Draft Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2017 General Committees

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

It is indeed a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. I think that this is the first time I have done so. This is a historic day. The Minister talked about taking bold steps. I agree, and am delighted that she has taken bold steps down a path that Labour laid before her.

It has been almost 50 years since the women sewing machinists at Ford’s Dagenham plant downed tools and demanded what was rightfully theirs: equal pay for a hard day’s work, equivalent to that of their male colleagues. It was a demand that their work be considered of equal value—in fact, that they be considered of equal value. Successive Parliaments have failed to deliver on that demand. As the Minister said, pay inequality—a woman being paid less for doing work that is of equal value and demands equal, or even higher, skills—is still a factor for women across the UK despite being illegal. Recent cases taken against Birmingham City Council, for example, and the ongoing case against Asda, demonstrate that clearly.

We know that the situation is more complicated, and even harder to tackle, than companies acting in breach of the Equal Pay Act 1970. Average pay for men remains greater than that for women. As the Minister said, the gender pay gap persists at 18.1%, and that simply is not good enough. That disparity is not due in the main to explicit gender discrimination by employers choosing actively to pay women less for the same work. Rather, it is far more ingrained. It is about the undervaluing of roles done by women, the dominance of men in the best-paid positions, unequal caring responsibilities and occupational segregation, for example. Those issues collide and compound to create the perfect storm. It is only through direct action that we have any hope of tackling the underlying causes of the gender pay gap and living up to Barbara Castle’s promise to the Dagenham machinists. That is why the last Labour Government included practical measures to tackle the gender pay gap in the groundbreaking Equality Act 2010, brought to reality by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman). We all owe her a great debt of thanks.

Section 78 of the 2010 Act introduced mandatory pay audits, under which companies employing more than 250 people will have to publish details of the pay of their male and female staff. Labour knew then, as we know now, that transparency will push companies to focus on the reasons why the pay gap still exists and highlight to the Government where changes are needed. It will highlight where women are being paid less than men despite doing work of equivalent skill and responsibility, where men are getting higher bonuses and where all the highest-paid roles in a company are held by men.

All of those things require changes, to allow equality in the workplace. That is why Labour continued to press the coalition Government to implement section 78 of the 2010 Act despite almost five years of refusals. It is why, in December 2014, as a Back Bencher, I presented a ten-minute rule Bill asking the Government to implement mandatory pay transparency, and it is why—under the stellar leadership of my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero), the then shadow Minister for Women and Equalities—Labour was able to pass the amendment to the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill in March 2015 that ensured the Government could no longer wriggle out of their duty to tackle the gender pay gap.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. We all recognise that, now that there is cross-party consensus on this issue, it is excellent that we have reached this point today, although obviously it is still sad that it has come seven years from when the Equality Act was passed.

My hon. Friend may be coming to this, but does she agree that it is one thing to introduce these regulations, but another to make sure that there are consequences for non-compliance so that we get the outcome we want, which is equal pay for men and women?

[Sarah Champion]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is not about the regulations, which are sound. It is about how we implement, monitor and evaluate them and what we ultimately do when we see the disparities. She is right that I will come on to that.

We must congratulate the Government for bringing the regulations forward. I am grateful to them for doing so. I know that the Minister cares passionately about the issue and that, wherever blatant gender disparities exist, she will be there tackling them.

It is important, and to be welcomed, that the reports that will be produced will go into pay bands. That will help to demonstrate how the pay gap differs across an organisation and across levels of seniority. It is also really good news that the data will incorporate bonuses—both their amount and the proportion of men and women employees who receive them.

However, the regulations are bereft of some basic powers that would assure a benefit for women, so excuse me, Sir David, if I do not wholeheartedly celebrate them today. The Government have chosen to omit any enforcement provisions or sanctions for non-compliance, or for publishing inaccurate or misleading reports. This is especially disappointing as, in the “Closing the Gender Pay Gap” consultation paper, the Government correctly sought sectors’ views on whether a civil enforcement system would help ensure compliance with the regulations. The majority of responses—two thirds, in fact—agreed that such a system would help compliance.

Does the Minister actually believe that the regulations will be effective in getting data from employers without an enforcement regime or being backed up with civil sanctions? I take a guess that she will claim that the Equality and Human Rights Commission—another Labour creation—will be able to use its existing powers of enforcement in section 20 of the Equality Act 2006, as outlined in the explanatory memorandum. But of course, section 20 does not confer suitable powers on the EHRC to fulfil that enforcement duty. In its response to the “Closing the Gender Pay Gap” consultation, the Equality and Human Rights Commission said it would

“require additional powers, and resources, to enable it to enforce compliance with the regulations, because its current powers are not suitable for enforcing, in a proportionate manner, a failure to publish.”

[Sarah Champion]

Again, my hon. Friend hits on the nub of the problem. Unless we can first reliably gather the data and then have some form of enforcement, all we will have is statistics on a piece of paper.

[Seema Malhotra]

My hon. Friend is being generous in giving way. Does she agree that one reason why enforcement is so important, and why we have strong ongoing Government backing for this change, is the reality of good intentions not materialising into outcomes? Of the 300 organisations that signed up to the “Think, Act, Report” voluntary initiative introduced in 2011, only 11 voluntarily published gender pay information. We cannot rely on good intentions; it has to be backed up in law.

[Sarah Champion]

I thank both my hon. Friends for their interventions. That is the problem—even if section 20 of the 2006 Act could be interpreted as extending to a breach of the regulations, it appears that the EHRC does not believe it can enforce that.

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[Seema Malhotra]

It is a pleasure, Sir David, to participate today and to serve under your chairmanship.

I will say a few words following the excellent speech that my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling has just made. If he was looking for a part-time advisory role to the President of the United States of America, I would certainly be willing to support him in that endeavour.

First, I thank the Government again for introducing the regulations. However, building on the points that have already been made, I encourage the Government and the Minister, who laid out her case for the need for the regulations powerfully, to think about the wider issue of economic equality for women, particularly in the run-up to the March spring-statement-stroke-Budget. Keeping the issue going and mainstreaming its implications is an important part of how we can move forward in achieving equality for women across all areas of the economy, which is essentially the backdrop to this debate.

I was struck by some of the analysis of the gender pay gap, and I want to put a couple of suggestions to the Minister. My concerns are around the implementation of the regulations. On one level—the transactional level—that is about how they are implemented within a corporation and how the data are collected and reported on. That can stay within a very small sphere of people: maybe the head of human resources and the chief executive officer. Culture change and the players involved in it are an important part of what a company or organisation owns at the highest level.

I know from my past work on equality in companies, on public boards and in politics and public life that it is important to have wider stakeholder engagement to ensure that people understand the responsibility we can all have in making a shift. That helps to create a context and environment within which there can be actors who will act on the messages that come out from the reports and from transparency more widely. They will have a sense of their own responsibility in making that shift.

I am keen to understand how the regulations will be implemented and whether messages and communications will go to chairmen and women on boards, heads of HR, management networks or other networks. We must look at how to mainstream thinking about jobs and pay much more widely, so that we can pre-empt and reduce the problem and see the results coming through.

[Melanie Onn]

On implementation, I am interested to see that in the devolved Administrations in Wales and Scotland, the measures will be implemented under the regulations. I wonder how the Government will monitor that implementation at devolved level, to ensure that these measures are being implemented fairly across the whole United Kingdom.

[Seema Malhotra]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. The public expectation will be that the regulations go beyond administrative boundaries and that the Government take a lead to ensure that they are effectively implemented. It would be helpful if the Minister responded to that point.

It might seem like it is just a small Committee putting the regulations forward today, but I worked in the Government Equalities Office on a different project at the time when the Equality Bill was going through Parliament, and I pay tribute to the civil servants for their work and engagement and to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham for leading that work. It was near the close of the Labour Government’s time in office—it was pretty much the last Act that went through Parliament.

To return to the point about the meaning of these measures and those for whom they could make a difference, I was struck by the analysis of the gender pay gap by age published by the House of Commons Library. The gap is much greater for older women, who are hit in other ways as well. They might lose their job and find it harder to get another. We know that they are often the poorest pensioners and the least likely to have pensions in their own right to sustain them in older life. That compounds the problem of the economic wellbeing of older women and poverty that can become entrenched. Awareness of that within organisations would be an important part of tackling economic inequality for older women, particularly when we look at differences by decade of birth.

There is another important issue, which is the relationship, or otherwise, between educational attainment and the pay gap. When we look at the analysis, it is striking that although there is sometimes a link between a better-educated workforce and a reduced pay gap, that is not always the case. There is still a strong gender dimension. We can try to distil the pay gap down to contributing factors such as people leaving school earlier or not having certain educational qualifications, but the data do not suggest that those are the key issues. Rather, the gender dimension remains the key point. That suggests there is a wider cultural inequality issue, which it is important to address. Whether women have GCSEs, A-levels or degree-level education, the analysis shows there is still a gender pay gap for them.

That leads me to my final point, about how we can work much earlier in schools to create role models and a sense of confidence and aspiration. The Fabian Women’s Network, of which I am the founder and president, undertakes deep thinking about that issue. We need to ask what tone we are setting as a nation for the girls, and we need to give them confidence that any future they may want is a future they should be able to achieve; that any profession they want to be in has a door open to them; and that any sky they want to reach is available to them.

The regulations are vital for women who are currently in the workplace, and they can also help us achieve a culture change if we implement them effectively, think about the factors that will support better understanding of the pay gap in organisations and make sure that the issue is cascaded down through management levels in organisations.

I hope the Government will not just encourage organisations to keep data at senior management level but encourage directorates or departments to understand what the gap is in their own departments. That will help to create wider appreciation of these issues lower down the management chain. As those managers then become the senior leaders of tomorrow, they will have begun to appreciate and been engaged with these issues as they become embedded within management life.

I hope that as the regulations are implemented, we will look at the immediate implications and at how we can shift our culture through the opportunity that the regulations will enable. Achieving that shift now will not just help the generations of women in the workforce today but set a completely different tone for our country and benefit the young women coming forward through the schools and in the workplace of tomorrow.

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[Caroline Dinenage]

Yes, it is exactly the same.

The female employment rate is currently the joint highest on record, at 69.8%. The female participation rate has increased by more since 2010 than during the three previous Parliaments combined. We agree, of course, that there is a wider gap for older women, as the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston described. That can be explained in part by age, but not completely. That is why we have introduced measures such as extended flexible working, shared parental leave and increased hours of paid-for childcare—working couples can expect 30 hours from September.

We are not requiring gender pay gap reporting by age, as workforce demographics vary significantly. Such reporting could also raise confidentiality issues, if a company had only a small number of employees in one age bracket. That was raised with us as a concern, and we do not want to betray anybody’s confidence. We agree that the data need to be owned across organisations, which is why we will require a senior director to sign off the data. We will closely monitor compliance on that.

I was asked about devolved approaches. Section 78 regulations cover England, Scotland and Wales. Scottish and Welsh public bodies are subject to their own specific duties in regulations under section 153 of the Equality Act, but the Equality and Human Rights Commission works across England, Scotland and Wales.

[Seema Malhotra]

Can the Minister clarify one point? This may be in the details we have been given, but will companies be required to report on the gender pay gap in their annual reports?

[Caroline Dinenage]

I am not entirely sure whether they will be required to do that, but they will be required to publish the information on a website that is readily accessible. It cannot be hidden away in a tiny little corner of their online presence that nobody can find. We will then republish that information on the Government website, so it will be easily accessible.

We know that transparency may not be a silver bullet, but it will incentivise employers to analyse the drivers behind their gender pay gap and explore the extent to which their own policies and practices might be contributing to it. I am really pleased that the regulations are broadly supported by the House, and that we agree on the underlying policy intent. I understand that we might have slightly different motivations about how we want to support businesses—whether we want to cripple them with massive amounts of bureaucracy or support them to create the jobs that the country needs—but I truly believe that this reporting marks a significant step forward in making that policy intent a reality, and I commend the regulations to the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the Committee has considered the draft Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017.

School Funding

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

I hope that the hon. Members I mentioned will make contributions today, because the motion before the House makes it clear that our schools are facing a cocktail of cuts that will see 98% of schools lose out in the funding formula. I hope that the Government think again about their proposals.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech. In my constituency we are looking at cuts of £437 per pupil between 2015 and 2019. With the Government saying that they believe in and want to support social mobility, and with a third of our children across the country not achieving even five good GCSEs, does she agree that this is absolutely the wrong time to be cutting school funding for the pupils who most need it and that it is an own goal when it comes to thinking about our future shared prosperity?

[Angela Rayner]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend, and I would go so far as to say that the meritocracy that the Prime Minister talks about is already in tatters.

The National Audit Office has said that the Secretary of State expects schools to make £1.7 billion of savings by “using staff more efficiently.” Can she guarantee today that those so-called efficiencies do not mean fewer staff? A £1.7 billion cut could mean up to 10,000 redundancies for teaching staff in our schools. She has resolutely failed to give us figures on the impact of the planned cut, but her own analysis of the research conducted by the education unions shows that, for example, the cuts in my region—the north-west—would amount to well over £400 million, requiring the loss of more than 2,000 teachers. Given that the Government have failed to meet their own teacher recruitment targets for the past five years in a row, I urge her to think again before she tries to solve school budget crises on the back of hard-working staff.

Make no mistake, this is a crisis. Indeed, schools are already resorting to staff cuts in order to cope. A Unison staff survey conducted last year showed that, even then, more than one in 10 respondents were reporting redundancies in the past year and in the coming year. More than one in five said that their school had left vacant posts unfilled over the past year or had cut maintenance. Nearly a quarter had seen increased class sizes, and over a quarter had experienced cuts to budgets for books and resources over the past year.

Education and Social Mobility

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

The right hon. Gentleman knows that this is a completely different issue. I say to him, as I say to all hon. Members from across the House, “Follow the evidence.”

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Talking of excellence in sport, does my hon. Friend agree that we should celebrate the fact that Mo Farah, who grew up and went to a state school in my constituency, has succeeded on the world stage? The school that he attended is now suffering from cuts, which mean that it is referring more than 40% of its pupils for mental health support services.

[Mr Speaker]

He is also a staunch Arsenal fan, which makes him an even greater man.

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[Justine Greening]

I certainly do not think so in relation to the outcomes achieved for young people who left the education system having all too often taken exams that suffered from grade inflation and—critically, as we see from the report by Alison Wolf—having taken qualifications that employers simply did not value, but that those people had often been told to do because that was an easier route for the institution that they were in. There is lots to learn from that Labour Government, but clearly it is what not to do, rather than what to do.

[Seema Malhotra]

rose—

[Justine Greening]

I will try to make some progress and finally conclude.

Opportunity areas are not simply about addressing the need for more good school places in all parts of the country. We want them to be in the vanguard of helping us to ensure that we learn how best to drive social mobility in very different places, to spread what works throughout England. Under this Government, further and higher education, schools and apprenticeships have been put back into one Department—the Department for Education. That means that we have never had a better chance to make sure that education, and opportunity as a whole, work to drive social mobility throughout our country.

Improving social mobility is our country’s greatest generational challenge. Its complexity means that change will not happen overnight—as I have said, no country has cracked how to drive great social mobility—but making the best possible success of Brexit, as this Government and this party are committed to doing, is why social mobility matters, and why education is at the heart of that agenda. In the end, it will be people who lift this great country of ours, which is why we have to make ours a country that works for everyone. The Prime Minister set out her intention and the intention of the Government. Now it is time for the House to do the same so that we can get on with ensuring that the education system becomes the driver of social mobility that it really can be. Young people get only one shot at their education, so we urgently need to get this right. That requires all of us to be prepared to work together so that, if at all possible, we can build a cross-party consensus on how we get it right.

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[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to speak in this vital debate, which goes to the heart of how we grow prosperity and share it for all.

We live in a divided nation, and the divisions are becoming deeper and more entrenched. Children in this country should feel that they have a society and a Government who are on their side, but poverty is on the increase and social mobility has stalled. I want to share a few perspectives from my constituency—to give a dose of reality about what life is like on the ground—and call on the Government to reverse their cuts to school budgets.

The lives of thousands of young people are being blighted by family poverty, and low educational attainment often flows from that family stress. Schools that can and should be engines of opportunity and mobility are themselves struggling, and now find themselves filling the welfare gap. I pay tribute to a number of schools in my constituency that have helped to research how we can come together as a local community much more so that we support them as they struggle, particularly Cranford Community College, Springwest Academy and Reach Academy.

The Social Mobility Commission’s report last week was a grim read, stating that

“Britain has a deep social mobility problem which is getting worse for an entire generation of young people”.

According to the commission, those born in the 1980s are the first generation since the second world war not to start their careers with higher incomes than their parents and immediate predecessors. We also know that more than a third of our young people nationally—it is the same in Hounslow in my constituency—are leaving school without the equivalent of five good GCSEs. That is a matter of shame for us all. It is the case for 900 young people in Hounslow alone per year.

My recent conversations with headteachers about the impact of benefits changes and rising family poverty are revealing consistent themes. A picture emerges of families struggling to make ends meet and not always being able to afford food, of children arriving at school hungry, of housing stress, of overcrowding in damp conditions that hampers children’s ability to study and parents’ ability to work, and of rising family debt whereby parents have to borrow money for school uniforms and shoes. Schools try to help. One teacher has told me that they hand out money for shoes two or three times a day.

There is no getting away from the fact that Government cuts are making life harder for families and schools. The choices made by this Government and by the previous Chancellor show that there can be no greater false economy than underfunding our schools. It is time that the Government did more than give us the rhetoric—time that they understood that the reality of the choices they make are having an impact on the lives and prospects of children across this country.

School Funding

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Thursday 21st July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I can indeed; we are going to get on with this funding formula. To tie my hon. Friend’s point together with that of the hon. Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas), we now have a school funding system and a funding formula, but we also introduced the pupil premium, so we have additional mechanisms to ensure that the funding follows disadvantaged pupils with additional needs. We are now trying to get a system in place that is sensible about the core funding that schools receive and not based on frankly very old data. At the same time, the system should take account of the fact that we are able to top up through the pupil premium and other funding mechanisms when we particularly want to tackle disadvantage.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the Secretary of State confirm that, behind the warm words of fairer funding, school funding is still set to be cut by some 8% by 2020, as confirmed by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, and that is coming at the same time as we see the threat of falling teacher numbers? Over a third of the children in this country currently leave school without five good GCSEs. Will she also confirm whether my local authority in Hounslow will see a funding cut? When will it know?

Equal Pay and the Gender Pay Gap

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill) and my hon. Friend the Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Neil Coyle) on two outstanding maiden speeches. I believe they will do a tremendous job in this Parliament in standing up for their constituents.

I welcome the debate and the opportunity to speak, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero) on calling it. It is an incredibly important issue. As we have heard from many hon. Members, it is an issue for men as much as women. It is an issue for our nation as much as it is for our economic benefit and local communities. As well as being an end in itself, the debate is important in sending a message that women’s labour is equal to men’s.

I was pleased to hear the Minister’s commitment and her words about the importance of transparency. However, it is a shame that it has taken the Government so long to recognise that transparency is a key step on the pathway to action. As has been mentioned, the previous Labour Government introduced rules on pay transparency in section 78 of the Equality Act 2010. It was only earlier this year, when Labour tabled an amendment to the Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Act 2015, that the Government gave in, having voted down a proposal as recently as December 2014. That happened even after we had launched a campaign to implement pay transparency that was supported by Grazia. I was incredibly proud to be part of that.

I welcome the Government consultation that will be conducted over the summer. I will certainly contribute my thoughts to it.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is only under Labour Governments that the equal pay issue has been pushed forward, and not under Conservative Governments?

[Seema Malhotra]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point. Labour’s commitment to pay transparency and equality, and to gender equality, has been second to none in the history of Parliament.

It is 45 years since we passed the Equal Pay Act 1970, but in my constituency there is still a 13.3% pay gap. Women earn 87p for every pound that a man earns. That will continue to come as a shock to the men and women in my constituency—the engineers, the shop workers, the public sector workers, the small business employees and carers—who are earning a wage. They will consider themselves to be treated equally until they realise that there is actually pay inequality.

A number of incredibly important issues have been raised in this debate, particularly on the perception of the causes of pay inequality, whether relating to careers advice, role models, social attitudes or care responsibilities that can impact on women’s ability to hold down a full-time job. My hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) raised important points about the impact that violence against women and girls can have on employment and on self-esteem. The ability to hold down a stable life has an impact on their experience in the workplace. I recognise and celebrate the work of the Women’s Business Council, which does a lot to tackle inequality in business.

I want to raise one issue in particular that I believe contributes to pay inequality: the perception of jobs in gender stereotypes. I want to ask where the agency of change is, because I do not want the debate to turn into a discussion about what women need to do differently. The debate needs to be about what business and society does and thinks, and how they need to change. Too often, pay has been set based on perceptions of whether something is a “woman’s job”. In a “man’s job” the perception will be that a woman might do it less well. In this Parliament, we have to break such perceptions. We need to say that there should be no glass ceilings and no no-go areas for women in any sector of employment.

[Dawn Butler]

My hon. Friend is making a compelling case for why Members on all sides of the House should support the motion. The Secretary of State said that she supports the motion in principle. Should we just urge Government Members to support us?

[Seema Malhotra]

I continue to urge the Government to follow our lead. They have a few hours in which to do that, and I am sure all Opposition Members would welcome it.

I want to share a couple of cases of stereotype-busting by women who have entered different professions or jobs, starting with my sister. I do not have daughters, so I may just talk about sisters. I have three sisters—perhaps that can be a new dimension of the competition today. My sister is an engineer. She works with racing cars in America and is often the only woman involved in any particular race. She started out life, as I did, at the Green School in Hounslow. Being a racing car engineer was not part of the careers advice. Being a politician was not part of my careers advice either. I remember asking whether we might invite a politician to speak at the school and was told that we did not really want to be political.

I want to share the story of someone I met yesterday, a young woman called Caitlin, who is on an apprenticeship. She is a fork-lift truck driver, among other things. When I was shown how to operate an electric forklift truck by her in Feltham, I can honestly say that she was an inspiration to me, as someone who is busting a stereotype in the work she is doing. She is setting a true example, leading and encouraging others to take the pathway to a career in logistics.

I welcome the Government’s consultation, and I look forward to continuing debate and dialogue on this issue. I also want to support today’s call from Opposition parties for an annual gender pay check for this simple reason: there is no point in having a target, as aspiration or a process without a method of delivery being put in place behind it. I believe that this is a proportionate measure—one that would fit in well with the work of the Equality and Human Rights Commission and one that would make a useful contribution to ensuring the achievement and the outcome of gender pay equality that we all wish to see.

Education and Adoption Bill

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Monday 22nd June 2015 Commons Chamber

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

I congratulate the hon. Member for Thornbury and Yate (Luke Hall) on sharing his experiences with us. I am sure he will bring real value to the House. I also thank the other four new Members who have given their maiden speeches today.

I have to say that I am intrigued. This is the Second Reading debate on the Government’s one piece of legislation addressing standards in education. We are left with a draft Bill that looks at a very narrow definition of something called “coasting” and proposes yet another top-down reorganisation in education, rather than looking at the causes of the unbelievable pressures on our schools at this time and at what would really make a difference to children’s education. Those pressures include the cuts to support services provided by our local authorities, the recruitment and retention crisis in our schools, the incredible pressures under which teachers are being put, and the funding crisis that many of our schools are experiencing. It is the causes that we should be debating today and what will really turn around the lives of our nation’s children and improve schools. Instead, we have to debate something called “coasting”. Even at this moment, we are denied the opportunity to have a clear definition of what that actually means.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising other issues and the causes of the difficulties, including recruitment and retention. A number of head teachers in my constituency have highlighted the increasingly challenging times they are facing as they try to recruit teachers and get teachers who have not been trained. They are finding it difficult to fill vacancies and are having to pay expensive introduction fees to agencies. That is having an impact on morale and team spirit in schools.

[Rachael Maskell]

My hon. Friend raises so many of the issues that are impacting on school standards today and the vital profession of teaching. We really must take heed of what she has said.

My second bemusement is that the Government talk about the urgency of improving standards in education, yet they are legislating only for schools currently under local authority control. Why is it acceptable that there are 133 failing academies on this Secretary of State’s watch? That certainly raises the issue of why the standards in those academies are not being questioned in this Bill. It is important to improve the outcomes for all children through the Bill. Why are alternative providers—perhaps even local authorities—not insisted upon for those schools?

There is a lack of evidence behind the Bill. The Education Committee proved that there is absolutely no evidence of net improvements in standards in primary and secondary schools that have become academies. Ofsted determined that other initiatives such as the city challenge were far more effective at improving standards. One educationist said:

“schools fail for a number of reasons and simply changing their structure may not address the whole picture”.

Therefore, in view of the evidence, why has there been this ideological move to turn more schools into academies? Tragically, after listening to parents, governors and heads of schools in York, it seems that schools are now seeing this as an inevitable process and are therefore debating whether it is better to jump before they are pushed and to have some control of the process in the meantime—and that includes even our outstanding schools. They are concerned that they will lose more resources; schools in York are seriously underfunded as we fall below national funding levels. The plea I have heard from all heads in York who have raised the issue with me is that the Government should do everything they can to improve school funding as the priority for raising standards.

I could stray into talking about the funding issues in further education, which are also having an impact on our education system. It is pointless to mend one part of the education system without looking at the challenges that will come later. However, I will return to the mainstay of the debate: who is now in charge of our children’s education?

Parents spend most of their time with their children—school holidays, weekends, mornings and evenings—yet the draft legislation is trying to take them out of the education-making process and is instead inserting the very remote Secretary of State. If this Government are at all serious about devolution and parental engagement, they will give a real voice to parents in the future of their children’s education. No one can have the interest of their children’s success closer to mind. Every parent wants to do what is best for their children.

In York, as we have debated the academisation of Millthorpe school and Scarcroft and Knavesmire primary schools—outstanding schools, I might add—it is the parents who have wanted all the information to hand to understand the best path for their children. We are about to enter the same debate at Hempland primary. Why detach schools from parents? Surely we should be involving them more. Why, instead, place the powers in the hands of the Secretary of State, who may know about what happens in Loughborough but will not know about the issues faced in the corners of York Central?

We should strengthen the parents’ voice, empowering parents’ involvement in their children’s education, and listen carefully to the issues they raise. In York, parents have called for a ballot over the multi-academy trust conversion exercise—one that Labour would have granted, but now denied by the Tory-led coalition council. We have to give parents the information they need, trust their expertise and give them a voice and the respect they deserve. After all, localism must be about trust.

I want to mention teachers and support staff and to put on record my sincere thanks for their outstanding dedication to our children, as they work day and night, often under extreme pressure, in giving their all. Teachers and support staff—not just heads—must also have a say. They cannot be told how important their professionalism is in one breath and then not be trusted to make the best decisions for children in the next.

The whole Bill—whether the education or the adoption clauses—boils down to trust. Are we going to trust the true professionals and the parents to determine what is best for children, or place everything in the hands of the Secretary of State, who is, after all, not an educationist?

Skills and Growth

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Wednesday 17th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Tristram Hunt]

Adult skills budgets have faced a 24% cut under this Government, and that will not do anything to meet the productivity challenge in Enfield and right across the UK. I am wholly in agreement with my right hon. Friend on that.

We have the most unequal skills and education system in the developed world and it is our productivity performance that best provides the index for that continued structural failure. The purpose of the debate is to explore the role that education must play in tackling our poor productivity. That is not to deny that the purpose of education is far broader. What is more, the productivity challenge cannot be solved by higher skills alone. Arguably, Governments of all stripes have overly focused in the past on pushing the supply side of the equation, yet at a very basic level our education system must seek to equip all our young people with the skills they need to thrive in this most competitive of centuries.

More and more, our economic strength will come to be defined by the quality of our human capital. The Royal Academy of Engineering forecasts that the UK needs an extra 50,000 science, technology, engineering and maths technicians and 90,000 STEM professionals every year just to replace people retiring from the workforce.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

As usual, my hon. Friend is making a fantastic speech. He has raised the very important question of STEM. I started out as a computer programmer. Does he agree that we must take advantage of new technologies, have a much better national strategy for the next generation and reskill people for digital jobs, including in programming? As more than 90% of our programmers are men, there is also a gender dimension to the problem.

[Tristram Hunt]

My hon. Friend is totally right. One of the cross-party achievements of the previous six or seven years is the state of English education in computing science and the move away from the drawbacks of the information communications technology world and the qualifications surrounding it. We are world leading in some of the qualifications we are now developing in computing science.

International Women’s Day

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak in this important debate. I thank the right hon. Members for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) and for Meriden (Mrs Spelman) and the hon. Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee) for securing the debate, and I thank the Backbench Business Committee, too.

We have had an extremely wide-ranging debate and important issues have been raised on both sides of the House. Indeed, Parliament has an important tradition of marking international women’s day at a time when we must recognise the challenges we face in achieving gender equality in Britain and around the world, as well as celebrating the achievements of women. The right hon. Member for Basingstoke was right to focus on Formula 1 female driver Susie Wolff and on the first female bishop, as well as on important issues about equality in the workplace and in politics, and securing a commitment from the Speaker to put up a new set of women’s portraits based on the recommendations of Members.

My hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) made some very passionate remarks, not least on the need for men to do more housework, but also on the importance of equal pay and checking that our law is still fit for purpose.

The hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod) called for a new Select Committee, and I congratulate her on the important work she has done in the all-party group for women in Parliament. She also talked about women and entrepreneurship, and as a fellow Hounslow Member of Parliament I certainly recognise the importance of supporting women in business across our borough.

My hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) made a passionate speech and raised some sensitive and important issues about making sure that there is no cultural excuse for violence against women and girls. She also talked about the documentary “India’s Daughter”, which was shown on BBC 4 last night, and the issues it raised about cultural attitudes to gender and the place of women in society and the rights of women as equals not just in one nation but across the world. She also raised some important issues around older women and access to work and equal pay, and also women in prison and how their rehabilitation differs from that of men.

The right hon. Member for Meriden raised some important issues about the empowerment of women economically. The HeForShe campaign makes clear the important principle that gender equality is not just a matter for women; it is also a matter for men to engage with.

I also recognise the efforts of my right hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Ann Clwyd), who has done an incredible amount of work to move forward legislation around female genital mutilation, and who remains a passionate campaigner on that cause and on ending FGM within a generation.

The right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) talked about gender-based violence as well as child abuse and the protection of young girls at risk. She also referred to the importance of ensuring that the Beijing Platform for Action continues to be recognised and built on for future generations, until we realise its goals.

The hon. Member for Erewash talked of Girlguiding and its work, as well as the representation of women in business and science and representation more generally.

I would like to make a few general points recognising the importance of international women’s day across the nation. It will be marked by a range of events, not least in Hounslow on Saturday where up to 1,000 women from all faiths and communities are expected to come together, recognising the role women play in working together to build strong networks in society and sharing that common goal of tackling inequality.

The “women of the world” festival at the South Bank is also holding a range of events connecting politics and civic society, and this year’s global theme of “Make it happen” is incredibly important in continuing to inspire the work done by so many organisations. We have heard mention of Plan UK, Women for Women, Co-ordinated Action Against Domestic Abuse, and the violence against women and girls campaigners across the country, including on FGM, RISE UK, Women’s Aid, Refuge, the Hollie Gazzard Trust and the White Ribbon Campaign.

Two weeks ago I joined my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) and my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) and the tireless campaigner Lynne Franks for “one billion rising”, a campaign that recognises that over the course of their lifetime one in three women on the planet will be raped or beaten; staggeringly, that is 1 billion women. We also know that one in 20 children under 18 is sexually abused in the UK, 90% by people they know. We have also heard mention of the fact that two women are killed each week by their partner or their ex here in the UK, and that a staggering 1.2 million women reported incidents of domestic violence last year.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Some of us have been in Committee during this debate, but some of us have very powerful women in their family; I have three daughters and a wife, and also a lot of women constituents. Those of us who served on the anti-stalking campaign know that there are many challenges still to meet. Does my hon. Friend agree that, looking at the recent cases of abuse against young women and girls, we need to think seriously about changing the age of consent—moving it up a year, just as a signal—and doing something about the way the police take things for granted and become very casual about whether it is proper to prosecute for statutory rape after the age of 12?

[Seema Malhotra]

My hon. Friend makes some important points. I will be touching on a couple of issues around girls’ safety and recognising that we have a particular role in making sure that the world is safer for young women growing up today.

I have been undertaking a series of girls’ safety summits around the country, and what I have found staggering is the commonality of experience, whether among young girls in Rotherham, in Croydon or in Hounslow. They have a sense that society is not on their side as they go about their ordinary lives, even going to and from school. They do not always feel safe, and to some extent, adults have buried their heads in the sand when it comes to the reality of young people’s lives today.

I want to make a couple of points about equal pay. Women today still earn only about 80p for every male-earned pound, 45 years after Labour’s Barbara Castle passed the Equal Pay Act 1970. That is why I am proud that Labour has backed the ten-minute rule Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), which demands that large companies show their commitment to equal pay for men and women by publishing their gender pay gap. Parliament voted in favour of her Bill, but the Government have so far refused to implement it.

I am also proud of the role that successive Labour Governments have played in ensuring progress by breaking down barriers and enabling women to smash the glass ceiling. Labour introduced the Equal Pay Act 1970 and the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, as well as introducing the national minimum wage—which we are committed to raising to £8 an hour—which helps around 1 million people a year, the vast majority of whom are women. We extended maternity leave and doubled maternity pay. We also introduced paternity leave, which I believe has shifted our national culture and indeed the debate about the role of men in the home—the other side of the coin as we also debate the role and progress of women in the workplace.

I want to move on to political representation. I think there will be agreement on both sides of the House that it is a matter of shame for our nation that only 23% of Members of Parliament are women. Internationally, we rank either 57th or 74th—depending on the measure used—out of 190 countries for the number of women in Parliament. That is hardly a record of which we can be proud, given that we are referred to as the mother of Parliaments. Political representation matters, because it is through diversity in decision making that we get the best decisions. We bring the reality of women’s lives into our parliamentary debates. We have 650 MPs today, yet only 370 women have ever been elected to Parliament, in total. I am told that I was the 366th.

However, although the number of women MPs in Westminster has increased, representation at the most senior level has decreased. Five women currently hold Cabinet positions—around 14%—but what matters is not only representation but women’s access to positions of power. It is significant that around 45% of Labour’s shadow Cabinet are women. Should Labour win in May, we will form the most gender-balanced Government that Britain has ever seen.

Positive action has been taken in the Labour party to increase women’s representation in Parliament, but positive action is not enough on its own. We need to see more women from all backgrounds coming forward to stand for election—women of different ages, from different ethnic minorities and from different parts of the United Kingdom. I pay tribute to the groups that campaign for and encourage women to come forward in politics, including the 50:50 Parliament campaign, EMILY’s List, the Labour Women’s Network, the Fabian Women’s Network and the equivalent Conservative and Liberal Democrat groups. Women’s political rights can be meaningless unless they are matched by social and economic rights. A woman with the vote is not equal if she is subject to violence, poverty and exclusion from society. Politics has to be connected with our campaigns for social and economic progress, and the representation of women in Parliament is vital to achieving all those goals.

This has been an excellent debate. The gender agenda needs to stay on Parliament’s agenda. We should be confident and proud of our role in the world. We must ensure that we make progress on the rights of women and girls, progress on their need for education, safety and clean water, and progress in the workplace. These arguments must be heard at every level of Government and of the international political decision making bodies. We must do our job of keeping the law up to date in support of equal rights, and this place needs to lead the fight to empower, encourage and inspire girls and women in Britain and across the world to achieve their dreams. In doing that, we will make progress for future generations.

Oral Answers to Questions

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Monday 1st December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

I agree with my hon. Friend and welcome Fiona Kendrick’s comments on the need to bridge the gap between education and employment and the need for industry to play its part. I think I was with my hon. Friend when I visited Bombardier, which is also in her constituency, and met the fabulous Kirsten, who is doing incredibly well as an apprentice welder.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

It may be a “Blue Peter” link to say that I was at primary school in Heston with Zoë Ball. Very recently, I was talking to Heston residents about the opportunities for young people in the local economy, which is full of light industry. Exposure to the world of work at a young age makes a huge difference to confidence. What is the Secretary of State doing to improve work experience opportunities for under-16s in science, technology and maths subjects?

[Nicky Morgan]

I agree that work experience is extremely important, and I should like it applied to pupils as young as possible. As a first step, I would like young people to get advice about the jobs that are out there—I am talking about labour market information. But if the hon. Lady’s Government had not introduced so much red tape and so many health and safety regulations, employers might not be so put off taking on people for work experience.

Oral Answers to Questions

Seema Malhotra Excerpts

Thursday 10th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Fallon]

I congratulate Waste Spectrum and the Worcester ambassadors, and I thank my hon. Friend for his work to promote trade with China. I know he visited China with the trade mission and was involved with an inward delegation from China, and understand that he is planning to visit China again. We need to thank him for his work in promoting links with that particular country.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Yesterday I held a meeting with a range of British businesses on their experience of support for trade in India. They did not have a good story to tell about the signposting and advice of UK Trade & Investment and other agencies. Is the Minister concerned about UKTI’s budget plans and the support that it provides if the experience of British businesses is not positive?

[Michael Fallon]

I am sorry to hear that. If the hon. Lady lets me have the details, I will certainly ensure that that is followed up with UKTI. We have allocated a bigger budget to UKTI and it has sharpened its focus. If there are improvements that we can make to the service that UKTI offers, I would be happy to consider them.