Business of the House

Maya Ellis Excerpts

Thursday 6th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Powell]

May I start with a couple of business questions updates? After my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Laura Kyrke-Smith) asked me to join her in congratulating “Bake Off” star Dylan Bachelet, they both joined me this week to taste some delicious cakes in my Leader of the House’s office bake-off. Dylan is not only an inspiration to young people from Aylesbury; I can report that he has extremely good taste, because he chose my lemon drizzle as the winner.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton West (Warinder Juss) for coming to see me this week with a copy of a Stone Roses record after we had exchanged nice words about Revolver Records in his constituency. I hope that hon. Members across the House can see that I am open to nice invitations celebrating constituencies and communities.

This week marks LGBT+ History Month, which is a chance for us to reflect and remember the contribution of the LGBT community and the discrimination that they still too often face. The Labour party is proud to be the party of equality, having abolished section 28 and introduced civil partnerships, the Gender Recognition Act 2004 and the Equality Act 2010 among other things.

Turning to the remarks of the shadow Leader of the House. First, let me take head on some of his misleading allegations about the process for the assisted dying Bill. As he is well aware, the House agreed by a clear majority that the Bill should proceed from Second Reading to Committee. That was the will of the House. That Committee is now convening, and in an unprecedented procedure for a private Member’s Bill it has been taking written and oral evidence to begin with. It will begin many weeks of line-by-line scrutiny of the Bill, which is again unprecedented; it will be a lengthy Committee stage.

The make-up of the Committee, as set out in the Standing Orders, reflects the vote on Second Reading and the party make-up of the House. Many would argue that its make-up has been overly conscious of that. As I have said at the Dispatch Box on a number of occasions, while the Government have a neutral position on the principles of the Bill, we have a responsibility to ensure that any Bill passed by the House is workable and operable. That is the role that we will play through the Ministers representing the Government on that Committee.

It is extremely regrettable and ill-advised of the shadow Leader of the House to use his privileged position at the Dispatch Box to give such a political, one-sided and misleading account of what is a difficult, technical, important issue of conscience to the country and to the House. On the day of the Bill’s Second Reading and since, I think every colleague across the House—perhaps apart from him—has recognised that we and our procedures showed themselves at their very best in debating that important matter.

The right hon. Gentleman could have used his moment at the Dispatch Box to mark another important anniversary. It may have escaped people’s notice, but next Monday will mark 100 days since the Leader of the Opposition took office. I wondered how the right hon. Gentleman thought that was going. I am not sure why he did not celebrate all her brilliant achievements—perhaps it is because, like the rest of her leadership, they have gone completely unnoticed.

Oh no, sorry, we have learned a few things about the Leader of the Opposition: we now know what she is against. She is against maternity leave; the triple lock; abolishing hereditary peers; our Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, which will protect young people from abusers; rights and security for workers; investment in the NHS; and—oh!—sandwiches for lunch. She has got a couple of things right: she admitted that her party made mistakes in government—indeed it did—and accepted that it had no plan for growth. This morning, despite saying that there would be no new policy until 2027, she has finally come up with one.

I gently advise the shadow Leader of the House that until the Conservatives accept that they got it badly wrong on immigration and that all their rhetoric and targets in the last Parliament were just hot air, I do not think that anyone will take the Leader of the Opposition’s ideas seriously. One hundred days is normally a moment for reflection and consideration, so he might want to reflect on that and agree that his party picked a bit of a dud.

[Maya Ellis (Ribble Valley) (Lab)]

As the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on babies (pregnancy to age 2), I have had the privilege over the past few months to meet leaders from across society who have incredible passion and energy for Government policy that relates to babies from pregnancy to age two. Will the Leader of the House consider a debate on the impact of all angles of Government policy on babies from pregnancy to age two, given the significant impact of that time on long-term health and wellbeing outcomes?

[Lucy Powell]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising this important issue and for all her campaigning on these matters, which she takes incredibly seriously. This Government consider the early years to be really important, as well as maternity and paternity leave and ensuring that parents can do their jobs and be parents. The early years are the most important in a child’s life. I look forward to working with her on that.