May Adjournment

Nick Smith Excerpts

Thursday 3rd May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Ian Mearns]

I entirely concur with my hon. Friend’s comments.

Workers Memorial Day is important, but it comes with a vital message. As we prepare to leave the European Union, when so much power will be handed back to Ministers, the protection of health and safety regulations and law is so much more important now than it has probably been for an awful long time.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

I am a former night worker at Brace’s bakery in Oakdale in south Wales, so I congratulate my hon. Friend on the important work he is doing with the bakers’ union.

[Ian Mearns]

I thank my hon. Friend for those kind comments.

In commemorating Workers Memorial Day, we have to do two things. We remember the dead and we fight for the living, and it is so important that that fight continues.

In the last pre-recess debate, I raised the issue of a vexed question that is threatening the provision of a safe environment for adults with learning disabilities. A big problem has occurred because there is a lack of recognition that sleep-in workers who look after people with learning difficulties should be paid the minimum wage. A court case concluded that individuals who look after people with learning difficulties and carry out sleep-in duties should be paid the minimum wage, and that that minimum wage payment should be backdated by about six years. This is making providers—many of which are in the voluntary, not-for-profit and charitable sectors—very worried because the overall bill, which has not been provided for by central Government or through central Government grant by local government, could amount to £400 million.

There is a real danger that some providers will hand back contracts—in fact, this is already happening—and local authorities could end up having to deal with people who are no longer being provided for by the charitable or not-for-profit sectors. This case is really quite worrying. Providers are being told that they will have to pay back the £400 million bill by March next year, but they quite clearly do not have the means to do so. Organisations such as Mencap have expressed severe concern about what will happen to people with learning difficulties should the provision cease.

I also chair the all-party parliamentary group for footballer supporters, which we established because we felt that, although there is a very good all-party parliamentary football group, it mainly looks at the interests of clubs, leagues and football associations across the United Kingdom. The APPG for football supporters has great support from fans around the country and Members of the House. The secretariat is provided by the Football Supporters Federation, which has been campaigning on a number of things with the all-party group. For instance, a couple of years ago we ran a campaign called Twenty’s Plenty, which was about the cost of tickets at away games in the premier league. The premier league came to a deal on that, and the maximum cost is now £30, so the campaign was clearly a success. Having travelled to away games in London against sides like Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur and paid in excess of £50 at some of those grounds, I am glad to say that now, because of the campaign, the maximum that clubs can charge is £30. That is a very welcome change.

A campaign that is coming to prominence at the moment, which has seen 110,000 signatures added to a parliamentary petition, is for safe standing in top-tier football grounds. We all know that after the Hillsborough disaster, the Taylor report brought in all-seater stadiums, and I think we have all welcomed the new safer environment in football grounds because of that. Unfortunately, however—or fortunately for those who like the atmosphere at football grounds—fans regularly stand in all-seater stadiums, particularly in the away end, where there will invariably be people standing in their droves at any championship or premier league ground. We see that week in, week out at over 40 grounds.

Safe standing may well be the solution. Rail seating, for instance, is an engineering-based solution that has been tried and tested north of the border by Celtic in Glasgow. The other night, we had a presentation at the all-party group by the safety officer of Celtic football club, Mr Ronnie Hawthorn. I thank him for coming down from Glasgow to give that presentation, which was really illuminating. The debate in Westminster Hall as a result of the petition is due to happen on 25 June. I hope that the Government take very seriously the suggestions being put forward by football fans up and down the country. You might have seen, Mr Speaker, that the other night I made a brief appearance on “Sky Sports News” talking about this issue. I understand that “Sky Sports News” probably attracts one or two more viewers than Parliament Live TV, so I was happy to get the message out there.

I also chair the all-party parliamentary group on rail in the north. There has been some correspondence between north-east MPs and the Department for Transport following a report produced by the Institute for Public Policy Research about differentials in levels of transport infrastructure investment between London and the regions of England. The report, which looked at forecast expenditure, including the Transport for London budget, shows that up to five times as much is spent on transport for people in London per head of population than it is in places like the north-east of England. That is clearly unfair and unsustainable.

That is also fettering the growth of the economy in places like the north-east of England. I am sad to report that, together with uncertainty around Brexit and some problems in the motor industry, that means unemployment is continuing to rise in my constituency of Gateshead, even though we are constantly told that employment is at an all-time high. Unemployment in my constituency is currently about 6%, and youth unemployment stays stubbornly high. We therefore need those differentials in transport infrastructure investment to be eroded, so that people in the north-east can be held in the same esteem as their counterparts in London in the way in which Government expenditure is handed out for investment purposes.

Lastly, it would be remiss of me not to mention, as we are now in May, the launch of the Great Exhibition of the North on 22 June, which is being hosted in Newcastle and Gateshead. It has an 80-day programme, which will culminate in September with the Great North Run and will show off all that is great and good about the north of England. I am sure the Minister has already said that he is looking forward to coming to Gateshead and Newcastle for that festival. It will be a great festival, celebrating the architecture, culture, industry, innovation and creativity of people all across the three northern regions. So please, from 22 June, get north and come to Newcastle and Gateshead for the Great Exhibition of the North.

I thank you, Mr Speaker, and I wish all staff in the House a very pleasant May day celebration and weekend.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Lefroy]

My hon. and gallant Friend is right about that. As far as I know, we will not find an accident and emergency department that is privately run in the UK. If there is such a department, we are probably talking about only one or two. It is not possible to do that because of the cost of running A&E departments. Parliamentary colleagues in France will talk about healthcare deserts in parts of rural France, where people cannot get access to the highest quality of healthcare that they want. I am not trying to play us off against France or Germany here; I am just trying to state a few facts, as we tend to run ourselves down sometimes.

I wanted to start by discussing the health service because it is now five years since the Francis report on the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, which is in my constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Amanda Milling). That was a very difficult time for us all in Stafford. I am still very proud of the Stafford people and the Cannock people, who put so much into the work to preserve health services in Stafford and Cannock during that time. I am also proud of the work that has been done since then, and of the people who stood up and pointed out the real problems that were going on at the time, which needed to be corrected. If we consider what has happened since then, we see that patient safety has become an absolute priority for the NHS and for this Government, and I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend for taking that on. If we look at the recommendations in the Francis report, we can see that most of them are now in place. When I talk to colleagues from around the country, they say, “You know, that Francis report made a huge difference for my local hospital”. It made a difference not just for Stafford or Cannock, but for hospitals throughout the country, where patient safety has gone to the top of the agenda.

I pay tribute to the staff of the County Hospital, as Stafford hospital is now known, for what they have done over the past five years. In the past couple of weeks, more than 96% of patients in our A&E have been seen within four hours. That is well above the national target. I am most grateful to the staff for achieving that. Other things must still be done—there are more services that I want to see back in the hospital, or brought to it and the Stafford area for the first time—but I put on record my thanks to everybody who has made that happen over the past five years.

To return to the general point about the health service, it is quite true that they have a different system in Germany and France, and there are merits in that. It is a different system that requires co-payments: people have health insurance, whether it is largely state-funded, as in France, or done through private or co-operative health insurance systems, as in Germany. People still pay often several hundred euros a year on average to access healthcare when they need it. It is a serious issue and a political debate that we need to have. I am not necessarily saying that my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough’s points should be disregarded—not at all; they should be considered very seriously—but we have to look into what is sustainable.

[Nick Smith]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the 96% support for the NHS throughout the country is fantastic, but does he agree that the future challenges for the NHS are the modern killers that are out there now, such as obesity and related diabetes, and the conditions related to old age, such as dementia? The NHS now has to bend itself to deal with these new conditions.

[Jeremy Lefroy]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, although I should say that that 96% referred to access to high-quality healthcare, rather than support for the NHS. I thought I should make that distinction. It may well be that the NHS has 96% support, but I was talking about access to high-quality healthcare.

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right that diabetes, cancer and other conditions are clearly the issues. The health service has to adapt; I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough that it can be far too monolithic. Often, we see really good, inspired leadership that makes a real difference in some places—perhaps it even comes from those paid £100,000 a year—but in other places we see some very uninspiring leadership. It is often very much about who is taking on the challenges at the local level and what their motivations are. We clearly have a great deal more to do on that.

Time is short, so I shall move on from the NHS after one final point. I fully agree with the cross-party report published last week by my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles) and other colleagues from the Labour party and the Liberal Democrats. It contains 10 points on how to have a sustainable health system. I have been talking about most of those 10 points in this place for the past five or six years, so I would agree with them, wouldn’t I? Still, there is an awful lot in there for the Government to look at and perhaps take on. I return to the initial point: if we want high-quality services and a strong defence, along with funding for other issues of great importance to our constituents, we will have to pay a little more. The question is whether we pay that through a national health insurance system—a progressive system—through direct taxation or through contributions. Those questions have to be asked. I am in favour of a fully funded system, which may mean that we have to do it through the proposed national health insurance system.

The second thing I wish to talk about is General Electric, which is the largest private sector employer in my constituency. At the end of last year, it announced several hundred job losses, and the consultation on that is currently ongoing. It is a very serious situation. I praise General Electric and its predecessor, Alstom, for their investment in Stafford. They have built two new, modern, state-of-the-art factories, which will provide security for many people in my constituency.

For those facing the prospect of redundancy, it is vital both for them and their families, and indeed for the country, that we see how we can ensure that their skills—often very high skills—are best employed elsewhere. In that context, I want to raise again the matter of the Swansea Bay tidal lagoon, which I and other colleagues have been pushing for. If we are to have a power manufacturing sector in this country, we must be at the forefront of modern technologies, and that is one of them. I urge the Government to come forward with a positive decision on that as soon as possible.

My third point is a local matter. I am very glad to see two of my Staffordshire colleagues—my hon. Friends the Members for Burton (Andrew Griffiths) and for Cannock Chase—on the Front Bench at the moment. I know that they will probably agree with me on most, if not all, of these issues. We have already heard about potholes. Being a rural county, we have the same problems in Staffordshire. Potholes are not just an inconvenience; they are a menace. When cyclists go into potholes that are filled with water, they can suffer very serious injuries, as some of my constituents have. Cars suffers great damage, which brings loss either to the county if there is a claim or to the individual whose car has been damaged. We need to see more money put into that area, both at a local and a national level. After the winter that we have just had, it is a priority. I would like to see the Secretary of State for Transport coming forward with some supplementary funding for potholes for local authorities as soon as possible, because, as we already know, a stitch in time saves nine.

Bus services in rural areas are suffering. My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough did not mention this issue, but he has probably been affected by it as well. Clearly, we do not want buses running around empty and wasting a lot of money, but there must be ways of ensuring that our villages and small towns, which are becoming ever less connected with the major centres of population, see a reversal in the situation. We need innovative thinking. Perhaps we should go back to a situation in which councils, as in Nottingham, which runs a very fine public transport service, say, “We will have to step in and fill the gap to ensure that our communities are connected.”

Finally as far as local councils are concerned, I wish to raise the issue of breaks for carers. Carers across the country, and certainly in Staffordshire, perform an absolutely magnificent job. We need to ensure that they can have the breaks that they need, especially those who cannot afford them. They need to be able to get away from time to time. I welcome the fact that Staffordshire has supported such breaks and continues to do so, but the funding is too little. We need to see greater funding in this area and more innovative solutions to ensure that money is wisely spent and available to as many of our carers as need help.

Clearly, on the national scene, the debate is dominated by our leaving the European Union. I will not go into the principles on either side, but I will make points on four areas. Frictionless trade for the manufacturing industry in Stafford and the west midlands is essential. I was recently at the Honda factory in Swindon, and heard very clearly how important it is for us to have seamless trade, in and out, for components. The factory operates, as does almost all manufacturing industry in the automotive sector and others, a just-in-time policy. Such firms cannot have delays at borders.

Another critical area is data, as the Exiting the European Union Committee heard when we took evidence in the City of London. With the EU’s understandable fixation on data protection—we are, of course, putting that into our own law—the City is very concerned that we ensure that data issues are sorted out well in advance of our finally leaving at the end of 2020. It is vital that this is done, because data is at the core of not just financial services but every business.

Financial services companies have a concern about contracts that go beyond the end date of our membership of the European Union. That is a serious issue, because if we do not have the rules on contracts in place, there is a risk that contracts will not be able to be fulfilled and that people will not be paid such things as life assurance or pensions.

--- Later in debate ---

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), who made a serious and important contribution.

We are here just before the recess, while our colleagues are across the country for the local elections. In the spirit of us all being here together, I would like to wish them all good luck in those elections. I am pleased to be joining my colleagues slightly earlier than I anticipated here in London before returning to Bristol, where we do not have elections this time round.

As hon. Members have mentioned, today is May day. It is also Workers Day, or Labour Day—indeed, may it be a very good Labour weekend. I draw the House’s attention to the fact that a former Tory-led Government tried to get the day moved to October, but fortunately that was thwarted, and we are hopefully all going to enjoy some sunshine. May Day means one thing for Labour, but it currently means something quite different for the Conservatives, as “mayday” is often a cry for help. In the three weeks since Easter, the Government have managed to have two national scandals and a resignation, so we look forward to a more peaceful time following the recess.

We have perhaps not had the quantity of debate today that we thought we might, but we have certainly had some good quality. My hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) talked movingly about his constituent, Kim Voogel, from the Netherlands. He highlighted that the issue we have been talking about recently with regard to the Home Office is not confined to the Windrush generation, and I am sure the Government have listened to that. The work that is affecting people now is undertaken by several Departments, including the Department for Work and Pensions, and that is certainly something I have experienced.

My hon. Friend also talked about Workers Memorial Day. It is a very important day and we do not pay enough attention to it. One of my earliest memories as a child is of returning from the Christmas holidays and learning that a family friend had been killed by a collapsing trench on a building site, leaving a very small family and devastating the community. We have moved a long way since those days, largely thanks to the work of the trade union movement, but this is a good day on which to commemorate the people who, sadly, have died on building sites in particular.

The hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) talked about criminal barristers. I have a number of friends of middling years or younger who are barristers, and I think he made an extremely important point about what really amounts to a crisis at the criminal Bar. The hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) intervened to speak about legal aid, and I agree that the legal aid changes have not helped the situation. The legal aid system does a very important job and is much undervalued and under-resourced. I wish him good luck in continuing to raise that issue.

The hon. Member for Beckenham also mentioned “run, hide and tell”. I am a former emergency planner for the NHS—I will come on to my career as a lifelong bureaucrat in a moment—and I am concerned that Members are not always as cognisant as we should be about the role that emergency planning plays in this place or about our duty to ourselves, and our staff and visitors, when it comes to understanding what we should do in a crisis. That is a really important point.

The hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) also spoke about Workers Memorial Day, and he mentioned the Taylor review. I highlight the fact that he is quite right to raise the confusion about the public sector pay cap, and the Government really have been dancing on the head of a pin about whether there is a cap any longer. This is about the wages of real people with families to feed, and it is important for them to have clarity about what they are to expect from their employment in the coming years.

The hon. Member for Gainsborough talked about defence and its importance as an insurance policy. He mentioned the 1983 election, which is not one that Labour Members remember very fondly, although it was my first election as an activist. He also made a serious point about learning lessons from the 1930s.

I was not going to speak about my lifelong career as an NHS bureaucrat before entering Parliament—I joined the service in the late 1980s—but I cannot resist doing so. It is a service, not a religion, but I recognise that it has not always performed in the way it should have done. I praise my colleagues, particularly in NHS management, who have actually done an excellent job over many years. We have one of the least managed systems in the world, in proportion to the size of the service, as has been proven in many studies over the years. I am very happy to discuss that with the hon. Gentleman, who I know is a very eminent former Chair of the Public Accounts Committee.

Not everything is always done well, of course, but the NHS has made massive strides in productivity in recent years. We are now concerned about the level of funding, including in relation to safety, which was mentioned by the hon. Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy). We have come a long way, and we must now be very careful that we do not go backwards with some of that work. I want formally to praise the marvellous work done by NHS managers across the country.

The hon. Member for Gainsborough may not know this, but there is a new all-party group on clinical leadership and management. I am very proud to be a part of it, along with the hon. Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison). I do not know whether the hon. Member for Gainsborough is interested, but we are having an interesting meeting with the lead from NHS England after the recess, and if he wants to come along, I am sure he would be most welcome. As I have said, the hon. Member for Stafford reminded us about the importance of the Francis report. Making sure that those changes happened required clinical support, but also very dedicated senior and superior management support.

I very much look forward to coming back after the recess, when, as Members may not have noticed, we will debate the Haulage Permits and Trailer Registration Bill.

[Nick Smith]

Before my hon. Friend moves on, may I congratulate her on her important work as an emergency planner in our national health service? Does she agree that it was our public health workers who supported our military personnel in Salisbury after the recent nerve agent attack?

[Karin Smyth]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. In fact, one of the joys of travelling from Bristol each week is that I meet so many of my former colleagues on the train. [Interruption.] Other Members have perhaps had the same experience. Indeed, I met one of my former colleagues who now works for Public Health England, and we discussed the way that it had to respond to that incident. People had just come out of a severe weather crisis in the south-west, and Public Health England is not currently well-resourced. It then had to respond quickly to an unprecedented international attack and deal with the interplay between local and national when managing that serious incident. I think that we will consider that issue in future. Public Health England now has a huge area to cover on the ground, and I know that my hon. Friend takes a particular interest in that. We could be here until 5 o’clock this evening if I were to talk about the NHS more generally, but we have elections to fight, so I will move on.

I have been working on the Haulage Permits and Trailer Registration Bill with colleagues in the Lords and the Minister, including work on trailer registration for light trailers following the tragic death of a young boy, Freddie Hussey, in my constituency in 2014. I look forward to the debates on that important Bill.

We are all looking forward to a couple of days off once we have knocked on those doors. Let me tell anyone who is coming to the west country that there are a number of festivals going on in Bristol, and I understand that a big festival is on in Exeter. I will be trudging down the M5 from Bristol with my family to enjoy a lovely weekend in Cornwall. I wish all hon. Members and staff of the House a happy May Day bank holiday weekend.