Oral Answers to Questions

Karen Lee Excerpts

Monday 26th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Lee (Lincoln) (Lab)]

Last night’s fire in Leicestershire, in which five people sadly lost their lives, once again highlighted the bravery of our firefighters. The number of firefighters has been cut by 11,000 since 2010, and their wages have seen a real-terms cut. The current level of un-earmarked reserves equates to just three weeks’ operating costs, at the same time as deaths in fires have increased. I ask the Minister to reconsider the levels of funding and resourcing for our fire service. There has been praise today for our firefighters. When will the Government pay them a fair wage for the courageous work they undertake?

[Mr Hurd]

No one disputes the courageous work that firefighters do: we saw it at Grenfell and we saw it yesterday in Leicestershire. The point is that active negotiations are going on between those who are responsible—employer and employee. Central Government do not have a role in that process, unless we are called in for additional support.

The hon. Lady mentions reserves. Labour is in denial on this. The fact is that the fire system, which claims to be short of cash, has increased its reserves by £288 million since 2011. Reserves can only be increased by not using the money received, so our question to the fire service is, “Tell us what you’re going to do with the public’s money.”

Civil Partnerships, Marriages and Deaths (Registration Etc.) Bill

Karen Lee Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 2nd February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karen Lee (Lincoln) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) on introducing such an important Bill. I am proud that the landmark policy of civil partnerships was introduced by Labour. We took a stand long before it was considered fashionable or acceptable. We took a stand to allow lesbian, gay and bisexual people to have their relationships recognised by law and to have benefits equal to those for married couples. That proud moment built on Labour’s history of fighting for the equal rights of LGBTQ+ people, and the Civil Partnership Act 2004 paved the way for same sex marriage.

Following the passing of same sex-marriage legislation, it is a complete anomaly and unjustice that civil partnerships are not available to all, an anomaly that the Government could have easily rectified and would have received support from both sides of the House to do so. Although I was not a Member at the time, it is clear that the only reason Labour did not push further to extend civil partnerships during the passage of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 was for fear of losing it altogether.

We were met with much hostility when we introduced civil partnerships, but we were on a mission to ensure some level of equality as quickly as possible, and we achieved just that. Times have now moved on, but it appears that some attitudes have not. Allowing some couples to choose whether to marry or to enter a civil partnership while others cannot is no equality at all. That anomaly is not in the spirit of either the Civil Partnership Act or the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act, which are based firmly in parity and not in the semantics that are often used to hide bigotry and prejudice. Labour Members believe that all people should be equal before the law. Having joined us in passing same-sex marriage, it is so disappointing that this Government have previously made excuses regarding expanding civil partnerships to all couples. They have argued that the results of their consultation were inconclusive. There have even been voices suggesting that we abolish civil partnerships altogether. That would be a step backwards for the millions of couples co-habiting who may not want to marry but simply want protection and recognition of their relationship under the law. Surely it is our job, as representatives in Parliament, to give further protections to our constituents, not strip them away.

Turning to the other measures in the Bill, allowing mothers’ names to be included on marriage and civil partnership certificates brings us into line with what happens in Scotland. I point out to the Government that it should not take a private Member’s Bill to make such an obvious change, and that they might consider that such a measure should have been proposed by them, through delegated legislation.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Karen Lee]

I am going to make some progress.

On the investigation of stillbirths, I point out that in the UK we still have a woefully high number of stillbirths for a western country. I know that as I used to work in a gynaecology out-patient clinic and I remember this happening. A stillbirth can be truly traumatic for mothers, and we need to do more to support women that go through this and more to prevent stillbirth. We agree that stillbirths that occur before 24 weeks should be formally acknowledged and registered, but by no means would we want to see such a measure used to undermine abortion rights and a woman’s right to choose.

In conclusion, Labour Members fully support this Bill and only wish that the rest of the Government were as forward thinking as the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham.

Oral Answers to Questions

Karen Lee Excerpts

Monday 20th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

I can confirm that decisions about police funding have not been finalised, but that that will be done shortly. An announcement will be made to the House as part of the draft grant settlement for 2018-19 in the usual way. On the report that the hon. Lady cites, I hope she understands that we have worked with that report closely, because the Home Office and the police system wanted to do a proper job of updating our understanding of the pressures that the police are under, which are real.

[Ms Karen Lee (Lincoln) (Lab)]

T1. If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Amber Rudd)]

I recently returned from America, and I would like to update the House on progress made there. Along with the US Justice Department, I met representatives from Facebook, Microsoft, Google and Twitter to discuss our collective efforts to fight child sexual exploitation online. I was very encouraged by the development of Project Arachnid, which is groundbreaking software developed by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, backed by significant investment from this Government as well as start-up funding from Google. The technology proactively detects child sexual abuse material online and issues notices to content hosts, so that they can remove it. It has so far crawled 1 billion web pages to identify illegal material, and approximately 300,000 new images of child sexual abuse have been vetted. Appalling images of children being abused and extremist content have absolutely no place on our internet or in our society, and we will work internationally to combat them.

[Ms Lee]

From December, the Policing and Crime Act 2017 will stop police cells being used as places of safety for people detained under section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983. In Lincolnshire, with around 750,000 residents, there will be only four hospital-based places of safety, and two of those will be in Lincoln’s Peter Hodgkinson Centre. Last year, 89 people were detained in police cells because there were no other options. Will the Minister give an assurance that moneys will be made available to provide adequate resources for this change?

[The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Mr Nick Hurd)]

The hon. Lady raises an important issue. I assure her that the Government have made £30 million of funding available to local areas to improve places of safety provision. Around half of that has been allocated and a second round of funding opened on 18 October, to which applications are invited. The legislation also provides that any suitable place may be used as a place of safety to help to supplement local provision.