Human Rights in the UK

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Wednesday 13th February 2019 Westminster Hall

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am grateful that we have you in the Chair, Mr Gapes, and it is a pleasure to serve under you. I congratulate the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) on securing the debate. I certainly have concerns about the loss of the charter of fundamental rights of the European Union, including article 25, on the rights of older people. I have been campaigning for a commission for the rights of older people; they are very much voiceless in our institutions, and we need serious reparation.

Today, I will take a different perspective. People will be glad to know that I am going to talk not about Brexit but about my city of York, which became the UK’s first human rights city on 24 April 2017. Currently, there are 41 human rights cities across the world, including nine in Europe, which are networked together. That is something we are incredibly proud of, and it builds on a strong legacy. In setting out what a human rights city is, I hope hon. Members will be encouraged to take that message back to their own cities to develop a case like the one Swansea is currently developing.

York is a human rights city built on a legacy. We became a city of sanctuary in 2016. York Travellers Trust has done incredible work representing Travellers and Gypsies in our city. The York LGBT Forum has welcomed lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender asylum seekers and refugees, bringing them together in a safe space. The University of York has a global reputation, and its Centre for Applied Human Rights is famous for its protective fellowship scheme, which brings human rights defenders from across the world to the university not only to have some thinking space to make sure their human rights activity is sustainable globally, but to have some intellectual rigour in looking at best practice in terms of human rights defenders across the globe.

I ask the Minister to ensure that we do not face real challenges in getting visas for these individuals when they come to the UK, so that they can have that space. We are humbled to hear of the work they are doing, whether they are journalists, human rights defenders or people working in court systems. They come to the UK not only to have some respite, but to advance their human rights practice, yet visas are blocked time and again because these people do not have the resources, although they have people here who are willing to sponsor them. It seems a shame that doors are shut when we should be extolling the incredible work these people do.

As a human rights city, York has signed up to a charter to work on the domestic human rights agenda. I disagree with the hon. Member for Henley (John Howell) on the importance of these issues, because human rights must also apply at home in the UK. The five areas that York has chosen—they are not circumscribed—are equality and non-discrimination, education, decent standards of living, housing, and health and social care. In becoming a human rights city, York embraces a vision of a vibrant, diverse, fair and safe community built on the foundation of universal human rights. It is a vision that is shared by all citizens and institutions in our city, including the council, the police, the voluntary sector and the faith communities. It puts fundamental rights at the heart of policies that are passed by these authorities, and builds on hopes and dreams.

People who know the history of York will know that this follows a strong legacy. On housing, human rights is such an important issue to our city, where the Rowntree family built our country’s first garden village in New Earswick. That stimulated the Housing Act 1919, which was the foundation of social housing in our country, and the model was then taken forward into Tang Hall, further into the city.

As a city, we have had pioneering mental health services—first at Bootham Park Hospital, which was established in 1777. When a patient tragically died there, the Quaker movement said, “We can do better” and set up a retreat. To this day, there has been competition to advance the human rights of people with mental health challenges in our city.

We then had Seebohm Rowntree, and many people will know that he wrote three incredibly powerful reports on the issue of poverty—the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has followed that through until today. Even in the 1899 report “Poverty, A Study of Town Life”, the authors talked to over 46,500 residents of York to look at the serious poverty in our city. What an incredible study that was, taking the stories as well as the statistics to try to advance our city.

Then we had Joseph Rowntree himself—yes, he of chocolate fame—who outlined what good-practice work should look like in our city. He provided not only jobs with decent pay, but pensions, healthcare, education, housing, a park, theatres, access to the arts, a swimming pool and decent conditions. He and his family understood the real importance of that holistic agenda for advancing individual rights, and he sewed that legacy into our city. That is why we are proud to be the UK’s first human rights city.

However, we are on a journey, and it is fair to say that there is a lot that we need to achieve. As we map our way forward, we are looking at statistics and stories to tackle challenges where, quite frankly, our city needs to improve. Over the last year, we have seen wages fall in York by £65, causing greater economic inequality when we are already the most inequitable city outside London. By using the human rights framework to look at economic disadvantage, we will be advancing opportunities for people in our city. We have a gender pay gap of £117, which has to be addressed—it is above the national average. We have also looked at the issue of food bank use, which is up 25% in the last year—over 4,000 residents needed to use a food bank. How can that be ignored when we look at a human rights framework? These are fundamental issues facing our society today.

There is an eight-year gap in life expectancy in York. In the wards of Clifton, Westfield and Tang Hall, men die eight years earlier than their counterparts elsewhere—they are disadvantaged both economically and in terms of health.

On education, using the human rights framework we have established, we have already seen the number of NEETs—people who are not in education, employment or training—fall. That is a really positive outcome, which is due to our tracking through the causation and then introducing the restorative means to get more people into work. However, York has received the worst school funding in the country from the Government. In areas where we have the lowest attainment—we have the biggest attainment gap in the country—we are not building a legacy for the future. I urge the Government to look at the data and make the link between funding and attainment, which our human rights framework clearly does.

Cuts to social care have had a real impact. To go back to the fundamental rights I mentioned, we know that contact with social care services has fallen in our city. On the important issue of housing, although we are a low-wage economy, we have people with high skills and therefore under-employment. That makes it harder to access housing, because we have a very high cost of living. Purchasing a property in York requires 10 times the average annual income, and it is incredibly expensive to rent. We have poor access to housing, and greater inequality is therefore being created between the haves and have-nots in our city. We therefore use the human rights framework to advance opportunity and map a way forward for people in our city.

Since 2017, we have established a human rights and equalities board and developed community voices, ensuring that those who never engage in our democracy, and whose voices are silent, are at last being heard. We reach out particularly to the homeless, disabled people, women and young people. We also support others who hope to develop the framework to advance rights in their own city. York has been built on its history and social traditions, and we want its legacy to move forward. The Labour party in the city has a vision of building a fair city for the future and re-enacting and repeating the work that Seebohm Rowntree did.

[Several hon. Members rose—]