Representation of the People Bill

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading
Wednesday 2nd September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. I will extend the time limit because we have gathered some time. Mark Sewards now has six minutes.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I know that many of my colleagues are keen to get in, so I will try to keep it under five minutes. I will speak specifically about amendments 31 and 34. When the Government brought forward this legislation, I was so pleased that they referenced enhanced “know your donor” checks, because before accepting donations from anyone all political parties should know who those donors are and where the money is coming from. We know that malign state actors are seeking to influence our politics. They often try through wealthy individuals who have the means to try to distort things here in the UK, so I was pleased with the Government’s announcement on donor checks.

However, I did not think that the original Bill as drafted was strong enough, and with the support of my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Phil Brickell) I drafted some amendments that I think will greatly strengthen those checks. For example, amendment 31 states that parties must consider things like the location or jurisdiction of the donor, any links the donor has to politically exposed people, and the source of the wealth being donated from.

I was equally delighted a few months ago when the Government, in a statement from the Dispatch Box in response to the Rycroft review, said that location would be incorporated within the “know your donor” checks. However, it is now the second day back, I have had two Select Committees and some work on funeral regulation, and I have looked through the amendment paper and have not, other than in my amendment, been able to find reference to location in any of the Government’s amendments. I would appreciate the Minister’s comments on that and on whether the Government are still committed to ensuring that location is something that political parties have to check before accepting a donation.

I would also like to ask the Minister about two other areas. Why did the Government not consider that it was necessary to include politically exposed people or the source of the wealth being donated from? I ask that because recommendation 5 of the Rycroft review said that “know your donor” rules should

“more closely mirror the customer due diligence provisions in the anti-money laundering regulations.”

If a young couple from Leeds South West and Morley seeks to take out a mortgage, they have to answer these questions. It is reasonable and fair that a political party accepting millions of pounds in donations should also have to answer them. If the Government have fully accepted the Rycroft review yet not incorporated those two recommendations, I suggest there might be a contradiction, which I would like the Minister to acknowledge.

It is worth saying that the things in amendment 31 are not radical; they are not new. The Electoral Commission said as far back as 2018 that such changes could prevent foreign money from being used to influence UK politics. The Committee on Standards in Public Life said in 2021 that such measures would be useful and that, again, the money laundering regulations are the model that we should follow. I would be interested in the Minister’s comments on why those additional two things were not incorporated in the Bill.

Foreign Interference in UK Politics

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Monday 6th July 2026 Commons Chamber

[Samantha Dixon]

Any company that wants to donate into British politics will have to substantially prove that it is able to do so by being headquartered in the UK and having persons of interest from the UK. We will end the way in which shell companies have been used to channel illegitimate funds into our political system.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I very much welcome the Minister’s statement today and the incorporation of the Rycroft review recommendations. I also welcome the changes to the “know your donor” rules, particularly in respect of location; political parties must be forced to include location in their considerations before accepting a donation. I was going to submit that as an amendment to the Representation of the People Bill, so job done on that. Does the Minister agree that political parties should also be forced to consider politically exposed people and the source of the wealth being donated before accepting donations?

[Samantha Dixon]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. We will be working across the Benches to develop a donor declaration that will set out where exactly money has come from. We need to proceed on that with care and collaboration to ensure that when a donation is given, it is clear where exactly it is coming from. I agree with him entirely.

Elections: First Past the Post

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2026 Westminster Hall

[Lisa Smart (Hazel Grove) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Turner. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) on securing this vital debate. Like many colleagues, we have both been vocal, proud advocates for political reform. This debate builds on the important work of my hon. Friend in the previous session, when she won a vote on the Second Reading of her Bill to bring PR to elections for national and local government in England. That was a clear sign that the demand for reform exists across the House and continues to grow.

In her excellent opening remarks, my hon. Friend mentioned the newly re-elected right hon. Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham) whom I have told I would mention. He is not alone in his support for proportional representation. The right hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell), the deputy leader of the Labour party, has said that she has always supported electoral reform. From a different side of the political spectrum, the Conservative London Assembly member Emma Best has said her party should start thinking seriously about proportional representation. She speaks compellingly, making a strong Conservative argument for PR.

When voices across the political spectrum are saying the same, the Government should listen. I am proud to sit as vice-chair for the all-party parliamentary group for fair elections, which is the largest APPG and shows clear cross-party support for replacing first past the post with a proportional system. It is good to see several members of the APPG here today. We have heard from a number of them, so I will reflect on some of their comments. My fellow vice-chair, the hon. Member for North Herefordshire (Dr Chowns), reminded us that PR is fair. We are in a multi-party political system and first past the post, which was set up for two parties, is no longer fit for purpose.

The hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Dr Arthur) talked in detail about his experience on the city council, and how PR in Scotland works. My constituency neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle (Mr Morrison), said that despite being elected on a minority of votes, he represents well his whole community. That is an urgent issue, to ensure that people have trust in our system. My hon. Friend the Member for South Cotswolds (Dr Savage) talked about how the voting system shapes the way we campaign, focusing on a core number of marginal seats and a group of voters in them. My hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Clive Jones) reminded us that PR is not a panacea—he is absolutely right to do so—but it is a fundamental step in the right direction towards a fairer, better system.

My hon. Friend the Member for Mid Dunbartonshire (Susan Murray) reminded us how PR shapes how we campaign and what we choose to do and not do with our resources. My hon. Friend the Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover)—while doing an impression of my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle—gave us examples from overseas and of parties working together in local government. He also reminded us that sorting out the voting system would better enable us to sort out our country.

I know that objections are made to reform. We are told that PR means weaker coalitions, constant instability or Members who answer to a party list rather than the people they serve. To those who have those concerns, I point to the weakness, instability and chaos, frankly, that we have seen over the past decade. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) made his case, as he often does; he had a very good go at making arguments that I disagree with, but I am sorry to say that he failed to convince me on this occasion. Seven Prime Ministers in 10 years is not what a well-functioning system looks like.

Our current system is failing, and we have such a great opportunity to push forwards and make positive reforms. Some may look at each change of Prime Minister as a story about one person, one party or one bad week in Westminster, but that just does not cut it. When a pattern repeats again and again, it stops being about individual issues, personalities or failures and starts reflecting the system that produces them. First past the post manufactures large majorities out of modest vote shares, and those majorities are built on such shallow foundations that they can collapse as quickly as they were built. Instability is not a glitch in our multi-party system; it is a feature of it.

There are various forms of PR. I will not try your patience, Mr Turner, by ranking them in order of my preference—I will save that for the Lib Dem conference—but, suffice to say, the Liberal Democrats support the single transferrable vote. It keeps a strong direct link between Members and the place they represent. Constituents have local MPs to turn to, but they would have a real hand in choosing them. That is the price of different voting systems.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way, especially as she is my friend on the armed forces parliamentary scheme. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Turner. I am sorry I was not here at the beginning of the debate; I was at a really important statement on Nottingham maternity services in the main Chamber. Does the hon. Lady not agree that, even if some commission came forward and said that STV was absolutely the way to go and that we should adopt it in future, this country should adopt it only if the electorate validates that through a general election where a majority of the parties making that promise win a majority in Parliament, or through a referendum?

[Lisa Smart]

I am not personally a fan of a referendum. They can be quite divisive and they return one of two answers, so I would not support one. The Liberal Democrats have had a fairer voting system in our manifesto since the foundation of our party. I believe that the current Government, whose party the hon. Member is a member of, have put forward some other suggestions that were not in their manifesto in 2024, so it is possible for situations to change. It is possible for the world to move on, and for people of good will to work together for the betterment of our country.

Single transferrable votes for the House and for local councillors in England would mean that communities would not be written off because they were a safe seat, and nobody would feel that their vote was wasted. We could also introduce more nuance into a debate than can be delivered via the medium of bar chart. Consider the previous general election: the Labour party won about two thirds of the seats in the House on roughly one third of the vote. A system that can hand near-total control of the Commons to a party that two in three voters did not vote for cannot honestly claim to speak for the country.

The Liberal Democrats have argued for fair votes for decades, because a democracy in which every vote counts is a better democracy. I do not want to spend my time today just listing what is broken, because the more important point is that we have in front of us a genuine opportunity to put it right. The appetite for reform is no longer confined to the Liberal Democrat Benches; it is growing across the House and across the country. We need to fix our politics so that we can fix our country. An amended Representation of the People Bill could be the vehicle to deliver it and to give this country a voting system worthy of the people it serves. I hope the Minister will tell us today that the Government are ready to take that chance.

Foreign Financial Influence and Interference: UK Politics

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Wednesday 25th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Steve Reed]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that point, and of course I am more than happy to look at that.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State’s announcement of a cap on donations from overseas electors and a moratorium on cryptocurrency donations from today is extremely welcome. What criminal penalties will be incurred for breaking these rules? After all, we need an effective deterrent to dissuade those who might seek to circumvent them.

[Steve Reed]

We will lay the details before the House so that Members on both sides have access to the relevant information. It was important that the provisions in these two circumstances were brought forward to today, because of the risk of a window for evasion had we not done that. That retrospective change will be subject to the legislation going through Parliament successfully.

Funeral Premises: Environmental Health Inspections

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2026 Westminster Hall

[Sir Roger Gale (in the Chair)]

I will call Mark Sewards to move the motion. I will then call the Minister to respond. I remind other Members that they may make a speech only with the prior permission of the Member in charge of the debate and the Minister. That does not apply to interventions, which are in order. There will be no opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up, as is the convention in 30-minute debates.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Government support for environmental health inspections of funeral premises.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Roger. At the outset, I will say that we must keep firmly in mind the needs of grieving families: people who, in their most vulnerable moments, deserve dignity, clarity and the reassurance that they can trust that their loved ones’ remains are being cared for.

[Steve Yemm (Mansfield) (Lab)]

A grieving family in my constituency contacted me last year. They said that their deceased father, who had been left in the care of a local funeral home, had been stored in such a way that his body had decomposed to the extent that it was “covered in maggots” by the time it was sent to the coroner. That was reported to the family by the coroner. I understand that the funeral home was not regulated. Does my hon. Friend agree that the case in my constituency highlights the case for further regulation and a more rigorous inspection regime for those who work in this industry?

[Mark Sewards]

I absolutely agree. There have been too many cases in recent memory of people not being cared for with the dignity that they deserved.

This topic first came to my attention when my constituents Cody and Liam Townend contacted me, along with another mum, Zoe Ward. They lost babies in different circumstances and went to the same funeral director, an organisation called Florrie’s Army. To their horror, their babies’ bodies were taken to the private home of the person in charge of Florrie’s Army, and they were not treated with the care and respect that they deserved. I will not repeat the shocking details here, but the BBC report can be found online. Cody and Zoe asked what I could do to help, because although it was reported to the police, they found nothing actionable.

[Ayoub Khan (Birmingham Perry Barr) (Ind)]

I thank the hon. Member for securing this debate. I know that he is deeply passionate about our shared work in the all-party parliamentary group for funerals, coroners and bereavement, where we have learnt about the cases he described. Does he agree that the Minister would benefit from meeting our APPG to discuss the funeral sector and how it can develop the clear standards, robust oversight and proper enforcement it so desperately requires?

[Mark Sewards]

I concur; the Minister is very welcome to come to our APPG.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. I always try to be helpful by talking about what we do in Northern Ireland. Issues around funeral service premises are sensitive and people must be treated with care when they are dealing with the death of loved ones. In Northern Ireland, funeral premises operate within general health and safety frameworks rather than a dedicated inspection programme. There is also no published fixed frequency for routine environmental health inspections. Does he agree that more must be done to create clearer regulation? I believe that the code of conduct in Scotland would be helpful to ensure industry standards and oversee premises and services more consistently.

[Mark Sewards]

The hon. Gentleman is right to point out the example of Scotland, which I encourage the Minister to consider. I think the Government should consider everything the hon. Gentleman set out, which I will come on to.

This debate is about a fundamental issue that many of us find difficult to talk about—death. The treatment and dignity of our dead is not typically a subject for dinnertime conversation; those who have experienced bereavement, which is most of us, know how complicated and emotionally overwhelming it can be. At such a vulnerable time, one of the few sources of comfort should be the reassurance that a trusted funeral director is caring for a loved one with dignity, professionalism and respect. The vast majority of funeral directors live up to and often exceed such expectations. People’s trust has been betrayed by a very small number of rogue operators. Each stunning revelation about a rogue operator —in some cases, they have even desecrated remains—has a compounding effect on the public’s consciousness. People used to believe that the funeral sector was regulated, but they now know that it is not regulated, and they worry about the consequences of that for their families.

There are a variety of options open to the Government to solve this problem. Empowering local authorities to carry out environmental health inspections, which I will get to, is one of them; introducing a national standard is another; and empowering trade bodies should also be considered. Ultimately, however, we have to establish an independent statutory regulatory regime. I want to be clear that inaction is not an option that we should consider. I firmly believe that statutory regulation should be introduced for this sector. However, that will take time and primary legislation to achieve, so we need to consider our options for such regulation and what can happen in the interim.

Environmental health inspections could act as a stopgap before full regulation, or become the statutory regime itself, or both. However, there are differing opinions. I have spoken to representatives of the funeral service industry, including from the two largest trade bodies: the National Association of Funeral Directors, or the NAFD; and the National Society of Allied and Independent Funeral Directors, or SAIF. I have also had discussions with Co-op Funeralcare, having visited its premises in Leeds. I am also very pleased to serve as the vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on funerals, coroners and bereavement, which brings together many organisations from across the sector, as the hon. Member for Birmingham Perry Barr (Ayoub Khan) said in his intervention.

Every person and every operator who I have spoken to about this situation is appalled by the cases they have seen. They know how vital public confidence is to the funeral profession. They want the reassurance that a statutory regime will come into place, although views on what it should look like definitely differ.

Environmental health inspections could help to build back trust, but only if there is a unified national standard that funeral premises must adhere to. But that is precisely what we do not have right now: there is no statutory inspection regime in relation to the services provided by funeral directors. My constituent Cody put it best when she said that it is harder to set up a burger van than it is to set up a funeral home. Shockingly, she is right about that.

There are no routine checks or minimum standards of funeral homes outside those established by the trade bodies. The Government are still considering the Fuller inquiry’s recommendations on funeral sector regulation and inspections. I am very grateful for the engagement that I have had on this issue, particularly with the Ministry of Justice, including with the Minister for Victims, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones). She met me and some of my constituents towards the end of last year, and she was phenomenal in that meeting.

However, I will take this opportunity to ask the Minister who is here today: what assessment has her Department made of the Fuller inquiry’s recommendation to establish a statutory regulatory regime for funeral directors in England? I appreciate that that is really a question for the Department of Health and Social Care, but given that it also affects her Department, I hope she has a view on it.

That question matters because of the steps that the Government have taken in the past. In May 2024, the Ministry of Justice and the then Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities wrote to all councils in England to strongly encourage them to inspect funeral premises. The letter said that this was to reassure the public that the sector as a whole is safe. That was a welcome step at the time, both for the public and the sector, but those visits were never intended as technical deep-dive inspections. Instead, they were conducted to check whether everything was generally in order.

The NAFD supported those visits, and it encouraged its members to co-operate and demonstrate the high standards required of them. It advised the environmental health officers on good practice and hosted webinars to help members to prepare for their visits. However, most of those EHOs had limited experience of visiting funeral premises. It is also unclear the extent to which local authorities communicated their findings back to the Ministry of Justice and to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Has the Minister’s Department collated the information that was collected through those 2024 inspections? If it has, will it use that information to inform any position that it might take in relation to funeral sector regulation?

In my view, it is concerning that those inspections failed to identify the problems that came to light when my constituents needed help. Leeds city council participated in those inspections, but to my knowledge it did not inspect Florrie’s Army or identify it as a provider of concern at the time.

That also highlights a wider issue. There is scope for environmental health inspections to be carried out by local authorities and EHOs, but that approach would probably be best employed as a short-term or interim option. It must not act as a shield against wider regulation of the funeral industry. Environmental health officers may not have the relevant sector-specific experience, but they have the skills in overlapping elements, such as infection prevention, premises hygiene and safety. The benefit of utilising EHOs is that a move to expand their remit would not necessarily require primary legislation in the short term. It would be the quickest route to ensuring some sort of Government-backed regular inspections regime, but the issue of national standards would still be outstanding.

[Shockat Adam (Leicester South) (Ind)]

We need regulation. One story of the mismanagement of a loved one is one too many. Does the hon. Member agree that in certain faith communities—and especially in the Jewish and Muslim communities—the expediency with which people wish to bury their loved ones must be taken into consideration within that regulation?

[Mark Sewards]

I could not agree more. Any regulatory regime introduced nationally needs to take into account how different faiths and cultures bury their dead.

In order for environmental health officers to conduct their work properly, they would need the backing of the Local Government Association, but it recently indicated in comments to the BBC that it would prefer the Ministry of Justice to take on the responsibility for a national scheme rather than leaving it at a local level. It would appear that the LGA has no desire to take on the responsibility for inspections on a permanent basis. Does the Minister agree with the LGA’s position?

There are other options available. Both the NAFD and SAIF require their members to undergo inspections, but they have no enforcement powers and there is no requirement for members to register with them as trade bodies—although about 80% of the sector’s players do. These bodies can expel a member, but they cannot stop them operating, and that is the gap that, in time, statutory regulation must fill. There is a strong argument for backing those trade bodies in relation to inspections. They have the respect of the industry, and with Government support and the possibility of placing their inspection regime on a statutory footing, they could play a central role within any future regulatory system. The Government may consider advising consumers to use only funeral directors who are members of the NAFD and SAIF to add an extra layer of protection.

Although this falls under a different Department—the Department of Health and Social Care—it would be remiss of me not to mention the Human Tissue Authority. Expanding its role so that it becomes the sector’s regulator is another option. The HTA has considerable experience and expertise, and expanding its remit may be more time efficient than establishing an entirely new independent regulator from scratch.

Where does this leave us today? In the medium to long term, the inspection of funeral premises undoubtedly needs to come through a statutory regulatory regime and a national standard. That is what the Fuller inquiry recommended, what the majority of the public would back and—importantly for me—what my constituents want. In the short term, the Government must move at pace and come to a decision that can reassure the public and maintain confidence in the funeral sector. That may mean utilising local authorities or the existing capacity of trade bodies to bridge the gap before regulation in the ways that I have described. I do not have all the answers, but any conversation must include the families and victims of these horrific crimes. I use the word “crimes” even though my constituents found nothing actionable when they contacted the police, because what happened to them was abhorrent. They have borne the greatest burdens, and any proposal must work for them.

I want to acknowledge the tireless work of Members from across the House, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice (Emma Hardy), who has worked relentlessly on behalf of her constituents to ensure that the voices of the bereaved remain at the centre of every discussion of this topic. Action must be taken as soon as is reasonably possible, both to reassure the public and to recognise the good work of those who operate in the profession and the funeral industry. As everyone in the House knows, introducing primary legislation can take a long time. If we cannot act quickly, we need to consider every non-legislative solution outside of full statutory regulation.

What assessment has the Minister’s Department made of the need for environmental health inspections at funeral premises? What conversations, if any, have taken place between her Department and the Ministry of Justice, the Department of Health and Social Care and the Department for Business and Trade on statutory regulation of the funeral sector? Will MHCLG, through local authorities, be supporting environmental health inspections at any point, now or in the future, and will the Minister commit to wider engagement with the funeral sector ahead of proposed implementation of any kind of inspection?

Families deserve dignity, transparency and peace of mind; the sector deserves Government support in reassuring those families; and Cody, Zoe and Liam, and all the affected families, deserve the peace of mind that what happened to them will never happen to anyone ever again.

Chinese Embassy

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Tuesday 13th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

I note the right hon. Gentleman’s concerns, and the Security Minister and other Ministers will have heard them too. However, the case is specifically a planning decision to be made in accordance with the propriety rules and other considerations that Planning Ministers have to take into account as part of the quasi-judicial process, but all material considerations will be taken into account as part of that process.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

My constituent, Chloe Cheung, has to live with the fact that she has a £100,000 bounty placed on her head under the national security law in Hong Kong. She walks around every day knowing that anyone here could claim that bounty by taking her to the Chinese embassy and handing her over to the authorities. Now she is worried that she might find herself locked away in one of the secret rooms shown in the new embassy plans. What exactly are the Government going to do to ensure that Chloe is protected and kept safe, and that that never happens to her or anyone else with a £100,000 bounty on their head, if the new embassy is approved?

[Matthew Pennycook]

I recognise my hon. Friend’s frustration and anger on behalf of his constituent. We will not tolerate transnational repression of the kind that he is concerned about. Specifically, the counterfactual here is not that the Chinese do not have an embassy; they have seven diplomatic premises in the UK already. Again, I come back to the fact that we will make a decision on this case on the material planning considerations that pertain to it.

National Plan to End Homelessness

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Thursday 11th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alison McGovern]

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the use of taxpayers’ money. As she will have heard me say in previous responses, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury is leading some cross-ministerial work on value-for-money questions on the provision of support for homeless people. That is important, because we cannot afford to waste a penny in this mission. I would be delighted to visit her constituency.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for the strategy and I agree with its stated aims. I especially welcome the ending of the unlawful use of B&Bs for families. We have already heard the case powerfully made by my hon. Friends the Members for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Danny Beales) and for Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme (Lee Pitcher) as to why that is so important. In Morley, my team and I are supporting a particularly complex case of an individual who is homeless. Although the details are complex, the outcome is simple: they are sleeping in shop doors across Morley. Would the Minister consider meeting me to discuss this case to ensure that the strategy will cover them so that we can get them off the streets and into a home?

[Alison McGovern]

My hon. Friend makes his case well. If he would care to send me some details of the case, I will of course meet him.

Pride in Place

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Wednesday 15th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I remind Members to keep questions short so that we can get try to get everybody in. I would not want Members to miss out on the opportunity to speak about their constituency because other Members had taken so long.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I warmly welcome the £20 million for Old Farnley, but now is the time for action. Hundreds of people have already completed my survey. I have more than 100 volunteers for the neighbourhood board alone—it will not be that big—and we have plenty of ideas that we want to spend the money on. Given that we are ready and impatient to deliver, will the Minister empower my residents to crack on and spend this money and deliver the change that we know they deserve?

[Miatta Fahnbulleh]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his work and the huge progress he has made, both in reaching out across his community and in convening and galvanising people to join his neighbourhood board. We want communities to run this. We want pace and we want impact, and we are committed to working alongside him and his community to drive the change that they want to see.

Indefinite Leave to Remain

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Monday 8th September 2025 Westminster Hall

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Mr Pritchard. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Ben Goldsborough) on his opening remarks, and I welcome my hon. Friend the Minister to his place.

Earlier this year, I held a surgery with Hongkongers living in my constituency, alongside Alison Lowe, the deputy mayor of West Yorkshire, who is responsible for policing and crime. While I was so pleased to see the room absolutely packed out—standing room only—it was clear from the questions I was being asked that the No. 1 concern was the immigration White Paper and its potential impact on Hongkongers and their families—people we invited to live here.

I need to make it very clear that we must take extremely strong action on immigration—the British people demand it—and that having functioning borders should be a basic function of the state. The level of immigration to the UK, both legal and illegal, has been too high, and the White Paper is a decent package of measures to try to bring the numbers down, which should be welcomed. However, we do not want to unfairly penalise those who we have invited here, or who make a huge contribution to the UK.

When the BNO visa scheme was introduced in 2020 by the previous Government, it was in response to the imposition of the national security law on Hongkongers, to help them escape political repression. To change the rules now, when the first BNO visa holders are just months away from qualifying for settled status, would be a devastating blow to the Hong Kong community. It would constitute a broken promise. These people have come to the UK under a set of conditions that we determined, and at our request. At the very least, even if we were to change the rules, they should never be applied retrospectively.

What would happen if we did change the rules? First, extending the indefinite leave to remain period for BNO visa holders would have very little impact on immigration figures. Government data shows that most BNO visa holders arrived in the first two years of the scheme, between 2021 and 2023, and, since then, the numbers have been falling. Currently, BNOs represent about 1.65% of total visa grants, so changing the rules in this area will do very little to change immigration trends.

More importantly, the Hong Kong community make an immense contribution to the UK, even though they are often prevented from giving their full talents to society because of the limitations they face without settled status or citizenship. Take university-age students, for example, who we have heard about today: without settled status, they will not qualify for home fees, making university unaffordable for most of them. Delaying that settled status for a total of 10 years would have a hugely detrimental impact on those young BNO visa holders. They will still go on to contribute to the UK throughout their working lives, but why would we not want to increase that contribution as much as we can?

It is also true that a huge number of Hongkongers in the UK are working far below their qualification or training levels, or are potentially unemployed entirely. There are accountants, journalists and engineers, for example, working in roles that do not necessarily match their skills. We have heard that there are some practical steps that the Government could take to alleviate some of those problems, which would be in our interests, but extending the ILR route for Hongkongers to 10 years—further delaying their access to further education, training, citizenship, Government support and integration into UK society—will obviously make the problem worse. Despite all the obstacles they face today, they are still making a huge contribution to the UK.

With one eye on the time, I will draw my remarks to a close. I urge the Minister to exempt BNO visa holders from any changes to the ILR route or other qualifications for settled status. This country made a promise to the people of Hong Kong, and we should honour it.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Chinese Embassy Development

Mark Sewards Excerpts

Monday 9th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

The right hon. Gentleman’s views on China are well known, and he knows my views on China, too—we have discussed the matter in the past. He raises two distinct issues. On sanctioned parliamentarians, let me take this opportunity to make it clear that the sanctions are completely unwarranted and unacceptable, and this issue will remain a priority under this Government. The Foreign Secretary and the Chancellor have raised their case at every meeting with their counterparts, including with President Xi at the G20 in November and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in February. The right hon. Gentleman tempts me to comment on the Chinese planning system. I am very glad that we have a different and more robust system than the People’s Republic of China.

[Mark Sewards (Leeds South West and Morley) (Lab)]

I appreciate that the Minister cannot comment on individual planning applications from the Dispatch Box, but when I speak to Hongkongers in my constituency, they are seriously concerned about the risks that come with transnational repression and that might come along with the creation and construction of this embassy. When I was speaking with Hongkongers in my constituency last week, on the 36th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre—something that can be commemorated in Leeds, but not in Hong Kong—they were seriously concerned that those with £100,000 bounties on their heads might be more at risk now because of the construction of this embassy. I appreciate that the Minister’s portfolio does not necessarily cover this, but what assurances can he give on behalf of the Government that if such an embassy is built, we will do everything in our power to protect those from Hong Kong who have made the UK their home?

[Matthew Pennycook]

I hope hon. Members will appreciate why I will not comment on hypotheticals, again, on a decision that has not been made on a case that is not before the Department. I have made it very clear that we stand with the Hong Kong community. The Minister with responsibility for Asia and the Indo-Pacific, my hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Friern Barnet (Catherine West), met members of the Hong Kong community in this country, along with my hon. Friend the Security Minister. We will stand by them.