Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Paul Waugh and Lindsay Hoyle

Monday 14th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I welcome the new Minister.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Paul Waugh)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Apprenticeships are the responsibility of the Department for Work and Pensions, but the Department for Education is supporting apprenticeships by introducing new technical and vocational pathways from 14 to 19 years, including new V-levels from 2027, new level 2 pathways and even more T-levels, from which young people can progress through apprenticeships and higher education. These new 14 to 19 qualifications will enable students to progress more easily and on to apprenticeships.

[Paul Waugh]

May I return those congratulations by congratulating the hon. Member on his elevation to the shadow Front Bench, and may I congratulate him, too, on the work he has done on vocational skills, including in his jobs fare in Bromsgrove? It is worth saying that V-levels are precisely designed to tally with what employers want. That is exactly why we are reforming the system to ensure every child will have the right technical education. More broadly, the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State have said that the parity of esteem between vocational and academic education is exactly what everyone in this country wants.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Select Committee.

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

May I put on record my condolences to the Prime Minister on the sad loss of his father?

The Education Committee strongly agrees with the Government’s focus on expanding opportunities for apprenticeships and high-quality technical and vocational education across the country, but too often young people who want to pursue apprenticeships are left to do their own research across multiple different platforms with varying application timescales. Last year, the Education Committee recommended that to help young people understand the full range of opportunities available to them and provide parity of esteem, there should be a single point of access for information about apprenticeships alongside vocational, technical and academic courses. Will the new Minister look again at that recommendation and seek to ensure young people wishing to do apprenticeships and vocational and technical courses are just as well supported as their peers who are applying for university?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Paul Waugh and Lindsay Hoyle

Thursday 20th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Paul Waugh (Rochdale) (Lab/Co-op)]

I warmly welcome the tough action taken by this Government to cut the backlog in driving tests, but one thing that will help drivers more than anything, and help pedestrians too, is a crackdown on drug drivers such as Leon Clarke, who crashed his car and killed his eight-year-old son while driving under the influence of cocaine. Does the Minister agree that we need to change the law on roadside drug tests to stamp out this rising menace?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The question is about driving tests, so as important as that matter is, the hon. Member would do better to try during topical questions.

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Debate between Paul Waugh and Lindsay Hoyle

Report stage
Friday 13th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

May I informally suggest that we aim for speeches of around six minutes? I call Paul Waugh to provide a good example.

[Paul Waugh (Rochdale) (Lab/Co-op)]

I rise to speak in support of the amendment in my name, which seeks to strengthen new clause 14 tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater). Why do we want to restrict advertising about assisted dying? It is not just because such adverts could appear crass or insensitive, or because we worry that private companies could profiteer from death, but because advertisers know that they influence choices. The issue of choice, whether it is informed choice, skewed choice, self-coercion or coercive control, as has already been mentioned, is, in many ways, at the heart of the Bill and whether its safeguards are sufficient.

My brother works in advertising and he knows its power. It is why companies spend billions of pounds on it, why Google is the giant that it is, why we see lots of adverts at Westminster tube station trying to influence every single one of us, and why X is full of ads. Advertising works because we human beings are suggestible, and prone to messaging, visual cues and hints. Older people are bombarded with adverts for everything from stairlifts to care homes. One person’s advert, though, is another person’s public information campaign. It is not impossible to imagine a future Secretary of State, who passionately believes in the merits of assisted dying, authorising such a campaign. It could be a Government-approved plotline in a soap opera, or an ad read out by a podcaster that ever so subtly sounds like a news item, or even their own opinion. Many in this House rightly try to protect teenagers from online harms, but the online harm of an ad for a website about assisted dying shared on TikTok could be a reality without the tighter safeguards in my amendment.