Breaking Down Barriers to Opportunity

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 8th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

I want to start by acknowledging the lifetime of service and commitment of Her late Majesty. I also acknowledge that, yesterday, we heard the first King’s Speech in more than 70 years. It was an historic day.

I am pleased to be speaking in this debate on such an important area—breaking down barriers, inspiring the next generation, and making our country fairer and more equal. That is why we are all here. It is certainly why I stood for election to this place back in April 2019. But, after the last 13 years, this Conservative Government have given up on governing. Rather than tearing down barriers to opportunity, they are putting them up—left, right and centre. They have left our country with stagnant growth, skyrocketing mortgages, crumbling schools and hospitals, a cost of living crisis, and the people of Newport West with very little faith in this UK Government.

The Leader of the Opposition, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), has set out clearly the five missions that drive us. Of the five, three are especially relevant to Newport West. We will take back our streets from gangs, drug dealers and fly-tippers, with stronger policing, guaranteed patrols in town centres and more criminals put behind bars. We will break down barriers to opportunity so that every young person is ready for work and ready for life. We will switch on Great British Energy, a new British company giving us cheaper bills, new highly paid jobs and security from tyrants such as Putin. That is a plan to get our country on track, move us on and forward, and bring our country together.

When I spoke in the debate at the start of the last Session, I shared an email that I received from a resident of Newport West, and I want to mention part of it again. She said:

“We are in a position right now where we’re not coping. Our energy bills have risen by 54% and I am afraid that myself and many others will not be able to provide for our families.”

Nothing has changed since my constituent wrote to me, and nothing the Government have said this week will address those concerns or deliver the change that all my constituents need.

I heard from a carer in Newport West who earns just over the universal credit threshold. She said:

“I literally can’t afford to be sick. Statutory sick pay doesn’t cover my wages.”

In other words, in 2023, British workers have to make a choice: do they do the unthinkable and go to work while sick, or stay home and go hungry? The cause of their fear and concern, and the uncertainty facing so many people in Newport West and across the country, sit firmly at the door of this Prime Minister and his tired Conservative Government.

Thanks to the Tories, we find ourselves in a desperate situation, not just in all parts of the United Kingdom but here in this House too. The Tories closed up shop and sent us home early on nearly half of all sitting days in the last Session. I was elected to deliver, to get things done and to make life better for the people who sent me here, and I should be allowed to do that, but this Conservative Government are stopping us all from doing that. They are a zombie Government, paralysing Parliament, with Ministers unable to fill parliamentary time with substantive legislation to tackle the problems the country faces because, after 13 years in office, they have already failed.

The Prime Minister promised to halve inflation, yet our country is set to have the highest inflation of any G7 country this year. We see food prices soaring and petrol prices are once again on the rise. Inflation is set to be higher at the end of this year than forecast when the Prime Minister took office last year. Meanwhile, Labour analysis has found that mortgage holders are hundreds of pounds a month worse off compared with last year. The Tory mortgage bombshell is alive and well and causing misery to thousands of people across the UK.

The Prime Minister promised to grow the economy, yet the UK’s growth is set to be almost non-existent this year—the second lowest in the G7 and three times lower than the advanced economy average. The tax burden is at a record high, on the watch of every Tory MP sitting here in this House—or not, given the empty Government Benches. The next time they send us home early, let us remember that they are making the choice to avoid their responsibility to the people who elected us to this House.

The Prime Minister and his friends have let down the people of Newport West, of Wales and of our United Kingdom. The only way—the best way—to change course, to deliver for our people and to move forward is with a Labour Government, and the sooner the better.