Rail Services

Debate between Mark Harper and Alison Thewliss

Thursday 11th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

I do not think the hon. Gentleman is right on Avanti. The services have improved. They are not completely where they need to be, but they are now up with the rest of the industry and they need to continue to improve. I made that clear when I extended the contract; I said that it had made progress and needed to continue that. I will have to make a decision later this year about what we do when it comes up for renewal again. That will depend, as it did last time, on its performance. I hope Avanti will continue to keep increasing its performance and demonstrating that it can deliver for passengers. That will be important when I make that decision.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

The Secretary of State mentioned Avanti in his statement and the improvements that it is apparently making, but my constituent Zoe contacted me to say that she has been trying to book an advance standard premium ticket from London Euston to Glasgow for weeks. She needs it for the end of this month, and although she can book her ticket to London she cannot come home again because the tickets have not been released yet. What kind of a service is that, if people cannot predict how to get home? How can that possibly build confidence in the service and get people travelling?

[Mr Harper]

I obviously do not know what has happened in the hon. Lady’s specific example, but if she gives the details to my hon. Friend the rail Minister, we will look into that. If we look at Avanti’s performance overall, we see that it has made considerable progress both earlier this year and since I extended the contract. As I said in answer to the previous question, I want that performance to continue to improve for constituents such as the hon. Lady’s.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Harper and Alison Thewliss

Thursday 24th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

Some 73% of guide dog owners have been refused access to taxis, shops and restaurants in the past year. What is the Minister and his Department doing to improve access and ensure that guide dog owners such as my constituent Robert, and his guide dog Winnie, can get out and about with confidence?

[Mr Harper]

I am very familiar with that issue from my time as Minister for Disabled People. The behaviour that the hon. Lady describes is, of course, already unlawful. She has set out a specific case; if she writes to me with the details, we will look into it and see what further work we can do to make sure that the existing law to ensure fairness for guide dog owners is properly enforced across the United Kingdom.

Migration Policy and the Economy

Debate between Mark Harper and Alison Thewliss

Wednesday 29th November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Mr Harper]

My hon. Friend makes some interesting points. He mushed together several things, including visiting and working. I cannot see any reason why, once we have left the European Union, we would require people coming from the EU for visits—people coming on holiday or for travel—to have visas or vice versa. For example, we do not require visas from citizens of the United States of America coming to Britain on holiday or for visits. It is perfectly reasonable to have rules about people coming to work in Britain, and it would not be unreasonable for European Union countries to have similar rules. We could hardly complain if such rules were reciprocal, but to require visas for visits would not be sensible.

The final point I want to make is about the views of business. It is certainly true—I read the paper that the CBI produced ahead of the debate—that businesses, particularly larger businesses, are basically saying, “We want to carry on importing labour as we do already”, but I think we should push back a little. It is not surprising that businesses want to carry on doing things as they are, with unlimited supplies of inexpensive labour, but we should remind businesses that they should not only do what is in their economic interest, but what is in the economic interest of our country. We should challenge businesses to think about those who are already here and ensure they invest in them and improve their skills. We should also challenge businesses a little about whether they are investing enough in their capital, in the technology available to their business and in their productivity before we automatically say, “Let us just import people from overseas.”

The Home Secretary has commissioned the Migration Advisory Committee to look at the businesses that depend on EU nationals in their workforce, and that work will be helpful. It will enable us to identify those businesses that are using that labour, particularly at the unskilled end of the spectrum, and it will enable the Government to work with those businesses, particularly over the two-year transition period or implementation period that we have said there will be once we have left the European Union, during which people from the EU will still be able to come here. In that period we will be able to work with business to ensure that they can make the changes they need to make ahead of not having access to the unskilled labour that I talk about in my proposition.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

The right hon. Gentleman has been making very broad assumptions about who owns and runs businesses in this country. A great number of my constituents who have been in touch with me on this issue have come from other countries to Scotland to set up and establish businesses, but have found that Home Office rules and processes mean that they are then at risk. They employ people from Glasgow, and their businesses are being put at risk by the Home Office, in particular through delays to entrepreneur visas.

[Mr Harper]

The hon. Lady makes a good point, which is that we allow and welcome people to come here to set up businesses with appropriate rules about the investment of capital and so on. If she has any specific cases, she should raise those with either the Minister or my colleague the Immigration Minister. I have done that job, and I used to deal with specific cases. The hon. Lady is right: officials, fabulous though they are, are not perfect and mistakes do get made. Part of what we do in this House is fix those mistakes where they happen. We enable Ministers to ensure that systems work more smoothly, and that work is very welcome. She should continue to raise her concerns, as I know she does.

In conclusion, migration can have a positive effect on the economy, but we should look at the growth of our economy per head of population, and not just at GDP growth overall. We have to ensure that the existing population is better off. People coming to the country should earn enough to make a positive contribution to the public finances. That will support the public perception of migration and make people more welcoming. Finally, a migration system based on skills and not the country of origin will be essential for a global Britain that goes out looking for trade deals. It will be very difficult to explain to countries outside the European Union why a citizen of their country with the exact same level of skills finds it more difficult to come to work in Britain than someone from the European Union. Arguably, that would be a discriminatory system that would be difficult to defend once we are no longer a member of the European Union. For all those reasons, I commend my proposition to the House and look forward to the contributions from other Members.