Port Talbot Steelworks
Justin Madders Excerpts(6 months, 3 weeks ago)
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David T. C. Davies
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I think that Tata now needs to come forward with a bit more information about who exactly we can expect to see being made redundant and what their current skillsets are, so that we can begin targeting the help. The challenge up until now is that we have not had the information on who is being made redundant. Tata has made it clear that it will not automatically be the people on the blast furnaces, for example, who are made redundant, because it hopes to retain some of the people who are working there but offer redundancy to people in other parts of the plant. We have not had the information as of yet, but I think the time has come to have that information. We of course want to ensure that any redundancy packages are as generous as possible.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
My constituents who work at the Shotton plant are very worried about the news they are hearing and concerned about their colleagues’ futures, but they are also wondering what it means for them. Clearly there will be knock-on effects, not just in the supply chain but in other Tata plants around the country, so what assessment has the Secretary of State made of the short, medium and long-term impact of these decisions on other plants?
David T. C. Davies
We were very clear that while the arc furnace was being built, we wanted to make absolutely certain that all those other plants around Wales were able to receive product to finish, and Tata has been very clear that that will happen. It will have to bring it in from elsewhere over the next two to three years, but that will happen. There will therefore not be the impact that the hon. Gentleman is rightly concerned about.
Of course, that is possible only because of what some of the hon. Gentleman’s colleagues have described as a reckless deal. What would have been reckless would have been for us to see Tata in an office and say, “Okay, you’re going to make 8,000 people redundant and shut down all these sites, and there’s nothing for us to do about it.” That would have been reckless. What we actually did was to come forward with a £500 million package of taxpayers’ money, and rightly so, to support the continuation of steelmaking in Port Talbot and to ensure that all the other plants in Wales—Shotton, Trostre and Llanwern—continue to receive product during that interim period, so that we do not see significant job losses anywhere else.
Oral Answers to Questions
Justin Madders Excerpts(1 year, 8 months ago)
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Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
The Prime Minister (Rishi Sunak)
May I wish everyone, but in particular my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Craig Williams), a very happy St David’s Day?
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Justin Madders
The Prime Minister understands the importance of NHS staff, because he was out there every Thursday night clapping for them during the pandemic. He must therefore also surely know that he has not got a hope of dealing with the NHS crisis if he does not invest in its workforce. We have a plan to double medical school places and end the scandal of straight-A students being denied the chance to become a doctor. Patients support our plan, the NHS supports our plan, and even his Chancellor supports our plan. Why doesn’t he?
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman needs to keep up—we are doing a workforce plan for the NHS. There are tens of thousands more doctors, more nurses in the NHS, a record number of GPs and record investment in the NHS. That is what we get with a Conservative Government delivering.
Oral Answers to Questions
Justin Madders Excerpts(2 years, 1 month ago)
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Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
The Prime Minister (Elizabeth Truss)
This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
Justin Madders
When the penny dropped for the Prime Minister on Monday and she realised that her Budget was responsible for crashing the economy, she should have come to this House to explain herself and to apologise to the millions of people who will now be paying hundreds of pounds extra a month on their mortgages because of her mistakes. Now that she is here, can she tell us, given the absolute chaos that her Government have created, why the previous Chancellor lost his job but she kept hers?
The Prime Minister
I have been very clear that I am sorry and that I have made mistakes, but the right thing to do in those circumstances is to make changes, which I have made, and to get on with the job and deliver for the British people. We have delivered the energy price guarantee, we have helped people this winter, and I will continue to do that.
Oral Answers to Questions
Justin Madders Excerpts(3 years, 6 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
Yes. I thank my hon. Friend for his point, and he knows a great deal about the subject. We have worked very hard with the Welsh Government throughout the pandemic, supporting them with £8.6 billion of additional funding through the Barnett formula, but clearly we need to learn the lessons together as we bounce forward from this pandemic.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
Yes is the answer, but the Labour party junked it in—[Interruption.] This is something that, for decades, politicians have failed to address: in 1999, Labour failed to address the plan. They had 13 years—13 years—in government. I think it was 13—13 unlucky years for this country—and they did not do it. They did not do it, and this Government are going to tackle it. This Government are finally going to address the issue of social care. If they want to support it with their customary doughty resolve, if they want to support it without wibble-wobbling from one week to the next on whatever their policy is—without changing like weather vanes, which is what they normally do—if they want to support it and if they want to back it, then I am all ears.
Ford in Bridgend
Justin Madders Excerpts(5 years, 5 months ago)
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Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
The workers at Vauxhall in Ellesmere Port send their solidarity to those in Bridgend who have lost their jobs and to those who are going to lose their jobs in the wider supply chain. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Frank Field) said, we are concerned about what is happening to the car industry in this country. It seems to be disintegrating before our eyes and the Government appear to be powerless to stop it. I know that the Secretary of State has mentioned various aspects of the industrial strategy that we hope are going to reverse some of these damaging job losses, but self-evidently this is not enough. Please may we have more action, on business rates, on energy costs and on actually encouraging investment in the first place, because once these jobs go, they are gone forever?
Alun Cairns
First, let me say that Vauxhall is investing in Britain, and that should give the hon. Gentleman confidence as to the approach and attitude that Vauxhall is showing towards the UK economy. However, he is right to highlight the need for further investment. For the last full year for which data is available, business investment in automotive was £5.3 billion, which is a 20% uplift on the previous year. Clearly, these things will vary from tranche to tranche, so we need to be looking at the trend, rather than just seeking to overstate the figures in order to be selective. This is a positive environment, and automotive research and development amounts to 15% of total UK R&D, which highlights the importance that the private sector and the UK Government place on the automotive sector, so that we can provide the next generation of automotive vehicles.
Bill Presented
Employment Status (Definitions)
Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No.57)
Frank Field, supported by Nigel Mills, Steve McCabe, Justin Madders, Ronnie Campbell, Martyn Day, Albert Owen, Mr Virendra Sharma, Mr Roger Godsiff, Mrs Madeleine Moon, Gareth Snell and John Cryer, presented a Bill to amend the definition of worker and self-employed person; and for connected purposes.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time tomorrow, and to be printed (Bill 398).
Social Mobility (Wales)
Justin Madders Excerpts(6 years, 11 months ago)
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Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Chris Elmore) on securing this debate and on the considered way that he introduced it.
As chair of the all-party group on social mobility and a Member who represents a constituency that has not only a border but many economic, cultural and political links with Wales, I have two reasons for participating in the debate. As we all know, it does not matter whether someone lives in Bangor, Buckley or Birkenhead; in too many parts of this country, their place of birth can override their ability and potential, and generation after generation struggles against entrenched disadvantage that should put us all to shame. We have mistakenly and unquestioningly accepted the myth that greater economic growth leads to increased opportunity for all, despite overwhelming evidence that tells us otherwise.
Earlier this year, my APPG published a report entitled “Increasing access to the leading professions”. It looked at opportunities in law, finance, the arts, media, medicine, the civil service and politics, and found that, whatever the profession, there is a similar lack of opportunity and similar reasons for that. Privilege and opportunity go hand in hand across the board. For example, Sutton Trust research shows that three quarters of senior judges, more than half the top 100 news journalists and more than two thirds of British Oscar winners attended private schools.
The APPG recommended that there should be a legal ban on unpaid internships lasting more than a month. We found that their unpaid nature was not the only barrier: many of those placements are in London, which means that unless someone is from that area and has parents who can support them for an extended period, there is no prospect of them being able even to consider such an internship.
Liz Saville Roberts
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the excellent Speaker’s internship scheme should consider providing means for people to afford accommodation in London, so that we can reach out to people who could not otherwise gain from such paid experiences?
Justin Madders
I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. We took evidence from several successful applicants to the Speaker’s internship scheme. The geographical challenges were certainly very apparent, and that ought to be fed back.
How can anyone from outside London—from the north-west of England, Wales or anywhere else in the UK—go and do unpaid placements in London for months on end? There also need to be fair, transparent and open recruitment processes for such placements, which we found are often determined by existing connections, be they family or business contacts. The same rigour needs to be applied to those placements as would be applied if they were permanent jobs, otherwise we may just ease the path for people who are already on it.
One simple change could make a big difference to improving social mobility. There is a private Member’s Bill in the other place that seeks to end unpaid work placements. However, given what we have seen so far in terms of Government action, that does not seem easy to deliver in practice. Although I understand that responsibility for social mobility rests primarily with the Department for Education, any action on unpaid internships must be taken by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. There has of course been no action, which proves Alan Milburn’s recent point that commitment to social mobility does not spread out across the whole of the Government. It needs to. Yes, it is to do with early years, schools and universities, but it also involves the world of work, housing and health. The Social Mobility Commission provided us with a wholesale national analysis of all those issues, but the Government’s response is too often constrained by Departments’ silo mentality, which is sometimes exacerbated by devolved responsibilities getting in the way.
I am sure that if I asked a group of young people from many of the constituencies represented in the Chamber what they wanted to do when they are older, they would not say they wanted to be a doctor, a lawyer or an actor. For too many young people, the very notion that they should even consider such careers is almost universally absent. They need role models, mentors and inspirers—people from their communities who have been there and done it. We need to inspire young people from an early age to aim for wherever their abilities and interests take them. We should not accept that coming from the wrong part of town means low horizons. Getting a job should mean following dreams and forging a career, not simply working to survive.
In keeping with the Welsh theme, we were fortunate to have Michael Sheen give evidence to the APPG. There is no doubt that he is an inspirer and mentor for the kids of Port Talbot. We are not going to get a Michael Sheen in every constituency, but I hope there will be others in every other town who will provide similar inspiration.
Mentorship and inspiration are important, but without academic equality they will not be sufficient. The Sutton Trust report, “Global Gaps”, looks at attainment gaps across 38 OECD countries and as a result can pinpoint how each of the devolved Administrations is performing. Unfortunately, it showed Wales performing rather poorly compared with other industrialised nations, in particular in reading and mathematics, where the skills of the most able pupils are some way behind those of pupils in comparable nations. On a more positive note, it did say that the gap between the most able, advantaged and disadvantaged pupils in Wales was relatively small compared to other industrialised nations. However, sadly, the report concludes that the situation for high-achieving pupils across the whole of the UK is “stagnant at best”.
Stagnation is a good description of where we are now. I urge all Members, if they have not already done so, to read the Social Mobility Commission’s latest “State of the Nation” report, which paints a bleak picture of a deeply divided nation in which too many people are trapped in geographical areas or occupations with little hope of advancement or progression. It talks about an “us and them” society, in which millions feel left behind. Specifically, the report talks about major changes to the labour market in recent decades, which have imprisoned 5 million workers in a low-pay trap from which there appears to be no escape. The report highlights places that offer good prospects for income progression and those that do not, showing that real social mobility is in fact a postcode lottery, with the worst problems concentrated in remote rural or coastal areas and former industrial areas—that description will be familiar to Members in the Chamber today—not only in Wales but in England.
Encouragingly, the report finds that well-targeted local policies and initiatives adopted by local authorities and employers can buck the trend and positively influence outcomes for disadvantaged residents. In short, where there is a will and strong leadership, things can be done.
This country is too closed. It is a country where too often people’s life chances are defined by where they are born and who they are born to. We are now in a world where many parents believe their children will have less opportunity than they did, and I deeply regret that. Automation and artificial intelligence will only exacerbate the problem, and we are miles away from even beginning to understand the social impact that will have. The only way we will be able to meet those challenges in the future is by intensive, long-term Government intervention, not just at the ages of five or 15, but at 35 and 50 and so on. The world of work will change more rapidly than ever before, and we need to recognise that opportunity will need to be addressed not just in our younger years, vital though that is, but throughout our lives. We have to invest in ourselves through all of our working lives, but we cannot do that without Government support.
We have heard about the geographical divide, and the APPG is looking at that, but there is also a generational divide. I do not believe that the recent election was a ringing endorsement of the status quo. What we saw was that the more young people engaged with the question of what they want from their Government, the more they turned away from the existing set-up, and who can blame them? Do they want to better themselves and study at university? Yes, there are opportunities, but they come with eye-watering debt that may never be paid off. Want to own a home? Unless the bank of mum and dad is there to fall back on, there could be a very long wait. Want to build a career in a profession doing something rewarding financially and intellectually? Those opportunities exist for the few, not the many.
The more likely experience for our young people in the job market is casual work, low pay and chronic insecurity. It is time we offered them hope. Across the years, across the Government and across the nations, we need total commitment to delivering opportunity for all.
Oral Answers to Questions
Justin Madders Excerpts(8 years, 1 month ago)
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Guto Bebb
It is important to point out that this was announced in the last Budget and is being taken forward. However, there is a bottom-up approach. This Government do not take the view that Westminster knows best. We believe very strongly that the proposal should come from the region, and it is fantastic to see the way in which the four local authorities are working together. I am confident that the deal brings something quite special to south-west Wales, but let us see the detail. If the detail is persuasive, the support will be forthcoming.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Guto Bebb)
This week will see the completion of the engineering work in the Severn tunnel required for the electrification of the Great Western main line. This is a truly historic occasion and a clear demonstration of this Government’s commitment to deliver a rail investment strategy that will benefit the people of Wales in its entirety.
Justin Madders
The Secretary of State has spoken of the Growth Track 360 campaign, which, as the Minister will know, has the potential to transform the north Wales and Cheshire area by delivering 70,000 new jobs over 20 years. Improving the Wrexham to Bidston line, which serves Neston in my constituency, has been identified as the first priority for the team. Will the Minister join in the words of encouragement that we have already heard in agreeing to make representations to the Chancellor ahead of the autumn statement so as to deliver some of this much-needed investment?
Guto Bebb
I am pleased to echo the words of the Secretary of State, who highlighted the Growth Track 360 proposals. These are made in north Wales or made in north-west England proposals which will try to improve connectivity between parts of north-west England and north-east Wales. We are supportive of the proposals. I am pleased to say that this morning the Treasury wrote to the proposers in north Wales stating that support.
Oral Answers to Questions
Justin Madders Excerpts(9 years, 5 months ago)
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Stephen Crabb
Plaid Cymru had one single theme and policy during the general election campaign: funding and seeking parity with Scotland. [Interruption.] A voice behind her asks what about the north-east of England. The trouble with seeking parity with Scotland is that one would have to start dividing up the whole pie. The important thing is that we are delivering on a fair funding floor for Wales that will correct the way the Barnett formula operates for Wales, and she should be supporting that.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
4. How the views of English rail passengers will be taken into account after the transfer of responsibility for the Borderlands Line rail franchise to the Welsh Government.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Alun Cairns)
I have met the Under-Secretary of State for Transport to discuss aspirations to upgrade north Wales’ rail infrastructure. On the franchise, the Wales Office is working closely with the Department for Transport and the Welsh Government to agree which services will be devolved. Specific proposals will be consulted on in due course and I hope the hon. Gentleman will play his part.
Justin Madders
I thank the Minister for that answer. He has highlighted the difficulties in implementing some of the practicalities of devolution. Will he meet me and interested bodies from both sides of the border to discuss the practicalities, and how my constituents can be best represented during this process?
Alun Cairns
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that question; he makes an important point. Rail passengers just want smooth services on both sides of the border. Administrative boundaries should be there to support rather than to hinder. I look forward to the hon. Gentleman’s involvement in any discussions.