gentleman’s concern about the power of the Executive. Does he agree that the constitution should be established in the best interests not of the Prime Minister, but of the country as a whole, particularly in circumstances in which we are having to borrow a lot of money on the money markets to fund the deficit, which means the stability that arises from the Prime Minister not having the power to call an election anytime he feels like it is in the interests of the country as a whole?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

This is an important debate and I welcome the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) opened it. The subject needs to be aired by this House. I do not necessarily see the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011 as the work of the forces of evil or, indeed, the Liberal Democrats. On the other hand, the alternative of the previous system is not necessarily a panacea.

In practical terms, if the coalition had fallen apart at some point, the Prime Minister would probably have come to the House and proposed a Dissolution, and I would have been extremely surprised if the Leader of the Opposition had not agreed with the proposition of having a general election to sort out the situation. The need for a two-thirds majority principally means that the Conservative party and the Labour party could conspire to have a Dissolution on a date on which they both agree. Essentially, it does not prevent a general election from taking place; it just means that there would have to be a degree of consultation between both major parties.

I do not think that fixed-term Parliaments are necessarily a good thing, for some of the reasons that have already been discussed. I think there comes a time—four years is probably long enough—when a Government ought to try to get a new mandate from the electorate. If we look back at history, we will see that at one point we had seven-year Parliaments and then the term was reduced to five years. We have always taken a pragmatic approach to general elections. We missed a general election in 1940, for the very understandable reason that we were doing other things at the time. That was quite reasonable and one must remember that that Parliament ran all the way to 1945.

Whenever the United Kingdom has had early general elections—I think we ought to focus on early general elections, rather than those that have taken place towards the end of a term after four, four and a half, or five years—it was usually because the electorate gave an indecisive result and, for the sake of good government, the political parties wanted the electorate to reconsider through another general election. At the end of the day, apart from holding the Government to account, Parliament is about ensuring that there is a Government, who have to deliver the health service, education and pensions. Of course, the 2010 Government had to manage the British economy, which has to be managed in a particular way. Those are very important issues.

Governments have gone early on two occasions in my lifetime. The Wilson Government of February 1974 went and got a small majority that October, and the 1964 Labour Government were re-elected in 1966, having initially got a very small majority.

[John Hemming]

Obviously, we have had fixed-term Parliaments for a long time; it is just that the Prime Minister had the power to call an early election. Who does my hon. Friend believe should have the power to decide to have an early election?

[Mr Syms]

Actually, the power to call a general election is a poisoned chalice for a Prime Minister: if they win it is great, but if they lose they generally get the chop because they made the wrong decision. Under the old system, Conservative campaign headquarters told its candidates that there were only so many Thursdays—which, by convention, we used—and only so many days of the year, because of summer days and autumn, on which we could have a general election. When it comes down to it, there are only four or five dates a Prime Minister can choose from. A Prime Minister has the seals of office from the Queen and the responsibility to discharge a Government programme. If someone has to decide, I would prefer it to be the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

[Mr Syms]

I am perfectly sure that, in normal politics, some incumbents have a slight advantage. Clearly, both Mrs Thatcher and Tony Blair used it to the maximum. One election was delayed by foot and mouth, so events can intervene and cause a delay, if everyone agrees to it. At the time, there was consensus across the House that it would have been impossible to have a general election. I remember driving through Devon and seeing pyres of the carcases of animals being burned. That showed the British system being flexible to deal with something that emerged very quickly.

[John Hemming]

I thank my hon. Friend for his previous answer. He said the effective test of whether the Prime Minister’s decision to have an election was a good one was whether the Prime Minister got elected, and that the test was measured by the political party. In essence, such a decision is driven by the party interest, not the public interest.

[Mr Syms]

There is an element of truth in that, but to go back to my earlier point, if a Prime Minister dissolves Parliament and loses, they usually end up losing the leadership of their party. Harold Wilson was unusual: he won three elections out of the four he contested, but survived after losing—by surprise—in 1970. He of course chose the date in 1970, but that was after a long period during which his party thought that it would win. In reality, most Prime Ministers go when they think they will win. Most of them hang on when they think they will lose, in the hope of something turning up, which it normally does not, and five-year Parliaments can be tortuous and difficult.

I believe we should go back to the previous system of having some flexibility in when general elections occur. In reality, they normally occur some time in the fourth and fifth year of a Parliament.

[John Hemming]

rose—

[Mr Syms]

I will give way for the last time.

[John Hemming]

I am sure that my hon. Friend agrees that a key priority of this Parliament has been to sort out the finances, but uncertainty creates greater instability in the financial markets. If we had to pay another 1%, it would cost us about £10 billion or more a year. Does he think that that is a reasonable price for the taxpayer to pay for giving back a power over general elections to the Prime Minister?

[Mr Syms]

One thing on which I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough, who introduced the debate in a very reasonable fashion, is that we may in future have more coalition Governments than some of us would like. If we look at the pattern of politics, we can clearly see that more people are willing to vote for a range of parties, which in itself brings challenges for the major political parties. It may well be that fixed-term Parliaments are used as a device when other coalitions are formed in future.

I hope that there will be a clear overall majority for the Conservative party when there is an election—or that there is a clear majority among the electorate—but if there is no such majority and, to return to my earlier point, someone has to run the economy, interest rates need to be maintained, restrictions on public expenditure are still needed and tough decisions have to be made, coalitions will sometimes be the best vehicle.

I have always taken a very pragmatic view of the British constitution. It has shown that it can be amended, changed and challenged by what is thrown at it. The remarkable thing about 2010 was that there was an indecisive general election but a strong Government were formed to deal with the very difficult issues we faced. Those issues will still need to be dealt with in the next Parliament.

I simply point out that it would be better to have flexibility in the system. At some stage, we will find ourselves in the situation where a general election is the solution to dealing with the problems. Given some of the current polls, with both major parties on percentage shares in the 30s, one possible result would be for each to have between 260 and 280 seats and for neither to be able to form a coalition with any other party, and that would lead us into grand coalition territory. We had that in February 1974, when the Conservatives conspired to allow the Labour party to govern until there was another general election. It would be unusual but not impossible to have a situation in which no Government could be sustained. In such a case, rather than having some absurd coalition with both major parties getting together but agreeing on nothing, it would be sensible for the electorate at some point to get the chance to decide which party or coalition of parties they wished to run the country.

The coalition has not done a bad job. It was necessary, and it has probably helped the British economy. Having fixed-term Parliaments was one part of the deal. That was perfectly respectable politics, because there was a need to reassure the junior partner in the coalition. However, being conservative constitutionally, I rather hope that we can go back to the previous system. If we do, it will be the decision of my right hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr Cameron), if he is the Prime Minister after the next election, to decide about the following election. If he then made the wrong decision, he would have to pay the consequences for that.

[Austin Mitchell (Great Grimsby) (Lab)]

I support the proposal to repeal the Fixed-term Parliaments Act 2011. I congratulate the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) and his colleagues on raising the issue. It seems to me that we should have much shorter Parliaments. It is possible to have fixed terms, but there has to be a right or an ability to end a Parliament in circumstances such as war, economic crisis or disaster. We can therefore have a term that is fixed, but the period should be shorter.

The best evidence against five-year Parliaments—frankly, five years is too long—is the long, slow death rattle of this Parliament. If Members want to see a monument to the failure of five-year Parliaments, they should look at what is happening now. In effect, this Parliament and this Government did all they were going to do in their first three years. Most of that was wrong of course, but it was done during those first three years. Frankly, we are now just hanging on in this House with nothing particular to do. It reminds me of the old Bing Crosby song:

“We’re busy doing nothing,

Working the whole day through,

Trying to find lots of things not to do”.

The attendance at this extremely important constitutional debate shows that Members do not particularly want to be in the Chamber; they would rather be in their constituencies fighting an election campaign. That is what, at the end of this Parliament, we are really doing: if we are not fighting an election campaign, we are busy throwing custard pies at each other.

At this moment in this Parliament, the Government have got to the end of their tether. There has never been a better moment to use Oliver Cromwell’s words—they apply to all of us—when he dismissed the Long Parliament:

“You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!”

But this agony now has to be prolonged, with the farce of pretending to do things when we are just electioneering and throwing trivia at each other, until the end of March, before there is a renewal in the election in May. This Parliament is conclusive proof that five years is too long.

The hon. Member for Poole (Mr Syms) said that four years might be reasonable, but emphasised the need for continuity in economic policy. The usual claim for a five-year Parliament is that that gives the Government time to implement their policies, but this Parliament has given this Government time to change every policy that they started out with. We started out with “Hug a hoodie”, but that turned out to be cutting benefits for young people. We started out with “Hug a Husky” and “Save the environment”, but that ended up as “green crap.” We started out with “Support the European Union”, but we now use every possible occasion to provoke dissent and argument within the European Union. We started out with “Immigrants welcome”, but it is now, “Keep everybody out.” We started out with “We’re all in it together”, but that has ended up with putting the penalties and pains on the poor, while rewarding the rich.

Even continuity of economic policy, which is claimed to be the most sacrosanct element during this Parliament, has not been provided by a five-year term. The only continuity of economic policy to which this Government can lay claim—apart from cuts to everything, or slash and burn, which is the Government’s only long-term economic plan—has been produced not by them, but by the Bank of England. Frankly, the independent Bank of England has saved the Government. We now have a recovery, but if interest rates are kept flat to the floor, as they have been for the six years since the crisis, and if money is printed at a record rate—through quantitative easing, we have printed £375 billion—there is bound, at some stage, to be a recovery. That is not the Government’s long-term economic plan. Their plan was to cut and slash and burn everything and to roll back the state. The Bank of England’s management of the economy has produced the only successful long-term economic policy. Therefore, the argument for long-term economic policies also fails.

My hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) is too hopeful about long parliamentary terms. He mentioned five-year and even 10-year Parliaments, which caused me to shudder in my seat. What is the best term for a Parliament? I do not want it to be thought that, now that I am leaving, I want to cut everybody else’s joy and pleasure by reducing the parliamentary term to three years, but I would like to do so. I have said that consistently. I proposed it when the Fixed-term Parliaments Bill was discussed in 2011.

[John Hemming]

The hon. Gentleman is making the case for shorter Parliaments. The question is who should make the decision. Should the term be fixed or should the Prime Minister be given back the power to make the decision purely on party interest, thereby costing everyone a lot of money?

[Austin Mitchell]

There could be a combination of the two. That happens in Australia and New Zealand. In New Zealand, there is a fixed three-year term, but the Prime Minister can call an election earlier. The Executive has to have that right and power. Most Governments work out their three-year term and do not go earlier. Some go earlier to seize a particular moment or because of an emergency. We have to give the Government that power, otherwise we will have the situation that Germany found itself in when the Social Democratic party had to engineer its own defeat in Parliament before it could get an election.

[John Hemming]

Why does the hon. Gentleman believe that the Prime Minister alone should be able to make that decision, rather than Parliament through a majority?

[Austin Mitchell]

In saying the Prime Minister, I meant the Government. It has to be a collective decision. It will effectively be a party decision, although in my experience most of the elections that have been called by the Labour party have not been party decisions, because I have not been consulted. I am not sure whether the Liberal Democrats are consulted on such matters.

[John Hemming]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for the confirmation that it would be a party decision taken in the party interest. Should it not be a decision that is taken in the public interest?

[Austin Mitchell]

I think that that would be difficult to arrange. It is a political decision that is taken by the Executive. In a democratic party, I would hope that the Executive would consult the party. That did not happen before the elections that were called by my party when we were in power, but I felt that it should have done. Jim Callaghan certainly should have consulted me, because if he had called an election in October 1978, we probably would have won. He tended not to listen to my advice, however loudly it was put. That was a failure of Back-Bench power.

I am in favour of a three-year term. At a pinch, I would accept a four-year term. It should be a fixed term, with the ability to call an early election in extreme or difficult circumstances. If we had that, we would not have to have all the silliness of the recall legislation that we were dealing with on Tuesday. I have never known a more stupid Bill than the Recall of MPs Bill. I was not given the opportunity to vote against it, because there was no vote. All parties are grovelling before the electorate by saying, “Let us sacrifice ourselves and throw MPs to the wolves.” There would be no need for recall if we had a three-year term, because by the time the machinery of recall had cranked into operation, the three years would be over and the electorate would be able to turn everybody out and make a new choice.

I am being moderate by calling for short, triennial Parliaments. I am old enough to have been a Chartist, I suppose, but I am not espousing annual Parliaments, as the Chartists did. A three-year Parliament accords with the mood of the public, as we read it in the major polls and surveys. There is an alienated mood. People want to be heard. They are angry and upset. They want to have an influence, but they feel that MPs are not listening and that Parliament does not represent them.

Birmingham Schools

John Hemming Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

I thank the hon. Gentleman, and I appreciated the conversation I had with him this morning. The Department will of course take on board the information he outlines. As part of the new commissioner’s appointment, we will pursue those names, and there may be others involved in what has happened. He makes an important point, which is that what happened was the destabilisation of the teaching staff in those schools. When one reads the reports and realises what has been going on against the wishes of the vast majority of teachers, one sees that when the teachers, and head teachers in particular, turned to the council, they did not get the support they should have received. That is something we all have to reflect on.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

I support equal marriage, but a number of my constituents, both Muslim and non-Muslim, do not. Does the Secretary of State agree that it is very important to make a distinction between people with socially conservative views, and those who have extremist or divisive views? We must not be seen to be attacking people with socially conservative views.

[Nicky Morgan]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. There is an agreed Government definition of extremism, and that is the one Peter Clarke used in his report. However, I return to my original point: from all my conversations with the Birmingham community, it is clear that the vast majority were in no way involved with, or supportive of, anything that happened in these schools; it was a small group of people pushing a particular ideology, and it should always be remembered that the wider community deserves our greatest support.

Birmingham Schools

John Hemming Excerpts

Monday 9th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. Let me stress that prior to the publication of these reports and of Sir Michael Wilshaw’s covering letter, some questioned whether these investigations were worth while. I pay tribute to her for emphasising how important it is that we deal with the findings. I also pay tribute to the shadow Secretary of State for making it clear that Sir Michael Wilshaw’s integrity is unimpeachable.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

I thank the Secretary of State for the opportunity to see the papers in advance, there being two schools affected in my constituency. The National Association of Head Teachers has expressed concern that the system of investigation and inspection is rather inchoate and suggested that a more coherent system of investigation of allegations is needed. I agree—does the Secretary of State?

[Michael Gove]

It is absolutely right that we review how we investigate the problems that have been identified. As the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) pointed out, it is clear that Ofsted has uncovered a number of unacceptable practices. It is also clear that the Education Funding Agency has additional powers in relation to academies that have been incredibly useful in this regard as well. I am entirely open to considering how, in future, we can provide parents with guarantees that their children are safe.

EU-US Trade and Investment Agreement

John Hemming Excerpts

Thursday 18th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[John Healey]

Indeed. In this post-global financial crisis period, and the global downturn in trade that followed, there is a crisis in citizen and consumer confidence in business. Reasserting that confidence will require standards and agreements that people believe will benefit them, their families and their areas, and are not just deals done by politicians and big business in the backrooms of Brussels.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Healey]

The hon. Gentleman is the only Liberal Democrat in the Chamber, so I am delighted to give way.

[John Hemming]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for giving way and congratulate him on his all-party work, which he is very good at. I agree that the views on the Government Benches are not united. I have a lot of sympathy with the idea of maintaining minimum standards.

[John Healey]

I am grateful for that continuing cross-party support at least. [Interruption.] The Minister is chuckling away; I look forward to hearing what he has to say a little later.

I have a third answer to my friends who ask why I am backing the deal, and it is this. I am pro-European and pro-internationalist, and I think this potential agreement underlines more clearly than anything the benefits for Britain of being part of the European Union. Those benefits would be simply unavailable if Britain left the European Union and tried to go it alone.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

First, I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I do not think that I have any relevant financial interests on this occasion. I am a member of a copyright society, and I have traded with America in the past, but I do not think I have a direct financial interest; obviously, my constituents have a substantial financial interest in the subject, because I am the Member of Parliament for Birmingham, Yardley, and although there are no Jaguar Land Rover plants in the constituency, it is next to the JLR plants in Solihull and Castle Bromwich. An agreement could mean 26% more exports of vehicles, which would reduce yet further unemployment in my constituency, and that is obviously something that I would like.

The UK and the US were, in many ways, the first countries to promote and extend free trade worldwide, as we see it today. That vision has been furthered by our membership of the EU, and we have been a driving force in extending and widening the free market. There have been set-backs, both in the UK and the US. Both countries have toyed with protectionism—that is even going on at the moment—often with negative effect. More recently, the EU and the US have had periods of fracture. The dispute over the two biggest aircraft manufacturers in the world, Boeing and Airbus, at the World Trade Organisation was not good. The US obligations to scan shipping containers and the “Buy America” provisions have also served to undermine trade. The EU emissions trading scheme for airlines was seen as unilateral by international partners, despite decades of inaction on the issue.

Bars and grills have an exception from music licensing rules in the US; that exception exempts 70% of bars and restaurants and almost half of shops from having to pay copyright royalties, and that remains a key outstanding issue. That exemption was found incompatible with the agreement on trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights, yet it remains in force, and no compensation, however minimal, has been made available to European and British artists since 2004. Interestingly, people are critical of China for not abiding by intellectual property law, but the US has an issue in that regard as well.

[Jonathan Evans]

That is sometimes called the music case. It is interesting; the US Government did pay some compensation on behalf of those people who are breaching the law, but they have not paid it since, so there is a clear precedent for their recognising that they are in the wrong.

[John Hemming]

Yes; I think $3.3 million was paid before 2004, which is why I said “since 2004”. The US Government recognise that there is an issue, but the problem continues none the less. I think that the US has been critical of China, but it should sort out its own issues as well.

I am sure that the House will echo my call for American Congress to uphold its obligations under existing international trade laws, respect intellectual property and use this process to salve wounds. A disregard for intellectual property only encourages others to have a similar disregard. It would be quite wrong for our laws to ignore American intellectual property, and it is about time the United States returned our courtesy.

Despite those set-backs, this new free trade agreement is to be strongly welcomed as a once-in-a-generation opportunity for the UK that will bring benefits of around £10 billion a year to our economy, help to build a stronger economy, and create many much-needed jobs. It is proof that our participation in the European Union does not restrict us from trading with the rest of the world.

Although the EU and US combined account for more than half of the world economy, our agreements with Korea have seen EU exports to Korea go up by 16.2%. For the first time in 15 years, we have a trade surplus with Korea, and UK exports to Brazil, India, China, Russia and South Africa have jumped from £12.7 billion in 2007 to £27.1 billion last year.

Being a member of the largest free trade area in the world creates jobs and opportunities for British industry around the world, and our relentless drive to widen and deepen the single market has created prosperity for the many, not the few. We simply get a better deal when we work with the world’s trade superpower—the EU—than when we act alone, which is why we should work with our allies to concentrate on reform and ensure that the European budget spends more on boosting jobs, research, development and infrastructure, as we did with the multi-annual settlement up to 2020.

The coalition Government are to be commended for ensuring that there is an overall cut in the budget and an increase in job-boosting measures. We need these negotiations fast-tracked, and I hope that Her Majesty’s Government are able to impress both on our allies in the US and our European partners the need to enter these negotiations in a spirit of can-do—with the “single tank of gas” approach mentioned earlier.

We have seen the greatest slow-down in world growth since the 1930s depression, and stalled starts must not be tolerated. My party, the Liberal Democrats, wants to see a relentless focus on jobs and growth. I personally do not believe that we can delay the discussion with the electorate on our role in the European Union, but I am unashamed to make the case for working with Europe to boost our economy.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

I am sure that, like me, the hon. Gentleman has seen that the CBI’s director general recently said that we pack a bigger punch in securing trade deals when we are inside the EU, rather than outside. He clearly set out that the US wants that bigger prize. Is that not exactly why the uncertainty about our future position in the EU is really unhelpful to British business?

[John Hemming]

I disagree. I think that we owe it to the British people to give them a vote. There is uncertainty until that has happened. It has been far too long since the vote in the 1970s, and we need a referendum on the issue, although I am happy for it to wait until 2017. I would most likely vote to remain in, but that does not mean that I do not support a referendum. The issue needs to be resolved by us asking the British people.

It is in our national interest and the interests of the wider world to encourage free trade through Europe and increase prosperity for all, because it undoubtedly works. We must uproot direct barriers to trade; end import tariffs, business restrictions on services and regulatory barriers; and make it easier for investment to reach both sides of the Atlantic. Where joint positions on rules governing competition, state-owned enterprises, raw materials, energy, small and medium-sized enterprises, and transparency do not exist, it would be beneficial if joint positions could be established, so that we can form a new global standard of excellence in trade.

The potential benefits of an agreement are huge. The US is our second-largest trading partner, with two-way trade totalling £129 billion in 2011, while £200 billion has been invested by US companies in the UK. It is in our vital economic and national interests to ensure that we expand our economy, and this US-EU free trade agreement should receive support from all sides of the House.

I accept that there are complexities, and I have sympathy with the argument that we should not have a rush to the bottom internationally, so I am sympathetic to the idea of looking more widely than just at issues to do with tariff barriers in discussions. However, from the point of view of the financial interests of my west midlands constituents who work either directly in the motor business or in the supply chain, it is clear that an agreement would be a very positive step forward in most respects and should therefore be supported. However, it is good that the all-party group on EU-US trade and investment has been created, because the fear in such processes is that if we do not look at the issues until the agreement is brought about, what can we do about them? I welcome the fact that the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) and his colleagues asked for this debate, because we need to discuss the agreement before it is decided; otherwise, it is too late. However, generally, the agreement seems a good idea.

Children and Families Bill

John Hemming Excerpts

Tuesday 11th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Lisa Nandy (Wigan) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), who, like so many Members, is incredibly passionate about these issues and did an enormous amount to shape the Bill in its current form. Many Members here today are deeply frustrated that they have not yet had any opportunity to scrutinise some really important areas of the Bill, and I share their frustration. I will attempt to be as brief as I can so that as many of them can speak as possible while we make sure that we do this Bill and these children justice.

When we scrutinised the Bill on Second Reading, my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) and I said that it would come to be characterised as much by what was not in it as what was. That is the motivation behind our new clause 20, which would ensure that sex and relationships education is available to all children across the country. The nation has been shocked by child grooming scandals where young girls have been systematically exploited by older men—often men who they thought were taking care of them.

Research by the Children’s Commissioner has found that far too many young people—boys and girls—do not know what a good relationship looks like. Worryingly, it also found that many of them did not even understand the concept of consent. Our view is that we are failing to equip young people with the knowledge, skills and resilience they need to keep themselves safe. We must do much more to tackle child abuse, but more importantly we must prevent it from happening in the first place.

Young people are increasingly exposed to risks online. We think that the question is not whether we can afford to talk to them about issues as difficult as this, but whether we can afford not to. We think that all children should have the opportunity to access age-appropriate sex and relationships education. In a departmental report on personal, social, health and economic education, young people said that they valued the chance to express views safely and ask questions, and felt that that had improved their relationship with others. We believe that parents should retain the right to withdraw children aged 15 or under because they know their children best, but equally we know that the vast majority of parents would like their children to have access to sex and relationships education. For children whose parents do not talk to them about these issues, this could be critical in keeping them safe, especially given that a third of girls say that they have experienced unwanted touching. We are keen for the Government to support our proposed new clause 20.

Amendment 33, which stands in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Washington and Sunderland West, seeks to ensure that we do not put speed before getting it right for children. It would ensure that children are not placed in fostering or adoption placements either before it has been decided that adoption is the plan or, in the Minister’s words, as early as the first week in care. We debated this at length in Committee, so I will not labour the point, but that debate gave me more cause for concern, not less.

It seems to me that placing children in fostering or adoption placements before the local authority has decided that that should be the plan is more disruptive for the child. Conducting an informal matching process, possibly within a week, before placing the child and then considering their wishes and feelings about whether adoption is suitable and the placement is the right one runs the risk of putting more people off adopting, as many Members have pointed out, and of more adoption breakdowns, which plays into children’s biggest fears that this for-ever home may not be the right one. As always, when we talked to children about this, they felt strongly that their views should be heard.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Lisa Nandy]

I am sorry, but I cannot give way because a number of Back Benchers have sat through this entire debate and are desperate to get in. I wish the hon. Gentleman well in doing so.

In Committee, the Minister said that further statutory guidance would be provided to local authorities that are making this important decision. Although that does not alleviate all my concerns, the guidance will clearly be central to the practical effects of clause 1. Why have we not yet seen a draft of the guidance, and when will we see it?

Amendment 34, which stands in my name, relates to the consideration of ethnicity in adoption placements. The Minister expressed concern in Committee that placing ethnicity on the welfare checklist, as we are suggesting, will put undue weight on it. He said:

“As soon as one tries to specify particular elements of a child’s characteristics in an exhaustive list, one then starts to prioritise one characteristic over another.”––[Official Report, Children and Families Public Bill Committee, 12 March 2013; c. 205.]

I want him to consider briefly that the opposite may be the problem.

The Minister referred to research by Birmingham city council that looked at the experience of prospective adopters. It certainly emerged that a problem with practice—aggressive questioning, for example—and not with legislation had put people off. The research also demonstrated, however, that the majority of adopters—a staggering 90%—had expressed a strong preference to adopt a child with a similar ethnicity and that it was the failure to explore such factors with potential adopters that prevented children from black and minority ethnic backgrounds from being considered. In fact, in the one case in which a social worker did do that, the prospective parents went on to successfully adopt a child with a different ethnicity.

I reiterate that the amendment would not ensure that children were matched only with prospective adopters with the same background as them. Crucially, however, it would ensure that thoughtful consideration was given to ethnicity so that such factors were explored and we did not put off people from adopting a child who could otherwise find a loving home because they mistakenly thought that they would not be right for that child, which we think is a crying shame.

Amendment 35 is designed to ensure that we do not unwittingly create misconceptions for parents. We agree with the Government, as we said at length in Committee, that it is critical to most children to have an ongoing, good-quality relationship with their mum and dad, but we are concerned about the practical impact of clause 11.

I will not rehearse all the debates that we had in Committee, but the Minister was right to say that he did not want to be too prescriptive about what involvement meant. That is why our amendment would define what involvement is not, in line with the explanatory notes. It is important that that is put in the Bill and that no room is left for doubt, given that there have already been headlines in this country and that misconceptions have been created. I hope that the Minister will accept that amendment.

I do not need to rehearse why new clause 19 is so important, as it would prevent the harrowing and aggressive questioning of young witnesses in court. This morning, we received the welcome announcement that the Government are trialling pre-recorded cross-examination in Leeds, Liverpool and Kingston upon Thames. I am sure that the Minister appreciates the urgency of this matter as more child grooming cases are brought to trial. Will he say when the pilots will start, how they will be evaluated, whether there will be any measures alongside them to prevent the aggressive questioning that we have heard so much about and how soon they will be rolled out?

As I am sure the Minister is aware, the implementation of section 28 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 alone will not be enough to support vulnerable witnesses. New clause 19 also proposes specialist court sittings for children who have been sexually abused, with trained judges and barristers, and the restriction of multiple cross-examinations. Will he say whether there will be a cap on the number of lawyers who may cross-examine a witness? I would be grateful if he could give more information about that.

I tabled new clause 18 notwithstanding our strong opposition to the under-occupation penalty, known to some as the bedroom tax. We are extremely concerned that that policy will put people off taking care of children whom they otherwise would have looked after because of the financial implications. We want to ensure that, at a time when Ministers share our concerns about the acute shortage of foster carers and adopters, we do not make the situation worse. We were struck by the evidence from Adoption UK about the problems for prospective adopters and special guardians, which was provided by Grandparents Plus. We are very concerned that the National Housing Federation estimates that the discretionary housing fund will fall short by £100 million.

We thought that the Minister had allayed our concerns about foster carers in Committee until it transpired the following day that the Government’s second change of heart meant that only one foster child would be covered, despite the fact that many foster carers look after more than one child. I was grateful for the Minister’s assurance that he would monitor the impact of the policy. Given that it has come into force and that he assured us in Committee that it would be monitored from April, will he say whether the Department has begun the monitoring programme, how it is going about it, whether there is any independence in the evaluation and, if so, who is conducting it? What, if any, evidence has been collected over the past two and a half months, and when does the Department expect to publish a report? Will he ensure that the report is made available to Members of the House as soon as it is published, given how important this matter is to many Members from all parts of the House and given that it affects vulnerable children in every constituency?

Finally, amendments 36 and 37 would ensure that children’s views and sibling arrangements are taken into account when courts scrutinise or change a care plan. Although we support the Government’s efforts to focus courts on the long-term aspects of care plans, we are concerned that, in the real world, the acute pressures on social workers, independent reviewing officers and guardians will mean that important aspects may be missed. Does the Minister have anything concrete to report from the discussion that he was holding with independent reviewing officers about how he will alleviate that pressure? Court scrutiny has helped social workers to ensure that they have access to resources and has changed care plans to allow sibling contact. I was grateful for the Minister’s assurances in Committee that there is nothing to prevent courts from looking at this matter, but given the pressure that family courts are under, especially after the legal aid cuts, we think that it is too important to leave to chance.

I am grateful for the opportunity to set out those points, but immensely disappointed at the lack of scrutiny that we have given these aspects of the Bill today. I would now like to give other people the opportunity to contribute.

Child-care Ratios

John Hemming Excerpts

Thursday 9th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

Our policy is all about giving the hon. Lady’s mum more say over how she runs her own child care. It is a very important principle that no nursery care assistant or childminder is going to be forced to look after more children. What we are doing is allowing them to exercise professional responsibility. We are also doing something about the exorbitant costs that Labour created in our child care system. How on earth can Labour Members be proud of a record of having the highest child care costs in Europe?

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

May I first refer the House to my interest as the father of a nine-month-old baby who will be going to nursery in September? I ask the Minister to listen carefully to the representations of those who are concerned about the ratios, particularly for very young children and believe that those ratios should be very low.

[Elizabeth Truss]

Of course, there will be different requirements for different children, depending on their age and their level of development. Our policies are about increasing the level of professional judgment that child care workers are able to exercise to cater for the different ages and the different stages of development of the children they are looking after. I would point out to my hon. Friend that many parents in other countries where more flexibility is given to local providers are extremely happy with the quality of care they receive—in fact, they are happier than parents here.

Children and Families Bill

John Hemming Excerpts

Monday 25th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Timpson]

I will make progress. I know that everyone is keen to get in, and many people have been sitting here for quite some time, and were here throughout the urgent question, but I have a fair amount to get through, and at least 27 colleagues want to speak, so I ask hon. Members to bear with me for a moment.

We have listened to and considered all views offered on how to refine the draft legislation to make sure that what we are proposing will work in practice. In particular, I want to thank the four Committee Chairs—Baroness Butler-Sloss, my hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart), the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) and the hon. Member for Aberavon (Dr Francis)—as well as the Committee members and staff for their diligent and constructive reports. It has been a purposeful and fruitful process.

We believe that supporting strong families and introducing flexible working practices is key to achieving business and economic growth. A new system of shared parental leave will support business by creating a more motivated, flexible and talented work force. Flexible working will also help widen the pool of talent in the labour market, helping to drive growth. Underpinning all this, the Bill will give children a stronger, more independent champion of their rights through reforms to the Office of the Children’s Commissioner. That will ensure that their views are properly represented and taken seriously.

I am mindful of the time constraints, which will prevent me from detailing every clause, but I want to talk through our headline reforms, starting with those on adoption. As someone with two adopted brothers, I know all too well how life-changing adoption can be, for both the adopted child and the family they are joining. I also know how glacial the pace of the adoption process can often be. It currently takes an average of two and a half years to place a child for adoption. This is completely unacceptable. These inexcusable delays are costing children time that can never be recovered—time when they should be bonding with their adoptive family and enjoying the routine and stability that they so desperately need. We must do all we can to reduce the time it takes for a child to be adopted.

My hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) deserves real recognition for his personal crusade to tackle this problem and for the important progress already made. The Bill builds on that work to create a system more focused on the needs of children and which more actively involves and supports adopters.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

I refer the House to my declaration of interest as chairman of the Justice for Families campaign. Does the Minister accept that there are some people, including myself and some in foreign countries, who believe that sometimes children are adopted who should not be adopted?

[Mr Timpson]

I am very much aware of my hon. Friend’s views and have conversed with him on a number of occasions. I always listen to and am mindful of the words that he speaks on this subject, but I have a strong view that for those children who, for whatever reason, are unable to find any other permanent placement, we ought seriously to consider adoption as a way of giving them that stability, that routine, that loving, stable family home which far too often they miss out on because we have not managed to move them through the adoption system in enough time, commensurate with their best interests.

Safeguarding Children

John Hemming Excerpts

Wednesday 13th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

I must congratulate the hon. Member for Rochdale (Simon Danczuk) on his very good speech, much of which needs to be listened to and understood. It is not that we do not have the right laws in place; it is that the professional judgments made by practitioners are often basically not common sense.

Let me declare a declaration of interest on account of my involvement in the Justice for Families campaign. What I tend to see are the over-interventions, where the state intervenes improperly.

Returning to the issues of Rochdale, I raised a number of years ago the situation of a children’s home in Birmingham, where the practitioners did not mind if the children were prostitutes but did mind if they made toast for each other—because there was a health and safety risk to making toast.

I have made the effort to get the statutory guidance. If the motion supported the statutory guidance, I would probably have to vote against it, because it goes no further in looking at the definition of what is a risk of significant harm. It is quite clear that certain practitioners do not believe that being a prostitute is a risk of significant harm. [Interruption.] That seems to be the case, and it is not necessarily a UK-only situation. A family currently living in Wimbledon had similar problems in New Zealand where an under-age relationship was encouraged by the practitioners in that country because they thought it was right. That was on the New Zealand media last week.

[Ian Mearns]

In the Rochdale case and others I have read about, the abuse perpetrated against young girls has been so systematic and has lasted over such a prolonged period that the girls themselves did not see themselves as victims. In that scenario, who is going to look after them? We must think deeply about the implications of that problem.

[John Hemming]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that excellent intervention, but I shall not take any more because of the Speaker’s advice.

Let me explain one of my concerns about the Government’s complacency on this issue. We have the SSDA903 return, which tracks what happens to children as they leave care. A number of possible destinations are listed: for example, adopted; died; care taken by another local authority, and so forth. There are also those who leave care for an unknown reason. In America, this is tracked to find out who has run away. These are children who have been abducted and trafficked. Across the country, we find that 5,950 children left care for unknown and other reasons. Of those, 430 were aged one to four; 350 were aged five to nine; 630 were aged 10 to 15, and there were many more at the ages of 16, 17 and 18. I have the detailed figures for my local authority, if anyone wants to see them.

What is sad is the fact that the Minister has refused to consider trying to gain more detailed information so that we know what happens to these children. If I were losing 5,000 children here, not knowing what was happening to them—rather similar to the situation in Rochdale—I would not be feeling very happy as a corporate parent or as a parent in any form whatever. The failure is in not having proper systems of checks and balances on the judgment of practitioners who operate on a daily basis.

There are some excellent practitioners. I know of one social worker who was recently suspended because she would not change her view that a child should go back to its parents. The management tried to bully her into agreeing that the child should be adopted, but she would not do that, so she was suspended. We should be looking at what those managements are doing, and establishing whether it is valid. We know that much of the evidence is unreliable as a result of the excellent work of Professor Jane Ireland, which is the only proper independent work that has been done to assess the quality of evidence in the family courts.

I have here a letter from the Health Professions Council, which is refusing to investigate allegations about bad psychologists. Giving the reference FTP04616, the HPC says that it cannot “progress the concern” because of the current law. I think that it misunderstands the law: I think that the 2009 changes enable it to investigate allegations about rubbishy psychologists without the permission of a judge.

We have a problem with checks and balances, and with the failure of quality control in respect of evidence and the family courts. However, we also need to look at the wider issues of why children are taken into care. The failure of the statutory guidance to go beyond “risk of significant harm” implies that there is a real problem. The care system is very complex and involves very subtle judgments, but the Government come along wearing big boots and try to kick it in a particular direction.

Puerperal psychosis involves extreme baby blues or post-natal depression. When a mother has given birth and is depressed it can be dangerous for the child, who may need to be taken into care; but is that the sort of case that should be driven towards adoption, just because mum was depressed after giving birth? Such action is likely to make mum even more depressed. The Government’s policy is, “We need to speed it all up: we need rapid decisions.” The flaw in their approach is that there is none of the individual judgment on cases that is really needed. It is a very simplistic approach to what is a very complex system.

Domestic violence is another example. Angela Wileman is writing a book about what happened to her. She has been to Spain, Ireland and all over the place to avoid the UK care system, which was persecuting her in various ways. She has been in the newspapers plenty of times. She was a victim of domestic violence, on the basis of which the system wished to take one of her children from her, put that child in care and have it adopted—but only that child, because she had had the other child abroad.

Ms Toni McLeod, who lives with her family in Durham, is thinking of going to Ireland because she is pregnant. It is a difficult situation. She was a supporter of the English Defence League. I hate the EDL. Three of my children are mixed-race, and I protest against the EDL. Toni McLeod says that she is not racially prejudiced, but that children were taken from her partly because of her membership of the EDL. It was

“felt that conversations and opinions may be expressed in the children’s presence.”

That is a “thought police” approach to care. The system intervened because of what Toni McLeod might say in front of her children. She says that she has many friends who are Muslims and Sikhs, and that she disowns the EDL nowadays, but whether that is true or not, we should ask whether it is appropriate for the state to remove a child because children may be radicalised by a parent. Is that an appropriate use of the phrase “risk of significant harm”? That brings us back to the statutory guidance, which makes no effort whatsoever to give any indication of what is meant by the phrase.

One of the biggest problems in relation to the accountability of the family court and the care system is insufficient proper, academic access to the details of the proceedings. We do not know whether we are achieving something for the children or not. An excellent report by Ruth Gilbert, published in The Lancet late last year, raised major questions about whether we are getting anywhere at all with the overall system. We have some extremely serious problems, and in my view the interventions are often damaging.

I work with a number of care leavers. It is important to remember that care leavers remain care leavers even when they are in their forties and fifties. As people get older, they gain the confidence that enables them to speak out about what happened to them when they were younger, whereas many people in their late teens and early twenties do not have enough confidence to explain where the real problems lay. We need to be very careful. Lucy Allan may be going to speak to the Minister about her experience. She was a Conservative councillor. The same psychologist wrote two different reports about her, which was complete nonsense, of course. If a specialist of some kind writes two completely contradictory reports about the same person, what intellectual value does any of that information have?

Although I have a lot more to say on this subject, I only have 54 seconds left, so let me just put on the record that the Education Committee has done an excellent job in listening to people on different sides of the argument. The family justice review panel included only people who operated the system. It therefore did not properly consider the views of those who are affected by the system. The Home Affairs Committee will kick off an inquiry that I hope will be run on a far better basis. The Munro report is quite good, but we need to look more rationally at the detailed ways in which things are operated and make sure steps are taken that actually benefit the children in the long term, not just hit Government targets.

Munro Report

John Hemming Excerpts

Thursday 9th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

We now have about three minutes if we are to get everybody in. When do we have until? Is it not until 6? [Interruption.] Okay, I will keep going and stick to time. If I have six minutes, I will be quite happy. I want everybody to have the opportunity to speak in such an important debate. I do not mind shortening my speech to make sure that other hon. Members can speak, but there are certain things that I must say.

I disagree with the Government’s objective of increasing the number of adoptions. Already in England, roughly twice as many children under five who leave care are adopted than return to their parents. In fact, the number returning to their parents went down last year. Of the 4,700 under-fives who left care in the year to 31 March 2010, 880 went to their parents and 2,000 were adopted. In Scotland, the reverse is true and the majority return to their parents. I define care as compulsory care and do not include all the section 20 children who go into care voluntarily. It is important to consider those issues.

Checks and balances are critical. I very much support the Munro report and think that the approach of being less bureaucratic is important. Sadly, I do not support the family justice review. The difficulty is that if one is to look at the process of dealing with a child who goes into the care system, one must consider all the aspects. Even if one considers just the local authority costs and the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service costs for a child who is taken into care at birth and then adopted, one sees that half the costs are for foster care and half are legal costs, fees for experts and such things. If one is to look at how that process can be managed to work effectively, one has to consider both the judicial processes with its checks and balances and the decision making in the first instance. The Munro inquiry is about the process by which decisions are made and the process by which those decisions are given quality control. In my view, it is the quality control on the decisions that fails. That is why there are a lot of odd decisions and some very strange outcomes.

I thank the Minister for the efforts of his statisticians in producing a detailed analysis of the SSDA903 return. I have a copy here and anybody is welcome to see it. Obviously it is available under freedom of information. That analysis demonstrates what is happening to the children. Our priority should be what happens to the children and what is best for the children.

The problem when we get something substantially wrong, as I think we are, and when the practice is substantially wrong for a number of years, is that people continue to practice in the same way. Only many years later when the children grow up and wonder, “Why was that done to me?”, do things get reviewed. That happened in respect of the children who were sent around the world, for instance to Canada and Australia. That decision is now recognised as wrong, but at the time it was thought to be right. A similar situation is occurring in respect of about 1,000 children a year—that figure looks right when the figures in England are compared with those in Scotland—in cases of forced adoptions in which consent is dispensed with. That problem is of a reasonable order of magnitude and, in the end, it comes down to the need for individual case studies.

Another area in which the Government are missing out is in studying what happens to children who are adopted. In many cases the adoption is disrupted, so about a quarter of those children return to the care system and some are then adopted again, causing them additional trauma. If we are to assess the effect of adoption decisions, we have to include the effect on children who come back into care because they have had reactive attachment disorder, perhaps as a result of being taken into care too early and by overloaded foster carers. A lot of issues are not being looked at, and we need longitudinal studies of individual cases.

Many Members want to speak, and I have emphasised the points about adoptions that I keep making. The figures are there, and I thank the Minister for getting them, but he should take them into account.

Education Maintenance Allowance

John Hemming Excerpts

Wednesday 19th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford) (Con)]

I have very much enjoyed listening to many of the speeches in this excellent debate, which has been well worth having. I listened particularly closely to the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Mr Blunkett), who is not in his place, and to my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy), who made some powerful points.

I understand the reasons for the changes—the deficit of £23 billion in November brings things sharply into focus—but I am concerned, as many Members are, about the consequences. I shall briefly make two points that need stressing, although they have been alluded to by a number of hon. and right hon. Members. The first relates to fairness. Those who entered sixth form in September 2010 will cease to receive EMA in September 2011, and the Secretary of State needs to examine that closely, because it is not fair.

[John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD)]

Sixth-form colleges in Birmingham are trying to assess how much the lower sixth-formers need their EMA. Does my hon. Friend think that that is a useful process?

[Jeremy Lefroy]

I think that that is an extremely useful process. I should also mention, in this regard, the people who just joined in January and have no particular scheme available to them.

My second point, which has been made by many hon. Members, particularly my hon. Friends the Members for Mid Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke) and for Nuneaton (Mr Jones), is about transport. I have an 18-year-old daughter and I find it strange that she pays for her bus fares to and from school whereas others who could well afford not to have free bus passes receive them. We need to examine that seriously. Today I met a couple of students from Stoke-on-Trent, in Staffordshire, one of whom said that she was paying £7.60 a day in bus fares because she had to take two buses; the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Robert Flello) mentioned that situation earlier. I also wish to pay tribute to the work of the colleges in my constituency, in particular South Staffordshire college and Stafford college. They have brought the figures to me, and have shown me the importance of making these points and representations on their behalf.

Finally, I, like the Secretary of State and the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), wish to stress the importance of evidence. I agree that evidence is vital. This subject is too important to ignore evidence, because the prospects of young people are at stake. So my final request to the Secretary of State is that he be guided by the best possible evidence in this matter.