Palestine Action: Proscription and Protests

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 8th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis]

First, the Home Secretary is meeting our Five Eyes allies who are here for the five-country ministerial. That is incredibly important work in securing our alliances with our United States, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand allies. These are important partnerships that this Government value and that this Home Secretary is investing in on almost her first full day in office.

On the other points the hon. Lady seeks to raise, she has an absolute right, as everybody does, to protest in a lawful way. There is nothing that this Government have done to prevent her or anybody else from doing that. What this Government have done is ensure that we are best placed to protect the public. I am sorry that she does not agree with that—that is her absolute right—but I maintain that support for freedom of speech is a cornerstone of our democracy, and this Government will always enable people to have their say.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Ind)]

I absolutely condemn any action or violence taken against the public or, indeed, the police. However, I wrote to the former Home Secretary twice on this matter, because many legislators here have yet to see evidence that satisfies us about the proportionality of the proscription of Palestine Action and how the Government balance that with the public’s right to protest and freedom of speech. Could I encourage the Minister to review this law, not least because it has an impact contrary to what the Government want, in that the more arrests there are, the more it draws attention to Palestine Action?

[Dan Jarvis]

I entirely understand why the hon. Lady may wish to raise concerns in the way she has. She made an important point about evidence, and I give her an assurance that we have put into the public domain all the evidence we have been able to. I hope she will understand that there are strict limitations on some things we are able to say for a variety of reasons, not least that there are ongoing police investigations and ongoing criminal proceedings. That limits the ability of Ministers to talk about this issue, but within those constraints we have tried to be as clear as we possibly can about the reasons for this decision. On a number of occasions, the previous Home Secretary and I have laid out the reasons why we took this decision.

Borders and Asylum

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 1st September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

I welcome the campaigning the hon. Lady has done to support students in Gaza, because the situation we are seeing there is horrendous. The Foreign Secretary will shortly make a statement about the truly abominable situation in Gaza, as well as the work we are doing to get out students who have fully funded places in the UK and provide them with support.

On the hon. Lady’s question, I would say that the criminal smuggling gangs use the potential to work in the UK as a pull factor—as part of their advertising—which is a point the French Government have raised many times. The challenge with the scenario she sets out is that it would make it even easier for the criminal gangs to use that factor as part of their advertising to try to persuade people to part with their money and make an incredibly dangerous journey across the channel.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Ind)]

The stigmatising and dehumanising of asylum seekers has stirred up race hate in our communities, thankfully by only a small number, and I have been really disturbed to see that racism perpetrated on the streets of York. However, I am even more disturbed to hear that there are planned assaults on asylum hotels across the country, not least in York, where we have children and families staying. What policing operations will be in place to protect those children and families from this hate and ensure their safety over the coming weeks?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is right to point out the dangers of divisive, dehumanising language towards other human beings and to point to our shared humanity. We can have disagreements with people; we can have different views about the way in which systems should work and rules should be enforced and we can recognise that there will be people who have to be returned because they have no right to be in the UK. However, we can also avoid the kind of demonising language that ends up escalating tensions or promoting hatred and violence—something that we in this country should never do.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Member is right to highlight the appalling increase in antisemitism, antisemitic hate crime and assaults that took place after the events in the middle east. She will know that, in order to tackle antisemitism, we and the police work very closely with the Community Security Trust and we are introducing new measures to deal with intimidating protests outside synagogues.

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

3. What recent discussions she has had with Cabinet colleagues on the potential merits of integrating community policing and neighbourhood health teams.

[The Minister for Policing and Crime Prevention (Dame Diana Johnson)]

My hon. Friend speaks with a great deal of experience in health matters. There are regular discussions between ministerial colleagues about how we can best join up public services. We know that joined-up working results in better outcomes at a local level. Collaboration and engagement between neighbourhood policing and neighbourhood health teams already exists to tackle mental health issues, and drug and alcohol addiction. I hope that this Government’s investment in neighbourhood policing will enable more of that work to continue.

[Rachael Maskell]

Evidence shows that integrating policing and health is vital in delivering better outcomes in areas like mental health, substance misuse and youth violence—areas that we need to address in my city of York. With both police and health realigning into neighbourhood teams, will the Home Secretary ensure that there is reach across the services, with a named lead police officer, to develop prevention and early intervention strategies, diverting those at risk through harm reduction approaches, including treatment and support?

[Dame Diana Johnson]

With the recently launched 10-year health plan, we are moving away from those siloed services towards a more joined-up approach, including the preventive model of care. That aligns very much with policing and keeping people safe, and supporting wellbeing. I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the national neighbourhood health implementation programme and to ensure that policing is part of the conversation from the outset. By working more closely with health and care partners, we can reduce inappropriate demand on policing. Officers should not be left to pick up the pieces when other support services are better placed to help. This is about getting it right—and getting that tailored support—first time.

Crime and Policing Bill

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 18th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Taylor]

My hon. Friend’s words have convinced me and hon. Members across the House about her new clause.

The Met police recently responded to a freedom of information request about tool theft, which revealed that nine in 10 tool thefts in the last five years in London went unsolved, which shows the scale of the problem and the importance of supporting new clause 130 today.

I would like quickly to draw attention to some other amendments. New clauses 87 and 88, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove, would hold water company executives to account properly for the first time, and that would mark a huge step forward in tackling the sewage crisis we face in this country. Those individuals should be held liable for their carelessness and fixation with raising bills, while running companies into the ground and ruining our rivers. I wish I had more time to outline my reasons for supporting the clauses, but I refer the House to my many prior contributions on the subject.

New clause 44, tabled by the hon. Member for Bolton North East (Kirith Entwistle), would mark a step forward in providing support to victims of honour-based violence and murder.

New clause 122, tabled by the hon. Member for North Warwickshire and Bedworth (Rachel Taylor), would strengthen the law on hate crimes directed at disabled, LGBT+ people, and rightly seeks to protect people who are victims of hate crime because of their association with individuals in those groups, and I wholeheartedly support it.

In contract, new clause 7, tabled by the official Opposition, would weaken hate crime legislation in this country, and I fear it is motivated by a complete lack of respect for the decades of progress we have made in recognising the types of discrimination faced by people the length and breadth of this country. For this Bill to push us forward, and not drag us backwards, that new clause must be rejected.

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

I refer to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, as a proud member of the trade union movement.

No one should go to work with the uncertainty each day that their safety might be put at risk. We as a Government clearly support that for emergency workers, and of course we are legislating for retail workers too. New clause 48, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Anneliese Midgley), addresses delivery workers, and today I stand to speak for my new clause 11, which would do the same for transport workers.

Every day, transport workers face verbal abuse, sexual harassment or physical assault, whether on bus, tram or ferry. Transport workers, alongside their trade union, the RMT, are calling for new measures to protect them at work: first, the introduction of a specific offence of assaulting or abusing a transport worker; and secondly, an extension in the maximum sentence, from six to 12 months—not least if sentences are now to be served in the community.

[Monica Harding (Esher and Walton) (LD)]

I had meant to speak to my amendment 120 today, but that intention was superseded by the Government’s movement on this, which I really welcome. It will close a loophole so that it will now be an offence to abuse an emergency worker on the grounds of race, religion or sexual orientation in somebody’s private dwelling. I congratulate the Government on that.

[Rachael Maskell]

I welcome the hon. Member’s intervention. This just goes to show the extent to which our public servants put themselves in harm’s way, often running towards danger on our behalf. When people are serving us—our constituents—day in, day out, they deserve the protections that we are aiming to introduce in this legislation.

Let us look at the scale of the abuse our transport workers are facing. Transport for London says that 10% of workers are physically assaulted, with 90% verbally abused and 60% experiencing violence at work, and that is just in the last 18 months. In fact, 10,493 TfL workers had incidents of violence or aggression perpetrated against them. More widely, the British Transport Police highlighted in 2024 that 7,027 offences were committed, and just in the last year there were 7,405 crimes, with 3,650 violent crimes. And there has been a 47% increase since 2021.

Out transport workers will not be safe unless more measures are included in this legislation. We are also hearing from other groups of workers, so we need to look holistically at the threats they are facing and how we can put those protections in place to ensure that specific measures are available to help keep them safe. That would also be better for the public.

We should also look at the work the RMT has done. It has surveyed its women workers, and 40% of transport workers who are women have been sexually harassed in the last year, and that, too, is on the rise. Two thirds of RMT members have experienced abuse, violence or antisocial behaviour, but 40% have not reported it as they are not confident that they will get the recourse they need. This is having an impact on their health and wellbeing. The level of post-traumatic stress disorder experienced by transport workers is double that of the general population. That is why they are calling for legal protection for all public transport workers—because of the scale and the prevalence. Moving forward with this will also deter perpetrators and support workers. It will improve action and response times and the support that is available.

We in this House need only think back to the covid pandemic. Belly Mujinga was spat at while working at Victoria station and, sadly, lost her life. She was there serving faithfully as a sales clerk during that period. Her union, the Transport Salaried Staffs Association, has said:

“While we remember Belly today, our union continues to fight for safe and healthy workplaces for all of our members.”

That is why I am here today: to fight for them alongside the trade unions, the British Transport Police, the rail industry bodies, the Rail Delivery Group, Network Rail and all of the transport unions—standing together, saying they need more measures to keep workers safe on our transport systems.

We often hear about other safety risks that transport workers place themselves in, but today it is about their own personal safety, and I am sure this House will hear it. So I am asking for clear support for new clause 11, but of course I am willing to meet the Minister to discuss how we can advance the cause of transport workers and hope that, if we cannot make these amendments today, we will be able to do so in the other place.

[Nick Timothy (West Suffolk) (Con)]

Before I turn to my new clause, I welcome in particular new clause 7, on non-crime hate incidents, and new clause 150, proposed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Holden), which would ban sexual relationships between first cousins.

This Bill presents an opportunity for the Government to support my new clause 108 to protect freedom of expression. That is urgently needed, because existing legislation has been manipulated to create a blasphemy law for the protection of Islam from criticism and protest. As I said in my speech last week, I am not a Muslim, and I reject any attempt to tell me that I cannot say what I think about any religion. No ideas or beliefs should be above criticism or scrutiny.

Crime and Policing Bill

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 17th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

I rise to speak in support of new clause 106, which stands in my name, but first I will speak briefly to new clause 1, which we have been discussing so far. The hon. Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi) spoke about some pretty harrowing cases, and said how the first lady was utterly traumatised by having had her abortion at home, which she received via telemedicine. My new clause seeks to make women safer by ensuring that they are seen and given the opportunity for proper medical consultation before they get to the stage where they are given inappropriate medication because of a misunderstanding, and then end up traumatised, delivering a relatively mature foetus unexpectedly at home.

The hon. Lady did not say during her speech whether she believes that a baby should be terminated right up to term, but I want to put on the record that I do not. I work as an NHS consultant paediatrician, and I have cared for and personally held babies in my hands from 21 weeks and six days’ gestation right through to term. I am very aware that babies from, say, 30 weeks upwards have a more than 98% chance of survival, so although I am supportive of women’s right to choose early in pregnancy, I am not supportive of similar rights in relation to healthy babies right up to term.

Until the pandemic, women had to attend abortion clinics, where they would see a professional and talk through their desire for an abortion and the reasons for it. At the clinic, it would be checked that the woman was pregnant and how far pregnant she was. The hon. Lady raised cases of women who believed they were so far pregnant, but who turned out to be much further pregnant, which are well known; sometimes it goes the other way. One of the key reasons for this confusion is that women often bleed in early pregnancy, and they may believe that those bleeding episodes represent a period; when a woman thinks that she is 10 weeks pregnant, therefore, she may actually be 14 weeks pregnant.

That consideration is important in the context of accessing an abortion because at-home abortions via telemedicine are allowed only up until 10 weeks. The reason for that is not to be difficult or awkward, or to make it more difficult for women to access abortions; instead, it is a safety issue, because we know that complications are greater later in pregnancy. What happens in the early stages is that the procedure essentially causes the foetus to be born. If that happens to a baby much later in pregnancy, the procedure will cause it to be born when it has a chance of survival, which can lead to a traumatic experience for the mother as they deliver a much larger foetus than expected. It can lead to bleeding and, in one case I am aware of, has led to the death of a mother who was given pills to take at home when she was much further along in her pregnant than she had expected.

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

If this is about safety, then we also have to think about the safety of the baby. In my constituency, a baby had a live birth at 30 weeks’ gestation. Tragically, that baby went on to live for just four days, struggling over that period, and then died. Must we not consider the baby’s safety as much as the woman’s safety?

[Dr Caroline Johnson]

I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. I think we need to consider both.

I remember a case involving a lady, Carla Foster, in June 2023. From my reading of the case, she admitted to lying about where she was in her gestation, saying that she was further back in pregnancy, at seven weeks, when she was actually much further along; she turned out to be around 33 weeks pregnant when her baby—her little girl, whom she called Lily—was born. In the papers I have read about the case, she described being traumatised by the face of that baby, which could have been prevented if she had been to a proper clinic and seen a health professional, as that health professional would have clearly seen that she was not seven weeks pregnant, and that taking abortion pills intended for early pregnancy was not a suitable or safe medical intervention.

If one has a termination later in pregnancy, it is done by foeticide. Essentially, an injection of potassium chloride is administered to kill the baby, and then the baby is born in the usual way, but deceased. That is why it is important to know what the gestation is—because the termination offered under the law is done by a different route, to make sure that it is done safely. We know that the later in pregnancy a termination happens, the more a woman is at risk of medical complications.

Child Sexual Exploitation: Casey Report

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

Ten days ago, and this is Baroness Casey’s independent report. Anybody who suggests that she would change her views and reports for anyone has not met her.

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

I welcome the pace and focus that the Home Secretary has brought to Baroness Casey’s report. She is right to highlight the risk of the online space and the rapidity with which it has become a focus. Can she give assurances that protocols will change accordingly, so that we look for the information that we do not know about, and that the cases of survivors and victims who have been criminalised will be quashed, so that those people do not carry convictions for the exploitation that they experienced?

[Yvette Cooper]

I welcome my hon. Friend’s point about the need to ensure that victims are not criminalised for the coercion and crimes committed against them. That failure—the tendency to blame victims for the appalling crimes committed against them—has been a pervasive problem through the years. We are looking further at the issues of online grooming and exploitation, which are escalating. In a complication, more teenagers themselves are involved in that exploitation. It is more complicated to identify where people are being coerced and where they are actually criminals committing these crimes.

Immigration System

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 12th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

Even I could not draw up a White Paper in the space of two weeks. This White Paper was announced by the Prime Minister before Christmas when we saw the scale of the huge increase in net migration that the hon. Gentleman’s party had presided over. It is implementing the policies that we set out in our manifesto to properly link the immigration system with training and skills in the UK.

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

I am proud to represent this country’s only human rights city, where everybody is welcome and every life is of equal worth. Our economy depends very much on our universities, and our universities depend on international students—in fact, employers come to our country because of the diversity of our students. Will the Home Secretary properly consult the higher education sector—the second biggest export from my constituency is higher education—to ensure that we do not harm our local economy and the opportunities for both international and home students?

[Yvette Cooper]

I strongly value international students’ contribution to our economy. My hon. Friend is completely right to say how important international students are, but we also need to make sure that universities uphold standards by ensuring that systems are not misused, so that we can continue to support international students. It will benefit our economy if students who stay on afterwards are also doing graduate jobs.

Asylum Hotels and Illegal Channel Crossings

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Tuesday 25th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dame Angela Eagle]

I will write to the hon. Gentleman.

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

I can assure asylum seekers that they will be treated with kindness and compassion in my human rights city of York. However, tragically, a mother at full term lost her baby at a hotel. Will the Minister give a guarantee that pregnant women will not be moved from hotel to hotel, so that they can have continuity of services and a safe pregnancy?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

That certainly should not be happening. If my hon. Friend wants to talk to me about it, I will try to see what happened in that instance.

Church of England: Safeguarding

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 3rd March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Luke Myer]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend the Member for East Thanet (Ms Billington), who has had a long career holding powerful people to account in many different ways. As she outlined, this is a case of an institution for which it is difficult to get accountability and transparency. I am glad that we have this forum to discuss these issues, but Parliament itself is quite limited in how it can hold the Church to account.

I sit on the Ecclesiastical Committee, which has to wait for Measures to come forward from the Synod to be approved. There is some discussion as to whether that Committee ought to have greater powers to hold the Church to account, but the broader point is the same as the one I made earlier, which is that the Church falls below the standards required of other organisations.

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

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing forward this debate and for the way in which he is doing so. Does he agree that the technical nuances that caused the Church of England to go for option 3 rather than option 4 could be overcome by formulating a process of accountability around the safeguarding structures within the Church of England, to ensure that any provider of such services had a strong line of communication in order to hear what is needed in places such as York, where we have a cathedral, which I understand is where some of the challenges are coming from?

[Luke Myer]

I agree with my hon. Friend. Various issues were raised at Synod, and one of them was around the Charity Commission. I have discussed this precise issue with Professor Jay, and it is her view that there is nothing in this that cannot be resolved. I understand that the Charity Commission is taking a direct interest in safeguarding at the moment, and I hope that an arrangement can be made on that, but the point that my hon. Friend makes is right. There are too many blockers, culturally and in terms of technical details, but what the Church needs to do is move forward with pace and make sure that victims and survivors see justice.

It is our responsibility in this House to do all we can to urge the Church to act so that these failures are addressed, survivors’ voices are heard and meaningful, sensible and effective reforms are implemented. We touched on one of the main reforms earlier, and I will come to that in a moment, but before I do, let me be clear that I have the utmost respect for local clergy up and down the country who are doing so much work within our communities. I also respect the laity and all the volunteers who are doing good work to keep people safe, including the church wardens and the local parish safeguarding officers. They too are let down by systemic failure and many of them are crying out for change. In fact, it is my understanding that the sample carried out by the Church’s response group to the Jay report finds that not only survivors, but the majority of local clergy support the recommendations.

I also wish to recognise the work of many members of the General Synod, and in particular Clive Billenness, a lay member of the Synod who represented the Diocese in Europe and was a powerful ally of victims and survivors. He sadly passed away just last month, and I know that survivors truly valued his efforts and contribution to their cause. I also recognise the work of my own constituent, Father Adam Gaunt of Loftus, who has helped me to understand the structures of Synod and is working on the abuse redress scheme as well.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jess Phillips]

Absolutely. I will go on to talk about mandatory reporting, but the fundamental point is that, big or small, rich or poor, organisations that are in a position of power and responsibility and are working with children or vulnerable adults have a safeguarding responsibility. I would hope that bigger institutions, whether they are Governments or the larger religious institutions, want always to lead by example in this regard.

As has been mentioned, the Government have made a commitment to introduce a mandatory duty for those working with children to report sexual abuse and exploitation, making it a clear legal requirement for anyone in regulated activity—which will include the Church—relating to children in England to report to the police or the local authority if they are made aware that a child is being sexually abused. We are pleased that that commitment was introduced last week in the Crime and Policing Bill. We are also committed to making grooming an aggravating factor, toughening up sentencing and setting up a new victims and survivors panel, and we will set out a clear timeline for taking forward the 20 recommendations of the final IICSA report on child sexual abuse. As a nation, we also received recommendations from Professor Alexis Jay.

We like to conduct reviews. Institutions and Governments like to conduct reviews. We will not always agree with every recommendation, or even be able to implement every recommendation, but what is the point of constantly conducting reviews and just saying, “Lessons will be learned”? Lessons must actually be learned, and that must be followed by actions. It would seem from the litany of reviews detailed by my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland that a great many actions could be being undertaken currently.

The Government are committed to safeguarding children and protecting them from harm in all settings. There are already many legal powers in place to protect them, and local authorities have a legal duty to investigate when they believe that a child is suffering or is likely to suffer significant harm. Keeping children safe in all settings is our priority, and we are driving forward important work including updating guidance for staff and parents regarding out-of-school settings and strengthening guidance for local authorities on their legal powers to intervene, and the upcoming call for evidence will inform long-term proposals for safeguarding reform.

The Government have introduced the landmark Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, which puts protecting children at its heart, in addition to other measures such as the 2023 update of the Government’s “Working together to safeguard children” statutory guidance. The Bill will improve information sharing across and within agencies, strengthening the role of education in multi-agency safeguarding arrangements, and will require the implementation of multi-agency child protection teams so that children are better protected in both school and out-of-school settings.

We will not let up in our efforts to safeguard and protect children and adults. It is crucial that we continue to step up prevention efforts, drive up reporting, bring more offenders to justice, and ensure that victims and survivors receive better care and support.

[Rachael Maskell]

I am grateful to the Minister for what she is saying. Given that it has been cited that there could be a technical reason with the Charity Commission as to the roles of trustees within the structures of cathedrals, will she meet representatives of the Charity Commission to ensure that any impediment is worked through and that, if necessary, this place legislates to remove that impediment?

[Jess Phillips]

I thought my hon. Friend was going to ask me a very technical question about the trustees of cathedrals; characteristically, I would have stood up and said I do not know the answer. I can absolutely commit to meeting representatives of the Charity Commission to talk to them about what the impediment in this instance appears to be, because it almost certainly has read across for safeguarding in other institutions. If there is in fact an impediment, as the Minister for Safeguarding, I would be keen to find out what the impediment is.

There should be no status that is protected from scrutiny, and the culture of silence—through wilful ignorance or, worse, malign intent—to safeguard reputations above children must end wherever we see it. Lamenting and repenting is all well and good, but what my mom used to say to me is, “Sorry is just a word you say. Changing your behaviour proves to me that you are sorry.” We owe a debt to the victims who come forward about any institutional abuse. We owe them more than lamenting and repenting. We owe them change.

Question put and agreed to.

Border Security and Asylum

Rachael Maskell Excerpts

Monday 22nd July 2024 Commons Chamber

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

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the forensic work she has been doing in her Department. What considerations has she given to humanitarian visas for people in Gaza to be reunited with their family, if they are studying in the UK or working in our NHS? My constituent has a wife and two little children in Gaza at the moment; he cannot return home, yet the last Government refused to make provision for them to come and be reunited with him in the UK.

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend will know that there are long-standing arrangements for family reunion and for refugees. There are also different concerns that have been raised around Gaza, because there is a real importance to people’s being able to return to their homes in the middle east too. If she has an individual case that she would like to raise with my hon. Friend the Immigration Minister, she is very welcome to do so.