Planning, the Green Belt and Rural Affairs

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Christopher Chope

Friday 19th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Gateshead South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Gordon and Buchan (Harriet Cross), who made an excellent maiden speech, which I enjoyed. I also have to mention the excellent maiden speeches from my north-east colleagues, my hon. Friend the Member for Cramlington and Killingworth (Emma Foody)—she represents a new constituency—and my hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Sam Rushworth). I look forward to hearing more from them in the weeks, months and years to come.

Having entered the House 19 years ago, I am honoured to have once again been elected to serve my constituents in Washington and Gateshead South—another new constituency name. It is fantastic to see so many new faces around the estate, and my door is always open if new Members, or indeed old ones, want to pop in for a bit of advice, a cup of tea, or just to see a friendly face.

This King’s Speech ushers in a new era of government—one based on service of the people, and focused on building back trust in politics, which is greatly needed, by, as stated in the King's Speech, adhering to

“the principles of security, fairness and opportunity for all.”

We will start that process by bringing in legislation to transform the rights of every worker in this country. As a trade unionist, I believe that workers must have the right to access trade union representation, as well as the repeal of the disastrous minimum service levels legislation, which failed to protect public service users and workers alike.

We will ban all exploitative zero-hours contracts that leave people in uncertain and unstable employment. We will definitively ban fire and rehire practices, which my hon. Friend the Member for Brent West (Barry Gardiner) led the way on tackling with his excellent private Member’s Bill, which sadly did not make it. We will protect workers’ wellbeing by ending short-notice shift cancellations, and we will introduce the right to switch off, so that workers can enjoy a healthier, structured work-life balance—I think we could do with a bit of that sometimes as well. Finally, we will establish rights such as paternity pay and the right to challenge unfair dismissal as rights from day one. The basic rights of a worker are not a reward earned after years of service; they are rights from day one.

The Government have already got the ball rolling, building on the excellent work of former Labour Governments to truly deliver devolved power. It was excellent to see that, just days after moving in, the Prime Minister welcomed all Labour and Conservative metro mayors—thankfully, they were mostly Labour—to Downing Street to discuss how to kick-start growth in all parts of the country. Nine times out of 10, local knowledge is superior to departmental control, so it is only right that we bring power back to communities.

Among the mayors invited to meet the Prime Minister was our excellent new Mayor of the North East, Kim McGuinness, who I have worked with in my long-running campaign to reopen the Leamside line and extend the metro to Washington. I am sure that Members have all heard me say this, but Washington is one of the largest towns in the UK without a direct rail link. [Interruption.] It is. We see wasted opportunities, with people unable to travel easily for work, school or university or even to see loved ones. To quote the former Conservative Member for Sedgefield, with whom I co-chaired the Leamside line all-party parliamentary group, “Without physical mobility, there can be no social mobility”—now that he is not here, I am going to nick that line. I am pleased that, with a Labour Government and a Labour mayor, that project will at long last become a reality.

I grew up in a council house, and my family was totally reliant on social security. Free school meals were a lifeline for us, but I know that, in many ways, it is more important to have a warm, safe and secure house; that is what saved my family more than anything else. That is why, throughout this general election campaign and when I was listening to the King’s Speech, I was so pleased to see Labour’s commitment to building 1.5 million new homes—not just houses, but social and affordable housing—based on five key principles that will enable those houses to turn into secure homes, and those homes to turn into stable and thriving communities.

We will also deliver for our children, with policies intended to tackle childhood health and obesity head-on. Our plans to deliver free breakfast clubs in every primary school in England will ensure that kids can start school with a meal in their bellies, ready to learn. But we know that child feeding does not start and end with the school day, so we will also tackle the crisis of youth nutrition outside school by restricting the advertisement of junk food and the sale of high-caffeine energy drinks to children—both things I long called for when I was shadow Minister for public health for four years, and shadow Minister for children and families for four years, and as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on school food from 2010. I could not welcome these developments more fervently. We cannot shy away from protecting our children’s health, which is why I also welcome our tobacco and vapes Bill—carrying on the work of the former Government, I have to say—to phase out smoking. That will ensure that our children live a healthier future.

As we look to the coming years of our Government, I am excited not only to see these policies, and more, come to fruition and deliver the change that this Government were elected to bring, but to work with Members across the House to deliver these things together, because we need them for the benefit of all our constituents.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Christopher Chope)]

Unfortunately, because of the pressure on time, we have to reduce the maximum time for speeches to five minutes, but that does not apply to those making their maiden speeches.

EBacc: Expressive Arts Subjects

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Christopher Chope

Monday 4th July 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Hodgson]

What about major industry and the arts?

[Mr Christopher Chope (in the Chair)]

Order.

Teenage Pregnancy: Regional Variations

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Christopher Chope

Tuesday 19th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Hodgson]

That is a very good point, because where sex and relationship education is compulsory in maintained schools, unlike in academies and free schools, there tend to be two elements: the biology and HIV/AIDS awareness, and then the relationship side. That is exactly the hon. Gentleman’s point. It has to be good-quality sex and relationship education, rather than just ticking some boxes.

The ticking time bomb is paired with the increasing sexualisation of young people, with recent freedom of information requests to local police forces showing that reported incidents of children sexting has skyrocketed by more than 1,200% in the past two years due to increased access to social media such as Twitter and Facebook, and even to dating apps such as Tinder, which is why it is welcome that the Women and Equalities Committee has announced today an investigation into sexting as part of its inquiry on sexual harassment among pupils in schools. I look forward to seeing what comes out of that inquiry.

It is high time that the Government took action and issued an update of the sex and relationship education guidance, which was published before the smartphone generation was even born. I hope the Minister can update Members on the DFE’s plans. I will not hold my breath, however, as when the opportunity came for the Government to take bold steps in introducing statutory PSHE and age-appropriate SRE following the most recent report of the Select Committee on Education on this area, it was blocked by no less than the Prime Minister. That was despite it being reported that many women Cabinet Ministers, including the Education Secretary herself, were strongly in favour of introducing this measure and were dismayed at the Prime Minister’s inaction.

Not only disgruntled Cabinet Ministers but the Children’s Commissioner, the Chief Medical Officer, the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, 88% of teachers, 90% of parents and 92% of young people themselves are in favour of introducing both subjects to the curriculum as statutory subjects. Yet again, the Prime Minister is putting himself on the wrong side of the issue when it comes to teaching our young people about life and the resilience to deal with what is thrown at them.

In conclusion, it is undeniable that we have made great strides forward on teenage pregnancy and those achievements must be celebrated, but there is still a long way to go. The Government must make clear their vision about how they will build on the important multi-agency, co-operative intervention work of the last Labour Government, and about how they will finally bring forward plans for PSHE and SRE that will make them effective tools in the young person’s arsenal and enable them to make informed choices in their lives.

[Mr Christopher Chope (in the Chair)]

Before I call the Minister, I should point out that this debate has to finish at 5.52 pm.

Ticket Abuse

Debate between Sharon Hodgson and Christopher Chope

Tuesday 21st January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Crausby. I am grateful to Mr Speaker for granting this timely debate.

The all-party group on ticket abuse, which I am pleased to chair with my friend, the hon. Member for Hove (Mike Weatherley), ably assisted by the hon. Members for High Peak (Andrew Bingham) and for Selby and Ainsty (Nigel Adams) and my hon. Friends the Members for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy) and for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram), who are vice-chairs, was set up shortly before the Christmas recess. Our short inquiry into the state of the secondary ticketing market was due to start next week, so this debate is very much intended as being, I hope, the first of many in Parliament over the coming months.

Our inquiry had been due to start next week, but unfortunately we have had to cancel our first sitting, in which we were to hear evidence from the major players in the secondary ticketing industry. It was a shame that none was able to attend, however, including the boss of Seatwave, who sits on the Minister’s departmental board. None the less, the inquiry will go on, and over the coming months we will hear from the live events industry and consumers, as well as those who do whatever they can to design out, or otherwise prevent, the exploitation of events by resellers.

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

The hon. Lady says that her all-party group—an organisation that has already made up its mind that something is wrong—will be carrying out a non-independent inquiry that will be addressed by a select group of people. How will it ever be able to produce an objective response?

[Mrs Hodgson]

We have not already made up our mind—obviously that is the purpose of the inquiry—but we have already received evidence from the Metropolitan police that has proved that abuses are taking place. We are looking for solutions, as Ministers asked us to do when we met them. I hope that the inquiry will uncover solutions to some problems that have already been identified. We are not self-selecting, and if the hon. Gentleman wants to come to give evidence, we will be happy to hear from him.

The Minister and hon. Members are no doubt aware of where I come from on this issue. In 2010, I promoted a private Member’s Bill, the Sale of Tickets (Sporting and Cultural Events) Bill, which was debated on Second Reading on 21 January 2011. I will try not to repeat the speech I made that day, because it was around an hour in length, but many of the points I raised then are as true and as worthy of being made today. Other hon. Members who attended that debate are present today, and I hope that they do not use the same arguments—they might have come up with some new ones. Perhaps this debate will convince them to change their minds.

I am going to go through what has happened since that debate and what should happen in the future. It is worth restating first, however, why I embarked on this campaign all those years ago and what has sustained me, despite the continued stonewalling of the current Minister’s predecessors. My daughter is a second-generation Take That fan—I being the first generation—and I was alerted to this scandalous practice by her sense of great unfairness that she had not been able to acquire Take That tickets for us, despite being ready to buy them online the minute the tickets went on sale, only to see them moments later on other websites for many times the original price.

I looked into the practice further and found that neither my daughter nor Take That were alone. In fact, that day I found just the tip of the iceberg, because this happens week in, week out with music, comedy, sport and theatrical events up and down the country. The same situation affects not only Wembley arena gigs and international matches, but small and medium-capacity concerts in provincial towns and cities throughout the country. It even affects art exhibitions; someone would have been very lucky to pay face value to see the recent David Bowie exhibition at the Victoria and Albert museum at a convenient time or, similarly, the da Vinci exhibition at the National Gallery last year. The Chelsea flower show regularly makes the news when its tickets hit many times face value on secondary sites. The most recent example to hit the headlines and inspire columns and features about the secondary market was the Monty Python reunion, probably because lots of journalists and editors wanted to go themselves.

My daughter’s experience started me on this crusade, but I have kept fighting in the light of the experiences of countless other fans of all kinds of events who are disgusted by this practice. I thank all those people who have e-mailed and tweeted me over the past few years for their support.

This is not just an emotive issue, however, although that is often the case—bear in mind that famous line about football being not a matter of life and death, but more important than that. As I did my research and more people supported my campaign, I met more stakeholders in the live events industry and became increasingly aware of the real concern that this kind of parasitical practice is detrimental to our creative industries. It stands to reason that if someone is creaming off money from the sector without putting anything in, the industry will suffer. In the case of the creative and live events sector, it would make sense for the Government to do everything possible to protect and support it, given that it sustains more than 1 million jobs and accounts for a significant proportion of our exports to the rest of the world, especially with regard to music.

Tourism is important to the UK economy as well, and our creative industries are particularly important to tourism. How many tourists come to the UK to see a show in the west end, to attend one of our many excellent festivals or to see a gig at one of our growing network of regional stadiums, such as the Stadium of Light in Sunderland? According to a UK Music’s recent report “Music Tourism: Wish You Were Here”, music tourism is worth £2.2 billion to the economy, with each overseas tourist spending on average more than £650. Those tourists will not come over here to spend all that money in our service and retail sectors if they cannot get a ticket for a fair price.

In the same vein, domestic event goers with limited funds are not likely to go to other events, or to spend a great deal at or around an event for which they do have a ticket, if their ticket has cost them many times what it should have. Even worse, if people are priced out of going to a gig, game or comedy show, that could be the end of their relationship with the band, sport or comedian that they were planning to go and see, thus harming long-term sustainability. Ticket touting is bad for not only fans, but the live events business, which was why the fifth recommendation in the UK Music report was that the Government address the issue, including through legislation if necessary, to ensure that the sector keeps going from strength to strength.

Many within the industry have had to adapt their business models to fit the market following what I would call the green light that the secondary market got from the previous Government—I am sorry to say—and the Culture, Media and Sport Committee back in 2008. Both said that the secondary market served a purpose for fans and that it could regulate itself.