Public Health
Mark Harper Excerpts(4 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con) [V]
It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Robert Courts) and relatively close geographic neighbour, because what I want to stay chimes with the sentiments that he has just set out. I fully support the regulations in front of the House, but it is worth emphasising what an enormous restriction on our liberty they are—the greatest restriction on our liberty that there has been in British history. That restriction is there for a very good reason, but in a democratic country such as ours, where we have to have consent, it is the Government’s task each time they bring forward such regulations to remake the case as to why we are doing it. It is also worth saying that with each of the review periods, it is not for others to justify the regulations going away; the Government must rejustify why they have to remain in place so we do not consider that they become the new norm.
In that spirit, and I hope that the Minister will address this when he winds up, I request that before any changes to these regulations come into force —indeed, there has already been one set of amendments—any amended regulations are brought forward and debated and decided on by the House. I understand why that did not take place when the regulations were first brought in, but any subsequent amendments should be debated by the House. I was pleased that the Opposition have taken that view. I would prefer the process to remain consensual, but it will only if the Government behave in that way. Scrutiny is important because, as we have already seen with the current regulations, there has been confusion and debate about the guidance that the Government set out and the meaning of the regulations—that is, the law and what has therefore been interpreted by the police.
The Prime Minister confirmed last week, when he addressed the nation on his return to Downing Street, that he was in favour of the greatest transparency as we debate these measures. I therefore say to the Minister that it was disappointing that the seven documents that have been created to set out safe ways of working—the guidance for employers—have reached the public domain, whether that was through leaks or briefing. I think that those documents should have been published by the Government. They could have been published in draft form for discussion. That would have been a better way of conducting the debate than to have those documents reach the public in the way that they have. If we want to take the public with us, the more open and transparent we are about the trade-offs and the difficult decisions that we have to take, the better.
The final point that I want to make is about this House. When I spoke in the House last week, I said that we should pay great tribute to Mr Speaker, the House staff and those who have supported the ability to get the House up and running in this virtual way. It is clearly better to have the House back in virtual form than not at all, but we do lose something. Ministers are not under the same pressure or same level of scrutiny that they are when we are in the Chamber—[Interruption.] I can see that the Minister is laughing in his seat. The sooner that we can work out ways to enable the House to function with more of us physically present, albeit in a more socially distant way, the better. I urge the Government to consider ways in which we can do that.
The Prime Minister has set a decision point this week: for the regulations that we are debating today to be considered, and for the Government to take decisions about whether they wish to continue with them in force or to make changes. Either decision—keeping them in force unchanged, or making changes—is very significant, and has an impact on everyone in the country and on businesses around the country. I think that that statement should be made in Parliament so that Members of Parliament can ask questions, not our own behalf, but on behalf of all those whom we represent. I hope that the Government will bear that in mind when they are making those decisions.
Covid-19 Update
Mark Harper Excerpts(4 years, 3 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
Yes, it is acceptable. It is right that volunteers in that sort of work, for example Samaritans, should travel to do it.
Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
The Secretary of State will know that, following the Prime Minister’s statement yesterday, all tourism and leisure providers have closed. I commend those in my constituency that closed before the advice was given, in order to protect people. However, those who take lots of deposits are obviously being pressed by our constituents to return that money, and that may put them in financial distress, but equally our constituents need the money back given their financial circumstances. I accept that the Secretary of State may not have an answer for me now, but will he at least commit to take the issue away and see whether an answer is forthcoming, perhaps with the support of the Treasury?
Matt Hancock
Yes, I will get my right hon. Friend an answer from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.
Coronavirus
Mark Harper Excerpts(4 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Mark Harper (Forest of Dean) (Con)
The Secretary of State will know there are two confirmed cases in Gloucestershire, and I put on record my thanks to the public health professionals who have dealt with those cases in a professional, calm and considered manner.
My specific question is about the action the Department for Work and Pensions will take for those members of the public who, whether because of business downturn or because of self-isolation, have to access the benefits system. Will frontline DWP staff and systems accommodate the fact that self-isolation, as the Secretary of State says, should be treated as an illness and that no inappropriate sanctions should be applied?
Matt Hancock
We are absolutely clear that that is the rule, and I frequently talk to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions about this matter.
Health and Social Care
Mark Harper Excerpts(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Jonathan Ashworth
I give way first to the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) and then I will make some progress because I know that many Members want to speak.
Jonathan Ashworth
We have long argued for a cap on care costs, but of course the Government, as the right hon. Gentleman says, dropped their support for this policy.
On the issue of social care, the Prime Minister said at the Dispatch Box yesterday that he wanted cross-party talks, although in his BBC interview the day before he said that he had a plan that he would bring forward in the next 12 months. The Government want a consensus. I say to the Government that the Labour party has proposed free personal care. We have a version of free personal care in Scotland. There is a similar version of it in Northern Ireland. There is a version of it in Wales. The House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee, which includes Thatcherites such as Michael Forsyth and Norman Lamont, alongside the former Labour Chancellor, Alistair Darling, has proposed free personal social care. There already is a political consensus. It is the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister who stand outside that consensus. If the Secretary of State wants to engage with us on that basis, then my hon. Friend the Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley) is happy to do so. I will now take the intervention from the former Chief Whip.
Mr Harper
Given that the hon. Gentleman’s party is undergoing a leadership election and that will clearly mean—[Interruption.] No, I am trying to say this helpfully. If the Secretary of State has made a commitment to start the process of cross-party talks within the next 100 days, that will obviously be before that leadership election is concluded. So my serious point is that if we wish to engage on a cross-party basis on whether to implement the Dilnot proposals, as my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) mentioned, or on the basis that the hon. Gentleman just said, is he in a position to start that engagement with the support of his current party leader so that we can make progress urgently? The social care problems in the country are not going to wait, frankly, for another Leader of the Opposition to be elected. That is meant as a really serious and cross-party point.
Jonathan Ashworth
It is a serious point, and I am grateful for the way in which the right hon. Gentleman has put it. Of course, we are very happy to engage. My hon. Friend the Member for Worsley and Eccles South, who sits in the shadow Cabinet and leads on social care, is happy to sit down with Ministers at any point.
I am suggesting to the Secretary of State, rather gently, that there is a degree of political consensus on free adult personal social care. The House of Lords Committee, which includes Michael Forsyth and Norman Lamont, not socialists red in tooth and claw by any means, alongside Alistair Darling, has proposed it. We, as a Front-Bench team, have proposed it. There are forms of it in some of the devolved nations. It is the Secretary of State who is standing outside that consensus. If he wants to engage with us on those terms, and on the point about a cap as proposed by Dilnot, then of course we are prepared to have those levels of engagement.
There is also a degree of consensus around the need for better integration between health and social care, and better co-ordination of health and social care. That is why we are intrigued by the Secretary of State’s proposal to consult on the NHS Funding Bill.
Matt Hancock
The cash boost that we are giving now is bigger. I think today is the anniversary of Prime Minister Tony Blair sitting on the couch of a TV show, talking about increasing funding for the NHS, which was opposed by Gordon Brown, who was Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time. We will not take any lectures.
I am thrilled that the public comprehensively rejected the Labour party’s baseless scaremongering, which was repeated through the election campaign and worried some of the most vulnerable people who rely on our NHS. I lost count of the number of times I had to debunk some politicised nonsense put about by the Opposition across the country because they had nothing positive to say. The hon. Member for Leicester South was at it again yesterday and in his speech. He said that the settlement in the NHS Funding Bill is a cap, although clause 1 states that it is a minimum. Clause 1(1) states:
“In making an allotment to the health service in England for each financial year…the Secretary of State must allot an amount that is at least the amount specified”.
Did the hon. Gentleman even read the Bill? Did he get to clause 1? I am not sure he bothered reading it.
Let us look specifically at the amendment. It calls for reform of social care and for the Government to bring forward a plan, and that is precisely what the Queen’s Speech provides for. It also calls for additional funding for the NHS, which is what we are legislating for. The long-term plan is fully funded by the largest cash injection in the history of the NHS, and I urge Members across the House to support it fully. We can only fund the NHS with a strong economy, and that is exactly what we will do.
Mr Harper
The Secretary of State will have heard my earlier exchanges with the shadow Secretary of State, which I hope were helpful. He will be aware that more than half the budget for adult social care in England is spent not on older people but on those of working age, as we try to enable people to be more independent and to work. Will he confirm that the social care plan that he plans to discuss with other parties, and which he will bring forward this year as the Prime Minister committed to do, will cover older people and those of working age, and will probably entail different solutions for those two groups?
Matt Hancock
The proposals that we are working on include solutions for the provision of social care for older and retired people as they decline in the later years of their lives, and for people of working age. Part of the point about consensus building is that we must be open to options and look right across the piece. It was a disappointment that the Labour party proposals that came out in the autumn only covered older people and not working-age adults, and that point must be addressed. I hope we can do that in a spirit of cross-party discussion, and that those on the Opposition Front Bench will engage positively with that. We will engage right across the House when trying to bring forward a solution.