Oral Answers to Questions

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Tuesday 12th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

5. What recent discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on the future status of the UK as a signatory to the European convention on human rights.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

22. What recent discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on the future status of the UK as a signatory to the European convention on human rights.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Edward Argar)]

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has regular meetings with Cabinet colleagues relating to the UK’s exit from the EU and issues such as our approach to human rights and the ECHR. The UK is committed to membership of the ECHR, as my right hon. Friend has previously set out, and we will remain a party to it after we have left the EU.

[Edward Argar]

This country has a long tradition, which long predates the ECHR or the EU, of championing and setting the highest standards on human rights. The Human Rights Act 1998 reflects that and gives further effect to the ECHR in our domestic law, and we are not considering amending or repealing it.

[Dr Whitford]

Despite the Prime Minister’s previous wish for the UK to leave the ECHR, the Brexit White Paper committed to membership of the convention. However, the political declaration talks only of respecting the ECHR, so can the Minister explain the change of language and clarify whether the Government plan to repeal or protect the Human Rights Act after Brexit?

Joint HMI Prison and Probation Report

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Thursday 24th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Rory Stewart]

Resolving that problem is partly about resources. We need to make sure not just that we are putting in the 9.7% extra funding but that we are able to recruit the additional staff to reduce the caseload. It is partly about processes and management systems in order to make sure that we really record any contact with offenders. It is also absolutely about picking up on any issues where our national policy is not being followed at a local level.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

Over the past two years in Scotland, we have had the lowest recorded crime for almost 45 years. In particular, violent crime has been halved in the past 10 years because of the work of the violence reduction unit. However, exactly as across the rest of the UK, we have seen an increase in sexual offences. As the Minister said, this has been for different reasons. Some of it is about exposure to pornography and some of it is about new crimes—digital crimes—but, in particular, it is about victims coming forward, which everyone should welcome. We now have the challenge of reducing the re-traumatisation they often face in the criminal justice system.

The report highlights that the national probation service is managing over 100,000 offenders, one in five of whom need supervision. The treatment programme that was being used failed: it increased reoffending and has had to be changed. How will the Minister ensure that there are sufficient staff and that they have training in the new programmes and, particularly, support, because they are often dealing with very harrowing cases that can take a toll on them? How will he improve integration—in the courses, the approach, and the IT— between custody and community? How will he ensure that the MAPPA—multi-agency public protection arrangements—level that offenders are given is consistent across England? How will he provide monitored accommodation where required?

Two years ago, Scotland got the power to introduce sexual harm protection orders and sexual risk orders, but amendment is required so that they can be recognised across the UK. We cannot have it that people can offend and move. I know that the Minister recognises that and that our Cabinet Secretary has written again this week. When will this be changed so that we can take forward these protection orders in Scotland?

[Rory Stewart]

To take the hon. Lady’s last point first, we will look very closely at that. I am very happy to have a meeting with her as soon as possible in order to do so.

The hon. Lady raised some very serious points, and I agree with all of them. We already have in place a lot of procedures to ensure that staff dealing with traumatic cases are given proper breaks and proper support. However, there are ongoing challenges, particularly around IT, data management and information-sharing between different databases that we are trying to address by making the tools simpler and by making sure that the databases speak to each other properly.

The hon. Lady’s questions about MAPPA and accommodation are absolutely on the nail. Because of the limited time, it is difficult to go through all the policy areas in detail, but she made five very strong points, and I thank her.

Oral Answers to Questions

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Tuesday 18th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Frazer]

The Government already have agreements with around 100 countries in relation to prisoner transfers.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

T9. The Scottish Government have raised concerns about the effectiveness of the European arrest warrant as European member states will be permitted to operate constitutional bans on extraditing their citizens during transition. Can the Minister clarify this situation?

[Lucy Frazer]

I think the hon. Lady will have been pleased to see a paragraph in relation to extradition in the future framework.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Committee: 7th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 13th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sir Oliver Letwin]

It is very odd—it is as if the hon. Gentleman has not been here, but I have seen his body here all the time. The fact of the matter is that the House has had a series of votes, it is going to have a further series of votes, and then it is going to have a whole pile of votes on, inter alia, the new implementation and withdrawal Bill. In fact, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield is totally in agreement with that. There is no question of whether we give the House a vote. It is going to have a vote. The question is: what is the articulation of that with clause 9? That is what those of us who are being serious about this have been trying to discuss.

I really feel that I have come to the end of my remarks. I apologise, Sir David, that I am long past time. I hope you will accept that it is because I was answering points from other Members.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

We have been discussing new clause 3 and amendment 7, which is about process in this place and, as has been said, whether there is any point in clause 9 if there is going to be a withdrawal agreement Bill. The problem is that, if clause 9 remains in the Bill, the Government will still have powers in the interim to make changes, including to the Bill itself. That means that, when the Bill completes, the Executive could simply change it in any way they wanted.

On the issue of having a vote that is meaningful, if the only option we have is the deal that comes back or no deal, frankly, that is Hobson’s choice. What should have been happening is what the Prime Minister categorically refused: a running commentary. Other Governments in Europe have sent people back to the negotiating table to try to make changes when legislation has been enacted. It is important that we remember the paucity of the debate running up to June 2016. We did not explore all the impacts. There was one debate in this Chamber on the EU and the economy. There was no debate in this Chamber on the health or social impacts, or on the loss of rights and opportunities. We did not have that. We did not air these issues—it is like having the Brexit debate now.

I want to speak to amendment 143, tabled by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas), which looks for a signed agreement to protect EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens in the EU.

[Antoinette Sandbach]

On a point of order, Sir David. I am not able to hear what the hon. Lady is saying because behind me there seems to be an inordinate racket being made by one of my colleagues. I wonder whether it would be in order for you, Sir David, to make the point clear that this is an incredibly important debate and Members of Parliament should be able to hear what is being said.

[The Temporary Chair (Sir David Amess)]

The hon. Lady is entirely right. We should be courteous to each other. I should also add, while I am on my feet, that I said at the start that with so many people wishing to speak, if people spoke for seven or eight minutes each, everyone would be called. It is now down to three or four minutes.

[Dr Whitford]

Thank you, Sir David. I hope, as my party’s Front-Bench representative, and perhaps as the only SNP Member who will get to speak, that that timing does not apply to me.

I also wish to speak to amendment 241, which stands in my name and those of my colleagues, and which would preserve reciprocal healthcare and social security rights under the social security co-ordination regulations 883/2004 and 987/200, and to amendments 270 and 271, which stand in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) and which would prevent the Executive from using clauses 8 and 9 to reduce the rights of EU citizens in this country.

There was supposedly a breakthrough last week. The phase 1 agreement having been achieved, some level of agreement was meant to be fixed, but unfortunately it was then unpicked on “The Andrew Marr Show”. Moreover, we are still hearing the phrase, “No deal is better than a bad deal”, which completely undermines the agreement made last week. I make this plea: having reached a phase 1 agreement on citizens’ rights, this issue should now be taken out of the negotiations and a deal to give them security should be brought forward in the upcoming immigration Bill, and not left another year for the withdrawal agreement Bill.

It has been a year and a half already. Many Members know that my husband is German. There are many people here with EU spouses. We have friends who have been in extreme anxiety and uncertainty for a year and a half. This is not happening in March 2019; it is happening now. Ten thousand EU nationals have left the four NHSs because their children are being bullied and they feel insecure. They are going home “to be safe”. That is an appalling indictment of the current situation.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

The hon. Lady is making an incredibly strong point, and one that gets lost in all this debate about article this and article that: these are real people’s lives. Does she share my anger at the way the Brexit Secretary has played fast and loose with people’s lives? He went on “The Andrew Marr Show” and completely ripped up an agreement that people thought on Friday was done and which would have a big impact on their lives.

[Dr Whitford]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. Among other things, we are talking about preparing for a future deal, but the suffering and anxiety of EU nationals and EU national families in this country is already happening. They should have been given surety the morning after the vote, but instead we heard phrases such as “bargaining chips” and “playing cards” and were told they were key in the negotiations.

[Carol Monaghan (Glasgow North West) (SNP)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that young early-career researchers in the academic sector, for example, are highly mobile and can easily move elsewhere? We should be rolling out the red carpet for them to make sure they stay, but instead we are treating them worse than dirt on our shoes.

[Dr Whitford]

I absolutely agree. As I said, we have lost 10,000 EU nationals from our health services. We have seen a greater than 90% drop in the number of EU national nurses registering to come here. It is not just about protecting the people already here. For the four NHSs across the UK, the workforce is one of their biggest issues, yet we are sending out such an unwelcoming signal that we will struggle to attract anyone else.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

I agree with many of the hon. Lady’s points, but is it not vital that we send out the clear reassurance, which the Prime Minister gave at the Dispatch Box to all our NHS and care staff, that they and their families are welcome to stay, that we want them to stay and that their rights are now guaranteed?

[Dr Whitford]

I absolutely agree with the hon. Lady, but unfortunately it is not enough to come to the Dispatch Box every couple of months with warm words of welcome to EU staff, when in between women who are raising families here, with British partners or partners of EU origin, are being turned down for permanent residency because they have not taken out private comprehensive health insurance. We have had 100 EU nationals sent “prepare to leave” letters. Friends of ours tried to get citizenship for their three children, who were born and grew up in Scotland: the eldest and youngest were given passports; the middle child was refused. I am sorry but the experience of EU nationals on the ground over the past year and a half has been horrendous. If the phase 1 agreement last week is to mean anything, we must incorporate it into the immigration Bill to give them certainty now, instead of telling them they might have to wait another year before they find out what their future will be.

To exercise the right to live anywhere, access to healthcare and social security is crucial. It has made such a difference, not just to EU nationals here, but to our pensioners who have settled in the sunny uplands of the northern Mediterranean. What position will they be in if they cannot access healthcare? We must recognise that freedom of movement was not a one-way street; our young people and professionals have been able to take advantage of it for the past 40 years. We are taking that away from the next generation, which is something that I find terrible.

The Government say, and it is in the phase 1 agreement, that they accept keeping regulations 883 and 987, so let us bring that in. Let us get that down on paper and get it passed, because saying to EU nationals, “You’re welcome to stay, but there might be no deal, which means you’ll have no legal standing and you won’t be able to use the NHS,” is no use to anyone.

--- Later in debate ---

[Martin Docherty-Hughes (West Dunbartonshire) (SNP)]

In relation to the points and the amendments from the right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) and the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn), does my hon. Friend agree that, without the transparency of knowing what we are progressing to, many of the items that she is talking about cannot be agreed in the House? We leave ourselves open to the accusation made by Kathy Sheridan in The Irish Times this morning that the Government are

“failing to establish in advance what questions should be asked. Of utterly disdaining an alternative, unifying vision while obsessing about trade, blue passports and colonial nostalgia.”—[Interruption.]

[Dr Whitford]

Okay, I am just going to move swiftly on. It was a speech, so my hon. Friend has had his chance to get that in.

There are multiple agencies that are important for the nations across the UK, but my particular interest is of course health. We know that the European Medicines Agency is moving to Amsterdam, but the much bigger issue is the UK coming out of the European Medicines Agency. This is a body that has massively reduced bureaucracy, streamlined the launch of new drugs and meant that the pharmaceutical industry has to go through only one registration process for 500 million people. That is why drugs are launched in Europe at much the same time as America and about a year before Canada and Australia. Given some of what is going on in NHS England—including the budget impact assessment, which can allow expensive drugs to be delayed for three years—what I am hearing from those in the pharmaceutical industry is that they see the UK as a hostile market and that they may not come six months later or a year later. It may take longer than that because they only see the point in paying the extra cost to register when they have a chance of their drug being used in the NHS.

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

The hon. Lady is making an important point. Is she also mindful of the fact that, at a critical time for the future of the pharmaceuticals industry, there is currently no certainty even on cross-border production, which many of our companies are involved in, including GlaxoSmithKline in my constituency?

[Dr Whitford]

I agree. Processes such as quality control, batch certification and lot release must take place in the EU. Several centres in Scotland and, indeed, throughout the United Kingdom will have to move.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Dr Whitford]

I must make progress. A long queue of Members are waiting to speak.

The EMA also leads on research, especially on rare and paediatric diseases. It simply is not possible for a single country to carry out such research. My amendment 351 is intended to ensure that we continue to participate in clinical trials under the clinical trials regulation that will come into effect in April, and maintaining standards of data protection is crucial to that. If we rush into a race to the bottom, we will end up as pariahs and we will simply not be able to co-operate with others.

I support amendment 300, which was tabled by the right hon. Member for Wantage (Mr Vaizey) and which concerns Euratom, but I want to clear up one point. The issue of access to a secure supply of medical radioisotopes was raised by the Royal College of Radiologists, but was dismissed by the Government because the isotopes are non-fissile. It is true that they are non-fissile, but we had a catastrophic shortage between 2008 and 2010 as a result of which I, as a breast cancer surgeon, could not carry out my bone scans. The new technique of sentinel node biopsy which was being rolled out had to be delayed and stalled, and I would have to choose which of my patients might have access to the one dose of technetium that we had to do a bone scan. That is why the Euratom Supply Agency set up the European Observatory on the Supply of Medical Isotopes, and it managed the situation.

We face real challenges in the coming years. The reactors that produce molybdenum, from which we get technetium, are not in the UK. We do not produce any of that stuff, and we do not yet have a replacement technique as those reactors go offline. It is important for the Government to realise that, if we are not part of the observatory, if we are not participators, the Euratom Supply Agency will have no obligation to us. It might help us, but we will be at the back of the queue, and that will affect patients.

New clause 44, tabled by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West (Joanna Cherry), calls for an assessment of the impact of Brexit on health and social care and on workforces, especially social care workers. The percentage of EU nationals working in social care is even higher than the percentage in the NHS, but they will not qualify for tier 2-type visas. They are often not highly paid, but we rely on them utterly.

Staying in the single market and the customs union would solve all our problems, including the problem of the Irish border, but consideration of that is still being ruled out. I call on the Government to step back from creating all these difficulties, and reconsider the possibility of our staying in the single market and the customs union. The EU is not just about trade; it is also about rights and opportunities, and about co-operation.

[Mr Edward Vaizey (Wantage) (Con)]

I am very grateful, Mr Amess—[Hon. Members: “Sir David Amess.”] I am so sorry. I should remember that nearly everyone who is speaking in this debate has a knighthood.

I am very grateful, Sir David, for the chance to speak in this important debate. It has been extraordinarily interesting and, actually, enjoyable. I want to make a brief detour on amendment 7, because the dialogue between my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) was absolutely terrific. Listening to my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset took me back—to a certain extent—to meetings that I had with him when I was a Minister. You could not go in and order a cup of coffee without engaging in a two-hour debate about exactly what was meant.

In the end, however, the answer emerged, and it emerged in this exchange. Notwithstanding all the technical debate, it is extremely simple. Clause 9 was written before the Government realised that they would have to put the withdrawal agreement into a statute, and now that they have to put it into a statute, both clause 9 and, potentially, amendment 7 have reached their sell-by date. The offer from my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset is serious and real: to come back, effectively, with a rewritten clause 9 which tells Parliament exactly what the Government need to do as we implement the withdrawal agreement in legislation. Do they need some powers—I could understand that—to do some things that are essential preparatory work? I thought my point was good enough to stimulate—

--- Later in debate ---

[Dominic Raab]

It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who made some very serious constitutional points with great colour and eloquence. I am grateful to hon. and right hon. Members who have contributed to this debate through their various amendments and speeches. My approach over the course of my speech—I suspect that it will take me an hour to get through it—will be to take clause 9 first, and then to come on to clauses 16 and 17 as well as schedule 7.

It may be helpful to hon. Members who want to intervene to know that I will first explain the function of clause 9 and why it is necessary, and then set out some of the illustrations that the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) suggested were required. I will come on to talk about the limits, and then I will address the amendments, including amendment 7, which was tabled by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve). The key issue will come down to timing, so I will also touch on that, but first, let me set the scene.

Clause 9 highlights the interaction between diplomacy at the international level and the domestic legislative preparation for Brexit. The Government are committed to securing the best deal that we can with our EU partners for the whole United Kingdom against the very acute time pressure set out under the article 50 process imposed on us.

Clause 9 enables regulations to be made for the purposes of implementing the withdrawal agreement. It is now, as hon. Members have said, a supplementary provision to give us agility in the negotiations and the flexibility of legislative procedure to deliver the best deal under time pressure. The Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union announced to this House on 13 November the Government’s intention to bring forward new primary legislation in the form of the withdrawal agreement and implementation Bill to give effect to the major elements of the withdrawal agreement. That will include citizens’ rights, the implementation period, the financial settlement and the other issues wrapped up within the exit negotiations.

[Dr Whitford]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Dominic Raab]

May I just make a little progress?

I am not sure whether every hon. Member has had a chance to read the written ministerial statement that was published today—it is entitled “Procedures for the Approval and Implementation of EU Exit Agreements”—but it is worth taking a look at it with regard to some of the concerns that have been expressed. We intend to introduce the withdrawal agreement and implementation Bill after there has been a successful vote on the final deal in Parliament. Notwithstanding that, it remains essential that clause 9 stands part of this Bill. We do not yet know the precise shape or outcome of future negotiations, and it is important that the necessary legislative mechanisms are available to us so that we fully implement the withdrawal agreement in time for the exit date.

[Dominic Raab]

I will make a small amount of progress but then, of course, I will take the right hon. Gentleman’s intervention.

There will be a wide range of more technical separation issues that will need to be legislated for in time for our exit on 29 March 2019. Some will be better suited to secondary legislation, and it would not be practical to account for the sheer volume of all these issues in primary legislation. It is of course not uncommon for the principles of an international agreement to be implemented, at least to some degree, through secondary legislation. To give just one example, the Nuclear Installations (Liability for Damage) Order 2016 implements the 2004 protocol to the convention on third party liability in the field of nuclear energy.

As for how we implement such secondary legislation, clause 9—this is the crux—offers a material benefit in terms of timing. We would be able to start—not complete—laying some of the statutory instruments soon after reaching agreement with our EU friends alongside the passage of new primary legislation. It is impossible to say with 100% precision at this point all the technical regulations that will be required to implement the withdrawal agreement before the full terms have been negotiated. That is obvious, and is accepted by Members on both sides of the House. However, some regulations might be required, and some will require a lead time of several months, so we need to reserve the ability to use clause 9 as soon as practically possible after a deal has been concluded. If we waited for further primary legislation to receive Royal Assent, that might be too late and we could be too squeezed for time, even in the scenario in which we reach an agreement in October, as is our current aim.

[Dr Whitford]

Does the Minister recognise my point about the situation that EU nationals are in now? Will the Government consider moving their issue into the immigration Bill, which should be coming imminently, rather than leaving them in limbo for another year?

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 14th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

Is it not clear, from what has been said in Europe and by business, that they want the transition deal to be the same as what we have now, with all the same obligations, so that they do not have to go through two sets of changes?

[Mr Leslie]

That is absolutely the preference of most sensible observers. We need a transition, of course, because the trade deal arrangements cannot possibly be made adequately by the time of exit day, unless the Secretary of State for International Trade pulls a rabbit out of the hat—perhaps he has been known to do that in the past, but I doubt it will happen this time. The transition period is therefore vital if the UK is to salvage and stitch together a trade arrangement.

We must not forget, moreover, that the 57 existing free trade arrangements with non-EU countries from which the UK benefits by virtue of our EU membership will have to be grandfathered—copied and pasted into UK arrangements. The right hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr Grieve) talked about the 759 different international treaties. We do not know quite how those will apply. We have to think about the legal framework not just after but during the transition. We have a massively complex set of legal steps to take, yet we have no clarity from Ministers, apart from this concession yesterday that there might be a Bill at some point, possibly after exit day, perhaps with a vacuum—

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Monday 11th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)]

Mr Deputy Speaker:

“the Scottish Parliament, which adjourned on 25 March 1707, is hereby reconvened.”—[Scottish Parliament Official Report, 12 May 1999.]

Those were the words of Winifred Margaret Ewing, elected to the House of Commons 50 years ago this year, and more fondly known as Winnie and, to her EU friends, Madame Ecosse. To this day, Winnie is the only parliamentarian of these islands to have been a Member of the Scottish, British and European Parliaments, and she will be the only person who will hold that accolade.

It is almost 20 years today since Scotland said yes to a Scottish Parliament with devolved powers under a settlement that stated that everything was automatically devolved unless it was explicitly reserved. Despite what was said earlier, those powers were not notional. As the First Minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, rightly said in her speech this morning, this Bill

“threatens the very principle on which our Parliament is founded”.

In its current form, the Bill is a reversal of devolution.

Although I am a pretty positive person, I am struggling to find light among the Brexit process. After a summer of meetings with businesses and trade bodies in my constituency and across Scotland and the UK, aimed at understanding their hopes and fears about Brexit, I find it hard to see good in any of it. The retail sector in my constituency employs a lot of EU nationals. Let me take the insurance and aviation sectors as an example.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

As my hon. Friend knows, I have an airport and an important aerospace cluster in my constituency. Is she not concerned about the loss of open skies and the European Aviation Safety Agency? We might not be able to pass the engines, but perhaps that does not matter, because we will not be allowed to fly anyway.

[Hannah Bardell]

I share my hon. Friend’s concerns, and I am sure she shares those of the insurance sector, which cites aviation as a relevant example because national airlines based in any EU country require a range of specialist insurance cover. Most of that is a mandatory requirement for operation. The UK insurance market is the only location with the specialist aviation insurance knowledge and financial capacity to provide the full coverage for all the risks faced.

Attacks on NHS Staff

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Monday 27th February 2017 Westminster Hall

[Holly Lynch]

My hon. Friend is right. That is exactly my concern with the assault police charge, which I have explored in detail through my “Protect the Protectors” campaign. The maximum sentence for that charge does not seem to reflect its seriousness. We have to look at all the options available for sentencing.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

Hon. Members have mentioned that Scotland already has the Emergency Workers (Scotland) Act 2005, under which the maximum sentence for common assault is 12 months and the maximum fine is £10,000. That is about twice the general range in the rest of the UK. In Scotland, serious assaults like some of those that the hon. Lady describes are charged not under that Act but as serious assault, GBH or attempted murder, so the Act is very much for common assault.

[Holly Lynch]

I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. Again, in assault police charges we found that people were being sentenced under other crimes, which distorted the collection of information on frequency and prevalence of people committing those acts and brought into question the need to have a stand-alone assault police charge, if it is not effective in that regard. I approached the matter by asking what is the best way to sort out some of those charges, and what can we do? In putting together my Bill, it seemed like this was the best option.

One of the other aspects of my ten-minute rule Bill —it has been touched on already—would require someone who spits at or bites an emergency service or NHS professional to provide a blood sample to determine if that professional is at risk of contracting a communicable disease and would require antiviral treatment. If the Government were to adopt my Bill, it would become an offence to refuse, without reasonable excuse, to undergo such tests, much in the same way as it is to refuse a breathalyser test. That could save someone potentially unnecessary and invasive treatments as well as months of uncertainty and anxiety about whether they have contracted a potentially life-changing disease.

That anyone would assault or spit at an NHS worker is an absolute disgrace. The work that they do, often in the toughest of circumstances, should be met only with gratitude and admiration, never with violence. In seeking to protect them and all emergency service workers and NHS staff, my ten-minute rule Bill aimed to send a strong message. However, while it had cross-party support and proceeded unopposed, I am not naive about the nature of ten-minute rule Bills presented by Opposition Back Benchers; nor am I under any illusions about where we are in the parliamentary calendar. I therefore urge all MPs and campaigners to explore every opportunity to take action and bring about the changes we would like to see.

The spirit of my Bill was to say loud and clear that the public and elected representatives as legislators are on the side of NHS workers, and anyone who deliberately seeks to inflict injury on our medical professionals will feel the full and unavoidable force of the law. I wholeheartedly support any and all means of doing just that.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. As many people in the Chamber know, I spent 33 years working in the NHS, and I have been on the receiving end, as other Members may have been.

I remember a particular incident in a breast cancer clinic. I was warned by the nurses before I went into the room that the husband was very angry, not at anything I had done but at something on the way that had upset him. That is often the situation. It is not necessarily someone who would normally be violent or worked up. They are frightened for the person they love. That can be in A&E, where they have been sitting for hours and people are going past them, or it can be in the situation I had. What I had was a man about 6 inches from my face with both fists clenched. Because the staff knew about it, they were not seeing anyone else and had their ears at the door. The problem for me was that I could not afford to fall out with this man, because the pale woman sitting in a chair had breast cancer, and I knew I would have to work with the two of them afterwards.

The challenge of de-escalating such situations is enormous. NHS staff can become very good at it, but if they are under time pressure—we have seen that this winter in accident and emergency—it can pour petrol on the flames. Someone is saying, “Excuse me! Excuse me! Can I speak to you? My wife is ill,”—or “my child is ill”—and people are running past all the time. Eventually, a gasket blows. It is not always someone with tattoos of “love” and “hate” or whatever, making it obvious that they are trouble; it can be someone who is frightened. To de-escalate that requires training, support and back-up. More than anything else, it requires time, so that when we spot that something like that emerging, we can put the time into that person to explain their situation and what will happen next and to look at what they are worried about. If everyone is rushing to someone who is more ill, that situation will spiral out of control.

The hon. Member for Hertsmere (Oliver Dowden) mentioned people who work on their own and providing them with lone-worker devices. I agree with that. However, the hon. Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch) talked about someone responding to 999 calls in an ambulance on their own, which is probably not altogether appropriate. In particular, if we have a patient in the community who has been noted as being violent or aggressive in the past, social care workers and others should not be sent to that person by themselves.

In my health board, we have a service where someone who keeps being violent or aggressive in primary care is removed from that practice. Specialist primary care has been developed to provide care for people who have anger issues or violence issues so that care can be given in a protected way, not—we keep hearing about the seven-day NHS—by a female GP at half-past 7 at night when there is hardly anyone left in the practice. Some of the issues need to be thought about in advance. We need to think about how we set up the system and how we organise things in particular so we do not always end up with a kettle whistling shrilly, which is what we have seen over the past winter.

It is quite difficult to get accurate or comparative data. In England data are gathered through NHS Protect. It sends a bad message that a consultation is starting this Wednesday at the end of its contract—it is due to finish at the end of March—with NHS staff none the wiser as to who will protect them or collect the data. That is a terrible message to send out in the face of such escalating numbers across NHS England. In Scotland we have Datix information, which is the same as we use for any non-standard occurrence in a hospital or medical situation.

Members have mentioned the Emergency Workers (Scotland) Act 2005, which was updated in 2008 to ensure that it extended to all community workers—GPs, mental health workers, social workers, social careworkers and people assisting them—and many of the points made by the hon. Member for Halifax about her ten-minute rule Bill are covered by that Scottish Act.

That Act did not of itself bring the numbers down; as in England, they were climbing. The turnaround seems to have been five years ago in 2011-12, and part of that was because we, too, started to have practically a zero-tolerance campaign. People who walked into accident and emergency saw posters that said, “This is not acceptable behaviour and it will not be accepted.” It was easier to do that when we could say, “This was so important that we made a separate piece of legislation to protect all emergency careworkers.” The Act includes coastguards and lifeboat volunteers at the Royal National Lifeboat Institution—they are all covered in Scotland. That is a really important message to send out for a zero-tolerance campaign.

In the past five years our numbers have decreased by 10% and the number of violent offences taken forward by the police and prosecuted has decreased by more than a quarter. It does therefore appear to be having an effect, although the numbers are still shockingly high and something that we should not see.

In response to the Government’s comment about a new charge being unnecessary because it is covered by the offence of assault, we must remember that people in other businesses, and even in other public services, can bar someone and walk away. A healthcare worker cannot walk away. We have a duty of care no matter how aggressive, no matter how rude and no matter no violent someone is being, particularly if they are ill.

The hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) mentioned that she would not support an automatic custodial sentence because many of these people have mental health issues. However, the NHS Protect data show that even when we exclude people with a medical cause or medical excuse for violence, ambulance staff report half of the assaults on them, but the acute sector—that includes acute wards and A&E— and mental health sector report fewer than 5% of all assaults. Creating an offence can encourage people to report.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

That is an important point, because part of the prosecutorial decision is whether prosecution would be in the public interest. The Crown Prosecution Service published some useful guidance three years ago about how many cases perpetrated by someone struggling with mental health issues were discontinued, or not advanced, on the basis that to pursue them would be against the public interest; so that criterion already exists. While the 5% figure represents what could be reported, prosecutors often decide not to pursue a matter on the basis I have set out. That does not go against the strong argument for a stand-alone offence.

[Dr Whitford]

The NHS Protect data clearly separate out the assaults with no medical cause, and then focus on what percentage of those are reported. The number is remarkably low.

The data that we are capturing in Datix, which shows high numbers in Scotland as well as in England, include verbal assaults and racist comments. Sadly, with some of the reaction after the EU referendum last year, we have seen horrific reports of people from the EU who work here—and make up a significant proportion of medical and nursing staff—being racially abused by the people they look after. As every Member of the House has tried to do in debates since the referendum, we must send out the message that that is unacceptable. An Act relating specifically to all types of emergency worker, both in the community and in hospital, would send a strong message and would have an effect. The fact that staff cannot turn away must be taken into account.

Just because a patient has a mental health issue, a learning disability or, particularly, dementia, it is not any less distressing for a member of staff to be punched in the face, have their glasses broken, or be cut or scratched deeply by someone’s nails. That comes back to how situations are managed. It should be possible, as soon as any incident occurs—or any perception arises of a patient beginning to develop violent tendencies—for a social careworker not to be sent in alone to deliver personal care to them; planning for the patient’s care should be done in a responsible way by the team, for both the patient and the staff member.

[James Gray (in the Chair)]

Order. We have plenty of time left, and, slightly unusually, I intend to call one further Back Bencher before the winding-up speech by the Opposition spokesman. I call Alex Chalk.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gyimah]

My hon. Friend makes a forceful point. That is precisely what the engagement with the Director of Public Prosecutions is meant to achieve, and I would like to involve my hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere in those discussions.

Prevention and effective law enforcement, through collaboration between the NHS, the police and the CPS, are the best solutions to the problem of attacks on NHS staff. This debate is about a specific criminal offence. As has been mentioned, there are already comprehensive provisions in criminal law for dealing with a wide range of attacks and assaults. The relevant offences include common assault; assault occasioning actual bodily harm, where the injuries are more than superficial; wounding or inflicting grievous bodily harm; and wounding or causing GBH with intent. All those offences cover every victim, whatever their occupation. Depending on the particular offence and the seriousness of the criminal conduct, the penalties available to the courts range from a maximum of six months’ imprisonment, a fine or both for common assault, through a maximum of five years for ABH or GBH, to a maximum of life imprisonment for wounding or causing GBH with intent.

Given the current offences framework and sentencing guidance, which make provision for an increase in sentence to be considered where an assault victim is a public sector worker, I am not persuaded that there is a need to create a specific offence for this group of workers. Of course, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere pointed out, some specific offences of assault apply to particular occupation groups, such as police officers. As the Minister responsible for prisons, I am aware of the specific offence of assault against prison officers.

[Dr Philippa Whitford]

Can the Minister clarify why prison officers and immigration officers warrant that extra protection, but healthcare workers looking after patients do not?

[Mr Gyimah]

That is a very good question. The first point I would make is that even in the case of prison officers, where there is a specific offence, the most important thing is better law enforcement. The fact that a specific offence exists does not on its own lead to an increase in prosecutions. What is needed is the better law enforcement that I have outlined. There is also a wider point. It is recognised that, by the very nature of the roles that have been mentioned, the individuals working in them are likely to be assaulted in the course of their duties. That is why the law provides specific protection. The law currently makes a distinction between those occupations and others serving the public, although, as I have said, if there is an attack against someone serving the public, that is treated, and should be treated, as an aggravating factor in law.

[Dr Whitford]

I thank the Minister for giving way again. Does he not accept that 70,500 attacks on NHS staff means that they, too, face the likelihood of being assaulted at work?

[Mr Gyimah]

The evidence clearly suggests so, but let me come on to my other point and the point about Scotland, which the hon. Lady mentioned. All the occupation-specific offences have the same maximum sentence—six months’ imprisonment, a fine or both—as common assault. As I have already said, where the offending behaviour is more serious, more serious offences and penalties are available. Having the specific offence does not change the sentence that someone can receive.

--- Later in debate ---

[Gavin Robinson]

rose—

[Dr Whitford]

rose—

[Mr Gyimah]

I will give way to the hon. Gentleman.

[Mr Gyimah]

As I said earlier in my speech, a piece of work does need to be done on who is doing the assaulting and what has happened. I gave the simple example of a grandparent suffering from dementia who wakes up confused and lashes out. It is not as simple as saying that they have assaulted a member of staff in the NHS and therefore they should go to court, be convicted and get a long sentence. The key point, when people make this argument, is the belief that the creation of a new offence of assaults on health workers would deter such attacks and so offer better protection for NHS workers or result in more prosecutions than occur under current legislation.

[Dr Philippa Whitford]

rose—

[Mr Gyimah]

I would like to develop my point. I am aware that in Scotland there is a specific offence of assaulting health workers on hospital premises. Sadly, however, the number of assaults on NHS staff in Scotland has continued to grow since the legislation was introduced. In 2010, the Scottish Government stated:

“There is no clear evidence that the 2005 Act has been a success in acting as a deterrent.”

[Dr Whitford]

rose—

[Mr Gyimah]

I need to develop my argument. The Scottish legislation raises a number of other points, some of which I have touched on. Would the offence, as in Scotland, apply only to attacks on NHS staff on hospital premises? There are many other NHS locations. Would it apply to attacks by patients or also to attacks by visitors and family members? How would “NHS staff” be defined? Many people work in the NHS without being employed by it. Would the offence apply only when staff were on duty, or when they had left the premises and were at a bus stop outside the hospital? However those questions were resolved, every specific circumstance applying to a new offence would be an additional element for the prosecution to prove, over and above a charge of common assault.

[Dr Whitford]

I thank the Minister for giving way again. I wanted to intervene again to point out that in 2008, the maximum sentence for the offence in Scotland was changed to 12 months’ imprisonment and/or a £10,000 fine, so it is not exactly the same as for other common assaults. The protection is not just for staff in hospitals. The 2005 Act already covered blue-light workers, their assistants and particular classes of people, and in the 2008 renewal of the Act, it was extended to all, including volunteers and assistants, so it is not just about hospital staff. As I said in my speech, it includes lifeboat, coastguard, ambulance and fire service workers—all emergency workers.

[Mr Gyimah]

The hon. Lady’s question points to precisely that definitional issue. As we have gone through the debate, the definition of “NHS worker” has expanded with each speech we have heard.

I will bring my comments to a close where I began. Any attack on NHS workers is unacceptable. It is right that the House is debating this issue today, and right that LBC raised it. I would like to pursue, with my hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere, a way of ensuring that the joint working agreement actually works; that we have the right evidence to understand what precisely is happening; and that, where what we are discussing should be treated as an aggravating factor by the CPS and the courts, that is indeed happening. I strongly believe that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham said, we need to act urgently to ensure that the law, as it stands, is implemented properly, so that NHS staff are protected. That is the best way to ensure that they can go to work and not have to suffer some of the violence that they have suffered.

Sexual Offences (Pardons Etc) Bill

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 21st October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

I understand that an urgent question has been tabled for 11 o’clock so I will endeavour to be brief so my remarks do not become truncated.

First, I want to congratulate the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (John Nicolson) on introducing this measure and on his excellent speech in support of his Bill. I welcome what he has sought to do.

There is general agreement in this House that great injustice was done to gay men in the past by laws that have since been repealed. There is a great deal of regret for that injustice and a recognition that there are people who are still alive who have suffered as a consequence of it. Further to that, there is broad, although perhaps not unanimous, agreement that it is right that not only should that legislation have been repealed, in many cases some time ago, but that this House and the Government should go further and extend a pardon to those convicted of offences we now believe should not have been criminal offences, because of the enormous injustice done to them. It seems to me that there is no disagreement between the Government and Members on the Opposition and Government Benches who believe it is right in principle for such a pardon to be extended.

I recall being a Minister in the Ministry of Justice along with my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt) at the time when we were discussing the initial proposal that a specific pardon should be granted to Alan Turing. We had those discussions with my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), who was then the Justice Secretary. One can hardly imagine a more humane or liberal Member of Parliament than my right hon. and learned Friend, but he had concerns about the possible implications of the further application of the principle we were embarking on. I think those were legitimate concerns, and I think there is a legitimate debate to be had about the extent to which it is possible to embark on a process of revisionism such that we find ourselves extending a general apology or pardon for all sorts of crimes that may have been committed a while ago and for legislation that was enacted before our time.

Members on both sides of the House have spoken with passion about why we should offer a signal or expression of regret. It is clearly important for the living that the state recognises the injustice that was done, but it is also important to a broader community. The hon. Members for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and for Glasgow South (Stewart Malcolm McDonald) spoke powerfully about that. That is important because, in spite of the near completion of the legislative agenda, in this country at least, to ensure full equality for gay people, there is still discrimination in our society, and particularly in our schools, where there are young people who face prejudice and are worried that they may not be accepted in our society. Therefore, the signals this House and the Government send are immensely important.

There is also the question of the signal we send more widely to the rest of the world. I am honoured to be the elected chairman of the all-party group on global lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender rights, and the hon. Member for Glasgow South is also an officer of that group. We focus on the appalling breaches of human rights increasingly being perpetrated in other countries around the world where human rights are going backwards, not forwards; gay people are living and working in fear in, for instance, countries in sub-Saharan Africa and in Russia and other countries in eastern Europe. In those countries, progress needs to be made to secure equality and a respect for human rights. We are often told—as are those who are victimised in those countries—that their laws historically owe their origin to this place, to laws fashioned and promoted by this Parliament as part of our Empire.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

Is that not why it is so utterly important that this Bill goes through in its own right to send out that message, rather than have just a few lines of an amendment?

[Nick Herbert]

The hon. Lady anticipates what I am about to say. I was explaining that I believe it is important that this House sends the right signal with a general pardon because of the effect on the living, because of those to whom an injustice has been done, because of the way in which young people in particular may anticipate how they will be treated, and because of the signal we might therefore send globally about the importance of standing up for human rights.

Sexual Offences (Pardons Etc) Bill

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Friday 21st October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

Before I start, I want to get the sartorial bit of the debate out of the way as quickly as possible. I am not wearing pink because we are discussing gay men’s relationships: today is “wear it pink” day for breast cancer. I would have liked to see hon. Members all in pink. I ask those who came to the event that I hosted—I noted the queue; over 200 MPs came, dressed somewhat flamboyantly in their “wear it pink” photographs—to remember to tweet their photos later.

There has been a lot of humour today, but the issue is serious. Alan Turing was probably the individual who made the single biggest difference to the second world war. It has been estimated that he shortened the war by two years and saved 14 million lives. There were many heroes who suffered, and many heroes who lost their lives, but there is no other person we can identify like that. Unfortunately for him, of course, what he did at Bletchley Park was secret: he was not a hero, and he was not welcomed with tickertape, given a medal or anything else.

Alan Turing was not charged for having sex with someone under age, having sex in public or behaving in a lewd way. Having been burgled, and having had to call on the public service of the police—when it, of course, became obvious that he lived with his partner—he and his partner were charged with gross indecency. His partner was let off, but Alan Turing ended up pleading guilty under legal advice. He was given the brutal choice of going to prison or facing medical castration. He was injected for a year with diethylstilbestrol, which causes the growth of breast tissue, impotence and depression. It is no little wonder that he took his life with cyanide two years later.

On top of that, one of the things that was probably very important to Alan Turing was that he lost his security clearance. He was allowed, technically, to stay in his job and to write academic papers, but as a cryptographer—as one of the leaders in developing computer technology—what he did was so much part of him that it was also his identity. Therefore, his identity at work and his identity in his person were removed.

The idea of sexual orientation change efforts has, sadly, not disappeared, and is still practised in many parts of the world. It is still advertised in America, and there are still people in this country—people with healthcare connections—who believe that homosexuality can be cured. Therefore, the idea that we are talking about a parallel to witchcraft from medieval times, and that the issue we are discussing is just technical, is not true. Many people were tortured. Aversion therapy included giving people nausea-inducing drugs while showing them pictures of male homosexual sex. Some people were electrocuted, some were burned and some had all sorts of horrible things done to them. We need to realise that these people were systematically tortured by the state and by health services. That was not that long ago. I was alive when the law changed—a few of us here were. This is not about medieval times. As Stonewall showed in its survey last year, there are still people associated with healthcare practice—perhaps on the edges—who believe these things. We need to be very clear about that.

We have seen the whole approach change. The hon. Member for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams) was so honest and so moving in talking about how he had changed. That is what we have seen. It is not just a matter of social change; what we do in this place drives social change. Equal marriage has helped to change society. However, the anomaly we are talking about is still here, and a small amendment to the Policing and Crime Bill will simply not do what this Bill does. I am not talking about process; process can be sorted in whatever way necessary in Committee. We should not be arguing on the head of a pin.

Voting this Bill through sends a message. As the hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) said, it is not the case, as the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) said earlier, that being gay is not an issue in schools. Actually, it still is. There are lots of young people hiding it, struggling with it and in pain with it. If we vote against the Bill today, or if we talk it out because of some piece of trickery, the message we send out will be appalling.

We also need to take on our responsibility—I do not talk about this much—for the Commonwealth. We hosted the Commonwealth Games two years ago in Glasgow. In the run-up to them, we had all the discussion about the countries where people are persecuted and imprisoned that are part of the United Kingdom Commonwealth. For the mother of Parliaments, which is heard all across those countries, to talk this Bill out, or to vote it down, sends an appalling message. We have seen how a vote to leave the European Union has empowered people who are in a tiny minority to feel somehow enabled to take actions of race hate or, indeed, homophobia. Our saying, “We don’t think we should do this”, would give exactly the same feeling of empowerment across the country.

I am sorry, but the two things are not equivalent. It is not just a matter of speed—of taking a few months. These men have waited five decades. We should do them the honour of trying to get it right and get the biggest impact. People have campaigned, and not just for Alan Turing. We have pardoned him, but it is our job to make sure that all the other silent heroes who have suffered in the past are pardoned as well. I call on Conservative Members not to use some technical thing to oppose this or feel uncomfortable about supporting it. Abstaining will not do it; voting against it will not do it. We as a House need to send this through with a massive majority so that our voice cannot be ignored in any part of the world.

--- Later in debate ---

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

I commend the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (John Nicolson) on bringing forward this Bill. May I give particular praise to a number of speeches we have heard in the Chamber today? It is unfair to single people out, but I am going to, because I think there have been some brilliant speeches. I will highlight four: those of the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire himself, the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and my hon. Friends the Members for Milton Keynes South (Iain Stewart) and for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams). They all made fantastic contributions to the debate in their own different ways.

I will say at the start that, despite what I would say is my rather unfair reputation, I have no intention of taking the clock down to 2.30 pm today. I am as keen to hear from the Minister as everyone else. But it is important that those of us who do not particularly support the Bill have an opportunity to express why. We have heard today that everyone agrees and shares the same sentiment—I will make this clear right from the word go—of the principles involved here as far as I see them; if we are asking whether the fact that someone is gay should ever have been a crime in any shape or form, the answer is quite clearly no, of course not. Should we think any less of anyone who was ever convicted of any of these crimes? No, of course we should not. I hope and believe that everyone in this House can take that as read.

The issue is whether we get involved in having a widespread and blanket pardon for these particular offences. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) said of the approach taken by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), this is not quite as easy as it looks.

The hon. Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) has unfortunately just left the Chamber, but I want to put on the record my praise for her intervention. I thought in that brief intervention she made one of the most powerful contributions in this debate. She made two very good points that should weigh heavily on the House. Her first powerful point was about whether a gay person should ever have to come out. Of course they should not. People’s sexual orientation is absolutely irrelevant. The moment when this country gets to the stage when sexual orientation is an irrelevance cannot come soon enough in my opinion. Like the hon. Lady, I look forward to the day when no one ever has to come out as gay.

The hon. Lady’s second point, specifically in relation to the Bill, was very powerful and is something that the Government might wish to consider; I would not say that it has changed my mind about the Bill, but it has certainly weighed heavily with me. As she said, this Bill having its Second Reading, going into Committee, then coming back for Report and Third Reading would inevitably mean that these issues gain more scrutiny in the House than if an amendment were simply accepted in the House of Lords and came back to the Commons for a debate of an hour or two, maximum—perhaps not even that—and was in effect nodded through without any further scrutiny. There is some merit in that point. The Government might want to consider it. I had not given it much thought before, but I thought she made that point very well.

I must say that when I first heard about this Bill, my initial reaction was to think that it sounded as if it should be titled, “The Re-writing of History Bill”—a concept with which I am not generally comfortable. Plenty of ugly, evil and wrong things have happened in the past, but they are what they are. It is very easy for us in the House today to criticise people who were here in the past—I did it at the start of my speech when I said that these things should never have been a crime—but there will be things that we pass in this House with the best of intentions about which MPs will doubtless come along in 100 years’ time and say, “It is absolutely disgusting that they passed those laws and offences at that time, and they should have been ashamed of themselves for doing it”.

We should always be slightly wary of imposing our modern-day judgments on the past—it is easy to do, but not always fair to the people who made decisions on the basis of what they thought were in the best interests of the country at the time. We obviously think they were wrong, but they thought they were doing what was right at the time.

[Dr Philippa Whitford]

Does the hon. Gentleman not think that we should be a bit more concerned with people who are still alive and suffering, rather than our own vainglory in the future when we are dead?

[Philip Davies]

I was coming on to that point. The hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire made a fair point in that respect, but if the hon. Lady will forgive me, I shall come on to deal with her point in a few moments.

I was saying that we should be wary of getting into the habit—it seems that we are already in it—of always being anxious to apologise for things that other people have done in the past. Unlike my hon. Friend the Member for Selby and Ainsty, who is clearly a notable exception, we rarely apologise for the things that we have done. I suspect that the public are usually keener for us to apologise for the mistakes that we have made rather than taking the easy option of apologising for the mistakes that we think people made hundreds of years ago. Tony Blair is a prime example. He was very keen to apologise for slavery that somebody else had done hundreds of years previously, but he would not apologise for the mess he left in Iraq following the Iraq war. I suspect that most people would regard it as more worth while for him to apologise for the decisions that he took, rather than for the decisions that others took many years previously. I do not generally like that particular approach to politics, but I leave it there.

Although my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff North (Craig Williams) was slightly chastised for it, I think he was absolutely right to pull up our friends from the Scottish National party for coming here and chastising the Minister for introducing something late in the day, going very slowly and all the rest of it. The Bill applies only to England and Wales, and the Minister is going virtually all the way that the SNP would like him to go—not fully, I appreciate, but he is going an awful long way to meet their requests. It is slightly churlish of SNP Members not to have given the Minister more credit for that.

Moreover, the Scottish Administration have not introduced this law, even though they have had plenty of opportunity to do so. It would be interesting to carry out a freedom of information request to see how many letters the Scottish Government have received from SNP MPs about introducing this particular law in the Scottish Parliament. SNP Members should be wary of criticising this Government, who have clearly gone a lot further than the SNP Administration have in Scotland. A bit of humility on that particular point would not have gone amiss.

On the substance, I said that the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire made a good point—it was a rhetorical flourish, but still a good point—when he said that we should be more concerned about the living than the dead. There is something in that. The problem is that once we start going down this route, it becomes difficult to stop the juggernaut in its process. It can become difficult if people try to draw distinctions. For example, once we have pardoned Dr Alan Turing—I have not heard anyone say that that should not have happened—it becomes an intellectual nonsense to deprive other people of the same pardon who were convicted of exactly the same offences but did not have such an exciting life and achieve as much in their jobs as he did. Dr Alan Turing’s sexuality is irrelevant to his achievements. It should not have been because of his achievements that he was pardoned; he was pardoned for something which, as far as I can see, was irrelevant to them, and if he is pardoned for that, it becomes very difficult not to pardon other people.

I think the point that the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire was rightly making is that once the Government have accepted that people who are deceased should be pardoned, it then becomes very difficult intellectually to ask why the same should not apply to people who are still alive. That is a fair point, and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response to it.

Women and the Vote

Philippa Whitford Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage]

May I make a bit of progress? I really want to talk about the lasting change that starts with education. Girls are now outperforming boys at school and outnumbering boys at university. We really need to ensure that success in school translates into career success. To do that, we need to free women and girls from the pressure to conform to restricted choices in aspirations. There are no longer such things as boys’ jobs and girls’ jobs; there are just jobs. That is why the Government are working so hard to broaden girls’ career choices by encouraging more of them to consider careers in science, technology, engineering and maths. Those are the skills that our economy needs and those are the career choices that will narrow the gender pay gap, which, I am proud to say, is now narrower than it has ever been, and it is the Prime Minister’s ambition to eliminate it altogether within a generation.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

rose—

[Caroline Dinenage]

I will make a little bit more progress. We have published regulations that will increase transparency around the gender pay gap, and we expect employers to start publishing the required information from next April. We have been working closely with business on these regulations at every stage, and we will provide a package of support to help employers calculate, understand and address their gender pay gap areas.

It is also vital that we continue to gain positions of leadership and influence in business. I am delighted that Lord Davies’s target of 25% of women on the boards of FTSE 100 companies has been met and exceeded. Across the whole FTSE 350, the proportion of women is more than double what it was in 2011. Backed by the Government, this business-led approach is working. The work is not over. We need to promote the business-led 33% target for FTSE 350 boards. I am delighted that Sir Philip Hampton and Dame Helen Alexander will be bringing their wealth of business experience to a new review into the executive pipeline.

Many of the initiatives I have mentioned have been led by the Government Equalities Office. I am immensely proud to be a GEO Minister alongside my colleague the Secretary of State for Education, and to continue the work that has been done by making sure that in everything we do we make the UK a better place for women to live and work.

I am also proud of how the Government lead the way internationally on promoting women’s rights. I was honoured to lead the UK delegation to the convention on the status of women in New York earlier this year, which involved delegates from across the world. It was striking how many common issues were raised that affect women globally. Economic empowerment, the violence against women and girls mentioned by the hon. Member for Wirral South, and political representation are all issues for women across the world.

The progress we have made on these issues has not simply been given to us. It has been fought for every single step of the way and there is still such a long way to go to achieve the genuine equality we all want to see. The hon. Member for Wirral South spoke powerfully about the speech made by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips) earlier in the year. Two women a week still die at the hands of an ex-husband or partner, and although we have made so much progress in increasing the number of convictions and prosecutions for domestic violence, every single one of those women is a woman too many.

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Dinenage]

Yes, and we have already heard about the parity of voice that is so important in this and many other campaigns. We all have a role to play in inspiring the next generation of women to take these seats and we can do that only if we present a face of Parliament and of Government that women aspire to be part of.

[Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)]

We have referred to the number of women currently in Parliament, but there are still more men in Parliament than there have ever been women in Parliament. We need to point that out on the record. Many hon. Members know that I am a surgeon. I started training as a surgeon in 1982. In 1978, as a medical student, I was told that I could not be a surgeon because I was a woman. At an interview I was asked about monthly mood swings as a problem for a surgeon. I replied that I had worked for consultants with daily mood swings, and that monthly mood swings would be an improvement. Hopefully, we have come a long way, but there are still probably fewer women surgeons than women politicians, so we still have a long way to go.

[Caroline Dinenage]

We have all met men like that. The hon. Lady is right. We need to keep up the fight, we need to talk about the issues that matter to us, we need to encourage the women around us to get politically engaged, and above all we must encourage them to go out and vote. That is the right that those early suffragettes fought for and we must all use it. As the next big decision facing the UK is put to the vote shortly, I am sure hon. Members on the Opposition Benches share my desire to ensure that women are at the forefront of that, and that their votes count.

Question put and agreed to.