(6 years, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberWhen I go walking in Wales I tend to walk up and down hills, rather than on the beaches, but I know that Wales has some fantastic beaches. The hon. Lady raises the important issue of marine plastic. The UK public, as well as Members across the House, have shown great energy in picking up this cause and in wanting to fight against plastic waste.
Indeed, the UK is going to be leading, jointly with Vanuatu, the newly formed Commonwealth Clean Oceans Alliance, and we are committing £61 million to fund global research and to improve waste management in developing countries to tackle plastic pollution. Again, this is another issue we took forward at the G7 summit and we got commitments on dealing with plastic waste.
I say to the hon. Lady that, with the greatest of respect, I am sorry but I think my diary has already been slightly changed as a result of what has been happening in the Chamber today. I regret that I will not be able to sit and listen to her speak to her Bill.
Does the Prime Minister agree that those people who want a meaningful vote in this House which would allow the House to vote to stay in the European Union would be betraying the result of the referendum? That shows how much the Labour party has lost touch with working-class people up and down this country. Does she further agree that those people who want to take no deal from the Government’s negotiating hand would only incentivise the European Union not to negotiate in any meaningful way, and would betray not only the result of the referendum but the best interests of the British people?
(6 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberMay I paraphrase our former colleague, the late, great Eric Forth? Prime Minister, I believe in the free market, I believe in individual freedom and individual responsibility, and I am suspicious of the nanny state. Am I still a Conservative?
(6 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberAs the hon. Lady said, both I and the Leader of the Opposition express our condolences to the family and friends of those who were sadly killed in this tragedy, but we also recognise the impact it has had on the local community. I am very happy to pay tribute to local residents, who have shown the real value of community in the way they have come together, and I can assure her that everything will be done to get to the bottom of why this happened and to ensure, as far as possible—depending on the cause, of course—that it does not happen to anybody again.
Last year, I attended a meeting in the House of Lords organised by the wonderful Cross-Bench peer and human rights campaigner Baroness Cox, at which three very brave women told us their harrowing tales of how they had been treated and discriminated against by sharia councils. It is amazing how noisy feminists in this place are so quiet about this issue, given that women are being discriminated against so blatantly in this country. Is it not time that this alternative, discriminatory form of justice was no longer tolerated in this country?
Let me say to my hon. Friend that we are very clear that there is one rule of law in the United Kingdom, and that is British law. But he is right, and I too have heard stories from individual women who were discriminated against, or felt that they had been discriminated against, and treated badly as a result of decisions by sharia courts. That is why, when I was Home Secretary, I set up the review of those courts. I believe that it published its report recently, and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary will respond to that shortly.
(6 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberAs people are living longer, it is important that we equalise the pension age of men and women. We are doing that, and we are doing it faster. We have already acted to give more protection to the women involved. An extra £1 billion has been put in to ensure that nobody will see their pension entitlement changed by more than 18 months. That was a real response to the issue that was being addressed. If the right hon. Gentleman wants to talk about equality, he has to recognise the importance of the equality of the state pension age between men and women.
I thank my hon. Friend for raising this point. I have known Lord Shinkwin for many, many years. He has been a valiant champion of the rights of disabled people over those years. His own experience and his work in public life, particularly in the other place, are a fine example of how disabled people can be standing up, speaking up and ensuring that they take their rightful place in public life.
On the issue of the disability commissioner, the EHRC is an independent body, and it was its decision to abolish the disability commissioner. The question is: what is being done to help disabled people and how can we ensure that we are helping them? That is why we are committed to tackling the injustices that they face. We are spending more than £50 billion a year on benefits to support disabled people and people with health conditions—that is a record high. But, of course, we do want to ensure—I urge the commission to do this—that the EHRC pays proper attention to the needs and rights of disabled people, because that is an important part of its remit.
(6 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberOf course, significant savings will be made when the United Kingdom leaves the European Union and is no longer paying the price of membership of the European Union to the European Union every single year.
The Prime Minister said that there has been give and take in these negotiations. Of course she is absolutely right: we are giving the EU tens of billions of pounds, and the EU is taking them. She said that the money will not be paid unless there is a final agreement. By definition, that must mean that we are not legally obliged to make these payments because otherwise that option would not be available to us. Will she explain why she is paying tens of billions of pounds that are not legally due to the European Union when she is continuing a policy of austerity at home? Many of my constituents simply do not understand where all this extra money is coming from.
I said in my statement, and have repeated, that the offer we have made is in the context of us achieving that agreement on the future partnership between the United Kingdom and the European Union. I said in my Florence speech—I have repeated this on a number of occasions—that we are a country that honours our commitments, and it is important that we do that.
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberThe whole question of our membership of the WTO, and the independent role that we will take once we are outside the European Union, is one on which the Department for International Trade is already working. It is looking ahead, with partners such as the European Union, to the position that we are going to take.
The reason why this country has been so successful in the past and will be in the future is our belief in the rule of law. May I therefore urge the Prime Minister to pay the European Union what is legally due to it when we leave the EU—not a penny less, but not a penny more either? If the Government have spare tens of billions of pounds in their coffers, and I am not sure that they do, that money should be used to pay for things such as social care and pay rises for public sector workers, not to go into the bottomless pit of the EU and into Jean-Claude Juncker’s wine cellar, which I am sure is rapidly diminishing as we speak. We cannot look public sector workers in the eye if we give tens of billions of pounds to the EU that we do not legally need to give to it and hold back their pay at the same time.
I assure my hon. Friend that, as I said in the Florence speech and have reiterated today, we are clear that we will honour our commitments, but we are going through those commitments line by line. Of course, part of the discussion about those commitments is precisely the legal nature of them. We are a law-abiding nation and we want to ensure that we stand by the commitments that we have made, but we are not just going to sign up to anything, as the Labour party would do.
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberMr Spencer, what is the matter with you? My dear fellow! You eat home-produced food, you are a very respected farmer, and you are normally of a most taciturn disposition. I do not know what has come over you. Perhaps you should go and have a rest later. You must cheer up. Cheer up!
Along with the Scottish National party, the Labour party has said that it will not accept no deal with the European Union in any circumstances. That means that Labour will pay whatever final bill the EU demands, and accept any conditions on which it insists. Does the Prime Minister agree that no one with even an ounce of common sense would enter into a negotiation making such an announcement in advance, and does she agree that the stance proposed by the Labour party and the SNP is not a negotiation, but a capitulation?
My hon. Friend has put it very well indeed. We cannot enter the negotiations taking the stance that the Labour party and the SNP have taken. As my hon. Friend says, their rejection of a “no deal” means that they would accept a deal at any price to the British taxpayer, whatever the damage it would do to our economy, and we will not do that.
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberI have announced some of the action today. I am sorry that the shadow Foreign Secretary was not listening to the statement I made all of five minutes ago, when I announced three separate pieces of action. There will be action from other Government Departments as we develop the policy response to the evidence.
Let me make one final point to the Scottish National party’s spokesman. I would encourage him to encourage his colleagues in the Scottish Government to take part in this process, because so far we have found it quite difficult to get the equivalent information for some areas in Scotland that are completely devolved. Facts and figures on reserved matters in Scotland, where they are available to the UK Government, are included in the audit, but at the moment there are no devolved facts and figures, and I genuinely think that it would help people in Scotland if those could be added to the audit figures.
The review by the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) did not actually include much hard evidence of discrimination. For example, despite setting out with the assumption that black people are more likely to be found guilty by juries, it concluded:
“Juries are a success story of our justice system. Rigorous analysis shows that, on average, juries—including all-white juries—do not deliver different results for BAME and White defendants.”
Will the Minister therefore ensure that success stories are also highlighted, that any actions taken are based on evidence, and evidence alone, and that we do not have solutions looking for problems?
I am delighted to have the opportunity to agree entirely with my hon. Friend—that might be regarded as a rare treat. He is exactly right; the report by the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) was very fair in pointing out the great successes in the criminal justice system as well as the problems, some of the answers to which I have announced today, and my right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor will follow up on those. Across the board in this area there are indeed some successes, as I set out in response to the Opposition spokesperson. In some areas there are clearly endemic problems that have been going on for a long time, and action needs to be taken by society across the board—by central and local government, by businesses and by arm’s length bodies. We are not desperately searching for problems for our solutions. We will bring forward solutions only for those problems that we know exist.
(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberNone of us wants to see the sort of violent scenes that we saw on the streets of Catalonia; I want to see this situation resolved peacefully, as I am sure do all hon. Members. But we are very clear as a Government that the Spanish Government have the right to uphold the Spanish constitution and that all parties should be operating under the rule of law.
I very much support the Prime Minister in the final destination that she set out again today, but I have to say that her speech in Florence seemed like a reward for the EU’s intransigence. Can she confirm that we buy around £70 billion more in goods and services from the EU each year than it does from us, and that when we leave we will be the EU’s single biggest export market? Can she therefore confirm that there will be no more rewards for the EU’s intransigence?
My hon. Friend is of course right that the trading relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union is very important to the EU, as well as important to the UK. What I did in my Florence speech was set out a vision—a proposal—for the future relationship between the UK and the EU, based on our current relationship, showing how we can develop that relationship in a way that is in the interests of both sides. This has switched the dial in our negotiations, and obviously we look forward to being able to enter negotiations on those aspects in more detail.
(7 years, 5 months ago)
Westminster HallWestminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
I beg to move,
That this House has considered Government policy on hereditary peers in the House of Lords.
Order. I hope right hon. and hon. Members will leave quietly. This is an important debate, and I am sure we should give the right hon. Gentleman the courtesy of being heard. If Members could leave quietly it would be much appreciated.