Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Debate between Olivia Blake and Nigel Evans

Consideration of Lords amendments
Wednesday 24th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

I wish I could say I was happy to be called in this debate, but the truth is that I do not believe we should be having it at all. I am not sure that if I tried, I could design a worse way of withdrawing from a legal framework. Not content with crashing the economy, the world being literally on fire, and our food prices and energy bills being so high that people are no longer able to afford to eat or heat in many parts of the country, Ministers now want to waste our time and energy driving us off this regulatory cliff. I wonder how many civil servants have been drafted in and redeployed to deal with the legal consequences of the sunset clause—I am pleased the Government have now dropped it—which was ridiculous and absolutely unworkable. Despite the recent climbdown on what the Bill will cover, the truth is that it still hands power to Ministers to rewrite, revoke and replace hundreds of our vital laws on substantive issues.

Without the Lords amendments, the Bill places our rights at work, our environmental protections and hard-won equal rights on a cliff edge. From working with my constituents on the Hallam citizens’ climate manifesto, our vision for climate action locally and nationally, I know the importance and appetite for democracy, especially around protecting our natural environment. Our response to the climate and nature emergency must be led by communities across the country who already feel the impacts of the climate crisis. That is why I have been working with campaigners to bring forward the Climate and Ecology Bill as a 10-minute rule Bill. It would enable us to reach the goals we need to protect us from a 1.5°C increase in global temperature. We need to bring about a democratic transition. We urgently need to protect our precious natural environment and expand our democracy when talking about these issues, not curtail it.

The Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill will do the exact opposite, concentrating power even further into the hands of a few Ministers. That should concern everyone in the House who claims to represent their constituents. The truth is that the Government do not value our natural environment. Just look at the key pieces of environmental law that were missing from the dashboard, or the way it treats the people who work every day to protect it at the Environment Agency.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. I do not mind you touching on the fact that you do not like the Bill at all, but you really should be speaking to some of the amendments. That would be really useful.

[Olivia Blake]

Lords amendment 15 stops regression on environmental standards and it is really important that it stands tonight. At the exact moment when we should be strengthening regulation to protect nature and biodiversity, the Bill does the complete opposite. I remember the debates on the Environment Bill and how we were repeatedly assured that there would be no regression on environmental standards. Without Lords amendment 15, the Bill will put all that at risk. The Government have refused to legislate to provide any guarantee that they will be protected.

Points of Order

Debate between Olivia Blake and Nigel Evans

Wednesday 7th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for indicating that she was going to raise this matter. I am sure that all Members will wish to express their sympathies for her constituents. She has clearly pursued this important issue with tenacity. Indeed, I have been in the Chair and heard her raise this issue before. Everybody here understands why she wants this matter resolved. Ministers on the Treasury Bench will have heard her comments. Let me say that again: Ministers on the Treasury Bench will have heard her comments, and I hope that they will be able to respond to her speedily.

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Local authorities and Sheffield City Council have declared a major incident in my constituency. In Stannington, in my constituency, 6,000 litres and counting of water have been pumped out of a gas main, and there is still a lot of water left in that gas main. That has impacted 2,000 properties, hundreds of which are still without gas since Friday. Some streets have been left with repeated power cuts, with no way to heat their homes effectively or to cook food. The Council Leader has said that the area is at risk of a humanitarian crisis. Tomorrow, snow is predicted, which will hamper efforts to get people back online. Residents need more support now. Hundreds of vulnerable residents have been identified, and the ground effort by Cadent, Yorkshire Water and the council has been huge, and I thank them for that.

However, I wrote to the Secretaries of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, and for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and to the Chancellor on Tuesday and I am yet to receive a full response. I am very conscious that the council needs not just money, but resources. Parts are needed to repair boilers and meters need to be replaced. This is a huge effort. Water is flowing out of people’s ovens, out of their fires and out of their boilers, which should be sealed, and getting past the water meter. This is an unprecedented incident and “novel”, as it has been described to me, which really needs some support and action to make sure that we have the right infrastructure on the ground. I do not think that it can be left to the local authorities to organise that.

Have you, Mr Deputy Speaker, had notice of any statements from any of the three Secretaries of State whose portfolios cover this matter? How can I best get action to make sure that we have a co-ordinated effort from this place to support my community, which is obviously really suffering?

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

I thank the hon. Member for raising that point of order. It sounds absolutely appalling and she is right to raise it today as a point of order. I have had no indication that any Minister is to make a statement further to the ones that we have already had. If that changes, clearly, the House will be notified in the usual manner. The Treasury Bench has heard what has been said, and I ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to make sure that these points get passed to the Departments that the hon. Member has mentioned.

Bill Presented

Pre-Payment Meters (Temporary Prohibition) Bill

Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)

Wera Hobhouse, supported by Richard Foord, Mr Alistair Carmichael and Wendy Chamberlain, presented a Bill to prohibit the installation of new pre-payment meters for domestic energy customers before 31 March 2023; and for connected purposes.

Bill read the first time; to be read a Second time on Friday 3 February 2023, and to be printed (Bill 212).

Fairness at Work and Power in Communities

Debate between Olivia Blake and Nigel Evans

Thursday 12th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate, because although the Government talk abstractly about levelling up the country and addressing the housing emergency, people in my constituency and throughout the country are paying the price of years of failed policy and Government inaction.

The proposed renter reform and social housing regulation Bills in the Queen’s Speech are once-in-a-generation opportunities to build a new system in which everyone’s right to safe and secure housing is protected, respected and guaranteed in law. It is vital that this opportunity is not squandered, and I will hold the Government’s feet to the fire to ensure that it is not because, I am sorry to say, their record to date has hardly been inspiring. Throughout the pandemic, we saw Ministers’ willingness to cast aside people in the rented sector. The covid crisis only confirmed what we already knew: that rents are too high, that renters’ rights are too precarious and that too often rented accommodation is unsafe or in poor condition.

Since I was elected in 2019, not a week has gone by in which I have not heard horror story after horror story from people in my Sheffield constituency about mould, damp, exposed asbestos, broken appliances, rats, vermin and many other issues. Tenants are afraid to speak out in case they face eviction or cannot re-sign their contract the following year. Renters are being gradually priced out of areas by landlords who are unchecked, unchallenged and feel no consequence for their actions.

One family I have been working with cannot put furniture against the walls because it causes cavities where black mould builds up. This is not happening in just a handful of properties: according to a report by Shelter, across Sheffield 28% of private rentals and 4% in the social rented sector contain category 1 hazards such as excess cold or risk of falls. To make matters worse, my constituents themselves are often unfairly blamed for the hazards. I constantly hear of people being told that the black mould in their properties is because of their own ventilation problems and that they need to open their windows more and bleach their walls. Often, these families have been sitting in the cold with their windows open all year round, constantly running dehumidifiers, at great cost. One family has even innovatively —albeit sadly—been using sticky-back plastic on their walls and replacing it every few months to remove the mould.

Given the rising energy costs, problems such as those I have described are all the more concerning. The impacts are far-reaching: I have seen numerous cases of new or worsening asthma in children, formally recorded by doctors as likely to be linked to their living in mouldy or damp housing conditions. Other families have reported repeat infections. We are returning to the 1800s. My constituents are not only paying the price with their physical health; every single person I speak to with housing issues is also experiencing poor mental health. Living in conditions unfit for human habitation is devaluing. It makes people feel as if they do not matter. The stress of having constantly to complain and chase up repairs comes at a cost for people because they are having to take multiple days off work to try to resolve the issues and to protect their families.

Our housing market is fundamentally broken. This is not a new emergency, but the covid-19 pandemic has made the situation more acute, exposing worsening cracks in the private rented sector and pushing more people into long-term crises of homelessness, debt and precarity.

In Sheffield, we saw a 46% rise in the number of private renters claiming housing benefits to help pay their rent between February 2020 and 2021. Nearly 3,000 households were made homeless, or threatened with homelessness, over the same period. The main issue, as we know, is that not enough affordable housing is being built. Shelter’s recent report makes it clear that a key part of our solution must be to build more new, good quality social housing. Investing in social housing would deliver affordable homes in which local people can thrive, because genuinely affordable social rents allow people to save money and to build their lives.

Between 1946 and 1980, an average of 126,000 council homes were built every year. As of 2019, that figure was just 6,826. My city, once famed for the construction of great public housing works, including the streets-in-the-sky design of Park Hill, and the radical Gleadless Valley estate, now faces a year-on-year decline in social housing stock, largely as a result of Thatcher’s right to buy. Between March 2015 and April 2020, 1,812 social homes were sold in Sheffield through right to buy, and only 229 were built.

The situation is not just about the affordability of rents, but about the quality of housing and the affordability of day-to-day bills. I am pleased to say that Sheffield Labour group has pledged to spend £350 million to improve the quality of council housing to upgrade all council homes to EPC band C, retrofitting homes to make them warmer, and greatly cutting energy bills and emissions.

Our council now plans to build 3,100 new council homes—to the highest energy efficiency standards—but unfortunately it is nigh on impossible for local authorities to build enough to maintain that rate let alone carry out the investment in maintenance that is so desperately needed to improve council stock.

As Shelter’s “Levelling up with social housing” report states, in order to truly level up the city of Sheffield, it needs to be provided with the funding to ensure that it can build the good quality, genuinely affordable social homes that it needs. To date, however, the Government’s ambitions for levelling up have stopped far short of the action that we need to see even to maintain our current stock of social housing, let alone provide genuinely affordable, warm, new-build homes.

It is time that Ministers stepped up to the challenge. My constituents are tired of poor quality housing. They are tired of high rents and of struggling from pay cheque to pay cheque to pay their rent and bills. We need a housing revolution, and I will be fighting to ensure that that is what these two Bills provide.

I wish to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) for his work as the Mayor of South Yorkshire. It is incredibly brave of people to put themselves forward for election, and I congratulate Oliver Coppard on becoming the new Mayor. I thank all candidates up and down the country who have taken the brave step to represent and build power in their community.

There is much that is missing in this Queen’s Speech. I know that colleagues today have outlined very eloquently the issues that arise from not having the employment Bill. We have heard much today about taking away the ability of people in our communities to live independently and to be empowered to get the best out of their lives. It is incredibly telling that we see what I would call a Yorkshire mix of Bills—which is a bag of boiled sweets that are all different—because it is unclear what the Government’s ideology is. It seems that each Department has a different flavour of right-wing ideology going on. That is very confusing for people up and down the country who are facing a cost of living crisis when their clear demands are to live well, live healthily, live in warm homes and have good quality, well-paid jobs.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

We come now to the last Back-Bench contribution, from Kirsten Oswald.

COP26: Limiting Global Temperature Rises

Debate between Olivia Blake and Nigel Evans

Thursday 21st October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) for securing this debate.

The COP26 President has tweeted that

“to host a successful, inclusive #COP26 this November, both youth and civil society must be at the heart of both our preparations, and the summit itself”.

I agree that the climate emergency requires a democratic response, and our approach to the talks should reflect that. It is because we have not had enough democracy in our economy and in our society that we find ourselves debating the issue today. As long as only a few wealthy and powerful people make and lobby for decisions, those decisions will be taken in their interests, not the interests of everyone, and especially not those of the people most affected by the climate emergency.

Whether it gives people more power over our political institutions, over our communities or over our workplaces, more democracy is a precondition of averting climate catastrophe, but to people across the country, negotiations at the summit will feel very remote. I know that while many people believe passionately in taking actions to address the climate crisis, they also feel powerless. There will almost certainly be a chasm separating those campaigning for climate justice on the streets of Glasgow and those inside the conference hall, which is starkly highlighted by reports today of Governments seeking to water down key proposals ahead of COP26. That is why we have been meeting regularly in my constituency to produce a Sheffield Hallam people’s manifesto for COP26, bringing together campaigners, trade unionists, experts, economists, and people who just want to know how they can help to tackle the climate emergency. At a time when many feel voiceless, we aimed not only to put on record my constituents’ strong belief that more can and should be done, but to make concrete proposals about what they believe must be done.

I have come here today, to this Chamber, to amplify that voice, and to ask for the COP26 president to meet my constituents and me tomorrow, when they present their manifesto to No. 10 Downing Street. The ideas in the manifesto are wide-ranging, speaking to policy on planning and local government, energy, transport, finance, food, nature, industrial strategy, and international climate justice. Above all, they speak to the dynamism and ingenuity of my constituents in imagining how to do things differently.

Ministers have a choice at COP26. They can watch the world burn comfortably from the windows of the conference centre, or they can let down the drawbridge and bridge the chasm between themselves and the people watching from their televisions at home or marching in the streets of Glasgow—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. I am sorry, but we have to leave it there. The winding-up speeches will begin at 3.15 pm. I call Bob Seely.

Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill

Debate between Olivia Blake and Nigel Evans

Wednesday 21st April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab) [V]]

I start by congratulating the Minister for Defence People and Veterans, the hon. Member for Aldershot (Leo Docherty), on his promotion. I welcome him to his new role.

Article 8.2 of the Rome statute of the International Criminal Court defines the term “war crimes” in two ways: as “grave breaches” of the Geneva convention or

“serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in international armed conflict”.

Under those two headings, the article provides 31 different offences. Here are just some examples:

“Attacking or bombarding, by whatever means, towns, villages, dwellings or buildings which are undefended and which are not military objectives”;

“Killing or wounding a combatant who, having laid down his arms or having no longer means of defence, has surrendered at discretion”;

“Subjecting persons who are in the power of an adverse party to physical mutilation or to medical or scientific experiments”;

and

“Committing outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment”.

I list some of those crimes because if we accept only the Government’s proposal, instead of the amendments from the other place, they will remain “relevant” offences under the Bill. I am incredibly sceptical about there being a presumption against prosecution just because a crime was committed abroad, but it is unclear to me why anyone would support a time limit or presumption against prosecution specifically on the charge of attacking defenceless towns or killing people who have surrendered. Why rule out torture but not physical mutilation or scientific experiments on enemy combatants?

The concessions that Ministers and the MOD have made on torture, genocide and crimes against humanity are very welcome, but they do not go far enough to ensure that some of the worst crimes a person can commit are excluded. I agree with the many Members who have signalled that adopting Lord Robertson’s excellent amendment, Lords amendment 1, wholesale would be the best approach to uphold our international reputation.

On the issue that Ministers say the Bill addresses—the wellbeing of veterans—it also falls well short. My right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) mentioned Lord Boyce’s remarks, and I will reiterate them. A presumption against prosecution helps no one. The issue that needs to be dealt with is the investigation and reinvestigation of cases. The Lords amendments provide a mechanism for dealing with those reinvestigations, yet the Government are opposing them. At the same time, Ministers propose to make it harder for veterans to bring cases against the MOD and oppose any attempt to provide a duty of care to ex-service personnel involved in legal cases.

Without the Lords amendments, the Bill fails across the board and falls well short. Instead of playing politics with human rights, the Government should guarantee access to justice for all victims of war, from the victims and survivors of war crimes to those ex-service personnel failed by the MOD. That is why I will vote for the Lords amendments today.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I call Geraint Davies.

Local Contact Tracing

Debate between Olivia Blake and Nigel Evans

Wednesday 14th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Blake]

No, I will not give way because we are short on time.

Why are the Government prioritising those private labs over our NHS to implement the testing system when those labs are clearly failing? We have seen some really good success in our labs in Sheffield, which have been testing staff at the teaching hospitals, and that could have been a lesson learned and applied across the country.

I have conducted polymerase chain reaction tests. I know that it is not that difficult. Moonshot is a complete and utter dream. I can safely say that I have been watching the testing system with frustration and I have suddenly become very popular with my ex-colleagues. They have been very enlightening when describing the conditions in which they have been working—often as volunteers while they are furloughed from their other labs.

In Sheffield, we heard that a recruitment drive was requested by the Prime Minister in September—a little bit late and a little bit after the horse has bolted. By that time, the planning for teaching was well under way and the contracts of many of them had ended and the seconding of staff was no longer available.

I have much more to say on this issue. I could go on and on and on, but the last thing I wish to say is that the numbers speak for themselves—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order.

Environment Bill

Debate between Olivia Blake and Nigel Evans

Money resolution & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion & Ways and Means resolution & Ways and Means resolution: House of Commons
Wednesday 26th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Olivia Blake (Sheffield, Hallam) (Lab)]

I appreciate the opportunity to speak on such an important issue. It is right that we legislate to protect the environment, our water and the air we breathe. It is also vital that we preserve the biodiversity of our countryside and woodlands and conserve our areas of outstanding natural beauty, such as the Peak district in my constituency, for the enjoyment of everyone.

I am pleased that, after pressure on the Government, the Bill now includes a reference to climate change enforcement. If the rising sea levels, fires and floods do not constitute a threat to our environment, I am not sure what does. The fires in Australia have affected 1.25 billion animals and, according to WWF estimates, have harmed 30% of the koala population. There is abundant scientific research to demonstrate that global heating will result in the extinction of thousands of plants and animal species, and the UK is not immune. It is nonsense to say that we are in favour of biodiversity but not lift a finger to stop the carbon emissions that have led to the destruction of ecosystems and fragile ecologies, making the 10% increase in biodiversity almost impossible to deliver. It is not meaningful to talk about protecting the environment without also talking about how we end the climate catastrophe that is currently wreaking havoc across the globe.

The only way to secure our environment and defend the diversity of our wildlife in the long term is to halt rising temperatures and reach zero emissions by the 2030s. That means fundamentally reshaping our economy and infrastructure by handing power to the people with the greatest interest in stopping climate catastrophe—not the bankers, as we heard earlier, or big businesses, but working people.

Despite the changes to the Bill, the truth is that it falls well short of the protections we need to secure our natural environment for the years to come. The EFRA Committee charged with scrutinising the proposals was right to call them a missed opportunity. This was an opportunity to enshrine environmental protections in all aspects of our public institutions. Instead, the proposals only oblige Ministers to act and only with mealy-mouthed “'due regard to” the principles in the Bill. It was an opportunity to make Britain a beacon of environmental standards for the whole world to follow. Instead, there is no provision in the Bill to prevent our own standards from slipping and falling below those of the European Union; in fact, the environmental principles outlined in it represent a significant downgrading of the principles behind our existing environmental protections. It was an opportunity to create a world-leading, independent institution for environmental auditing. Instead, the Government are proposing to establish an organisation with nowhere near the level of independence that is required to hold Ministers and public bodies to account.

At a time when No. 10 can sack a Chancellor for refusing to fire his staff, are we really to have any confidence that the Government will not seek to interfere in the decisions made by the proposed Office for Environmental Protection? I wonder whether the intention is to create a Cassandra-esque body so that those in power can wrongly ignore the truth that it speaks. To tackle climate change and protect our environment, we need democratic and independent institutions that have the power to enforce action on climate chaos in a meaningful way.

We can either face up to the reality of the climate crisis and transform our institutions, our economy and our infrastructure, or consign our planet and our wildlife to environmental catastrophe. That is the decision we face. It is a historic opportunity and a historic responsibility. I am sorry to say that it is an opportunity that the Bill squanders and a responsibility that it shirks.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I call Marco Longhi to make his maiden speech.