Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Julian Brazier and Chris Grayling

Tuesday 6th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

What divides us is the fact that the Government must take hard decisions. The Labour party has argued for reductions in legal aid; it had plans for reductions in legal aid in its manifesto but now, in opposition, it is trying to prevent reductions in legal aid. That is, I am afraid, another example of the Labour party saying one thing and doing another.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

May I draw my right hon. Friend’s attention to the Select Committee report on the impact on our armed forces of this deluge of cases? May I urge him to look again at the £10 million that went to those law firms who deliberately suppressed evidence that their clients were part of a terrorist organisation?

[Chris Grayling]

Let us be absolutely clear: in relation to the inquiry to which my hon. Friend refers, what has happened in those cases appears to have been untoward to say the least. If the taxpayer has ended up paying a large amount of money for a case brought on a false premise, I will want to take the strongest possible action, including looking at taking financial measures against the firms involved.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Julian Brazier and Chris Grayling

Tuesday 4th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

Where I differ is that I do not believe it is necessary to have an international court deciding things that should be a matter for this Parliament and our courts. That is what needs to change.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

I strongly support my right hon. Friend’s stand on this matter. Does he agree that just one example of how far the European Court of Human Rights has moved from its original foundations is that the British Government and the lawyers who were instrumental in setting it up were also responsible for the largest programme of judicial executions—of Nazis at Nuremburg—in modern British history?

[Chris Grayling]

It is certainly the case that the jurisprudence of the Court has moved a long way from where it started, and some things have clearly changed for the better, but I would argue now that the decisions coming out of the Court are matters that should be addressed in this and other Parliaments. Of course, this is an area where there are divisions between all the parties in the House, and I have no doubt that it will be an area of lively debate as we approach the general election, when the people will decide.

EU Charter of Fundamental Rights

Debate between Julian Brazier and Chris Grayling

Tuesday 19th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

What I say to my hon. Friend is that we should never enter a renegotiation in the expectation that we will lose.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

I welcome my right hon. Friend’s robust stance on this matter, but, as someone who is not one of the usual suspects on Europe—to the best of my knowledge I have never made a speech in this House on the subject—may I say that we really are at a Rubicon? If this does go into law, it would suggest that we have moved a very long way in a bad direction.

[Chris Grayling]

I take a clear view that there is an issue in all these matters around who governs Britain. My view is that Britain should be governed by this House. I can assure my hon. Friend that were we to discover that the charter had a broader legal reach than we understand to be the case at the moment, we would take rapid steps to address it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Julian Brazier and Chris Grayling

Monday 23rd January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

It is precisely because I am keen to get information out there that we are looking at ways to ensure that that can happen, despite the rules about national statistics, which we have to obey very carefully. If the hon. Gentleman wants some statistics about employment programmes, let me share a set with him. The flexible new deal, to which he referred, cost the taxpayer £770 million and delivered 50,000 six-month job outcomes. He can do the maths on that—it amounts to approximately £14,000 per six-month job outcome. That is one failure of the welfare-to-work programmes we inherited, and that is why the welfare-to-work package that we have put together through the Work programme will be better value for the taxpayer and do a better job for the unemployed.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

Following that robust answer, does my right hon. Friend agree that when we are able to publish these data, they are likely to show the success of putting work out to contract when we see that organisations such as the Shaw Trust are much better at providing work for disabled people than the work done in-house by the Benefits Agency?

[Chris Grayling]

When I visit Work programme providers —I have now visited most of them—I certainly find a great deal of enthusiasm, a sense of purpose and successful progress. I hope that that will show through in the official statistics when the time arises. I am not in the business of burying good news, and I very much hope that we will be getting the good news about the Work programme out there as soon as we possibly can.