Fairness at Work and Power in Communities

Kirsten Oswald Excerpts

Thursday 12th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)]

I refer hon. Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I welcome the Queen’s Speech, which is a timely intervention if ever there was one. On apathy, last Thursday is a warning that many of our voters see us as rudderless and lacking ambition and vision. That is a shame after we led the world in fighting the pandemic and given we are leading the support for a battered Ukraine—I commend the Prime Minister for both. It was an extraordinary coincidence that, on 24 February, when all restrictions were lifted, Russia invaded Ukraine. Since then, the world has faced soaring costs, shrinking revenues and shaky alliances, with fuel and food shortages threatening global stability. What concerns me is that, while we defend freedom and aim for recovery, our nation struggles with ever-weakening institutions and toxic culture wars, and citizens are struggling with the consequences of a cost of living crisis.

The future seems less certain now. Our economy, blighted by covid and lockdowns, is not reigniting as fast as we would like. Unbelievably, we, the Conservative party, are presiding over the steepest taxes since the 1940s and the highest sustained spending levels since the 1970s. That is not the Conservative way, nor is it the way to cope with a stumbling economy. High taxes stifle enterprise, aspiration and, as we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope), productivity. They also risk low growth, stagnation and unemployment. This week, the Bank of England warned of impending recession and 10% interest rates driven by higher energy prices.

These are difficult times, but every cloud has a silver lining and, as Conservatives, this is the time to be radical and to return to our vote-winning philosophy of less state, low taxes and sound public finances. If ever there was a time to loosen the screws, this is it, and the Prime Minister knows it. He said that

“this moment makes clear our best remedy lies in urgently delivering on our mission to turbo-charge the economy, create jobs and spread opportunity across the country.”

Hear, hear. So let us get on with it, Prime Minister.

The Chancellor, of course, must fulfil his role. The promised tax cuts in two years will be too little, too late. We will have lost the electorate, who, burdened by high taxes and debt, will turn to a ruinous socialist Government, possibly in coalition with the SNP: the ultimate nightmare scenario. I accept that legislation on its own cannot solve the cost of living crisis, which has been caused to a large extent by events outside the Government’s control, but we do have the power to cancel the increase in national insurance, remove VAT from domestic fuel and reduce fuel duty even further.

The power to control our own economy is one of the major reasons I backed Brexit, and I am generally delighted by measures in the Queen’s Speech to, at last, fully exploit our new-found freedom. About time, too, as hardcore remainers are still out there and only too eager to highlight any difficulty that we face. While I am on the EU, despite the lack of a specific Bill, I am glad to hear that the Government will prioritise support for the Good Friday agreement and its institutions. Unless the EU compromises further, we must rewrite the Northern Irish protocol to ensure that Northern Ireland is genuinely and unquestionably back in the United Kingdom. The current system is not working and endangers all that so many have worked hard to achieve, namely, peace and prosperity.

I am also relieved—I think that is the right word—to see at last a Bill that aims to conclude the appalling witch hunt of our Northern Ireland veterans. I do not want to commit myself any further at this stage as the devil will be in the detail. While I am on our armed forces, I would be failing in my duty not to warn the Government once again against impending cuts to the Army. Regrettably, Ministers appear persuaded that Ukraine’s success against overwhelming odds proves what a small, flexible and manoeuvrable army can achieve on the battlefield, but the Russians have shown, fortunately, how inept they are at combined operations, so that is a false comparison. I am told that mass is no longer necessary, but an Army of 82,000 is not massive and, for sustained operations against a peer adversary—God forbid what we may face in future—numbers will count in any future conflict.

I return to the Government’s direction of travel. Their adviser has said that it is time to

“scrape the barnacles off the boat.”

I have some sympathy with the Opposition about the lack of an employment Bill, but, as an employer myself, I would say that we are already riven with legislation from top to bottom. The danger of imposing more is to disincentivise employment rather than encourage it, while quite accepting that employees should have rights—of course they should. On flexible working, yes, if it works for the employer, the employee should be allowed to work flexibly, but it should not be a right. That is all we hear so often from the Opposition Benches—right, right, right, right. What about responsibility? It is the employer who takes the risk to employ someone and give them a life chance, a career and a salary, not the employee. A balance should be adopted, with not necessarily so much weight on one side

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Richard Drax]

If the hon. Lady will forgive me, I will not. I am going to plough on. There are a lot of people who want to speak and I do not have much longer left.

On housing, my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox) spoke such sense. The Bill to ensure that locals have more of a say is to be welcomed and I really am backing that. Far more imagination, less density, more green space and supporting infrastructure is needed in the planning system. It is failing every single time. Affordable homes must be affordable. I have seen examples where developers have really taken the care to build affordable, friendly, safe and warm homes that look nice. All too often, sadly, I see larger developers building homes that seem to fall apart within a year. That has to be changed.

There was no mention of the NHS, but as I have said repeatedly, I believe that although it serves us well and I wish it to continue, it needs to be overhauled. As Allister Heath pointed out in a recent article in The Daily Telegraph, which I thought was very good, all reform is stymied by the lie that any improvement is privatisation by stealth. It simply is not.

I am delighted, too, that protestors will finally be challenged when gluing themselves to each other, roads or anything else they can find and stopping people going about their daily lives, jobs, medical appointments or whatever they want to do. I am delighted that, at last, that Bill has come forward.

In conclusion, there is much to welcome. I do not believe that a huge number of Bills—this point has been picked up—is always necessarily the right thing. My father was a great believer in less is more. What matters is the significance of a Bill and what it delivers, rather than the number of them. Having said that, I support many of the Bills in the Queen’s Speech.

However, I must end by warning the Government that we must return to our traditional Conservative philosophy if we are to turn the country around, regenerate the economy and, importantly, win the next election. That means giving people more of their own money, especially during hard times. What happened to the Singapore-style low-tax economy we boasted about, hoped for, fought for and were looking to deliver, which will create the wealth, prosperity and jobs we all need? It is there for the taking now and I urge the Government to grab it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate. I think it was correct for the Prime Minister to make the cost of living so central to the Queen’s Speech. I appreciate that some steps have been taken by the Government already, and I appreciate the fiscal position that the Government face is challenging, but I am of the view that more needs to be done, and I am glad that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor have indicated that this will be the case. I will be watching the situation with interest. Like many colleagues, I have knocked on huge numbers of doors across my constituency and other local areas in the last few weeks, and we have had conversations with people who are struggling to get by at the moment. Of course, that will also be supplemented with our surgeries and casework, so I think we really need to grapple that.

There was much I welcomed in the Queen’s Speech. One of the other issues that always comes up for me is our town centre. It is of great concern to many of my constituents, who feel that the town centre has gone downhill. It is our main civic place, and it is something of great passion. The most frustrating thing about the town centre at the moment is that it does not quite seem to work, even though we have so many brilliant small independent businesspeople and entrepreneurs trying to make it work. Just this Monday, I was fortunate enough to have the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Ipswich, and he met a number of those business owners. We went to Microshops in Carr Street, which is basically a pop-up facility so that local people who have an idea can get a foothold and try it out. If it works, it works, and if it does not, it is less high risk. For most of them it has worked, and 17 small independent businesses are now in there, and a number have got other premises in the town or are expanding. I was very pleased that the Chancellor was able to meet them.

There are too many significant buildings in Ipswich that are empty and have been allowed to collect dust for far too long. It is very pleasing to see that, in the old post office building that had been empty for years, the Botanist, a quite high-end cocktail bar, has opened up. Speaking of al fresco, it has lovely outdoor seating spilling on to the Cornhill. I was pleased to be able to attend its soft launch and its hard launch. At the first one I had completely non-alcoholic cocktails, and at the second one I was convinced to have one alcoholic cocktail. I very much advise everybody to go there if they are in Ipswich.

I welcome the measures relating to compulsory rental auctions and the powers that local authorities can use. Sadly, it has been too difficult to get many of these important buildings back into use, and as much as I would like to just blame the Labour council for all that, it would be wrong for me to do so because it is far more complicated than that. Often it is the owners of these buildings who, frankly, have not done enough. The owners of the building on Carr Street that is now the home of Microshops deserve credit for showing the initiative to get that going, but it is frustrating that it has taken so long to get off the ground.

To get our town centre thriving again, we also need to try to address my constituents’ concerns about the persistent antisocial behaviour in the town centre. Many of my long-term Ipswich residents do not go into the town centre, particularly at certain times of night, because they do not feel safe or secure. Having a good, high police presence in key parts of the town is important. If large groups, invariably of young men, are gathering and drinking alcohol when they ought not to be, and making inappropriate lurid comments to women of all ages going into the town centre, we need the police to be incredibly hands-on and interventionist to disperse and disrupt those groups and enforce the no-alcohol zones. That has not been happening to the extent that I would like, and that desperately needs to be addressed. Our town centre is of immense importance to my constituents.

Another key point that I was pleased to see in the Queen’s Speech was the issue of the small boat crossings. It is right that as a country we are being as generous as we are to refugees fleeing from Ukraine, as we were to those from Afghanistan. A number of constituents have taken in Ukrainian families, and it is the same for colleagues across this House. That is a tribute to them. It is the right thing to do, but of course it will place significant pressure on many of our public services. That is just a reality. We already have quite a long council housing waiting list in the borough, and the pressure on that over time will likely go up as a consequence of this, but it is still the right thing to do. The extra money we provided for school places was the right thing to do.

The challenge is made much more difficult when we have a parallel illegal flow of, invariably, young men arriving here from another safe European country. The reality is that those individuals who are coming here illegally and not claiming asylum in the other numerous safe countries they have come through are working directly against the interests of some of the most desperate families who are fleeing persecution. The more we can state that, the better. That is very much my view, and it is important that the Government have gripped that. Actually, I think it is the view of most of the country, who make the distinction between those fleeing areas of persecution and coming here and those who have refused to apply for asylum in France and other safe countries. It is important that we draw that distinction.

[Kirsten Oswald]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Tom Hunt]

I will not be taking an intervention on this topic from the SNP. [Interruption.] I am so terrified of their illogical arguments that I could not possibly counter them.

The movement away from the Human Rights Act is also very welcome. A British Bill of Rights is a step in the right direction. Frankly, if we are subscribed to an international treaty that prevents us from being able to control our borders and therefore be a sovereign country, of course we need to review our membership of it—[Interruption.] I understand that Labour Members will find that difficult to understand, because most of them support open borders and do not believe in border controls, but I think that this is where most of my constituents are at.

I also want quickly to touch on the Public Order Bill, which I think builds on the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. I was immensely frustrated by the Just Stop Oil protests, as I know most of us were—at least on this side of the House. People who were trying to get to work and go about their daily business were being disrupted by those self-righteous individuals who had no concern for the effect their reckless behaviour was having on others. I really struggle to explain to my constituents why, when individuals are carrying out criminal damage at petrol stations or chaining themselves to public buildings, our police force cannot just get in there and immediately remove them. Why are we dancing around? Just get on with it! Frankly, the stronger we can be in that area, the better.

The Public Order Bill is the right thing to do, but of course it would be voted against by the Opposition, who do not support it and who probably side with the reckless behaviour of those individuals. I know for a fact that the eastern region was one of the worst affected parts of the country during the recent protests. Only the seventh petrol station I went to had petrol, because of that behaviour. I had vulnerable constituents contacting me whose carers could not get to them because they could not fill up their motor vehicles. We should be completely intolerant of these reckless protesters, and I am pleased that the Public Order Bill will get us closer to that.

On a final note, I was pleased to see the point about education and opportunity for all. That is an objective that I, and the vast majority of Members in this place, believe in. On the topic of special educational needs, we have obviously had the Green Paper, which has been published. I have heard it referred to by some as a very, very Green Paper, which took a very, very long time to bring forward. The SEND review took too long, but we are where we are; we have a Green Paper in front of us and there is much in it that is positive. My desire is for that to happen as quickly as possible, so I urge the Government to place a huge priority on the SEN Green Paper, having the consultation and talking to stakeholders, but putting the action in place as soon as possible. Certainly in Suffolk, and in other parts of the country, there is a postcode lottery when it comes to SEN provision, and too many young people with great potential who have learning disabilities are being let down. We can never put enough money into SEN, as far as I am concerned. It is always an investment.

On the whole, I welcome this Queen’s Speech.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

People across the nations of the UK have had a difficult couple of years, and I fear that those difficulties—at least as the UK Government calculate it—provide the perfect cover for the Prime Minister’s current chaos and his Government’s failure to deliver on the promises set out in his party’s manifesto. He did, however, deliver a severely undercooked Brexit, which Scotland did not vote for but which we are all now paying a high price for.

This week was the Prime Minister’s opportunity to chart a way forward, if he intended to deliver on his promises. Instead, the Queen’s Speech showed him for what the people of Scotland have long known him to be. Instead of measures of substance to help people in challenging times, we have a Queen’s Speech of missed opportunities. We do not have anything that seriously addresses the themes of today’s debate, fairness at work and power in communities.

Of course, if the UK Government had any interest in delivering fairness at work or properly thinking about the future of work, the long-promised employment Bill would have been among the Bills in the Queen’s Speech—it was a Conservative manifesto pledge in 2019, after all—but, despite the numerous promises, yet again it is nowhere to be seen. That is a great shame, because for too many people the labour market in the UK is broken.

That was demonstrated during the pandemic, when millions of the self-employed and directors of small companies got no support because their place in the labour market did not fit the Treasury model. Some of the most vulnerable continued to work because statutory sick pay leaves people in poverty, and many just stopped receiving texts calling them to shifts and found themselves in limbo with nowhere to turn.

This was the UK Government’s line in 2019:

“The Prime Minister was clear that he is determined to make the UK the best place in the world to work… Once Brexit is done, we will continue to lead the way and set a high standard, building on existing employment law with measures which protect those in low paid work.”

To coin a phrase, what a load of baloney. It has proved, unsurprisingly, to be nonsense. Where are the measures to improve employment or fairness in the workplace? Where is the right to flexible working? They are all missing. Where is the stronger legal protection for pregnant employees, new parents or carers? Those things are missing too. Where is the single enforcement body to protect employee rights? It is missing.

The Queen’s Speech should have featured reform of the chronically failing shared parental leave scheme. Recent figures show that just 2% of new mothers used the scheme to transfer some of their paid leave to the child’s father. No one defends that scheme and no one pretends it works—it has been under evaluation by the UK Government since April 2018—but evidently addressing that undisputed failure does not merit legislation.

P&O Ferries sacking 800 workers without notice should have been a wake-up call for urgency in a wider reform of employment law. Instead, the Government have focused solely on the narrow issue of pay for seafarers, through the harbours (seafarers’ remuneration) Bill. Those plans been called “feeble and likely unworkable” by Frances O’Grady of the TUC, and the Bill leaves unaddressed the wider issues of fire and rehire.

The Parliamentary calendar being what it is, any interventions in the labour market that are not started this year stand little chance of ever seeing the light of day. Without the protection of EU law, much of which this Government intend to strip away, UK workers face greater unfairness in the workplace, not less. I echo my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman): the Labour party must step up and support our calls to devolve employment law, rather than enabling this Tory Government, which Scotland did not vote for, to sell our workers short.

The people of Scotland did not vote for this future at all. We in the SNP are committed to making sure that they have the opportunity to choose a different future in an independent Scotland, where delivering fairness is not just an electoral soundbite. I challenge the Labour party and the Liberal Democrats to recognise the right of the people in Scotland to choose that better, independent future, instead of once again siding with the Tories in their race to the bottom.

The other strand of this debate is power in communities. I must have a different understanding from the UK Government of what “community” means. I see little sign of them adopting a community focus and approach, either in response to the cost of living crisis or in the proposals—or rather the missing proposals—in the Queen’s Speech. I see that the Prime Minister has adopted the simple tactic of denying the link between the actions, or inaction, of his Government and people’s very understandable anxiety about their bills. That will not wash. Voters can see for themselves that the UK Government are actively choosing courses of action that affect their lives in the most challenging of ways. This UK Government are choosing to load on tax rises, choosing to cut universal credit by over £1,000, and choosing not to uprate benefits by something closer to the current rate of inflation. Contrast that with the Scottish Government’s prompt action to uprate the limited number of benefits they control and to support families via the groundbreaking Scottish child payment. Contrast the UK Government’s approach, with their missing employment Bill, with the Scottish Government’s focus on fair work.

The UK Government are actively choosing to damage communities in other ways too. They are taking a wrecking ball to human rights and the dignity of the individual. Having closed off legal routes to reach the UK in an emergency, the UK Government moved on to their abhorrent Nationality and Borders Act 2022, criminalising those who use another route. Now they have adopted the inhumane policy of paying a third country to take those who make it to the UK off their hands. Not only is that policy morally wrong and a shocking waste of taxpayers’ money, but there are serious questions about the safety of people under those plans, including LGBT people. I echo the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) about the contrasting approach to refugees between the Scottish and UK Governments. Like him, I very much welcome the election of Roza Salih. I think that the way forward will surely be one where more people are included in our democratic systems.

But that is not the approach that the UK Government are taking. Their decision to continue with their hostile environment instead of building an immigration system founded on community, on decency and on fairness is, I fear, a sign of what is to come. The safeguards in the Human Rights Act are an essential feature of our democratic society and our commitment to the rule of law. As we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock), they are also, whether the UK Government like it or not, at the heart of the devolution settlement, and changes must not be made without the consent of the Scottish Parliament. Looking at the report of the Independent Human Rights Act Review, it is difficult to disagree with this:

“Since its passage, the HRA has faced a steadily escalating series of attacks, designed not just to undermine the Act but, at times, the very concept of human rights. A genuine case can be made that the HRA has faced a series of attacks without precedent for a piece of legislation in modern British history.”

The Queen’s Speech was the next round in that series of attacks. It should really bring shame on the UK Government, but, having heard some of the remarks from Conservative Members today, it is clear that their approach to rights is to deny that they should exist.

The UK Government should also be ashamed by the way they have treated the issue of conversion therapy in the Queen’s Speech. There are no conversion practices that are acceptable, and provisions put in place must be trans-inclusive. We need to get a move on, too, given the serious harm that these practices cause. On 30 March, the Minister for Equalities, the hon. Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer), said in this House:

“Both the national LGBT survey of over 100,000 LGBT people and the in-depth Coventry report demonstrated that violent and harmful talking conversion practices continue to take place. That is why we need to act.”—[Official Report, 30 March 2022; Vol. 711, c. 796.]

But shamefully, within hours, it became clear that the UK Government would not use their proposed ban to protect trans people. In fact, it took a public outcry to get them to row back on what looked like a refusal coming down the line to protect anyone at all. Their excuse for their decision was the need to clear the legislative decks for the cost of living crisis and the Ukraine war. However, looking at the Queen’s Speech, it is now clear to all of us that no significant bodies of legislation are being brought forward on those issues, so that excuse does not wash. What is the fig leaf for that discriminatory decision?

It is a dark road that this Government are travelling down, in many ways, with scant regard for people struggling to manage because of the Tory cost of living crisis, a race to the bottom on rights, and a woeful disregard for workers. I repeat what my colleagues have said today: the people of Scotland deserve better and they have a right to reject this.