Criminal Justice Bill

Philip Dunne Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 15th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Laura Farris]

Yes, I did mean that.

The final amendments that I will speak to are new clauses 91 and 92, relating to a new criminal sanction on water companies.

[Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)]

Everyone in this House wants to ensure that our water regulators have at their disposal all the tools they need to get on top of the sewage discharge issue, but as the Minister sums up, could she explain to the House whether Ofwat already has the powers being sought in the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron)? If the same powers were given to the Environment Agency, that would be more likely to lead to confusion and a lack of clarity about which agency is taking the lead on such prosecutions, which might lead to prosecutions falling through the cracks.

[Laura Farris]

My right hon. Friend is quite correct: that is the basis on which the Government cannot accept the amendments. Of course, everybody agrees that water companies should be punished as robustly as possible, but it is also the case that we have pre-existing offences that apply. Pollution incidents are already the subject of criminal sanctions available to the Environment Agency under the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016, and there is a serious risk of duplication, not least because—I hope the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) will not mind my saying this—the sanctions he has included in his amendments are just more fines, and we already have a fines regime.

Let me set out very briefly the basis on which, in a principled way, we are saying no to the amendments. As the environment regulator, the Environment Agency can and does prosecute company directors and other senior officers under the relevant regulations. It has a power to fine, and there can be convictions for polluting rivers and coastal waters, where it can be proved that the offence has been committed. Expanding criminal liability would simply create a repetition of the existing powers. It is the Government’s view that the amendments would create a dangerous and unacceptable risk of double jeopardy across the two regulatory regimes that are administered by Ofwat and the Environment Agency.

The amendments would simply duplicate the existing sanctions, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Philip Dunne) put it, for not meeting performance commitments. More seriously, they could undermine the robustness of the Environment Agency’s criminal sanction regime. On that basis, I hope the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale will understand why we do not want to see duplication in an area where there is already the capacity to prosecute, a criminal law regime and the sanction of fines, which is everything that his amendments seek.

Oral Answers to Questions

Philip Dunne Excerpts

Monday 13th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Foster]

Many people listening in Torfaen and Halifax will be wondering whether the hon. Gentleman has been following the sad news about the economic impact of covid-19 and the number of our own UK-based workers who we will need to get back into employment. It is hard to believe that many will believe that there is a labour shortage. We engage regularly with the care sector and we listen to what it says. Our priority is that in future these jobs will be valued, rewarded and trained for, and that immigration should not be an alternative.

[Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con) [V]]

The Environmental Audit Committee highlighted in our reports on hand car washes in 2018 and on fast fashion in 2019 clear evidence of modern slavery, in plain sight, in hand car washes on streets across Britain and in garment factories in Leicester. Will my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary commit to doing all she can to work across Government agencies to rid our towns and cities of this scourge?

[Priti Patel]

I completely agree with my right hon. Friend’s description of this modern-day scourge of exploitation. On hand car washes, local authorities need to do so much more in terms of stepping in and investigating with trading standards. He is right to press me and the Government on integrated working across all aspects of the state, at both national Government and local authority level. On Leicester, he, like all hon. Members, will be interested to know that we have established a cross-Government taskforce, which will be on the ground, asking the difficult questions of all institutions and organisations across Leicester about this scourge in the textile sector.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Philip Dunne Excerpts

Wednesday 5th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows). I rise to speak in a debate in the Chamber for the first time for some months, but this takes me back to my maiden speech during a debate on the European Union back in 2005, because the topic has continued to be discussed in the House every year since.

Those looking at this debate from outside—I am sure that other Members are getting the same evidence that I am receiving in my postbag and via email—are encouraging the House to settle the issue and to get on with it. Since the referendum, and while the Prime Minister has been seeking to negotiate a deal, we have been living with a degree of uncertainty that we cannot, in all conscience, allow the country to continue to endure for years to come. Many of the alternative options to the deal that is on the table that have been referenced by other Members in this debate today and yesterday all require actions to be taken by parties other than the people in this House. In almost every case, they require either a continuing negotiation with the EU on matters that it has already indicated it does not intend to engage with us on, or they require both Houses of Parliament to enact further legislation, as we just heard in response to the question to my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) regarding a second referendum. Each option would involve months, if not years, of continuing uncertainty with no certainty whatsoever about the outcome, so I hope that hon. Members will take that into account when voting next week.

I want to talk about a couple of specific aspects of the deal that is on the table to try to explain why I intend to support the Government. I am looking for a pragmatic Brexit. I am looking for a negotiated deal that allows for as frictionless trade to continue as is possible, and not because that would be in the best interests simply of big business. I find it extraordinary that colleagues across the House refer to “Project Fear” or scaremongering when any business raises its head and says, “This is going to be damaging for my business. This is going to lead to job losses in my sector.” I sit on the Environmental Audit Committee, which heard yesterday from the chemicals industry, and the reality is that many Members have heard evidence given to multiple Select Committees that the complexities of seeking to continue to trade in a no-deal environment are such that many businesses in the chemicals sector, the pharmaceutical industry, the automotive industry and the financial services industry—many of the sectors that we rely on for the large majority of jobs in this country—would come under significant pressure in the event that we crash out with no deal. That would happen whatever colleagues might think.

I am thinking in particular of the largest employers in my constituency that I know best. My constituency is in the west midlands, so many are heavily involved in the automotive and manufacturing sectors. Grainger & Worrall is the largest employer in Bridgnorth alongside Bridgnorth Aluminium. The McConnel agricultural machinery business is the largest employer in Ludlow. Britpart, which is a motor manufacturer, is the largest employer in Craven Arms. There are companies engaged in food production and agri-products, such as Euro Quality Lambs in Craven Arms. All those companies are worried about what would happen to their business in the event of no deal and all are pressing us to negotiate a deal to allow frictionless trade.

In my time as a Minister, I was involved in two sectors in particular: defence and health. Some material has been put out regarding the impact of this deal on our defence relationships, and from the protocol I have seen for the future framework on security, there is nothing to be concerned about in relation to the Government’s intent on defence.

There is an opportunity for us to continue to have an associate relationship with, for example, the European Defence Agency, which has been characterised as a very damaging thing. We have been contributing the princely sum of £2 million a year to the European Defence Agency for the last 10 years, and we choose to take up very few opportunities to engage with its procurement arrangements because we think we can do it better on our own or through bilateral relations with many other countries across Europe. That is a canard, or a boil that needs to be lanced.

Similarly, we are not going to be engaged in a European army. In this country we rightly regard NATO as the foundation of our defence. If the European Union wishes to go ahead with a European army, we will have no part of it. On many occasions when operations take place around the world—some of those operations are EU initiatives—we choose whether we wish to participate. We should continue to be able to do that, but it will be our choice whether we participate.

On procurement, it has been suggested that we will lose the current exemption from article 346 and will therefore be bound by EU procurement arrangements for warlike stores. That is specifically ruled out by annex 2 of the protocol on the transition period, and it will undoubtedly be negotiated out of the eventual agreement.

On health, I am reassured that, in his opening remarks, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said that he intends to provide the unilateral right of residency to EU citizens and their families for the future, and I look forward to seeing that in the migration policy. That should provide considerable reassurance to the EU citizens who work in our health service and in our social care sector that they will continue to be welcome here, which I know concerns my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston), the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee.

I am concerned about having continuing access to medicines, which can only be achieved in a straightforward way through a negotiated deal. That is another reason why I will support the deal next week.