Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Roberta Blackman-Woods

Tuesday 14th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I strongly agree with my hon. Friend’s implication that there has in effect been institutionalised discrimination against patients with mental health conditions compared with those with physical health conditions. While I pay tribute to the previous Government for introducing waiting times for patients with physical conditions, it is only now—we have had to wait several years—that we have started to introduce the same entitlements for mental health care patients. For instance, if a child has a first episode of psychosis, from next year there will be the guarantee that the vast majority of them will be seen in a couple of weeks, just as if someone was diagnosed and referred with cancer, and someone suffering from depression will be referred to talking therapies and will receive those talking therapies within six weeks, and 18 weeks at the maximum. That is a big step in the right direction.

[Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)]

T7. I can see why the Deputy Prime Minister might not be chasing the student vote in 2015 in quite the way he did in the last election, so will he tell the House what he is doing to encourage students to register and vote?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

It is worth remembering what is happening right now. Despite all the controversy of the recent changes, more young students are applying to go to university than ever before, there is a higher rate of students from disadvantaged backgrounds going to university than ever before, and a higher proportion of youngsters from black and minority ethnic backgrounds are going to university than ever before, confounding all the predictions that the hon. Lady’s party made at the time of the change. I suspect that the effects of individual voter registration will confound all its predictions as well.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Roberta Blackman-Woods

Tuesday 11th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

It is absolutely essential that we as a country always abide by the law and by our international legal commitments. The hon. Gentleman will know that an independent commission looked into the case for a UK Bill of Rights, of which he is a great advocate, and provided its final report in December 2012. It concluded that this was not the right time to change the legal framework that governs the application of human rights in this country and the translation of the European convention, not least because of the knock-on effect on the devolved judicial systems within the United Kingdom.

[Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)]

T2. The Deputy Prime Minister will know that local authorities with the highest levels of deprivation are facing unprecedented cuts. Will he assure the House that the cost of securing individual voter registration will not be at the cost of council services aimed at supporting the poorest and most vulnerable in our society and will be fully met by central Government?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Those parts of the country where we have the highest number of under-registered populations, such as student areas, will receive more resources to do what is clearly a more resource-intensive job than in other areas. That will be reflected in the way in which the individual electoral registration system is funded.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Roberta Blackman-Woods

Tuesday 20th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, the Silk commission is divided into two parts. The first report, provided just this week, advocated a substantial change in the fiscal arrangements and the fiscal powers enjoyed by the Administration in Cardiff, analogous to what happened under the Calman process but in some important respects, particularly on income tax, going even further than the Calman design in Scotland. That will then be supplemented by a second report on the wider constitutional future of Wales. Only at that point will we be able to decide exactly how all those proposed changes will be adopted and possibly sanctioned by the people of Wales.

[Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)]

T12. Talking to people last Thursday, I found that few supported the introduction of police and crime commissioners, and even fewer understood why they might be necessary. Does the Deputy Prime Minister accept that he totally failed to make his case to the electorate? Will he now answer the question that has been asked twice already—would not the money have been better spent on more police officers or the building of affordable houses to kick-start the economy?

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

Surely the people who failed to make the case were all those Labour has-been politicians who did not get elected. I am still mystified. Even by Labour’s modern, contorted standards—let me get this right: the hon. Lady does not like police and crime commissioners, but she likes them enough to have Labour candidates. Then, when they do not win, she says that Labour never agreed with the introduction of PCCs in the first place. Who is she kidding?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Nick Clegg and Roberta Blackman-Woods

Tuesday 1st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham) (Lab)]

7. When he plans to publish his proposals to allow electors in a constituency to recall their elected Member of Parliament.

[The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Nick Clegg)]

The Government are committed to bringing forward legislation to introduce a power to recall Members of Parliament. We are currently considering what would be the fairest, and most appropriate and robust, procedure, and we will make a statement soon setting out our plans to establish a recall mechanism.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

As my hon. Friend may know, we want the recall mechanism to be based on two simple steps: first, proof that wrongdoing has been committed, as I explained in answer to the previous question; and secondly, a petition by at least 10% of the electors to trigger a by-election in the constituency concerned. That is slightly different from some of the models to which my hon. Friend referred, in California and elsewhere, where there is a much more open-ended process.

[Roberta Blackman-Woods]

Can the Deputy Prime Minister tell the House whether he still believes that MPs should be recalled for breaking their promises—and if he does, how many Liberal Democrat MPs does he expect would be subject to that system?