Business of the House

Debate between Penny Mordaunt and Toby Perkins

Thursday 21st March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

My hon. Friend is not the first hon. Member to raise concerns about the Mayor of London’s performance on crime and, most disturbingly, increasing violent crime. My hon. Friend asks how we can hold the Mayor to account, and whether we should debate that. I would suggest another course of action: vote him out of office.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

The Leader of the House could have announced today that next week, the Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill, the Football Governance Bill or the Renters (Reform) Bill would be before the House, but she did not. We are told that senior Government figures have said that the reason why Conservative MPs are being sent home on a one-line Whip until the middle of April is to placate them and ease tension. This Government have simply ceased to function. Their way of stopping their most important policy is to send Tory MPs home, so that they do not have to vote for it. It is beyond a joke. Can we have a debate most urgently about when we will have the general election that this country needs to get this useless Government out of office?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I do not think the hon. Gentleman could have heard my business statement, and he may not be aware that the Football Governance Bill has been brought forward. I remind the Opposition, who make allegations about Conservative Members phoning it in, that we want our legislation to go through. If business is collapsing, it is because the Opposition are not doing engaging in business; they have not even managed to get speakers for their own Opposition day debates. I suggest that the hon. Gentleman reflects on that.

Privilege: Conduct of Right Hon. Boris Johnson

Debate between Penny Mordaunt and Toby Perkins

Monday 19th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

The Leader of the House referred to the evidence, and it is important that people who perhaps do not have the report in front of them understand the depth of evidence that the Committee looked at. That included: visiting No. 10 Downing Street; looking at evidence supplied by the Government, emails, WhatsApp messages and photographs; and conducting many hours of interviews. Does she agree that those who have not had all that evidence and have not done all those interviews should not presume to say that the Committee was wrong when it did that hard work on our behalf?

[Penny Mordaunt]

We all owe the Committee a debt of gratitude for the work that it has done on our instruction, but it is for Members to decide whether its conclusions are correct or not.

Replacement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer

Debate between Penny Mordaunt and Toby Perkins

Monday 17th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

I am, Mr Speaker.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

Are you coming to the subject now?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Mr Perkins, if you want to go and get a cup of tea, I am more than happy to pay for it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Penny Mordaunt]

I would very much like to be able to tell all hon. Members what the Prime Minister’s business is today, but there are very serious matters, as well as economic matters, in her in-tray. As Members know, she comes to this House on a regular basis, and she will be here tomorrow, but she is not able to be here at this precise moment.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

The markets were spooked not just by the reckless mini-Budget, but by the sense that we had a Prime Minister incapable of answering questions at the end of her press conference and without any sort of grip on this Government. It is entirely legitimate for my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) to give her an opportunity to come here to assure the markets. Is not the reality that the Prime Minister’s inability to answer questions is just as fundamental as her failure on policy in why this country is now in an economic crisis?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I am buoyed up by the fact that Opposition Members very much want to see the Prime Minister. I hope that, if she is able to join us this afternoon, they will give her a big cheer.

Use of Torture Overseas

Debate between Penny Mordaunt and Toby Perkins

Monday 20th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

Just to clarify, it was the Prime Minister who asked the commissioner to review the Government’s guidance, which our MOD guidance follows—it is absolutely in line with that. I am told that it will be a couple of weeks before the commissioner is ready to report. When they do report, the Government will review it and I will review the MOD’s policy.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

I invite the Secretary of State to respond specifically to the question asked by the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) about the Government’s response to the call for a judicial review. We cannot blame her for the failures of her predecessor, but we heard that the promise of a response within 60 days was made about 320 days ago. Will she make it clear that she will now put that right and that the House will hear her view on that and let us know when we should expect to hear it?

[Penny Mordaunt]

The hon. Gentleman will understand that I am a couple of weeks into this role. I am looking at this situation, but I will not make pronouncements at the Dispatch Box until I am apprised of all the issues. I do not think that hon. Members would expect me to do anything else. I can assure the House that I am looking at the issue and at policy in relation to that. From what I have seen and from the inquiries that I have made in the Department so far, I think that the House would be reassured about our conduct. I think that the decisions that have been taken in the Department have been correct and that hon. Members would be reassured by that fact. But I fully appreciate that the House wants to have an update as swiftly as possible and I undertake to do that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Penny Mordaunt and Toby Perkins

Wednesday 13th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

Seventy of my staff are embedded in the Department for International Trade, forming a new post-Brexit trade offer, and a great deal of that effort is looking at what we can do to enable developing countries to trade their way out of poverty.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

T2. It has been reported that up to 300,000 Venezuelans could die if aid does not reach them shortly. Given that the Maduro regime will not allow aid from America, what can Britain do politically and practically to help Venezuelans on the ground?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that critical issue. The Foreign Office is doing a tremendous amount and is meeting its counterparts in not only the US and Canada but in the region to see what more we can do. We stand ready to do more, and what we do will be driven by what we find on the ground. He will understand that this is sensitive, because some of our partners with whom we work in the region are very vulnerable if we identify precisely who they are and what they are doing, but I assure him and the House that we will stand by the people of Venezuela.

Government Overseas Aid Commitment: Private Investment

Debate between Penny Mordaunt and Toby Perkins

Tuesday 9th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

We have all sorts of choices ahead of us as we take back control of that money. I have outlined today that I think we should be doing more investment to create the jobs and livelihoods that these nations need to lift themselves out of poverty and to bring a return to the UK, so that we can make the work that we do more sustainable and, if we choose, increase it.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

There is a legal duty under the International Development Act 2002 to ensure that aid spending is spent on poverty reduction overseas. There is also a responsibility on investors to maximise returns for their pension holders and shareholders. Those are probably contradictory priorities. Does the Secretary of State recognise that, if she is talking about this investment in terms of aid rather than of investment, she is going to have to change that legislation? Alternatively, is she talking about something entirely different from what we currently understand aid spending to be?

[Penny Mordaunt]

I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answer that I gave a moment ago. These are two different things, and I think many Opposition Members are confusing them. One reason why we are in the 0.7% club is that we do not mark our own homework; someone else does. That should provide some reassurance to people that we are not doing something that we are saying we are.

There is a difference when it comes to what a private company, entirely separate from Government, chooses to do—and what we are trying to encourage them to do: do some good in the world by investing in the developing nations that need investment and get a great return on their investment. There is a separate issue about what we do with public funds, which count towards the ODA spend. We are not talking about using private funds to replace that.

In terms of the Development Assistance Committee rules, we are talking about looking at how we count ODA, and about ensuring that when we get returns back we have more flexibility on what we do with them. We could spend more money on development or we could retain our 0.7% commitment and spend some of those returns on the national health service.

Armed Forces Bill

Debate between Penny Mordaunt and Toby Perkins

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Wednesday 11th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Penny Mordaunt]

I intend to be brief, Madam Deputy Speaker, as this is not a contentious issue.

I hope you, Madam Deputy Speaker, will allow me briefly to update the House. Our team in the Invictus games so far has a medal total of 89, 55 of which were won on the first day of the competition. One of our chief cheerleaders is my hon. Friend the Minister for Defence Personnel and Veterans, who has taken through this Bill. I am afraid that the House will have to make do with me today.

I am pleased to welcome the Armed Forces Bill back to the House to consider amendments made in the other place. These two amendments deal with a matter raised by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee in its 21st report—the regulation-making powers in new sections 304D(10) and 304E(9), which are inserted into the Armed Forces Act 2006 by clauses 10 and 11. The powers allow regulations to be made in relation to appeals against reviews of sentence.

Clauses 10 and 11 are part of the statutory framework that the Bill creates for offenders who co-operate with investigations and prosecutions. That framework closely follows the provision in the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005, which applies to the civilian criminal justice system. It includes provisions that allow a person to receive a reduced sentence in return for assisting or offering to assist an investigator or prosecutor. A decision of the court martial on such reviews may be appealed by the person who is sentenced or the director of service prosecutions. The Lords amendments make provision with respect to such appeals.

The Bill does not set out the detailed rules that will apply to the conduct of proceedings on such appeals. Instead, new sections 304D and 304E of the 2006 Act provide for those rules to be set out in regulations made by the Secretary of State. The rules will be based on existing rules in the Courts-Martial (Appeals) Act 1968 that govern the conduct of appeals from the court martial to the court martial appeal court or the Supreme Court.

Accordingly, the Bill confers powers on the Secretary of State to make regulations in relation to appeals against reviews of sentence that contain

“provision corresponding to any provision in Parts 2 to 4 of the Court Martial Appeals Act 1968, with or without modifications.”

That is provided for in new sections 304D(10) and 304E(9). Such regulations would be subject to the negative procedure.

The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee was content with that, subject to one point of concern. The Committee noted in its report that the 1968 Act includes some provisions that may be modified by the Lord Chancellor by regulations subject to the affirmative procedure. The relevant provisions in the 1968 Act are in sections 31A, 33, 33A, 46A and 47. They relate to the recovery of costs and expenses arising from appeal proceedings. The Committee’s concern is that the new regulation-making powers in new sections 304D(10) and 304E(9), which are subject to the negative procedure, could be used to make provision about the recovery of costs and expenses which, if made under the 1968 Act in relation to appeals covered by that Act, would have to be made by affirmative procedure regulations.

The Government therefore submitted amendments in the other place to clauses 10 and 11 to limit the powers in the sections of the Armed Forces Act 2006 under which regulations may be made about appeals. The effect of the amendments is twofold. First, regulations under those sections may not make provision corresponding to that which the Lord Chancellor may include in regulations under the 1968 Act. Secondly, regulations under those sections may confer regulation-making powers corresponding to those in the 1968 Act, but only if the exercise of the powers conferred is subject to the affirmative procedure, like the powers of the Lord Chancellor. The amendments address the concerns of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee.

Although I note that the amendments have been designated as engaging financial privilege, we do not expect any significant Government expenditure to arise from the use of the regulation-making powers. I therefore hope that hon. Members will support the amendments, which were accepted on all sides of the House of Lords without Division. I commend them to the House.

[Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for updating the House on the impressive medal haul for our Invictus games team: long may their successes continue.

Like the Minister, I do not intend to detain the House unduly, as there is considerable consensus in this area, but I want briefly to record our support for the Lords amendments to the Armed Forces Bill. It is always pleasing and reassuring when we reach consensus not only on both sides of this House, but with the other place, particularly when dealing with such important matters as the welfare of our armed forces personnel. The safety and security of our nation rely on the commitment, courage and patriotism of our armed forces personnel. We owe them a considerable debt of gratitude. It is only right that we continue to update the law to ensure that we protect their safety, security and well-being, as we look to them to protect our own.

We are therefore pleased to support Lords amendments 1 and 2. The amendments are technical in nature and will limit the regulation-making powers in new sections 304D and 304E of the 2006 Act in respect of the recognition of assistance by courts martial in sentencing, which the Minister went into in a little more detail.

We welcome the commitments that the Government made on Report to publish data relating to sexual assault in the armed forces in a clear format; conduct an independent review into the implications of, and potential benefits of, the removal of commanding officer discretion to investigate sexual assault; and review the compensation levels paid to injured service personnel, particularly the most seriously injured and those who suffer mental ill health. Although the Opposition originally called for those measures to be included in the Bill, we are very pleased that the Government are prepared to make the concessions outside the statutory framework. I commend my colleagues in the other place, particularly the noble Lords Touhig and Tunnicliffe, for continuing to push for those concessions.

We are therefore pleased to support the Lords amendments.